And just like that, the extremely depressing ending of Roseanne is no more.
According to ABC Entertainment president Channing Dungey, all of our tears over the series finale of Roseanne have been in vain. The recently announced TV reboot, which will reunite cast members including Roseanne Barr, John Goodman, and Sara Gilbert, will ignore the fact that Goodman's character Dan died of a heart attack.
"I can confirm that Dan is still alive," teased Dungey to the audience, which had likely assumed Goodman was returning to the series as some sort of ghostly apparition of his former self.
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It's good news, sure — but I'm not at all okay with it.
Roseanne's final season will go down as one of the bleakest in sitcom history, not because of what the audience saw happen, but because of what actually did. In the final episode it was revealed that Roseanne (Barr) had actually been writing a story about her life this entire time, and while it stuck mostly to the truth, she embellished a bit — and changed the things she didn't like. One of those things? The fact that her husband Dan died of a heart attack in the timeline of season 8, making everything after that season a complete work of fiction.
Is that absolutely insane? Yes, but I love it. It's brave! It's sad! It's memorable. The final season of Roseanne may not have been critically perfect, but the last episode put a nice little button to explain such a kooky season. You can't just erase the St. Elsewhere of sitcoms like that.
Or, you know, you totally can — especially when the John Goodman gives his thumbs up to appear on the reboot.
What will become of Roseanne, 2.0.? Perhaps more of the first eight seasons of the series, which are still the gold standard for sitcom writing. As for that season 9 experiment, well, maybe I'll be the only one to miss the twist.