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Netflix’s ‘remixed’ version of Arrested Development season 4 premieres May 4th

Netflix’s ‘remixed’ version of Arrested Development season 4 premieres May 4th

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Creator Mitch Hurwitz also says the fifth season will have a release date ‘real soon’

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Back in 2014, Arrested Development creator Mitch Hurwitz announced that he had decided to recut the show’s fourth season Netflix revival, abandoning its original structure — with each episode focused on a single character — and replacing it with a version that intercuts all the characters’ stories chronologically. It wasn’t clear at the time whether that edit would ever be made available to the public, but today, Hurwitz finally announced the new version’s Netflix release date: May 4th. As in, this Friday.

In a statement released on the official Arrested Development Netflix account, Hurwitz announced that the new season would be called Arrested Development Season 4 Remix: Fateful Consequences. The original season, which premiered on Netflix in 2013, was 15 episodes long; the new cut will be 22 shorter episodes. Hurwitz describes the original segmented style as “akin to eating some toast, then some bacon — maybe a sliced tomato followed by some turkey, and realizing, ‘Hey, I think I just had a BLT.’” The episodes in the remixed season will only be 20 minutes long, and they will create a more “interwoven” narrative.

Hurwitz also writes that the long-awaited fifth season of the series will have a release date “soon. Like real soon. Like, if you knew when, you would not be wrong to be thinking ‘why are we all just hearing this now?’”

Because Arrested Development was a cult favorite when Fox canceled the show in 2006, fans were understandably divided on the fourth season’s unexpected narrative style. The remixed version could placate viewers hankering for a version of the season that feels more like the show they originally embraced.

“I’m really excited about the final result,” Hurwitz writes. “It’s funny in a whole new way and I believe it creates a really entertaining and hilarious new experience for the ‘viewer.’ And I only call you that because I don’t know how to pronounce your last name.”