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It’s official: Roseanne is coming back to television.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, ABC has green lit a straight-to-series order for the revived series. Remarkably, both Roseanne Barr (Roseanne Conner) and John Goodman (Dan Conner) are confirmed to return, as is Sara Gilbert, who played Darlene on the show. Gilbert is credited for spearheading the revival and will serve as an executive producer alongside Barr. Laurie Metcalf (Jackie) and Johnny Galecki (Darlene’s husband David) are also expected to return.
No plot details have been shared, so it’s not yet known how the writers plan to deal with Dan’s death. In the series’ finale of the show’s initial run, it was revealed that the character had previously died of a heart attack and his appearance throughout the final season was actually just a manifestation of Roseanne’s character’s writing. Still, Barr herself came up with a workaround for this in a 2009 blog post imagining where the Conner family would be now. She imagines Dan returns “alive after faking his death,” while “DJ gets published. Mark dies in Iraq. David leaves Darlene for a woman half his age. Darlene meets a woman and they have a test tube baby. Becky works at Wal-Mart. Roseanne and Jackie open the first medical marijuana dispensary in town and pay off the mortgage before the house is foreclosed on.” It remains to be seen how many, if any, of these ideas will be used.
The revival comes almost exactly 20 years after Roseanne wrapped its nine-season run in 1997.
Update: More details of the show’s revival were revealed during ABC’s Upfront presentation on Tuesday. The eight-episode run will be set in present day. In addition to Barr, Goodman, and Gilbert, Metcalf, Lecy Goranson (Becky), and Michael Fishman (D.J.) are all confirmed to return. Additionally, Sarah Chalke, who played Becky in later seasons, will return in a different role.
Check out photos of the cast together again, along with a teaser trailer for the forthcoming revival.
