Katie Holmes: Headed To the 'Mother' Ship

Katie Holmes is no stranger to TV -- in addition to getting her break on Dawson's Creek, she's guest-starred on Eli Stone -- and this fall, she will guest-star on How I Met Your Mother.

Joining a long list of stars (Britney Spears, Martin Short, Enrique Iglesias, Joe Manganiello, Rachel Bilson, Kim Kardashian and John Lithgow) who've stopped by the hit CBS series, Holmes will play an integral role in Ted's search for love this season.

MORE: On the Set of How I Met Your Mother

She’ll appear later this season as the Slutty Pumpkin, a character that fans first glimpsed in the first season of the series, when the gang threw a rooftop Halloween party, where Ted bonded with a masked woman whose number he later lost.

"Katie is a lovely and talented actress, which is why we've saved for her perhaps the most classily named character in our show’s history," exec producer Craig Thomas told Vulture, who broke the story. Adding that the part is "literally six seasons in the making."