The Office is getting a reboot and fans are scared
NBCCue Michael Scott screaming no: The Office is set for an official reboot, and fans are already worried.
American remakes of British TV shows are notoriously woeful, with many failing to make it past their first season if not the pilot. Offensive examples include Peep Show, The IT Crowd, Spaced, Only Fools and Horses, and The Inbetweeners.
NBC’s The Office, based on Ricky Gervais’ aughts-defining mockumentary series, defied the odds. After a shaky first season that mostly revised the original show’s beats, the US version found its feet and heart in an award-winning, hilarious stretch of television.
It ended its nine-season run in 2013, but it’s still one of the most prolifically quoted shows in pop culture, not to mention its constant popularity on streaming. Well, it looks like a proper reboot is on the horizon, and fans don’t hate it… they just don’t like it at all… and it might be terrible.
Fans worry The Office reboot will “fail”
According to a new report from Puck News, a reboot of The Office is set to be announced once the WGA strike comes to an end, with Greg Daniels returning as showrunner.
While fans have long wished for a reunion of the original cast, news of a reboot hasn’t been received so warmly. “This will be the most watered-down reboot of all time. It will fail miserably. IMO,” one wrote.
“I’m on a watch of the original right now, let it be. It only worked cause Micheal made everyone else feel so uncomfortable, hard to reproduce in today’s environment,” another tweeted. “Because the How I Met Your Mother reboot was such a success. Let’s reboot another classic sitcom and cancel it after two seasons,” a third wrote.
“Now that the writers’ strike looks like it might be coming to an end, I promise you, we can come up with new ideas. I believe in us as a society,” a fourth tweeted. “Would LOVE for this to be nearly as good as #TheOffice…but I worry it won’t even come close to living up to that series. Not to mention MOST of the humor couldn’t possibly be done today without offending someone. Fingers crossed but I have my doubts,” a fifth wrote.
Daniels discussed the prospect of a reboot in February last year, telling The Hollywood Reporter: “When people hear ‘reboot,’ they think it’s the exact same show. I don’t think that would work. I also think that the content was very much pitched for that period of time, when people weren’t as sensitive to what is giving offense to people so that you could have a boss who kept putting his foot in it,” he said.
“You could feel that the content was sort of helping people see things as being offensive that they might not have seen as offensive before, because they were just used to it. Now, everybody’s much more aware of how offensive certain things are. We’re in a different place in the cycle of consciousness-raising.”
Daniels said he wouldn’t try to “redo” it or pitch another Michael Scott. “The part I would take is the documentary format and the idea that it is an examination from a documentarian’s perspective,” he added.
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