Remember when Arrested Development was cancelled?
If you’re anything like me, you probably don’t. It wasn’t until months and months after Arrested Development was yanked off the air by the suits at Fox that I had any inkling of, “Illusions, Michael!” or “I just blue myself”.
For a long time I just knew AD as the show a certain kid I hated from high school really enjoyed, so, equipped with the infallible logic of a 16-year-old me, I tuned the show out completely.
But this story really isn’t about me – the point is I’m here now. I was one of thousands clamoring for a sign of truth behind the fabled next installment of Arrested Development, a fourth season that seemed forever confined to nerd purgatory. Until Netflix broke that fateful news,
The Banana stand was back!
The entirety of the Internet virtually shat itself.
Rejoice, all ye message board contributors – your tired and ceaseless Arrested Development quotes are instantly validated again!
Suddenly production photos were sporadically peppering fan pages and community forums – it was really happening. And finally last week – a period that lasted seven years for some – the painful anticipation was over. 15 never before seen episodes of AD released on Netflix, simultaneously.
But what happened next was totally unprecedented. Only hours into its premiere, the same viral community that had campaigned and picketed for more of the Bluth family, seemingly and collectively responded, “Mehhhhh.”
The New Arrested Development Is Dark, Uneven and Frustrating. – TIME
Nostalgia’s a powerful drug, but it’s also a curse to a TV show trying to make a return. – AV Club
Oh, and one person on YouTube added,
“The only people who would find this show funny have a lukewarm intelligence.”
That has to count for something.
So what the hell happened? The return of Arrested Development was supposed to be on par with the second coming of Christ.
Perhaps Arrested Development is a victim of its own hype. Perhaps it returned at a time when it wasn’t needed – stellar programming such as Breaking Bad, Mad Men and Game of Thrones are dominating our attention.
Or perhaps enough years have transpired that even a show as revered and influential as AD was has been rendered incapable of resonating the same familiar way. Is it possible that perhaps we all ‘blue ourselves’ on this one?
I happen to find this newest chapter of Arrested Development quite compelling, a season that rewards the viewer time and again. For me, it gets better every episode.
This strange reception of the fourth season of Arrested Development is remarkably best represented by this video. The story unfolding is quite similar to Stephen King’s Pet Cemetery, and much later a South Park parody.
Quite frankly, Herman Munster put it in better terms than I ever could.
Sick with grief, the guilty parents – if only we watched Arrested Development more when it was alive! – carried their lifeless child to the Indian Burial Grounds. And although our astute neighbor in overalls gave stoic warning, we didn’t listen. The child that came back to us was not the same.
When it comes to Arrested Development, sometimes, dead is better.
