When the final episode of Arrested Development aired in February of 2006 talk of the Buth’s return immediately followed. Fans and critics alike couldn’t understand the show’s early demise. Arrested Development was often hailed by critics as “The Best Show You’re Not Watching.” It won six Emmy’s, and Jason Bateman took home a Golden Globe for his acting on the show.

Despite its critical success, the show failed to catch on with audiences and suffered low ratings. The fans who did watch were loyal. They launched online campaigns and wrote “strongly worded letters” to Fox in an effort to keep the show on the air. However,  after 2 1/2 seasons Arrested Development was cancelled.

In the years since then a movie based on the series has been mentioned several times. Often times it would be said show creator Mitch Hurwitz was working on a script. Other times it would be that the cast members, Bateman and Michael Cera particularly, were too busy with other projects to get a movie going.

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Then in late 2011 new life was breathed into the project when the announcement was made that new episodes of the show would be made for Netflix. The episodes would be shot in 2012 and streamed through Netflix in 2013.

“I’ll believe it when I see it,” has been my thought since that announcement. Last week however, I saw something that gave me hope that it would really happen.

It was a tweet from Jason Bateman that said “Taken at AD mission control, today! All systems are go. Filming for the new episodes starts in four weeks. Woo!” And he included this picture of himself with producer Ron Howard (who also tweeted a pic of the three of them) and Hurwitz.

Okay – so now that the project seems real I have some thoughts on “Season 4.”

While I loved the first two seasons, and think they had some of the funniest stuff to ever be on TV, I wasn’t so hot on the third season. The storytelling went a little off the rails. I don’t really blame them, things were falling apart toward the end and the show took on an “anything goes” kind of attitude.

So for the new season some events that happened in season 3 need to be forgotten:

  • Lindsay being adopted and her and Michael having a “thing” for each other. 
  • Anne and Gob.
  • The cabin car. Loved the stair car – thought the cabin was overdoing it.
  • Leave Tobias’ hair transplant rejection in the past.
  • Now that George-Michael and Maeby are adults their infatuation with each other probably needs to end – maybe this can be done cleverly – but if not it needs to be in the past.

I’m keeping my fingers crossed that the return of Arrested Development will be everything its fans are hoping it will be.  What do you think? Can the magic be recaptured?

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Sherry Lipp
Sherry is a writer/blogger specializing in entertainment and food writing. You can find her gluten and grain-free food articles at scdforlife.com.

One thought on “Arrested Development Coming Back to TV For Real

  1. Actually I think you’ll find that their relationship will continue according to Ali Shawkat!

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