‘How I Met Your Mother’ season 8 spoilers: The return of Patrice, Sandy Rivers

While Patrice was an important character before on “How I Met Your Mother” prior to this season (at least when it comes to giving Robin an archenemy at work), her character surged even more in importance courtesy of the story leading up to the big proposal. For at least a couple of episodes, Cobie Smulders’ character of Robin was absolutely convinced that Barney was dating her nemesis, and was even using a proposal as a way to make him feel even more horrible for him being shot down after the kiss.

Of course, this turned out to be a giant ruse, and Patrice was just part of an elaborate plan in order to make sure that Robin said “yes” to a marriage proposal. So what role does Patrice have now? We’re going to find out courtesy of the February 18 episode “The Ashtray,” which also features the return of Kyle MacLachlan as Zoey’s ex and Ted’s short-lived friend the Captain.  Here is the official synopsis for the half-hour (which sadly makes no direct mention of what Patrice will be up to):

“When Ted receives an unexpected call from The Captain, the gang reminisced about their last awkward encounter with him.”

In addition to Ellen D. Williams (who plays Patrice) being listed as a guest star in the press release, it also teases that we are going to see Alyson Hannigan’s real-life husband Alexis Denisof come on board once again as blithering newscaster Sandy Rivers. Considering that Denisof, Taran Killam, and David Burtka have all made guest appearances on the show already, this leaves Michelle Williams as the only significant other to a series regular on the show to not appear for a guest spot. (Josh Radnor split from his girlfriend Julia Jones earlier this month.)

What do you want to see Patrice, The Captain, and Sandy up to during this episode? If you want to watch a video preview for Monday night’s installment, you can do so over here.

Photo: CBS