How I Met Your Father: Neil Patrick Harris explains why Barney Stinson won’t return for spin-off

Actor said that the character’s behaviour would ‘likely get everyone in trouble’

Neil Patrick Harris has dismissed any hope of him bringing his character Barney Stinson back for How I Met Your Father.

The actor played the womanising Barney in sitcom How I Met Your Mother, which aired from 2005 to 2014.

A spin-off series, titled How I Met Your Father, began in the US in January and centres on a woman (Hilary Duff), who is telling her son the story of her romance with his dad.

While both shows exist in the same universe – one of the characters in the new show lives in Ted, Marshall and Lily’s old flat from HIMYM – Harris has now said that he doesn’t feel like Barney’s return is “in anyone’s best interest”.

Interviewing Duff for his newsletter Wondercade, Harris said (via TVLine): “As for coming on your show (insert joke here), I worry.

“Barney’s antics, his overt delusions of grandeur, would likely get everyone in trouble. So, unless he’s changed his ways or joined a nunnery (insert an insert joke here), not sure if it’s in anyone’s best interest.”

Duff agreed, adding that Barney and his behaviour would likely not slide in the modern day.

“I’m not sure how you feel about this, but I’m pretty sure Barney would… be in jail in 2022,” she said.

While many fans of the original series have said that How I Met Your Father is “surprisingly good”, a lot of viewers have been put off by the show’s laugh track.

“Turned on How I Met Your Father and 30 seconds in the laugh track is already unbearable,” one fan commented.

How I Met Your Father comes to Disney Plus in the UK on Wednesday 9 March.