Summary
Disney's 2023 Goosebumps reboot is not connected to the previous live-action movies, but it shares some creative blood with the director and producer of the earlier film.
The reboot of the Goosebumps show appeals to a more mature demographic and takes on a subtly more serious tone, influenced by the character-driven drama seen in Netflix's R-rated Fear Street trilogy.
Diverging from the original '90s series, the new Goosebumps show showcases older protagonists navigating high school and presents a continuous storyline spanning multiple episodes, as opposed to standalone stories.
Disney's upcoming 2023 reboot of Goosebumps bears a striking resemblance to the recent live-action Goosebumps movies. This raises the question of whether these two iterations of the franchise are connected. The Goosebumps series originally emerged as a collection of children's horror novels by RL Stine in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Its immense popularity led to a TV adaptation, which became a launching pad for future stars like Ryan Gosling. Decades later, Goosebumps was revived with two horror-comedy movies that displayed self-awareness, featuring Jack Black portraying a fictionalized version of Stine whose manuscripts held the monsters from his imagination at bay.
In 2023, Disney's Goosebumps reboot offers a fresh perspective on the franchise, arriving only five years after Goosebumps 2: Haunted Halloween concluded Black's portrayal of Stine. However, it's worth noting that Goosebumps 2023 isn't the first Stine project to debut on streaming platforms following Goosebumps 2: Haunted Halloween. In 2021, Netflix released the Fear Street trilogy, consisting of interconnected horror movies based on Stine's YA book series of the same name. Differing from previous adaptations of Goosebumps, the Fear Street films were firmly rated R, targeting an older audience compared to Stine's usual family-friendly horror-comedy content.
The New Goosebumps Show Is Not Connected To The Movies
Zack Morris in Goosebumps
Disney's upcoming Goosebumps show in 2023 is not directly connected to the live-action movies from the 2010s. However, there are some shared elements between the two projects. Although RL Stine, played by Jack Black, will not appear in the Disney show, the reboot for 2023 was developed by Rob Letterman, who also directed the pilot episode. Letterman previously directed the 2015 Goosebumps movie, and the 2023 reboot has a similar tone. However, the reboot is intended for a slightly older audience and is slightly less comedic compared to the live-action movies.
While Letterman had a hand in directing 2015's Goosebumps, the show's development was also spearheaded by Nicholas Stoller. Together, they took a slightly darker approach to the source material compared to the cheesy '90s series and comedy-driven live-action films. The Goosebumps reboot took a page from Fear Street's book and recognized the power of character-driven drama alongside the chaos brought by monsters. Although the upcoming 2023 Goosebumps reboot promises an abundance of the latter, the trailer hints at a more grounded tone by placing emphasis on establishing the central group of teenage heroes and their relationships.
How 2023's Goosebumps Show Is Different Than The Original Show
Zack Morris, Ana Yi Puig, Miles McKenna, Will Price, and Isa Briones star in Goosebumps, the rebooted series for 2023. Unlike the franchise's previous live-action movies, this iteration of Goosebumps takes a less comedic approach. Additionally, it distinguishes itself from the '90s series by featuring older main characters. While the protagonists of the '90s show were typically in middle school or younger, the reboot showcases high school students as its central heroes. Another departure from the original series is the serialized multi-episode format adopted by the 2023 Goosebumps reboot. Instead of standalone anthology stories, this version tells a season-long narrative arc. Although it does adapt classic novels from the Goosebumps series, the 2023 reboot embraces a more comprehensive storyline, setting it apart from both the '90s show and the lighter live-action movies.