A reboot of 7th Heaven plans to address technology-based issues, “school stuff,” bullying, drugs and alcohol, Jessica Biel said in a recent Collider Ladies Night interview, reported by Variety. Biel said the original series “gently touched on” such subjects, while the new version has fewer limitations. She also wants to preserve its focus on family and faith, with a tone she described as “a little bit more glass-half-full.”
That combination is the reboot’s best idea and its main risk. Teenagers’ problems can become a checklist of urgent topics, each introduced, resolved and filed away before the next one arrives. A family drama has a better chance when those pressures change how people live together: a parent’s rules collide with a child’s privacy, or a school problem follows someone home. Biel’s list names subject areas; the writing will have to give them consequences.
Her appeal for something hopeful on television is understandable. Optimism need not mean varnishing the hard parts. A hopeful family show has to let trouble stay trouble long enough for care, faith or community to mean something. Otherwise “realistic” becomes a label for familiar issues, while the tidy ending does all the emotional work.
Variety reports that the original ran for 11 seasons. It also reported that the reboot is expected to focus on a diverse family, with no original cast members set to appear. That gives the new series room to build its own household instead of treating the Camdens as a guest attraction. The useful test will be whether its family members disagree in ways the show cannot smooth over by the closing credits. A little less limitation is promising; letting a problem stay complicated after everyone has gathered around the table would be more interesting.
