Image copyright ABC Image caption The series will be set around the explosive bond between a good girl and a bad boy
Four decades after A Queer Thing Happened to America, Queer Eye is to return for another makeover TV series, it has been confirmed.
The show, with its outspoken Fab Five advisers helping people in situations which are considered “taboo”, will be set around a fight between brothers.
The new version – known as Queer Eye: Fresh Faces for the Modern World – will air on ABC, re-teaming the group of gay pals.
David Collins, a TV critic for The Hollywood Reporter, said the move was “a classic case of double branding”.
“It’s further proof that everyone is selling to everyone else,” he told the BBC.
“ABC is selling gay people as a market, not as a cultural expression or an audience niche.
“Queer Eye: Fresh Faces for the Modern World will see our most optimistic fifth character – the quintessential heterosexual white man – turn into an exact replicating version of himself: a sanctimonious asshole.”
Image copyright ABC Image caption The new series is to air on ABC and Netflix. Previous episodes were on Netflix
The new series will see what became of the show’s original, all-male Fab Five; original host Carson Kressley, “but that’s about it”, Collins said.
“Look forward to gay YouTube stars being recruited to star in the new series because fakes are cheap. Trans guys, people with disabilities and hairdressers should get an offer.”
In 2006, Queer Eye for the Straight Guy picked up an Emmy Award, and a third season was commissioned for 2012 by Bravo, which is now on the same network as ABC.
The original Queer Eye’s popularity reached its peak in 2004, with one episode watched by more than four million viewers in the US.
Since then, the show has not returned to the airwaves, and despite reruns on Amazon Prime, no news has been made as to its current status.
We’re so excited to finally reveal the new #QueerEye Fab Five — the new reality/design show you’ll be tuning in to soon pic.twitter.com/SWhrkJfHpv — Good Morning America (@GMA) August 8, 2018
Queer Eye: Fresh Faces for the Modern World will debut in the US in 2019.
The new format will see the show’s fab five invite four straight celebrities to join them in each episode. The mentors will coach the celebrities “to step outside of their comfort zones and re-invent themselves” by personalising each participant’s lifestyle in the new setting, a statement from ABC said.
The formats of both Queer Eye and Step by Step, the show that was hosted by Rachael Leigh Cook, were co-produced by Good Morning America producer ABC Studios.
Earlier this year, Queer Eye favourite Karamo Brown said his version of the show would have a positive message to help gay and transgender people “feel comfortable”.
Having left the Fab Five after season three, he told PEOPLE magazine he felt the character of Tan France, “quirky and fluid”, had not fit in.
Asked what he thought he could have brought to the show in its fourth year, Brown said: “My heart broke when they let Tan go. I found my voice, I moved from the imaginary neutral ground of the Fab Five to the heart of the series.
“I am a doctor, I am a writer, I am a guy in L.A. who went through a divorce. I need to give people practical, available, available, give them tools they need that’s real, practical, that’s funny.”
Queer Eye will be appearing at Vulture Festival in London on 22 August, and airs on Netflix on 6 September.