How I Met Your Father season 2 premiere: Barney Stinson returns!
For starters, Neil Patrick Harris had expressed doubt in the past about whether or not his character could exist in a present-day society. Remember that he was a womanizer who did not always act in ways that anyone would approve of in 2023. There were certainly some softer edges, and we saw a lot of that in the time he had with Robin … but there are still a lot of layers here to sort out.
Within the world of How I Met Your Father, we see Barney in a flash-forward to where Sophie has a car accident. He’s still wearing his famous suit, so that part of his personality has not changed at all. So, have other parts of him?
Speaking in a new interview with TVLine, executive producer Elizabeth Berger noted that there were discussions between her and fellow EP Isaac Aptaker about bringing Harris back, and those included talking with him about the character’s evolution:
We wanted to bring him back, and we wanted him to be true to his character and to the fans that loved Barney so much. But we also wanted him to exist on our show, in our time, in a way that made sense, so all of [a Zoom with Harris] was spent talking about how we could blend all those things and service him and the show in the best way possible. We are very excited for people to see the way that turned out.
Ultimately, it’s pretty clear that we are going to see Barney again at some point, but it may be a little while before we actually get to that point in Sophie’s story. Remember that prior to the accident, she fears that she may be dating “her dad.” (Is this the character played by John Corbett?)
Related – Is there a connection to This Is Us on How I Met Your Father this season?
What did you think about Barney’s return during the How I Met Your Father season 2 premiere?
Let us know in the comments, and also come back now to get some additional updates down the road. (Photo: Hulu.)