20th Century Fox has said it remains hopeful that its hit sitcom How I Met Your Mother will eventually return.

Produced by Fox for US network CBS, How I Met Your Mother ran for nine seasons between 2005 and 2014. The show’s cast was led by Neil Patrick Harris, Jason Segel, Cobie Smulders, Josh Radnor and Alyson Hannigan.

“I hope we will have an opportunity to revisit these characters and tell these stories if (the creators and stars) have the desire to do it,” Fox’s TV chairman Dana Walden said yesterday (May 12), according to Deadline. “It’s a beloved show that still continues to be popular all over the world.”


In March, it was reported that a mooted How I Met Your Mother spin-off series had been delayed. The spin-off was being steered by Isaac Aptaker and Elizabeth Berger, who had also been serving as co-executive producers and writers on another hit US series, This Is Us.

However, Aptaker and Elizabeth Berger have since been promoted to showrunners on This Is Us, meaning the How I Met Your Mother spin-off has been placed “on the back burner”, according to reports.

Aptaker and Berger’s spin-off is the second attempt to continue the How I Met Your Mother franchise. In 2014, when the original show ended, a spin-off called How I Met Your Dad was immediately ordered by CBS. A pilot starring Greta Gerwig was filmed but never aired.