Alex Carson
Few 90s sitcoms were as iconic and beloved as Home Improvement. The series ran for eight seasons on ABC from September 1991 to May 1999. In the process, the Taylor family, with comedian Tim Allen as it’s patriarch, became almost like extended members of our families. While the show wasn’t exactly a critical success, it soared in the ratings for much of it’s run and racked up a number of awards and accolades.
Throughout the decade that gave us such things as Furbys, Pogs, Tamagotchis, and slap bracelets, the show was one of the most-watched programs on American Television. Not only did Home Improvement help launch the career of Tim Allen, but it also is notable for having started Pamela Anderson’s television career.
Tim Allen went on to star in The Santa Claus series of fans. For all of you holiday film fans out there, you’ll be pleased to know that the latest entry in the franchise, The Santa Clauses, just premiered on the streaming service Disney Plus. The festive, family-friendly miniseries serves as the continuation and direct sequel to 2006s The Santa Clause 3: The Escape Clause.
Besides The Santa Clause franchise, Allen has also voiced the beloved Pixar character Buzz Lightyear in the Toy Story animated film series. He’s also starred in movies like 1999s Galaxy Quest, 2006s Zoom, and 2013s 3 Geezers – just to name a few.
On Television, Allen portrayed Max Baxter in the ABC/Fox sitcom Last Man Standing from 2011 to 2021. While that series in many ways was the spiritual successor to Home Improvement – even going as far to feature guest appearances of many prominent members of the former series’ cast – fans of Home Improvement have been waiting with bated breath for a proper reunion or reboot to materialize.
Over the years, Allen has repeatedly teased a Home Improvement reunion, but as of yet, nothing close to what fan’s have been clambering for has come to fruition. Even so, diehard Home Improvement fans haven’t given up hope.
Recently, Allen has come out and discussed the prospect of a Home Improvement reboot while explaining why one hasn’t been developed yet. Join us as we see what Allen had to say about the potential Home Improvement reunion and what’s been holding it up. Facts Verse Presents: Tim Allen Confirms Why Home Improvement Reboot Hasn’t Happened Yet.
Allen Breaks His Silence
Speaking with E! News ahead of the November 16, 2022, release of The Santa Clauses, Allen revealed that we just might not have seen the last of the beloved 90s sitcom. That being said, fans of the program shouldn’t get too hyped up just yet.
While Allen hasn’t fully ruled out a Home Improvement of some kind, he did make it clear that he believes that Tim Taylor’s storyline just might be over for good.
According to Allen, the cast and crew of Home Improvement have long been open to a potential reboot, but from Tim’s perspective, he always imagined such a project materializing in the form of a short film produced for charity. He also noted that scheduling conflicts have been one of the most significant reasons why a reboot has yet to see the light of day.
Allen went on to say that in his eyes, Tim Taylor has already continued on TV in his Last Man Standing sitcom. As anyone who’s watched that series before knows, the character of Mike Baxter was remarkably similar to Tim Allen’s Tim “The Tool Man” Taylor role.
Instead of hosting a popular DIY tool-centric talk show, Baxter ran his Outdoor Man vlog covering all-things sporting goods adjacent and anything else that happened to come to his mind.
“Tim Taylor…graduated in the TV world into Mike Baxter” Allen explained. He continued by adding that his previous character was ‘kind of a gag’. In fact, Tim Taylor showed up on Last Man Standing on one occasion during a dream sequence.
Allen brought up a valid point when he told E! News that he didn’t know if Tim Taylor was still relevant in this day and age. If you go back and watch Home Improvement, it’s obvious that the show was very much so a product of it’s time. While Tim’s wife, Jill, was depicted as somewhat of a progressive feminist, the rest of the cast – with the exception of the sagely neighbor Wilson – really reflected the common values and gender roles that were the norm back in the 90s. Tim Taylor was oozing in male bravado despite being a bit of a hapless buffoon at times.
While Tim Taylor’s story might be kaput, Allen thinks that a reboot that instead focuses on his sons Brad, Randy, and Mark, played respectively by Zachary Ty Bryan, Jonathan Taylor Thomas, and Taran Noah Smith, might work.
Allen expressed his desire to see what those boys were like as adults and what they ended up doing with their lives.
Reboot Rumors Already Made Headlines
In 2018, Allen told E! News that the series was at one point close to making a comeback, but added that that plan had gotten derailed when Last Man Standing began airing.
Apparently about a decade ago, the cast and crew of Home Improvement had already entered into talks discussing a potential reboot or sequel series, but for one reason or another, it never felt quite right. The timing was off, and nobody’s schedules seemed to be open enough to allow such a project to get off the ground.
In 2021, when Home Improvement was celebrating it’s 30th anniversary, Tim Allen and his former co-star Richard Karn told Today that they were more than ready to do a reboot. According to both stars, if the stars were aligned just right, they’d jump at the opportunity to bring the series back.
