The Return of FEENY!!! Boy Meets World, Again.

The four best friends most of us didn't really have.

Twelve years after its final episode aired on ABC's TGIF! lineup, "Boy Meets World" (or "BWM" for the purpose of this article), the super-corny yet genuinely entertaining sitcom chronicling the life adventures of Cory (Ben Savage, younger brother of slightly more successful and Emmy-nominated actor-turned-comedy TV director Fred Savage); his on-again-off-again-on-again-off-again girlfriend (seriously, how many times did they break-up in high school?) turned fiancee-turned-wife Topanga (Danielle Fishel); his best friend, the "bad boy" Shawn (Ryder Strong), who was rather tame compared to his compatriots on other 90s teen shows and modern-day standards for TV and real-life bad boys; and his older brother Eric (Will Friedle, sporting a weird beard and get-up in this photo from a National Lampoon movie. Friedle was geniuenly laugh-out-loud funny, and it's a shame his career didn't continue to climb post-BWM)

Feeny!!!

Their life stories and adventures often included commentary/Greek chorus and advice from the beloved and respected Mr. Feeny, who was portrayed by William Daniels, in his best-known and beloved role. So suck on that Entertainment Weekly. Those idiots think his signature role was voicing some sports car on some 80s show.

I first began watching the show during the last couple of years on ABC, where it aired during its Friday night lineup called TGIF, where various other forgettable sitcoms featuring several actors who deserved much better (like Bonnie Hunt and Breckin Meyer) also aired. And George Lopez's sitcom.

When it went off the air in May 2000, the Disney Channel, which had been airing reruns for several years by then, picked up the slack for those who were suffering from "BMW" withdrawal. Back-to-back episodes would air every afternoon at 4pm that autumn. Then two hours of "BMW" were on the air every day. Granted the 11pm-12am episodes were a repeat of the 4pm-5pm ones, but still. That's two hours of "BWM." Then there were the 24-hour marathons that occurred every New Year's Day ("Where's There a Will, There's a Marathon") throughout the 2000s. Then mini-marathons (6-10 episodes in one sitting) would air during random weekends.

At one point, "BMW" was on Disney Channel more often than the network's original content, which included "Even Stevens", "Lizzie McGuire", and that show with the fake-famous black kid TV star and  the other one with that sports jersey that could take kids back in time to various sports-related events. It was on Disney Channel that really introduced me to Cory and Co. It was amazing. For awhile, I watched so much "BMW" that I was able to recite dialogue from almost every episode. I felt like they could have been my friends in real-life, or at least the friends I wished I had in real life. (Boo-hoo moment here.)

Look, it's a picture of a sad cute puppy to show how sad I was when I was a kid.
Oh, that puppy is so adorable.
Sorry, where were we?

Eventually, I managed to get some real-life friends (so, hooray for me.) and I stopped watching "BMW." Something called college, then Florida, then schedule changes at Disney Channel got in the way. Then a couple of years ago, I was working out at the gym on campus when I noticed a very familiar face on a TV screen that was attached to that weird machine where you work on your legs (you run on it and it records how many strokes you can do in one minute). It was Eric's face. And he was trying to get Feeny ("Feeny!") to meet him on the fence that bordered their back-yards. I got off the bike and asked the woman on the machine about this. She told me that it was on MTV2. I got on the machine next to hers and began working on my legs with the weird stroke-recording machine. While I never bothered to figure out the name of the device, I did create a schedule where I would go to the gym every afternoon when "BMW" was on MTV2. And I got into good shape in the process. But more importantly, I was able to laugh and enjoy a piece of my childhood that I didn't know I had missed so dearly when I saw Eric and Mr. Feeny on the small screen.

William Daniels, a Tony-nominee and two-time Primetime Emmy Award winner, made his acting debut in 1943. He has appeared on the screen in "A Thousand Clowns", "The Graduate" and "Two for the Road", and on Broadway in "A Thousand Clowns" and "1776". This is his most memorable role to people under the age of 30. I am definitely using this GIF for his obituary.

Now it has been announced that "Boy Meets World" is coming back to life. The Disney Channel (of course) are planning to create a sequel called "Girl Meets World", which would chronicle the Cory and Topanga's daughter and her life adventures.

The Feeny doll. I sincerely hope Disney creates this for their upcoming  BMW/GWM merch-fest.

I have mixed feelings about this. I understand this is part of the natural trend where we dig not-very-deep into the pop culture of our not-so-distant past for revitalized entertainment. Most of the 2000s where spent on revitalizing pop culture of the 1980s. (Thanks VH1!) And now the 2010s are about the 90s. We have rivalling boy bands. Several 90s TV stars are back on TV (and a bunch of them are on the cast of "The Good Wife"). There was an attempt at remaking "Total Recall" that didn't quite work out. Four people from "Friends" have TV shows. (And one of them, Matt Leblanc aka Joey won a Golden Globe in the process. Another one, Lisa Kudrow, won an Emmy for creating one a hilarious web series that turned into a TV series.)

I love "Boy Meets World." But I'm not sure it should be revived for a sequel. At least it shouldn't be a hack job. It has to be done right. People's emotions and childhood memories are at stake.

Let's be honest. The show hasn't aged well. Its drenched in that After-School Special juice that is ready to be mocked and parodied by the cynics of this era. The writing on the show wasn't that great (but then, that hasn't stopped numerous shows about high school from succeeding, even today). But it's going to happen, because:

Imagine this entire Disney Store filled with BWM merch.

A) it's Disney, and those guys know how to squeeze every last cent out of something in order to further profit from it.

B) it will succeed as long as there are "BMW" fanatics around.

C) the cast haven't really been successful professionally in the 12 years the show ended its run. With the exception of Daniels (Feeny), who won two Emmys for Best Actor for "St. Elsewhere" and has had a remarkable career on the stage and in movies for decades prior to ""BMW", it seems everyone else peaked with the show. Sure Friedle was on "Kim Possible" and Fishel was a TV host for some obscure entertainment show, then gained publicity for losing weight and became a spokesperson for Nurtisystem. But they haven't been on the tip of tongues of most people, except maybe contestants of game shows and board games at home when the category "90s kid actors" or "Disney TV shows" appears.

D) If they could find a way to bring the now 85-year old Daniels back, Disney will do it. Where there's a will, there a....

E) Marathon. Endless marathons of "BMW" to promote "Girl Meets World" or "GMW". And promo plug-ins. Plus, the initial audience from "BMW" and the fans who discovered the show in the 2000s are now adults. And some of them have some disposable income. Unless Romney is elected (and he won't, but let's be like New Yorkers for a second and prepare for the worst.), then that remaining disposable income is no mas. (That's "no more" in Spanish. I'm gonna use it now just in case Spanish is illegal under a Romney-fied America.) Think of the merch that the Rat, errr, Mouse can create to rake in some income. T-shirts, books, posters, dolls, lunch boxes, special packages of episodes on iTunes, DVD sales, maybe a tour where they will sing and dance. Who knows. Anything can happen.

I mean, as long as Disney continues to refuse to create anything positive for the largest minority in this country, then I will (reluctantly) get on this "Boy Meets World" bandwagon. Or BMW. I can get on one of those. They are comfy and reliable, like Disney.

A scene from the TV wedding of our youth.