At this point, many actors and show creators out there can attest to the reality of the concept known as the “streaming bump,” which refers to a newfound reign of popularity when a project arrives on streaming for the first time. (Or when it returns after a long absence.) Most recently, the former USA legal drama Suits has been absolutely tearing it up on Netflix (and Peacock), and literally set a Nielsen streaming ratings record, so the question now is whether Patrick J. Adams and Gabriel Macht will be brought back as Mike and Harvey for a revival season.
Suits has been part of Peacock’s streaming library for a while now, but rejoined Netflix as “new” content in June, and has remained a major fixture on the site’s Top 10 TV Shows list. To the point where fans streamed the show for a combined 3.1 billion minutes across both Netflix and Peacock, marking a record total for an acquired series. Quite a feat for a series that wrapped up its nine-season run three years prior. With viewers no doubt hoping anew for the series to find new life in some way, shape, or form, executive producer Gene Klein spoke with TVLine about the heightened spark of interest, and while there are no dedicated plans in place to bring the show back, he said there’s a general sense of understanding that a call could come at any point. In his words:
You know, I’ve mentioned to Aaron that I keep, in this era of reboots and reunions and all this other stuff, that I’m expecting a call at some point. But I’m not aware of any serious conversations. It’s just one of those things where, in this day and age, you wouldn’t be surprised if somebody called you someday. But so far, nothing that I’m aware of.
While it’s easy for those of us outside the Suits producer team to say things like, “Someone should bring the show back for a new season,” it’s an entirely different and exceedingly more complicated process to actually pull such a feat off. Especially regarding the context of Suits itself, considering the casting changes that took place in the later seasons.
As fans no doubt recall, Gina Torres’ Jessica Pearson bowed out of the flagship drama in the middle of Season 6, and returned later to lead the one-season spinoff that shared her surname. And then both Patrick J. Adams and Meghan Markle exited as Mike and Rachel at the end of Season 7, though Adams did return in a recurring capacity for Season 9. They were replaced in part by a pair of other TV drama vets in Dulé Hill and Katherine Heigl, and it would be wild to see a revival season bring together all five of the aforementioned actors into one storyline.
But that’s probably the hardest part of it all, as Gene Klein implied it’s far from a guarantee that the show’s stars would be up for returning, all things considered. Here’s how he put it:
Yeah. As you might remember, it was a complicated dance keeping everybody involved, getting all the actors deals done and keeping them involved through the end of the show. I’d be surprised if we could thread that needle for a reunion, but I’d also be delighted if that happened because [when] you do a show for that long, everybody becomes such a good friend.
One has to wonder if Meghan Markle returned for a new season of Suits on Netflix if it would help her get more projects off the ground at the streaming service as part of her overall deal with husband Prince Harry. She hasn’t shown much interest in returning to scripted acting in such a large capacity, but we shall see. Also, it’s hard to know if Netflix would be the one to actually fund more episodes, since the series falls under NBCUniversal, whose execs would no doubt be interested in porting that massive audience over to its own service.
For any Netflix viewers curious about why the show may end strangely, that’s because not all of the episodes are available there. The ninth and final season is currently only available to stream with a Peacock subscription, so that’ll all you need to see how the series ended the first time around.
