THE GREATEST AMERICAN HERO Flies Again

Deadline is reporting that Fox has given a put pilot order for a reboot of The Greatest American Hero.

Phil Lord and Chris Miller (The Lego Movie) will executive produce the new version of the show, created by Stephen J. Cannell, along with Cannell’s daughter, Tawnia McKiernan. Rodney Rothman will write and also executive produce.

This new version will follow an inner city teacher named Isaac after he discovers a super-suit and loses the instructions. Along the way, he picks up a government handler with different ideas on how to put the suit to good use. Isaac will have to learn how to use the suit by trial and error, very much like Ralph Hinckley did when he got the suit.

Slightly different from the original 1981 series, which starred William Katt and Robert Culp, this new version could be either a sequel or a reboot. It all depends on how the show is written, as the end of the original series had Ralph passing on the suit to Holly Hathaway after his secret identity was spoiled. The episode was intended to be a pilot for a new series on NBC after ABC cancelled the original, something NBC exec Brandon Tartikoff felt was a mistake.

The show also established that others had worn similar suits in the episode “Don’t Mess Around With Jim” — which also introduced the moral quandary of using the suit for personal gain, something that seems to be part of Isaac’s dilemma in the new show.