Now that “How I Met Your Father” has returned for season two, our curiosity about who the titular father is is higher than ever! The Hilary Duff-led Hulu reboot of the CBS fan-favorite sitcom “How I Met Your Mother” has drawn more than its fair share of comparisons to the original, and while we had to wait for nine long years to find out who Ted (Josh Radnor) eventually married and had children with, it seems that the identity of Sophie’s (Duff) son’s father might be revealed sooner rather than later.
The writers for “How I Met Your Father” have decided to keep the physical appearance of Sophie’s son under wraps, as to avoid giving anything away about the identity of the father among its diverse cast. So fans truly have nothing to go on but the story as it unfolds. Thus, we put on our sleuthing hats and uncovered several strong candidates that could fill these formidable shoes.
Perhaps the biggest clue so far has come in the seventh episode of season two, the Valentine’s Day episode, which premiered March 7. Older Sophie (Kim Cattrall) leads into the story for the episode by saying her son’s dad loves Valentine’s Day. And the episode ends with a short montage of every father candidate saying that they like the holiday – even curmudgeonly Jesse (Chris Lowell). But then, Sophie’s son says, “He wasn’t even in this story.” That seems to completely eliminate Jesse, Charlie (Tom Ainsley), and Sid (Suraj Sharma) as candidates. Sophie adds that the Valentine’s Day she spent with his dad was a “different Valentine’s Day.”
We’ve rounded up every promising theory about who the potential father might be and ranked them from most to least likely. While Sophie tells her son that she met his father on the night of the premiere episode, they can introduce characters Sophie met that night at the engagement party in later episodes, like they did with Drew (Josh Peck) later in season one. In other words, the possibilities are kind of endless! Assuming the father has been introduced in the show already, these are our top theories.
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Is Drew the Father on "How I Met Your Father"?
Drew was Sophie’s main love interest in season one. He seems to be everything Sophie is looking for in a partner, and he was in attendance at the engagement party in episode one, making him a prime candidate. But Sophie learned that Drew didn’t respect her for having a “real” job, and their relationship ended. If this school principal can get over his uptightness and appreciate Sophie’s art, then maybe they can make it work. Plus, in the Valentine’s Day episode, we see Drew in the flashback saying he loves the holiday, and he’s not involved in the episode, making it 100 percent true that he wasn’t in that story.
Drew was a fan favorite in season one, but that may have more to do with nostalgia than anything else. Peck starred in Nickelodeon’s hit show “Drake & Josh” around the same time Duff was starring in “Lizzie McGuire” on Disney Channel, making this pairing a 2000s kid’s dream.
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Is Ian the Father on "How I Met Your Father"?
Ian (Daniel Augustin) seems to represent what Ted had with his ex Victoria. Even though they came so close to being together a couple of times, they just weren’t each other’s lebenslangerschicksalsschatz (a German phrase that means “lifelong treasure of destiny”).
Similarly, Sophie and Ian seem like endgame in a lot of ways, but something always gets in the way. Ian spent most of season one on the other side of the world, only to return in the finale. But in the first episode of season two, things don’t work out with him again as Sophie tries to make sense of the romantic minefield she’s found herself in. But, since Ian likes Valentine’s Day and doesn’t appear in that episode, his place on this list just rose.
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Is Jesse the Father on "How I Met Your Father"?
Ah, the Robin equivalent of our spinoff! Everything in the reboot tells us that Sophie and Jesse will fall in love. In season one, they gave a romantic relationship a go, but it ground to a halt when Jesse’s ex Meredith (Leighton Meester) came back into the picture. Though they’re currently just friends, it seems their story isn’t over yet. Based on the new episode, it seems Jesse isn’t the father, but that could just be a misdirect. Or, the two could end up together long-term after Sophie has her son.
As Robin once said in “HIMYM,” “If you have chemistry, you only need one other thing: timing. But timing’s a b*tch.” Could that be the case with our lovelorn Jesse here? He’s a strong frontrunner, unless “How I Met Your Father” takes a page from the original series’s playbook and turns him into a good ol’ red herring, of course.
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Is Sid the Father on "How I Met Your Father"?
Sid ranks pretty low on the list of possible fathers, but only because he’s married to Hannah. They’re currently in a long-distance relationship.
Still, Hannah seems to be spread pretty thin with work. Who can forget when she had to cut her own engagement party short in the pilot episode to fly back to Los Angeles to perform a transplant surgery? She and Sid also got into a major fight about how he bought his bar without telling her, and those issues could continue to bubble up. While Sid and Hannah are happy now, the whole long-distance thing could throw a wrench in their romance down the line.
Sid and Sophie probably interact the least out of the main cast, but some fans are convinced that’s just to keep them off the scent. But his presence in the Valentine’s Day episode also seems to indicate it’s not him.
Yet, he’s certainly not the least probable.
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Is Charlie the Father on "How I Met Your Father"?
Since the older Sophie (Kim Cattrall) said she met her son’s father on the night of the premiere episode, we can’t rule out Charlie (Tom Ainsley) as a contender. Still, among Sophie’s crew of friends, Charlie is the least likely to be the father.
Charlie spent season one dating Sophie’s best friend, Valentina (Francia Raisa), and even though they broke up, dating her friend’s ex would be a pretty low blow for Sophie. Charlie and Valentina explicitly split because he doesn’t want kids, and she does, so this turn of events would be majorly devastating for all involved. Plus, he’s also in the Valentine’s Day episode.
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Will the Father Even Be Sophie's Partner on "How I Met Your Father"?
Every other guess on this list supposes that Sophie’s son’s father is someone she’s romantically involved with, but some fans think that’s a false clue. The father could be a sperm donor. Sophie could decide to have a child on her own after not finding love, or she could end up with a partner who can’t be a biological father and ask one of her friends to be a donor. Or, she could become pregnant with one of the candidates and just not end up with them long-term.
That really opens up the floor for who Sophie could end up with romantically. Some fans are rooting for Sophie to realize she’s not straight and end up with Ellen (Tien Tran) or Valentina, but the options are literally wide open in this case. It would be a little bit of a fake out, but with the right storylines it could really be fun to watch!
