Revivals can thrive because network TV is all about establishing relationships between a show and its audience

Vulture

“One of biggest creative advantages TV offers over movies is the ability to explore characters and story lines with the sort of depth impossible in a two-hour film,” says Josef Adalian. “Stories that take two hours to tell in a feature film unfold over the course of hundreds of episodes and many, many years. The weekly intimacy of network TV creates a massive emotional bond with its audience: It’s why the finales of shows such as Friends, Seinfeld, or Breaking Bad end up being the top-rated episodes in their respective runs, and why old episodes of those same shows do so well in syndicated reruns or on Hulu. Reviving well-loved shows seem symptomatic of creative bankruptcy, but for audiences literally programmed to connect with TV characters, continuations of Will & Grace or Roseanne are the small-screen equivalent of family or high-school reunions.”