Everyone who watched How I Met Your Mother will know what it feels to spend nine seasons building up to the introduction of a character only to kill her off unceremoniously. Why break up everyone’s favorite couple on the show just so insufferable Ted Mosby could shoot his shot decades later? The conclusion grabbed everything I enjoyed about the show and managed to blow it up in the last 10 minutes; still, the sitcom captured me with its tight-knit buddy group dynamic, full of inside jokes that the characters shared with the viewers. Hulu’s follow-up, How I Met Your Father, seeks to recapture some of that early zeal for 2022, which succeeds in specific ways. But it feels so far like a pale imitation in the ways that count most.
It’s a unique twist on the original, where we didn’t meet the Mother until the last episode of the last season. But much like how the original How I Met Your Mother was about the core friend group, How I Met Your Father feels like it was more intentional about friendship than about its romance. But unlike How I Met Your Mother, which invited the viewer into a mainly already established friend group, How I Met Your Father seems to be building it up with two separate friend groups coming together. It’s not the same instant chemistry as How I Met Your Mother. Still, the different dynamic makes the show particularly compelling — how does one make friends in their 20s in New York City without carrying them over from college.
The plot of How I Met Your Father is nearly identical to that of How I Met Your Mother. In the year 2050, Sophie, a middle-aged lady played by Kim Cattrall, contacts her son to tell him the tale of how she met his father. Flashback to 2022, where Hilary Duff plays her, and Sophie is about to go on the most critical Tinder date of her life, and the story begins from there. How I Met Your Father weaves together intertwined dating experiences that are supposed to be contemporary but add little to television’s persistent (and old-fashioned) fixation with what it means to be a single person swiping left and looking for love. It was also based on NYC living situation.
Hilary Duff plays Sophie, a photographer and hopeless romantic on the edge of 30, whose biggest dream is to find her “person.” Her roommate Val (Francia Raisa) is the show’s wild card. She introduces her rich British boyfriend Charlie (Tom Ainsley) to Sophie as their new roommate within minutes of the play introducing Val. Sid (Suraj Sharma), who spends the pilot organizing his surprise proposal to long-distance love Hannah (Ashley Reyes), and Jesse (Chris Lowell), the resident, round out the group cynic and most obvious counter for Sophie’s sunny optimism, and Jesse’s sister Ellen (Tien Tran), fresh off a painful divorce. Ellen is the closest the show comes to an interesting character, only barely. Even Lowell, who has been in series like GLOW and Enlisted, can’t save himself from the dreary description of “Uber driver dealing with the embarrassment of his botched proposal going viral”. Everything is going swimmingly between Sophie and Jesse until Jesse declares, “I love you,” causing Sophie to sabotage their relationship before it even begins unconsciously.
Sophie swings into the nearest pub below Jesse’s flat to cool off before her major gallery presentation. It’s MacLaren’s Pub, and sure, I sobbed at its sight.
Carl (Joe Nieves) is still behind the bar, and a familiar figure from HIMYM whom Sophie recalls from the news is sitting at a stool as if she’s never left.” My buddies and I used to squander years in this tavern gossiping about our stupid love lives. I STOP IN HERE whenever I’m in the area, ” she informs Sophie.
“So, tell me about your ridiculous love tale. Bring me back to my childhood.”
The two go to the famed HIMYM booth, where Sophie tells her about Jesse, and an older, wiser version of herself tells Sophie about this “genuine piece of work” guy she had dated. Sophie returns to Jesse’s apartment to apologize after hearing a HIMYM-quality promo speech, only to discover him kissing his ex, Meredith (Leighton Meester). Ugh! What the hell happened, man? She returns to our girl from HIMYM, who tells her, “If there’s one thing I’ve learned about love, it’s that timing is important. And timing isn’t always on your side.”
We return to The Captain and Becky before the episode concludes. She threatens to take away all of his prized possessions, but The Captain fights for the one in Australia. “What those marine biologists are doing is critical. They’re attempting to aid in the reproduction of coral reefs “He informs her. She accepts it anyhow. You weirdly have if you feel like you’ve heard the words “coral reef” and “procreate” on this show. Sophie’s perfect Tinder date from the pilot, marine biologist Ian, moved to Australia to work on that boat. But because Becky ended the research now he’s back in New York. More specifically, he’s standing right in front of Sophie at her exhibition, ending the episode. Whew.
How I Met Your Father goes out of its way to portray its characters using cellphones and ring lights, but it still feels stuck in the shadow of the original series’ mid-aughts setting.
It would have been more intriguing if it had just embraced the strange challenge of being a full-on aughts period piece. Not only would the show’s repeated winks to the fact that Duff (and subsequent guest star Josh Peck) was one of the era’s TV staples be more entertaining, but it would also distinguish itself apart from every other sitcom of the time. As it is, How I Met Your Father is a strange experiment in recycling nostalgia for current times without actually being modern.
