Hear Paul Feig's Idea For a FREAKS AND GEEKS Reboot

Before Paul Feig made Bridesmaids, The Heat, and became synonymous with Ghostbusters, he was responsible for one of the best "cancelled-before-its-time" shows ever made: Freaks and Geeks. With a cast that included James Franco, Jason Segel, Seth Rogen, Martin Starr, Samm Levine, John Francis Daley, Linda Cardellini, Lizzy Caplan, and Ben Foster, the funny, emotional, realistic high school series was practically a breeding ground for amazing talent that would go on to become big names in Hollywood. If you haven't seen it, the whole thing is on Netflix right now, and I'd recommend seeking it out.

But that was a long time ago. The show went off the air fifteen years ago, and Feig has moved on to other things. In a new interview with Esquire, though, the writer/director is asked about a potential reboot, and while he doesn't seem too keen on the idea right now, he does have an idea for a way he'd like to see the show adapted today:

Yeah, I want to do it as a musical. I think it would make a great musical, if we figured out how to do it great and not just as some blatant grab for money. It feels like the kind of thing that could be a fun, interesting, musical stage show because the emotions are so conducive to having musical numbers that are either very sad or very thought-provoking or very funny and goofy and weird. Music was such a big part of the series that it just feels very much like it could fall into that pocket. But this is something I've talked about wanting to do for years and years, and in order to do it right, you've really got to spend some time and figure it out.

And based on this next quote, it doesn't seem like he's interested in returning to revisit the series as a sequel or reboot on television until he gets the idea absolutely perfect:

I don't want to do anything to revisit Freaks and Geeks that isn't awesome, and so in general, I personally have stayed away from it. I still haven't had that idea where you're like, Oh my God, that's it. This is gold. This is the way to do it. People are going to love this. I'm so proud of what it was, the last thing I ever want to do, or want any of us to do, is ruin the memory of it. It's like every time I would watch—especially in the '90s, they did a lot of those kind of reunion shows. You know, you became more sad [watching them] than anything. That was different because our cast is still young and vital. Now if you do it, they're all movie stars and stuff, so it probably adds a different thing. But those other shows, you'd watch and go, Oh, they look so old. You know? I didn't want to visit them now, because I liked them back then. That's probably partly why I wanted to do a reboot of Ghostbusters as opposed to doing it as a sequel. It's saying, look, let's just let that thing exist. It's awesome. So let's not suddenly try to revisit it.

I see where he's coming from, especially with the Ghostbusters comment. While there's definitely a segment of the population that would love to see Murray, Aykroyd, and Hudson don the proton packs again, so much time has passed since the original film that no matter how hard the filmmakers tried to recapture that original magic, it just wouldn't be the same. It's the same reason I'm a little worried about the original trilogy cast showing up in The Force Awakens (although I do have faith in J.J. Abrams, so we'll see how that turns out).

What do you think? Would you like to see some kind of Freaks and Geeks reboot? Would you go see a musical version of the cult classic series?