King of the Hill fans are closer than ever to making a return to Arlen, Texas. Per The Hollywood Reporter, series creators Mike Judge and Greg Daniels recently reunited to form the animation company Bandera Entertainment. Their goal is to expand the animation genre to include as many sub-genres as live-action fare, and they've spent the past couple years building up a slate of various animated projects.
“We were very excited to go into different tones and different styles and try to expand the animation art form,” Daniels says. “We’re in a golden age for content, right? That’s animation, too. That was one of the things we were talking about in founding the company: 'Let’s push animation into all these different genres.'”
Working with YouTube head of originals Dustin Davis, the pair's programming roster includes the upcoming animated show Bad Crimes from Nicole Silverberg (Full Frontal With Samantha Bee). It is described as an "adult animation dark comedy procedural" and is the second animated project from Bandera to find a home. Judge also teased some of the other shows in the works, which includes a "very funny children's show" from Sacha Baron Cohen and other projects from Zach Woods (Silicon Valley), Jimmy O. Yang (Space Force), tattoo/graffiti artist Mr. Cartoon, and Carrie Brownstein (Portlandia).
While Judge and Daniels are not divulging any additional information, it's reported that "the return of former Fox favorite King of the Hill" is also in the works at Bandera. Judge notes that most of the Bandera projects will be coming from other artists, but possibly teasing the animated sitcom he co-created with Daniels, Judge slyly says, “There’s one show that I might be a co-creator of but the rest, it’s mentoring other people and getting people together and being a studio in that regard.”
The King of the Hill Reboot Might Be Set in the Future
There have been teases of King of the Hill returning over the years, and last year brought about a pretty promising update. Writer-producer Brent Forrester was doing a Q&A with fans on Reddit and he let the news drop that negotiations were happening for the revival. This new update suggests that Bandera may have since picked up the necessary rights to do the revival series.
"I am sure [series creators] Greg Daniels and Mike Judge will murder me for sharing this but... HELL YES," Forrester said. "They are in hot negotiations to bring back King of the Hill. The Trump administration made it suddenly very relevant again. The characters have all aged 15 years. The project is sooooo good. Okay I've said too much."
It's interesting that Forrester also suggested that this new version of King of the Hill would be 15 years in the future. This would provide an easy way of writing out Luanne and Lucky, as their respective voice actors Brittany Murphy and Tom Petty have since passed away. It would also provide a completely fresh take on the story rather than running the risk of repeating some of the gags and storylines from the previous 13 seasons.