Yes, this is a quasi-sequel of sorts to yesterday’s post about how Full House coming back to life is a rather terrifying prospect, even with the original cast on board. But TVline just published a brief interview with Kim Dickens where once again, the prospect of a Deadwood revival is brought up. The show was famously killed by HBO after three seasons, leaving many loose ends in the story and seeing the cast scattered to the winds. But all these years later, rumors of another season persist, and unlike the Full House idea, this is totally something that should happen, here’s why.
[Photo via HBO]
1. There’s an Actual Plan
Unlike many of these rumored revivals like Full House, or even the recent 24 revival, Deadwood was a carefully organized show from the beginning. They needed four seasons to tell the story they wanted to tell, and they got three. If the show came back now, that old plan would serve as a roadmap to get the show where it needed to go, and there wouldn’t need to be the usual problem of “well, we got everyone together, now what?” which has plagued some projects like say, Arrested Development.
[Photo via HBO]
2. The Cast Would Probably Be Up For It
Yes, actors like Timothy Olyphant, Powers Boothe and Ian McShane are all actively doing other projects, but in this case, I think it would be possible to assemble them all for just one more season of the show. They could make it short, eight episodes even, which would allow everyone to finagle their schedules in order to be able to appear for the reunion season, even Olyphant who is currently busy wrapping up Justified.
[Photo via HBO]
3. HBO Can Do Whatever it Wants
Like Netflix, HBO kind of has free reign to do whatever the hell it feels like doing at this point. I don’t think that used to be the case back when they cancelled Deadwood, as the show was constantly on shaky ground trying to find hits other than its big guns of The Sopranos, Oz and Six Feet Under. When Deadwood didn’t explode into some crazy pop culture phenomenon immediately, they didn’t think it was wise to let it see its story through. Yet now we have True Blood and Boardwalk Empire which are doing just that, despite that fact that realistically they probably should have ended a few years ago.
[Photo via HBO]
4. The Audience is There
Because of the magic of HBO Go, and um, piracy, audiences have been able to catch up on Deadwood over the years even if they missed it when it originally aired. I know I certainly wasn’t watching it week to week back when it was actually on, but I’ve managed to check it out in the years since, and I know I’m not alone. The show probably has five times the fans it did when it aired, and though a final season may not be a ratings blockbuster, I think it would still do pretty well.
[Photo via HBO]
5. TV Needs Al Swearengen
The drinking, cursing, fighting villain-sometimes-hero was far and away one of the best characters to ever appear on TV, both good or evil, and TV is just not the same without him. For this reason alone, I’d love to see Deadwood return, just to see what Swearengen’s next move is.
[Photo via HBO]
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