New Goosebumps series set to creep out Disney Plus subscribers
A live-action adaptation of R.L. Stine's popular book series is officially heading to the streamer
A new live-action adaption of the children’s horror novel series Goosebumps is creeping its way onto Disney+.
The series has been reported as being in the works as far back as April 2020, but now it’s been confirmed that Rob Letterman—who helmed the 2015 big-screen adaptation of the series—will be joined by Muppet maven Nick Stoller. The duo will be writing as well as producing. Letterman will direct the first episode of the 10-episode order.
This latest adaptation will take a serialized approach to the creepy stories of R.L. Stine and feature high school kids unleashing supernatural forces upon their town (doesn’t anybody just go drink in a cemetery or cruise around the same ten blocks of their neighborhood anymore). According to Variety, the kids will also learn “about their own parents’ teenage secrets in the process.”
As we live in the age of the cinematic universe and the legacy sequel, it’s fair to question whether this latest take will tie into Letterman’s film or the Canadian adaptation that ran on Fox Kids from 1995 to 1998, especially with the suggestion of the parents of the new crop of kids having some secrets just waiting to be unearthed.
The new series will no doubt feature callbacks and easter eggs for constant readers of the original series which features 62 books beginning with 1992’s Welcome To Dead House as well as its many spin-offs.
Lovers of young adult horror are smack in the middle of a Stine-aissance. His Fear Street series— the middle step for horror-loving adolescents who grew up on Goosebumps but weren’t quite ready for Stephen King or Clive Barker—was the inspiration for a trio of films released on Netflix last summer. This will be the second Stine property at Disney as an adaptation of his Just Beyond graphic novels premiered just last October with an eight-episode season that featured E.T.’s buddy Henry Thomas and Tim Heidecker.
No cast or release date is currently set for Goosebumps.