Tim Allen Explains Why ‘Home Improvement’ Revival Is Stuck

Tim Allen still wants to bring Home Improvement back — but getting the Taylor family together again may be easier said than done.

The actor has spent years talking about the possibility of a revival of the hit sitcom, which ran from 1991 to 1999 and helped make stars out of Allen and his on-screen sons. But according to Allen, there are some major obstacles standing in the way.

The Biggest Issues Involve the Boys

In a recent chat with Us Weekly, Allen explained that discussions about a Home Improvement revival continue, but the project keeps running into problems when it comes to the actors who played his TV sons.

“They keep talking about how it could move forward, but they get stuck [because] there are some personality problems right now with the boys,” Allen said, adding that “they’ve got their own issues.”

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Allen admitted he always thought it would be cool if a revival focused on the sons, but acknowledged that’s proving difficult at the moment.

I always thought it would be cool if it was a story about them. That’s a little challenging right now, to put it mildly.

Allen has previously suggested that a reboot could focus on the next generation of the Taylor family.

Speaking with Entertainment Weekly in 2024, he floated the idea of a series centered around the sons’ children.

“It’s funny, one of the conversations we’ve had recently is how weird it would be if Home Improvement would be about the kids’ kids,” Allen said at the time. “Like if all of them had children, and I’m a grandparent. Home Re-Improvement or something like that.”

Where the Original Cast Stands Today

Part of the challenge is that the actors who played Randy, Brad, and Mark have taken very different paths since the show ended.

Jonathan Taylor Thomas largely stepped away from acting years ago and has focused more on writing and directing. Taran Noah Smith also left acting behind after the series wrapped.

Meanwhile, Zachery Ty Bryan has faced several legal troubles in recent years. He is currently serving a 16-month jail sentence in California and, in March, was sentenced to an additional 19 months in Oregon after admitting to three probation violations.

Not Everyone Has Been on Board

Even among the adult cast, enthusiasm for a revival hasn’t always been unanimous.

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Patricia Richardson, who played Tim’s wife, Jill Taylor, previously pushed back on the idea that the cast was fully behind a reunion.

Speaking on the Back to the Best podcast in 2024, Richardson said she was surprised to hear Allen publicly discussing a revival because she hadn’t been contacted about it.

It was so weird. I would hear he was coming out publicly and saying this stuff about everyone was on board to do a Home Improvement reunion, but he never asked me, and he never asked Jonathan.

Richardson also pointed to some of the practical challenges facing any reboot effort, noting that several cast members have moved on from acting altogether.

“I mean, Zach is now a felon,” she said. “Taran hasn’t acted since he left the show; he’s not an actor anymore. And Jonathan’s not really interested in acting. He wants to direct and write. And we don’t have Wilson.”

That last point refers to Earl Hindman, who played the beloved neighbor whose face was famously hidden behind a fence throughout the series. Hindman died in 2003.

For now, Allen appears interested in revisiting the world of Home Improvement. Whether all the pieces can come together, however, remains a much bigger question.