Little House on the Prairie and other reboots in the works

Oh to return to the simpler days, when everything was bright and good and the world was still shiny and perfect. There is nothing like the good ol’ days before the world went to hell.

Well, actually, no, the world you remember was a horrible place, far worse than it is now, you just remember it fondly because you were younger and couldn’t understand how bad everything was.

Still, though, nostalgia sells. Because when you were a kid everything was simply better. Knowing that every one of us is on a futile journey to recapture the feeling of when we were younger is a force that powers the entertainment industry, so it makes sense that production companies want to revive beloved shows.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer

Buffy the Vampire Slayer was a much-beloved supernatural series that aired from 1997 to 2003. Starring Sarah Michelle Gellar as the eponymous Buffy, it followed a teenage girl who was chosen to battle supernatural beings such as vampires, demons and other dark forces. She also had to deal with high school and juggling everyday life. It was dark and light at the same time, blending humorous elements with social commentary. Fans have been crying for a reboot for years.

Gellar repeatedly said that she wasn’t interested in returning to the character while any hopes for a return were squashed after series creator Joss Whedon found himself battling multiple accusations of “creating a toxic workplace environment”.

Everything changed last week when it was leaked that Hulu was in the final stages of negotiations with Gellar to return to the series and that it was starting a writers’ room, the first step towards completing a script and getting the project greenlighted. The writing duo behind Poker Face are said to be penning the pilot episode with Chloe Zhao (the award-winning director behind The Eternals) and executive-produced by Dolly Parton’s production company, which did the original show.

Nothing solid yet but judging by the engagement and excitement, the final details are not far off!

Little House on the Prairie

More than 40 years since the series’ last episode aired, Netflix has officially ordered a new Little House on the Prairie based on the beloved books by Laura Ingalls Wilder about growing up in the American Midwest in the late 19th century. The original was so beloved it still gets high viewership numbers when it airs.

Rebecca Sonnenshine (producer and writer of Amazon hits The Boys and Vampire Diaries) will serve as the show’s executive producer, while Netflix has described it as “a blend of family drama, survival epic, and an origin story of the American West, aiming to offer a fresh perspective on the challenges and triumphs of frontier life”.

Not everyone was excited about the news though. Megyn Kelly, a right-wing conservative TV host tweeted a warning, promising that if Netflix tried to ‘wokefy’ the series she would make it her mission to destroy the show. She was immediately slammed by original show protagonist Melissa Gilbert, who pointed out that Little House on the Prairie was basically as “woke” as a series can get. We tackled: racism, addiction, nativism, antisemitism, misogyny, rape, spousal abuse and every other ‘woke’ topic you can think of, Gilbert said.

Malcolm in the Middle

Bryan Cranston had phenomenal success after Breaking Bad, starring in an avalanche of hit movies and series but there is one show that was always near and dear to him. Family sitcom Malcolm in the Middle aired from 2000 to 2006 with Cranston playing the Dad in a loving but chaotic family. The protagonist, Malcolm, was portrayed by Frankie Muniz, and the two of them have been trying to revive the show for years. It’s now becoming a reality as Disney ordered four episodes, with the majority of the original cast returning. The show is expected to drop sometime in 2025.

Scrubs

Bill Lawrence stunned the world once more with his feel-good hit series Ted Lasso. So much so, that many tend to forget that Lawrence has already found success as the showrunner of Scrubs, a medical comedy-drama that aired from 2001 to 2010, following the lives of young doctors at the fictional Sacred Heart Hospital. The series was known for blending comedy and drama, exactly the type of writing that made Ted Lasso such a phenomenon.

As Lawrence was close to the cast of Scrubs, a reboot was just a matter of time. The ABC network is trying to put together a new series, with many stars from the original cast already publicly agreeing to return. No news on a release date yet though.