In the last couple years, we have seen television executives plainly run out of news ideas (or ambition to try out news ideas) for sitcoms. Again and again, networks, have opted not to produce original shows but to simply remake or reboot old ones. Netflix has Fuller House. NBC has the new Will & Grace. CBS is bringing back Murphy Brown. ABC will soon debut a present-day Roseanne. And NBC is rumored to be working on an updated Office.
With that in mind, it was hard to blame Ellen DeGeneres for asking Jerry Seinfeld on Tuesday whether a Seinfeld reboot could be on the way. And as unlikely as that idea may sound, it’s at least interesting that Jerry called a return “possible” and acknoweldged the studio audience’s applause.
So it’s not as if the scripts are written or anything, but he sure didn’t rule it out!
You can see why this would be tempting for a network executive desperate for some ratings. There’s no question tons of people would watch a Seinfeld reboot just because it’s Seinfeld. Hell, there was a whole Curb Your Enthusiasm season devoted to the idea of a mere Seinfeld reunion show. But would anyone really enjoy a reboot? Would anyone truly gain pleasure from watching older, grayer versions of the characters they enjoyed two decades ago? Seems unlikely.
In the end, Jerry sounds fairly unenthusiastic about the idea and has firmly poo pooed it in the recent past, so we probably don’t have to sweat the idea of 68-year-old Kramer barging in on 63-year-old Jerry and all the various ways a Seinfeld remake wouldn’t work. The book on Seinfeld is closed and will stay that way… probably.
