TV shows that cause a stir are certainly nothing new, but every once in a while a series comes along and enters the conversation so loudly that everybody is talking about it. And, for six seasons, one of the most popular ‘90s shows was the teen drama, Dawson’s Creek. Starring James Van Der Beek, Katie Holmes, Michelle Williams, and Joshua Jackson, the series focused on the lives of Capeside High students Dawson, Joey, Jen, Pacey and their assorted friends, and many viewers completely fell in love with the drama. Now, we have the story behind the attempted reboot and why it didn’t get off the ground.
When Was A Dawson’s Creek Reboot Proposed And Why Didn’t It Happen?
Say what you will about hating the youth that Dawson’s Creek was named for (that would be James Van Der Beek’s Dawson Leery), or looking back on the show and having it bring up questions over some of the wild storylines or deep thoughts over just the pilot episode, but the teen soap was an unequivocal hit. People either loved it or loved to trash it, and the topical series has remained one of the most beloved/derided shows in semi-recent memory.
When talking to TV Insider, show creator Kevin Williamson (who’s working on Scream 7 and has the upcoming 2025 Netflix show, The Waterfront, debuting soon) revealed that there was a time, not that long ago, when there was talk of attempting to revive the story of the now-very adult Capeside crew. Conversations about it began during the pandemic, when nearly every long-gone TV show under the sun was doing cast reunions for charity. As Williamson said:
I thought Dawson’s Creek was behind me and in the past, but they desperately kept trying to get me to go back to it when there was that reboot craze. They kept trying and trying to get me, trying to get James, trying to get Katie, and get us all involved.
There was also a time fairly recently that we got a lot more than charity cast reunions, but also revived/rebooted TV series on the air. The most successful of these were probably Rosenne, which was quickly turned into The Conners and recently ended with a shortened Season 7, and Will & Grace, which ran for an additional three seasons after returning to NBC in 2017. Fans also got revived editions of shows like Murphy Brown, iCarly, Punky Brewster, Frasier, Dynasty, and the recently canceled Night Court, along with many others.
However you may have felt about all the other reboots that have crossed our screens over the years, there are doubtlessly some viewers who would have loved to catch up with the Capeside kids…or their kids, as the case may have been. And, it sounds like the original cast (sans Michelle Williams, for obvious reasons) was game. But, the creator noted that, as usual, scheduling was an issue:
James wanted to do it, but then Josh was busy. Katie wanted to do it, then James was busy. No one could come to terms at the same time to put it together.
This is hardly any surprise, even with many of these discussions about a reboot taking place during those dark pandemic days. Dawson’s Creek launched the careers of all of its young stars, with all of them going on to numerous other TV shows and movies in the decades since it ended. Once productions were able to begin filming again, it makes sense that they’d be busy, and at inopportune times to finalize plans for a revival. Eventually, this led Williamson and the OG cast to call it a day on the idea. He continued:
We kind of just went, ‘We did it and it was good.’ And what would it be today? We did the finale, we felt it was complete, we did five years in the future. You could definitely do a story about the children of [these characters] if you wanted to. You could maybe even do a This Is Us sort of thing. But ultimately, we felt like maybe it could live again in another way, but not as a reboot.
So, no Dawson, Pacey or Joey, but their kids with very modern problems? Oh, Kevin, don’t tempt us with a good time!
