Premiering back in 2003, Arrested Development was unfortunately too far ahead of its time. Despite its absolute comedic brilliance and wacky yet addictive sense of absurdism, the show just never caught on and unfortunately, didn’t make it past 3 seasons. It did, however, find itself with a huge cult following. As such, it wasn’t terribly surprising when Netflix revived it in 2013.
Though hardly a complete failure, the fourth outing for the series certainly wasn’t as impressive as what had come before. It was a bit of a disappointment for fans who had waited so long to see the Bluths back on screen, but the numbers were still strong enough for the streaming service to give the go ahead to a fifth season. That was several years ago, and to date, it still hasn’t arrived.
Rest assured though, progress is being made. The latest update on the status of the project comes to us from TV Line, who say that the producers are looking for young actors to play the Bluths in flashbacks, which suggests that at least part of the season will be a prequel of sorts. Not only would this give us insight into some of the family history that’s been hinted at throughout the show’s run, but it could also help deal with the issue of the incredibly busy schedules of all the main cast members – which has long been an obstacle in trying to get new seasons made.
It would no doubt be an interesting move, but we’re not sure how well fans would take to it. After all, most of the fun of watching Arrested Development comes from seeing the core group of actors interact with and play off of one another. Their chemistry is terrific and they really do make the show. To now go ahead and produce a new season where a significant chunk of screen time is dedicated to flashbacks with entirely new talent could backfire horribly.
It’s understandable that it’s tough to get everyone on set at the same time, given the fact that actors like Jason Bateman, Michael Cera, Will Arnett, etc. are all pretty big stars right now, but we hope that Netflix is able to find a way around this. A semi-prequel really isn’t the way to go, at least not in our opinion, and even if it means waiting a few more years, we’d rather see Netflix do the next season of Arrested Development right rather than just rush something out the door that might disappoint fans once again.