Hilary Duff Speaks Out on Surprising Cameo in How I Met Your Father Midseason Finale

Hulu just wrapped up the first half of the second season of their How I Met Your Mother spinoff, How I Met Your Father, and it gave us a major cameo from the original series. During the events of the two-part season finale, Sophie (Hilary Duff) begins dating an older man and comes across some evidence that he might actually be her biological father. Sophie runs out after discovering some evidence that the guy is her father and speeds away in her car, only to crash into the car of none other than Barney Stinson (Neil Patrick Harris). Harris' surprising cameo was teased during How I Met Your Father's Season 2 premiere, and now Duff is breaking her silence on working with the actor. In a new interview with TheWrap, Duff revealed that the cameo was "a big deal".

"Him coming on to the set was a such a big deal that they only handed out certain scripts with his scene in it, and the other ones [had] missing pages or just didn't make sense in the context of like, going from this to that," Duff revealed. "It was a big, big, big, big deal – and I felt very nervous and excited."

Have There Been Any Other How I Met Your Mother Cameos?

In the first episode of the series it's revealed that two of the main characters live inside of Marshall and Ted's old apartment and they seemingly hint that Marshall and Lilly are renting it out to them. But, some people have been wondering if Marshall or Ted will show up in the series and Josh Radnor who plays the latter recently revealed that if he's asked to reprise his role he'd be down to return.

"I had a really sweet email exchange with Duff," Radnor told Newsweek. "We kind of went back and forth about being the 'I' on How I Met Your…. She has said publicly [that] she would love to have me on, so I wouldn't turn down an invitation."

The apartment hasn't been the only crossover, even if a potential Ted reappearance does happen.

In a season one episode, Sophie found herself sitting at the bar by herself, and a stranger offered her some sage words of relationship advice. That stranger was actually Robin Scherbatsky (Cobie Smulders), who at this point in the timeline has already divorced Barney but has not yet settled down with Ted for their controversial happily ever after.

What is How I Met Your Father about?

Taking a similar approach to How I Met Your Mother, the Hulu series follows Sophie (Hilary Duff) as the older version of herself (Kim Cattrall) recounts to her son the expansive story of the events leading up to how she got together with his father. Set in New York City, the eccentric but lovable friend group works their way through adulthood the best they can, with many messy exploits along the way.

The series also stars Christopher Lowell, Francia Raisa, Suraj Sharma, Tom Ainsley, and Tien Tran.

"Kids, I'm going to tell you an incredible story: It's the story of how two writers got lucky enough to make their dream TV show for nine seasons and now get to pass the torch to an inspired new creative team with their own incredible story to tell, the story of How I Met Your Father," executive producers Carter Bays and Craig Thomas said in a statement when the series was first announced. "We are honored by their passion and vision, and look forward to helping them tell a legendary new story. (Thanks to all the HIMYM fans out there who waited for it.)"

How I Met Your Father Season 2 is now streaming on Hulu!

What did you think about the cameo? Have you been watching the sequel series?