“How I Met Your Mother” delighted fans on broadcast television for years because of the chemistry between it’s cast that included Neil Patrick Harris, Cobie Smulders, Alyson Hannigan, and Jason Segel. It was successful plug and play comedy TV with a sweet story at its nucleus.

After watching the first two episodes of “How I Met Your Father” I can report that this show has none of those things at the moment.

As the title suggests, this is the other side of the story following Sophie played by Hillary Duff, as she navigates New York with her new group of friends. There are cut-aways and other attempt to capture the magic of the original, but none of it makes a difference because the show just isn’t funny.

The writing is bad. Duff has to tap into an almost Disney channel type of frantic energy to sell this stuff. And her supporting cast comes nowhere near the likeability of the original crew. In fact they come off quite unlikable. Besides Sophie, I could care less for any of them.

Listen, I can understand the reluctance of holding this new project up against the strength of it’s predecessor, but producers want our time. They can’t expect us to not draw comparisons. And if they’re afraid of comparisons, then they shouldn’t shoot the show until they feel good enough about what they have.

On the positive side, Duff is good. And when you’ve got a central star that is pushing the project as hard as she is then there is some hope.

But at this point, I don’t care how you met your father.