Just in time for Halloween, the Disney Channel has announced they’re in the early stages of developing a Hocus Pocus reboot. Cue the impassioned internal screams of every girl who came of age in the ’90s.
While Bette Midler,Sarah Jessica Parker, and Kathy Najimy will apparently not reprise their roles as the wonderfully witchy Sanderson sisters (though here’s to praying for a cameo), Deadline reports thatDavid Kirschner, a producer on the 1993 film, is slated to executive produce. No word yet on who will direct orstar, and we’re racking our brains for which cool young actresses might be able to fill those black, lace-up boots.
For those who somehow didn’t obsessively watch the movie during its annual reruns on networks like Disney and ABC Family, it follows three sisters (who also happen to be witches) on a quest to revive their youthful appearances and generally wreak havoc on the town of Salem, Massachusetts after being inadvertently resurrected by a group of teens on Halloween. There’s also a talking cat, a book with an eyeball, and a mom dressed up as ’80s Madonna (cone boobs and all) in the mix.
Weirdly, when asked two years ago about the possibility of a Hocus Pocus reboot, Midler seemed adamant that it would never happen. “After all these years and all the fan demand, I do believe I can stand and firmly say an unequivocal no,” she said during a Facebook Q&A. In 2016, Parker said: “I would love to do a sequel. I think we’ve all been fairly vocal about being very keen but that hasn’t created any groundswell of movement. ”
It would, for obvious reasons, be a seriously missed opportunity for Disney to release the film during any time of the year other than Halloween, which means we probably have at least a year to wait for the adventures of the Sanderson sisters revived for the new millennium. And if they were freaked out by buses and lighters, just think how they’ll react to smartphones and Facebook.