Allen told the outlet that he would love to see where Al and Tim ended up and what ever became of Tool Time.
Karn, who played AL Borland, was more adamant in his enthusiasm for a new series. When asked if he would reprise his role in a new and improved iteration of Home Improvement, he responded with a spirited “Absolutely!”.
After Karn expressed his excitement over the prospect of a Home Improvement reunion, Allen held up a figurine of his Buzz Lightyear character and quipped that he had just gotten a ‘little Buzz’. Karn followed up with a witty retort of his own by joking in tongue-in-cheek fashion that Allen had been ‘upstaging’ him for ‘over 30 years’.
Although fans of Home Improvement have yet to see Allen and Karn reunite on the set of Tool Time, the duo did reunite in their History channel reality competition, Assembly Required, which premiered in 2021. In 2022, the series was rebranded with the Home Improvement-inspired name More Power.
Tim Allen Turned Down Millions For Home Improvement Season 9
Before signing on for Home Improvement, Tim Allen had been offered sitcoms based around hit movies like Turner and Hooch, but instead of going with any of those, he chose to focus his efforts on a sitcom based upon his stand-up routine. Home Improvement was originally billed in pre-production as “Hammer Time”, and it focused on Tim Taylor’s family life as well as his home improvement program Tool Time.
Since the majority of the show revolved around Taylor’s home life, we got to see how characters like Tim’s wife Jill, played by the lovely Patricia Richardson, grew and developed throughout the show’s progression. Simply put, Tim and Jill, along with their three sons, had a tremendous amount of onscreen chemistry. As the series went on, we came to fall in love with all of these characters while developing a deep interest in their various passions and dreams.
Home Improvement stumbled upon just the right formula to make everything work. And throughout it’s 204 episode run, it enjoyed remarkably high ratings. At it’s peak, the series was pulling in ratings of more than 30 million viewers. While those numbers eventually dipped towards the end of it’s run, Home Improvement was still a reasonable hit with viewers right up until it’s final season.
After airing for eight seasons, Home Improvement came to an end in 1999. The last official episode was the TV special ‘Backstage Pass’. In that episode, the audience finally got a chance to see the face of Taylor’s mysterious next door neighbor Wilson.
In a 2002 Biography Channel special, Home Improvement: A Half Hour of Power, it was revealed that the cast was beginning to grow bored with the show towards it’s end. Richardson was quoted as saying that she believed that the series had ran through pretty much every possible storyline by that time. Regardless, the network was still quite keen on keeping the series going. They even offered the leads an enormous payday if they committed to doing a 9th season. Allen was offered $50 million, while Richardson was offered $25 million. Obviously, despite all of those zeros, both stars ended up rejecting those offers.
Richardson later told ET in 2020 that at the time she was ready to move on from the show. ABC and Allen pressured her to stay, but she wasn’t having it. It was apparently only after ABC floated the idea of killing off Jill as a way of keeping the show going that Allen finally decided to call it quits as well.
The Taylor Kids Had Rough Lives
At this point, you might be wondering what happened to the actors who played the Taylor boys. Well, as it turns out, they’ve actually had pretty lousy lives outside of television. Now, this shouldn’t surprise anyone that knows anything about what life is like for current and former child stars, but it’s still something that we feel deserves mentioning.
In 2012, Taran Noah Smith, the actor who played the youngest Taylor boy, Mark, was charged with DUI and possession of an illicit substance. He also ended up defying his parent’s wishes by marrying a woman that was 16 years older than he was when he was 17. Ultimately the couple got divorced after five years.
When Smith’s family expressed disapproval of his marriage, he accused them of misappropriating his money to purchase a mansion for themselves. This conflict led Smith and his family to be estranged for a number of years, but fortunately, it seems as if they’ve worked out their issues and have rekindled a loving relationship.
In October 2020, police arrested Zachary Ty Bryan, the actor who played Brad Taylor, on several charges, including felony strangulation, misdemeanor fourth-degree assault, and interfering with filing a police report, after an altercation with his girlfriend in their Lane County, Oregon apartment. In February 2021, he pled guilty to two of those charges while the remaining six were dropped. He was sentenced to three years probation and was ordered to attend a batterer intervention program. Since then, Hollywood doesn’t seem to want to touch Bryan with a ten-foot pole.
Fortunately, Jonathan Taylor Thomas hasn’t had to deal with nearly as much drama in his life. That being said, seeing as how his last acting credit was in a 2015 episode of Last Man Standing, it seems as if his Hollywood career has all but stalled.
With that, we’ll go ahead and wrap things up, but that just means it’s now your turn to let your voice be heard. Would you be interested in seeing a Home Improvement reboot or do you think that the classic 90s sitcom should be left alone? Let us know in the comments. And as always, thanks for watching!
