24, The X-Files, Prison Break, Full House, Mystery Science Theatre.These are just a few of the many reboots or relaunches coming to television in the coming months.Television networks have no problem tugging on nostalgic heartstrings to get viewers, even if that means returning to a show that already had a pretty definitive ending.With networks looking to the past for their next big hit more than ever, ComicBook.com is here to lending a helping hand.Here are five series we feel are ripe for a relaunch.
LOST
LOST was one of the most captivating and infuriating television series on the air for six years. What started off as a drama about a group of plane survivors trapped on a mysterious island became an epic battle between the celestial forces of good and evil…even if most viewers didn’t know what the heck was going on half the time. While LOST‘s characters received a definitive finale, the show left plenty of questions unanswered during its six season run. It wouldn’t be a stretch to put a new group of castaways on the Island, giving us some resolution to some lingering mysteries and reintroducing millions to one of the most fascinating settings on television.
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Boston Legal
With an all-star cast that included William Shatner and James Spader, Boston Legal was one of the funniest and most captivating legal dramas on television from 2004 to 2008. Most of the series’ weekly legal cases were pulled from current events, but handled with a bit more irreverence and levity than other legal dramas like Law and Order. One of the weirder quirks of Boston Legal was its ever-shifting cast, with characters disappearing for good with little explanation (if any). While Alan Shore and Denny Crane (Spader and Shatner’s characters) received a fond farewell on the final episode of Boston Legal, a revival could bring back some of the many, many characters it discarded during its first run.
Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Beloved by TV critics everywhere, Buffy the Vampire Slayer helped bring about a rise in supernatural dramas with season long story arcs on television. A smash hit for the WB Network (now the CW), Buffy created a blueprint that many television series (including many “geeky” shows still on the air) still follow to this day. While series creator Joss Whedon went on to become a movie megastar by directing the first two Avengers movies, now that he’s done with Marvel, he might want to consider reuniting the Scooby Gang for another adventure. Honestly, a Buffy relaunch wouldn’t that be that hard to make, as Whedon has written several future “seasons” of the show published as comic books.
Pushing Daisies
Pushing Daisies was a wonderful, beautiful TV series that never had a chance to find an audience on ABC in part due to the 2007 TV Writers Strike. Starring Lee Pace as a piemaker who could reanimate the dead with a single touch, Pushing Daisies was part mystery show, part comedy and part storybook come to life. ABC cancelled the series after two seasons, forcing the series to wrap up far quicker than it intended. Series creator Bryan Fuller has tried to revive the series several times (a planned comic sequel fizzled out when DC discontinued its Wildstorm imprint), and has even approached networks about bringing the show as a miniseries. If ABC can fit room in its schedule for a second season of Galavant (which is a great show that more people should watch!), it can probably afford to make a few more episodes of Pushing Daisies to give fans the ending it deserves.
Alias
Before JJ Abrams revitalized the Star Wars franchise with The Force Awakens, he was the creator of Alias, a spy series starring Jennifer Garner as Sydney Bristow, a spy working for the black ops division of the CIA. While Alias started off as a standard spy drama, the show quickly veered into an endless parade of double agents, double crosses, secret criminal investigations, and wigs. ABC considered a reboot of Alias back in 2010, but now might be the perfect time to bring Sydney back for one last mission.
