That '90s Show

That '90s Show really does manage to pay tribute to its predecessor, give us a fun snapshot of a beloved decade, and still present the audience with endearing characters whose own stories are just as interesting and funny as their previous generation's.

The original show was comforting, witty, and a love letter to nostalgia with a young, hungry cast of actors — this new series contains the same loveable features. Now, the real test for the show’s creators is not how to best emulate the formula, but advance it into something more sticky and satisfying.

So much of what made That ’70s Show such a bingeable show is gleefully intact here: the humor, the heart, and, perhaps especially, the nostalgic, era-specific plots. But what really solidifies That ’90s Show as good television is its cast of newcomers, who quickly earn their spots on that legendary—and, by now, moth-eaten—basement couch.

Offering precisely what its title promises and building on the legacy of a Y2K era sitcom that looked back in order to appear fresh and cool, That ’90s Show is nothing new. That’s not so much a knock against it as an accurate assessment of its reason for being.

With funny moments filled with nostalgia, That ‘90s Show is charming and has a lot of potential.

The surest sign that the Turners' formula still fits is that they and showrunner Gregg Mettler have believably evolved the old gang (minus Hyde who, for reasons, may as well have never existed) into late-30s versions we believe and still recognize while making their '90s progeny and their friends' reflections of the kids we were.

That ‘90s Show did just enough to let us drop back into this world for a summer of fun, and here’s hoping there’s another summer or two to come down the line.

Sure, That '90s Show is an easy watch, another harmless sitcom added to Netflix's library. Unfortunately, being easy to watch isn't the same as being captivating or interesting.

That ‘90s Show is a comfortable watch that fans of the original should enjoy insomuch as taking an easy, if not a mostly forgettable trip down nostalgia lane.

We think there will be enough of the original cast on screen to make watching That ’90s Show worthwhile. But we’re not sure if audiences are going to want to sit through the broad scenes featuring the teens to get to the good stuff.

That ’90s Show is milder than a Milwaukee cheddar, built to be watched while scrolling on your phone, but from the moment Leia takes her father’s place, yelling out “Hello Wisconsin!” in the opening titles, the lure of generations past might just drag you in.

The makers have obviously worked under a laminated sign saying “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it”, and who can blame them? The same character traits are all there, if redistributed among the youngsters’ parts.

For older viewers, its format as well as storylines may well conjure nostalgia. For younger ones, I wonder if its sitcom-y rhythms, the way each episode builds around a conflict resolvable in 22 minutes and makes time for an applause-ready cameo, will suit.

But for whatever reason, one never quite emotionally invests in their challenges, as charming as the actors are to watch. Nevertheless, Haverda has an appealing presence, and her castmates (including Andrea Anders as Gwen’s mother, the series’ other adult) have fine comic instincts. ... To anyone interested in a sharper picture of young people in the last years of the last century, let me direct you to Freevee’s lovely “High School.” And “My So-Called Life.”

As an outgrowth of this fad [revivals], the series falls somewhere in the middle of the pack. While there’s a chance we’ll want to hang out in the basement with this gang in the future, we’d rather hang out with Red and Kitty upstairs for now.

It’s a little edgy and occasionally chuckle-inducing and mostly sweet-natured, and it’s just OK and quickly forgettable.

While there’s smoke here, there’s not much heat, as an uninspired next-generation crowd offsets encores by most of the original cast, leaving “That ’90s Show” feeling at best half-baked.

There will certainly be giggles. But there’s no longer any wink necessary between the show and its audience. There are also considerably coarser references to sex and basic biology now, which seem to arrive at moments when a writer has run out of wit. ... Unfortunately, “That ’90s Show” much of the time suffers from a sensibility that suggests Disney Channel tween comedies of the early 2000s, programs that never made much of an effort, perhaps because they had a captive audience.

"That '90s Show" is a harmless, also relatively pointless piece of nostalgia that has an even deeper fondness for a mustier style: the TV sitcom.

Forced, unfunny and lacking any kind of charm, "’90s" feels like a parody of a sitcom rather than an actual TV show. The jokes don't land, the actors are miscast and all the Kutcher and Kunis cameos in the world can't make a bad script good.

With tired punchlines and a new cast that lacks the easy charm of the originals, Netflix’s That ’90s Show is a total buzzkill.