The Scrubs crew are coming back, but can they beat the reboot curse?

It’s been 15 years since Sacred Heart Hospital last opened its doors, but the medical sitcom Scrubs is almost back in practice, with a long-teased revival locked in for next February.

While its final season introduced a new hospital and predominantly new cast – a move so divisive even creator Bill Lawrence positioned the show as a spin-off at release, sneaking the subtitle “Med School” into the opening credits – Scrubs 2026 is back to most of the core crew.

The cast of the original Scrubs (from left): John C. McGinley, Neil Flynn, Sarah Chalke, Zach Braff, Donald Faison, Bon Keslo and Judy Reyes.

That means Zach Braff returns as goofy protagonist JD, alongside Donald Faison as his best friend, Turk. Sarah Chalke and Judy Reyes are also returning as the duo’s better halves, fellow docs Elliot and Carla, while John C. McGinley is on-board as Dr Cox, the group’s sarcastic, cynical mentor.

Behind the scenes, Scrubs seems in steady hands via production company ABC and longtime writer Aseem Batra, who was promoted to showrunner, while Lawrence is an executive producer – a result of contractual restrictions from a five-year deal with Warner. (He’s also pretty busy with two hit Apple TV shows, therapist comedy Shrinking and sunny-side Ted Lasso.)

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OK, that’s not all the beloved faces. Neil Flynn, who played the antagonistic hospital janitor, is a notable omission, though the actor still works with Lawrence on Shrinking, suggesting the door is not completely closed. (But don’t hold your breath for chief of staff Bob Kelso, as actor Ken Jenkins is seemingly retired at 85, without an acting credit for close to a decade.)

If you have fond memories of Scrubs but are struggling to get excited, I don’t blame you. Over the past decade, plenty of fans have been burned by the promise that a classic show’s revival will capture the original’s magic, only for it to be announced dead on arrival.

But Scrubs could work. Yes, very few sitcoms have made for solid revivals (a continuation of the story with at least a few original cast members) or reboots (a reimagining of the core premise, maybe with a secondary plot or character link to the original).

Most successful reboots have been dramas, procedurals or even reality shows — concepts that could easily transplant into new eras and without relying on old stars, such as Cobra Kai, Heartbreak High, Queer Eye or Mr & Mrs Smith.

But a hit sitcom can’t simply jump decades into the future and stay intact. To really gel, sitcoms need a freakish confluence of factors, including great on-screen chemistry, a welcoming cultural context, a good timeslot (or, now, a drop date that isn’t swallowed by bigger releases) and sharp writing that’s reliably familiar yet fresh.

Each of these are worth their own deep-dive into their unique issues, but since the early days of streaming, these revivals and reboots have come and gone (deep breath): Frasier, That ’70s Show, Arrested Development, Mad About You, Murphy Brown, Will & Grace, Saved by the Bell, Punky Brewster and Night Court.

Put simply, bottling magic twice isn’t easy – especially under the pressures of executives unwilling to take a risk, relying on cheap nostalgia instead of inventive, thoughtful story continuations.

There was even a short-lived 2022 sitcom about this called Reboot, where an estranged cast of a 2000s hit are given a second-shot at fame with an edgy show revival (not a reboot, suggesting even the satirists are confused). It’s a kind of spiritual sibling to the much more successful Apple TV satire The Studio, targeting the same creativity-numbing IP-obsession but focusing on TV instead of the film industry.

After several pessimistic paragraphs, you might be thinking, “Wait, weren’t you trying to convince me that the Scrubs revival could work?”

Well, when was the last time you revisited Scrubs? You might remember the janitor’s pranks, the musical episode and JD and Turk’s bromance (to use a very 2000s term), but the series wasn’t a conventional sitcom. It was always a comedy-drama cloaked in a sitcom skin, with characters who evolved and grew from nervous, skittering interns to capable doctors.

Jack Cutmore-Scott as Freddy Crane, left, and Kelsey Grammer as Frasier Crane in the 2024 revival of Frasier.

Lawrence was inspired to write Scrubs by a college friend’s experiences as an intern, pulling many of the show’s medical conundrums and screw-ups from stories shared by real doctors. The show threw heavy issues at its characters – as expected for a hospital – and they learnt from their mistakes, transforming from goofy, slightly annoying 20-somethings at the brink of catastrophe, to responsible partners who could still get up to mischief.

We don’t know too much about the direction Scrubs is in, but Lawrence’s interviews suggest he’s well in-tune with the show’s secret engine and doesn’t want to just drop the same people into 2026. After two decades in the US medical system, even JD and Turk would be a little jaded.

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“If I saw two guys in their late 40s or early 50s doing ‘World’s Most Giant Doctor,’ and carrying each other around all the time, I would go, ‘What the f--- is going on?’” Lawrence said in a June interview with TV Line. “[We want] to see what that [friendship] looks like at their age, and [take] a comedic look at what medicine has become since those kids started out as interns.”

While a beaten-down batch of doctors might not sound super wacky, Lawrence seems to be following the lead of King of the Hill’s successful revival this year, another sitcom with a lot of heart behind its laughs.

There were a few awkward humps as the show jumped 15 years forward, but it kept its core humour intact, as decent, no-nonsense Texan man Hank Hill was just as baffled by 2025 as he was by the 2000s. Sticking true to the characters is key, but one tip: JD, let’s leave the G-strings in the past.

Scrubs is streaming on Stan – owned by Nine, the publisher of this masthead – and Disney+. The new season streams on Disney+ from February.

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