Cue Gavin DeGraw’s “I Don’t Want to Be,” One Tree Hill is set to return for a sequel series. According to a report from Deadline, a follow-up to the popular original series is being developed for Netflix. One Tree Hill stars and Drama Queens podcast co-hosts Sophia Bush and Hilarie Burton will star and executive produce the series. Danneel Ackles is in talks to reprise the role of Rachel Scott and will also executive produce with her brother Jensen Ackles under their Chaos Machine banner. Firefly Lane’s Becky Hartman Edwards will be at the helm. As Deadline reports:
The sequel is said to take place 20 years later following best friends Brooke and Peyton who are now parents to teens and facing challenges not unfamiliar to what they tackled in the original series like love, insecurities and grief.
One Tree Hill premiered in 2003 on the CW, and later the WB network. The drama series followed half-brothers Lucas (Chad Michael Murray) and Nathan Scott (James Lafferty), and their circle of friends, as they navigated adolescence, and later adulthood, in Tree Hill, North Carolina. After nine seasons, One Tree Hill wrapped in 2012. In 2017, concerning reports about series creator Mark Schwahn began to circulate. Several women, including Burton and Danneel, accused Schwahn of sexual harassment. He has no connection to the upcoming series.
In 2021, Bush and Burton launched the One Tree Hill rewatch podcast, Drama Queens, alongside Bethany Joy Lenz, who starred in the original series through its entire run as Haley James. It’s currently unknown whether Lenz (who previously said she’d absolutely return for a reboot) will join the sequel series. Burton, who exited One Tree Hill after its sixth season, recently stepped back from the podcast as it embarked on rewatching the seventh season. Robert Buckley, who portrayed Chad Evans, is now hosting in her place.
What the One Tree Hill Sequel Will Have to Explore
Warner Bros. Television
When Burton exited the series in 2009, so did Murray. During their last season, Burton’s Peyton and Murray’s Lucas get married and have a daughter. While we can imagine the series will touch on the two’s relationship, as Murray “has no plans to return for the follow-up,” we’ll have to assume that Peyton and Lucas weren’t endgame. As a reminder, Bush and Murray had a short-term real-life marriage that did not end amicably. As for Bush’s Brooke, the end of the series saw her married to Julian (Austin Nichols) and a new mom to twins. We’ll have to see if Nichols will return or if the storyline will take Brooke in a different romantic direction.
There is one couple that fans of the original series will definitely not want to see at odds: Lafferty’s Lucas and Lenz’s Haley. The fan-favorite couple began their romance during the show’s inaugural season and later became parents to Jamie and Lydia. It would be hard to imagine one of those characters returning without the other, so we’ll keep our fingers crossed that if the show gets the official go-ahead, we’ll be able to follow more of their love story. If the series gets the greenlight, more of the original cast is expected to be approached to return.
One Tree Hill
is streaming on Max, Hulu, and Disney+.
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