‘Young Sheldon’ Lance Barber Crashed His Own Character’s Funeral

It’s all over now. Young Sheldon, the beloved CBS comedy series, has wrapped its seven-season run and is now confined to the annals of history. Despite the show ending, The Big Bang Theory sequel will live on through an upcoming collector’s box set and another spinoff, Georgie and Mandy’s First Marriage. In the show’s hour long series finale double header, the first portion was dedicated to the funeral of George Cooper, after his unexpected death in the prior episode rocked the Cooper household. While George was not able to console his family, Lance Barber, who had brought the character to life throughout the entirety of the show’s run, was on hand at the funeral to comfort his co-stars.

In arguably Young Sheldon‘s most emotional episode ever, the show was able to fuse a bit of humor into an intensely moving episode. According to set images shared on Instagram by Raegan Revord, Barber had attended George’s funeral – dressed as “Georgina”. Rather than dress in the high school football coach’s typical casual fashion, Barber opted to sport a different look: adorned in a dress and sporting a white wig and yellow glasses, Georgina could be spotted in a wide shot of the funeral attendees. Barber’s Georgina is seen sitting at the back of the church while the cast paid their last goodbye to the beloved Cooper patriarch. Revord notes that the move “brought some much needed laughter to everyone.”

George’s Legacy is Set Straight

Much of Young Sheldon, at least in its opening seasons, focused on the childhood origins of the boy genius. However, as the show progressed, the storyline began to shift somewhat, and expand to cover the character arcs of other members of the Cooper family. One such character arc was addressed by executive producer Steve Holland and this is regarding canon in The Big Bang Theory wherein George cheats on Mary. However, as Holland explains, George doesn’t cheat on his wife. Rather young Sheldon had walked in on his father and his mother, with Mary roleplaying as Helga, a character she made up from her trip to Germany. Holland said:

“He [Sheldon] did not know it was Mary. He still thinks he walked in [on his father cheating]. I think thats a moment where Sheldon thought he saw something. He thought he saw his dad with another woman, and he didnt, and theres a sadness to that, that hes carried that all these years.”

Now that Young Sheldon is ended, we, alongside CBS, turn our collective attention to the events to come in the Georgie and Mandy spinoff series. The show will focus on Georgie (Montana Jordan) and Mandy (Emily Osment) as they try to raise their family together. The show is set to begin filming in the summer, with some cast members in Will Sasso and Rachel Bay Jones are set to reprise their roles as Mandy’s parents, Jim and Audrey McAllister. Executive producer Holland discussed the upcoming show’s timeline, highlighting “it’s still 1994” as we look forward to the show’s arrival this fall.

Watch all seven seasons of Young Sheldon on Paramount+. Check out the images above.