It's the Same Different World

A year and a half back, I wrote about watching all the available episodes of A Different World (1987–1993) from Netflix. I also mentioned the rumored new series. Well guess what, there are now ten new (2026) episodes, also on Netflix.

The ingredients are mostly the same: a 2020s generation enters the Hillman College, among them Deborah, the daughter of Dwayne and Whitley from the original series. Another notable freshman is Shaquille, Ron Johnson's successful football-playing son.

Sorry, Netflix wants me to photograph their show from the screen.

Deborah and Shaquille already have some history between them, which provides the necessary romantic fast forward for a series that only has ten episodes. Rashida from Compton, L.A. looks like the one fish out of water, and tensions will arise.

So it's not a full reboot, actually not a reboot at all, but a continuation of the show after decades have passed. The series concept is quite robust for re-vitalizing, as it's about the college and not about the specific characters. Yet at the same time the show was very much tied to the chemistry of the original actors, and as soon as the creators attempted to shift focus to a new generation, it began to fizzle.

Indeed I was surprised how many of the old actors are present. They are nearly stealing the show from the younger generation, as if to admit this was always about them anyway. The freshmen are dangerously close to having the same fate as their counterparts in the last seasons of the old series: not as inspiring as the pioneering crew.

Repeating the mistakes of our fathers.

The fact the main character is a daughter of Whitley and Dwayne, could have in itself been a sufficient baton from the old series, but as Whitley and Dwayne are almost constantly present as well, one wonders if the connection is even necessary.

No show today relies on laugh tracks or "studio audience", although the writers found a way to make a small nod to that practice. So even the supposed comedy is quite different from the 1980s style. The precedent for this was already scattered across the 1980/1990s show, as many episodes dealt with serious matters. I've also felt that whatever merits the original show had were hidden between the intended gags, and the new creators are aiming to bottle that spark again.

Even if a single episode usually explores a theme, more definite story arcs are introduced for the ten episodes. As the presidency of the entire college now befalls on Dwayne, he has to negotiate a crisis of missing millions and salvage what remains of his marriage. The students are mostly preoccupied with their relationships, but also study problems, money, mental health, and who had teh sexx0r with who. The Pit once again becomes a central environment for interactions.

As two semesters are being fast forwarded, a lot can happen between episodes. So all the newbie tropes are basically done after the first installment, and by the fifth the viewer is supposed to accept the friendships and enmities. The episode length is about right, but the season could have benefited from a few more episodes.

Weren't we all.

What is now endearing in the original series, was the complete lack of mobile phones and smartphone culture, or even the mainstream World Wide Web. Obviously a show explicitly set in the late 2020s is naturally entrenched in smartphone culture and we have skipped the entire WWW era.

A post-Covid smartphone culture is perhaps symbolic of the pace and quick shifts the story now takes. I can only compare this to the fairly recent Bold Type (2017-2021), where the transition from physical media was still a plot point. We've gone past something, again, which makes itself present in contemporary shows like this.

Just as the original, there's a pinch of politics and topicality. In the current ideological landscape of the US, the writers just cannot avoid commenting on the current administration even if they wanted to, and the reason for why the show needs to exist, also begins to reveal itself.

Because A Different World doesn't let go of the old characters, it works as a dose of closure for those who really, really wanted to know how it went with Whitley, Dwayne, Ron, Freddie and whoever is alive of the rest of the cast. And it does this just fine, and benefits from the fast forwarding approach. Unexpected guests from the past arrive at a staggering pace, and an interesting name gets dropped near the end. For some plot points I could have hoped the cast was at least 10 years younger.

Conveniently, all plotlines and tensions converge in the season finale. I hear the series has been signed for second season, not a problem at all.