'How I Met Your Dad' Was Canceled — but There's Another Version Coming to Hulu

Not long after How I Met Your Mother came to an end, there were plans to create a spinoff called How I Met Your Dad, which would star Greta Gerwig and detail a similar story. Only this time, it would be a mother explaining to her kids how she'd met their dad years before and would, like its predecessor, introduce a cast of characters to viewers as the series went on.

However, somewhere along the way, the show was canceled. And now that Hulu is launching How I Met Your Father, a clear spinoff in the same vein, it has led many fans to wonder what happened with the original offshoot of the show. 

There weren't plans for How I Met Your Dad to include characters from the original CBS series, but it was the first spinoff. The fact that it didn't see the light of day didn't sit well with fans.

Not long after How I Met Your Mother ended after its massive nine-season run, the network announced plans to make another series, this time with a female at its center. Greta Gerwig was supposed to play Sally, a young woman looking for love after a failed marriage. She was set to be joined by her own group of friends in New York City, and Meg Ryan was going to be the voice-over version of future-Sally, telling her story to her kids, a la How I Met Your Mother's Bob Saget.

In 2014, former CBS chairwoman Nina Tessler told reporters that the network had canceled its plans for the roundabout spinoff.

"There were elements on the pilot that didn't work out," she said at the time. "We tried to work out about redoing the pilot. That's not happening right now. Sometimes you run into these kinds of issues and you hope they can resolve themselves in that time frame."

There was even a trailer for the show, but it never came to be.

Now, however, Hulu has picked up a How I Met Your Mother spinoff that will come to fruition. The title? How I Met Your Father, of course. And instead of Greta taking the reins as the female lead, the show has Hilary Duff playing Sophie, whose son hears the story throughout the series of how she met his dad.

Isaac Aptaker and Elizabeth Berger, who created How I Met Your Mother, had hoped to bring the spinoff to life a couple of years after How I Met Your Dad was scrapped at CBS, but then went on to become joint showrunners of This Is Us.

These days, they apparently have more time to devote to the spinoff and Hulu has brought them on as creators, writers, and executive producers.

Hilary will lead the case on How I Met Your Father, but so far, no other cast members have been announced. Hilary's character will have a group of 20-something friends, much like the cast of the original series, and together, they will navigate life and love while viewers speculate about who the dad is until the very end.