From Baywatch to Malcolm, the nostalgia trend is in full swing in Hollywood studios and streaming platforms are banking on nostalgia.
The return of Malcolm on Disney+ confirms a heavy trend: faced with financial risks, platforms and channels are more than ever betting on nostalgia, recycling the hits of the 2000s to attract an audience in search of landmarks.
Raphaëlle PELTIER, new york – afp
Heroes of a successful sitcom from the early 2000s, Malcolm and his dysfunctional family are back in action on April 10th on Disney+. A proven strategy for channels and platforms, which minimize financial risks by banking on public nostalgia.
From the Trojan war to Superman, from literature to cinema, “we have been reusing characters and universes for a very long time,” recalls Robert Thompson, professor of media and popular culture at Syracuse University in the USA. But this phenomenon has taken on unprecedented proportions with the proliferation of streaming platforms, for which “reviving well-established franchises is a way to protect against many potential risks,” he adds.
In fact, millions of dollars have already been spent on marketing, promotion, and brand establishment. Besides Malcolm in the Middle (2000-2006), the hospital sitcom Scrubs (2001-2010) was resurrected by the American channel ABC and the Hulu platform earlier this year. Prime Video will dedicate a series this summer to Elle Woods’ high school years, the heroine of the movie Legally Blonde (2001).
And while Hulu has abandoned its project for a sequel to Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1997-2003), Fox is preparing a new version of Baywatch (1989-2001). In parallel, series launched in the 2000s and still in production (Grey’s Anatomy, NCIS) remain among the most streamed content each year.
A Feeling of “Comfort”
This is what makes them attractive? “Nostalgia,” responds Sohni Kaur, who studied the phenomenon in 2021 as a psychology and media studies student at Scripps College in the USA. “It’s a fairly common defense mechanism,” she analyzes, finding comfort during the COVID-19 pandemic in adolescent vampire movies like Twilight (released between 2008 and 2012) and Bollywood hits from the 1990s.
Like Gilmore Girls (2000-2007) or Friends (1994–2004), some series seem more suitable for nostalgia because they depict “families or chosen families,” says Sohni Kaur. But even horror films like Scream, launched in 1996, continue to be successful, with a 7th feature film in theaters in early 2026.
Nostalgia seems to “work in cycles of about twenty years,” observes Robert Thompson. This allows a generation to settle into adulthood and look back at the works that accompanied their adolescence. With purchasing power now and, sometimes, children old enough to consume these contents too.
It is therefore logical that productions in the 2020s are looking back to those in the 2000s. But that’s not all, according to experts. “It was just before we entered this phase of exponential technological growth,” notes Sohni Kaur. “Returning gives a sense of security.”
Television programs were still major collective events back then. Their “remakes” testify to the “central place that television held in culture at the turn of the 21st century,” affirms Robert Thompson.
Another sign of going back in time, platforms increasingly adopt weekly episode releases rather than entire seasons. This is the case with The Pitt (HBO Max), a hospital series in line with another success from the turn of the 21st century: ER (1994–2009).
