Best TV Reboots and Revivals (Since 2000)

by Danielle Turchiano, Senior Editor – September 1, 2022

Everything old can be new again with the right approach. At least, that's what television executives across broadcast and cable networks and streaming platforms hope. After all, there is already a proven built-in audience for series that came and went years ago, and sometimes the fans of those shows are actively clamoring for more.

So, it should be no surprise that as the volume of new television shows continues to creep up (hitting a record high 559 original scripted, English-language series alone in 2021), the number of reboots and revivals among those series also continues to grow. The question for many executives, writers, and producers seems not to be, should we return to this previous world, but rather, when and how?

Rebooting a television series means keeping the original premise and tone of a previous series intact for a new iteration, but creating brand new characters and story arcs, sometimes including a new setting and time period. Sometimes these series are also called remakes.

A revival is a series that picks up the same characters and world from the original series but tells new stories with them, meeting them at a new point in their lives. Sometimes revival series are also called continuation series, depending on the timeframe that has passed between the end of the original and the start of the return.

Using the word "reimagining" to describe a series is supposed to signify that other material from the previous series is the source material for the new version, but often, the Powers That Be just seem to just like it better and use it colloquially, loosening the definition.

It all may be a slippery slope. And that doesn't even take into account spin-offs and prequels!

Here, Metacritic highlights the best scripted, live-action reboots and revivals since 2000, ranked by Metascore. It should be noted that if a series is listed as a new season of the same original show on our website, the Metascore listed below is for its first revival season, not the series overall. And yes, we call out which series are reboots and which are revivals!

18 of 22 photo by History Channel

83 Roots (History, 2016)

(tied at #4)
reboot of Roots (ABC, 1977)

ABC's 1977 miniseries Roots is hard to beat, as it took home nine Emmy Awards, including Outstanding Limited Series, but the History Channel's 2016 remake still captivated critics and, to a lesser extent, awards voters. (It was nominated for seven Emmys, including Outstanding Limited Series, but it did not win any.) Like its predecessor, the source material for the story is Alex Haley's 1976 novel titled Roots: The Saga of an American Family, but this version stars Malachi Kirby as Kunta Kinte, a West African warrior who is sent to North America as a slave. The century-spanning story follows his journey, which includes starting an uprising and being on the frontlines of war, as well as his family's struggles, namely his daughter Kizzy (played in adulthood by Anika Noni Rose) and his grandson George (played in adulthood by Regé-Jean Page).

“History’s new vision of Roots justifies its existence almost immediately, reinforcing its worthiness through amazing performances and a tweaked narrative that puts more focus on the interior lives of the slaves.” —Joshua Alston, The A.V. Club

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