Jason Bateman signs on for a fifth season of Arrested Development

Last Updated on July 31, 2021

Following the cancellation of Arrested Development over a decade ago, rumours persisted that the show would find a way to return, either as a feature film or for an additional season. Netflix wound up coming to the rescue and resurrected the series for a fourth season which debuted four years ago, and almost immediately, there was talk of a fifth. It was hard enough to wrangle the schedules of Jason Bateman, Portia de Rossi, Will Arnett, Michael Cera, Alia Shawkat,Tony Hale, David Cross, Jeffrey Tambor and Jessica Walter for the Netflix season, and it would prove to be a stumbling block when it came time for get the band together once again. Everyone clearly wanted to do it, but with such a large ensemble, it would take a bit of effort to coordinate their schedules.

After Arrested Development executive producer Brian Grazer teased back in January that they were "really close" to announcing the fifth season of the series, it seems that the ball is finally rolling. Jason Bateman took to Twitter to announce that he has signed on for the fifth season of Arrested Development.

With Jason Bateman officially on-board, I would hope that we'll soon hear that the rest of the cast will be back as well. We still don't know exactly what a fifth season of Arrested Development will bring, but creator Mitch Hurwitz has previously said that it would be a "serialized murder mystery."