Topic: Saved by the Bell (2020)
https://next-episode.net/saved-by-the-bell-2020
Bayside's back!
When California governor Zack Morris gets into hot water for closing too many low-income high schools, he proposes they send the affected students to the highest performing schools in the state - including the wealthy Pacific Palisades' Bayside High. The influx of new students gives the overprivileged Bayside kids a much needed and hilarious dose of reality.
Daisy Jiménez: a smart, ambitious sophomore who is excited at the prospect of attending Bayside High after her local school gets shut down (like Zack before her she's the main POV character).
Mac Morris: the handsome, charming, privileged son of Governor Zack Morris and Kelly Kapowski.
Lexi Haddad-DeFabrizio: a sharp tongued transgender cheerleader who has her own reality show.
Aisha Garcia: Daisy's fun but ultracompetitive best friend and Bayside High's new starting quarterback.
Jamie Spano: the not-so-bright captain of the Bayside football team and Jessie's sensitive man-child son.
Devante Young: a new student at Bayside who has hid his love for high school musicals until now.
Principal Ronald Toddman: who attended Bayside High along with the old gang, even if no one remembers him.
Jessie Spano: Jamie's mother and a school counselor at Bayside High.
Coach A.C. Slater: a physical education teacher and football coach at Bayside High.
This revival/continuation was developed by Tracey Wigfield (30 Rock, The Mindy Project, Great News) based on the original series author, playwright, television writer and lyricist Sam Bobrick created Disney Channel TV series Good Morning, Miss Bliss which eventually evolved into Saved by the Bell in 1989.
Tracey Wigfield who serves as Show Runner is also an executive producer on the series alongside Franco Bario and Peter Engel and 50 Central‘s Shantira Jackson along with Funny or Die‘s Dashiell Driscoll were hired as a staff writer for this revival. Driscoll may have to thank his funny commentary on the YouTube series Zack Morris Is Trash (2017), which he created, as to why he was sought out.
For a series which boasts only 100 episodes (including the Good Morning, Miss Bliss season) the staying power of Saved by the Bell seems outrageous... including 2 TV movies and an additional 14 episode run of the The College Years as well as a mostly recast sequel series sub-titled The New Class premiering in 1993 and lasting for a whopping 7 seasons with a total of 143 episodes. The only hold-overs in The New Class however were Principal Belding (Dennis Haskins) and, starting with the second season, Screech Powers (Dustin Diamond) as a teacher.
Almost since it began Saved by the Bell had been in syndicated repeat, continuing to this day, so even though The New Class ended in 2000 the franchise hasn't been off of TV (in one incarnation or another), for any significant time in over 30 yrs. Meanwhile, in 2006 Cartoon Network's Adult Swim announced that a Saved by the Bell reunion would air at midnight as a two-week special... that turned out to be a joke. But then cast members Haskins, Diamond, Gosselaar, Voorhies, and Lopez came together in 2008 to do their own voices in a Saved by the Bell parody for Robot Chicken.
A year later Late Night with Jimmy Fallon launched a campaign to get the cast on board for an actual Saved by the Bell reunion. As many know Dennis Haskins, Lark Voorhies, Mario Lopez, Elizabeth Berkley, and Mark-Paul Gosselaar agreed to reunite on Late Night which came about on June 8, 2009. That hype lead to the the cast reuniting in August of '09 for a photo shoot in People. Then in 2015 the cast appeared on a skit on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, though Voorhies and Diamond did not appear.
Even in-between all of these nostalgic appearances many of the original cast of Saved by the Bell have been around or in the popular consciousness... whether it be hosting game shows, appearing in Dancing with the Stars, or just big on the midnight movie screenings scene or, like Mark-Paul Gosselaar did with Mixed-ish, heading back to the place they cut their teeth as actors, the sit-com.
As such it was far from unexpected to see a revival of this oddly beloved long lasting series... however what we got with Saved by the Bell (2020) is something else... a clash of real life issues and grounded characters with surreal humor, a ridiculous amount of 4th wall breaking and oft times magical realism causing a sort of cognitive dissonance hilarity.
P.S. For those who don't know there are also 21 novelizations based on the show, a comic book series and a number of unauthorized parody musicals (Dustin Diamond & Dennis Haskins have even made appearances in some of them).