Friday Night Lights Reboot: Everything We Know So Far

Family, community, and football. That’s what audiences expect when they watch “Friday Night Lights.” Inspired by the movie of the same name (which was based on a non-fiction book by journalist H. G. “Buzz” Bissinger), the show follows a high school football team in the fictional town of Dillon, Texas. The Panthers have just gained a new coach in Eric Taylor (Kyle Chandler), and he has his work cut out for him.

Across five seasons, “Friday Night Lights” not only highlights the difficulties Taylor inherits as coach, but the issues the teen players face at school and in their personal lives. Jason Street (Scott Porter) gets injured during a game, leaving the star quarterback paralyzed and trying to figure out his next steps. Tim Riggins’ (Taylor Kitsch) home life isn’t great, and it often impacts how he plays. Coach Eric’s daughter Julie (Aimee Teegarden) is trying to fit into her new school while crushing on the new quarterback Matt (Zach Gilford). From high school to championships to college, we’re along for the ride as the teens experience it all.

In November 2024, Variety sources revealed that a new “Friday Night Lights” series was in the works. Here’s what we know about the reboot so far.

There’s been no confirmation on when fans might expect to see the new “Friday Night Lights” series, but, in December 2024, Deadline exclusively confirmed that Peacock, the streaming service owned by NBCUniversal, would be the home for the show. Peacock fended off competition from Netflix, which has been leaning into 2000s nostalgia (the streaming giant snagged the rights to the “One Tree Hill” reboot, which also does not have a premiere date).

Though Peacock outbid Netflix, and the series is in development after being greenlit by the streamer, bosses are yet to make an official episode order. This makes the premiere date even farther off, since the project is still in the early stages of development. However, with several members of the first show’s creative team back for the reboot, fans can at least rest assured that the project is in good hands.

The “Friday Night Light” reboot is just that: a reboot. It will not follow characters from the original series and is meant to tell a new story. Deadline reports that the show will feature “a rag tag high school football team and their damaged, interim coach” trying to win the state championship after a hurricane impacts their town. Because it’s set nearly two decades after the original show, the “Friday Night Lights” reboot will be different in the numbers of ways, but it will still delve into the themes that fans loved. That’s according to Peter Berg, who developed the original series and is back for the reboot.

“The original show was done a long time ago. There were no cell phones. No social media. It was a very different world, and yet the same values still exist, and the same family dynamics exist. Football’s only grown in its relevance in communities all over the country,” Berg told Esquire in May 2025. “So the core themes of ‘Friday Night Lights’ — that were revealed by Buzz Bissinger when he wrote the book — are very much present. There’s just so many new elements, so we want to look at that.” It seems like the plan is to bring “Friday Night Lights” into the modern era without losing what made the show special.

In his Esquire interview, Peter Berg revealed that the plan for the “Friday Night Lights” reboot is “a complete reinvention of the show,” and that meant finding “a whole new cast.” As such, it’s unlikely that we will see many original cast members return, if any. It’s been almost two decades since the original show debuted and they’ve all moved on to other things (here’s what the cast of “Friday Night Lights” looks like today). Berg is confident that the show will succeed without any old faces, though he’s leaving the door open for some potential comebacks. “If certain cast members come back, have appearances, that’s great,” he said. “But if ‘Friday Night Lights’ works, it’ll be because it works as a reinvention.”

Two former cast members have spoken out about appearing in the reboot. Taylor Kitsch, who played fullback Tim Riggins, and Connie Britton, who was the coach’s wife Tami Taylor, both agreed in an interview with Vanity Fair in June 2025 that they would make cameo appearances, but have no plans to return to the reboot long-term. “I don’t feel I have much to say for Riggins or to reignite that whole thing, so I won’t be a part of it,” Kitsch said. “I’ll be the first one in line to watch. But in regard to being a part of it, I told Pete — and I bet you Connie would say the same — I would come in for a little bit of a funny arc or something, but I don’t think I would want to just full-stop go into three seasons of that.” Britton agreed, saying she was on board for “a real little tight cameo.”

One thing the “Friday Night Lights” reboot has in its favor is continuity, with several members of the original show’s creative team set to return. As mentioned, Peter Berg, who developed and produced the first series, is back for the reboot as an executive producer. This means Berg (pictured above promoting his 2025 Netflix show “American Primeval,” a Western inspired by the true story) will have been involved with all three adaptations of the source material so far, since he was the writer and director of the 2004 film “Friday Night Lights.”

Original showrunner Jason Katims, who worked on “Parenthood,” “Rise,” and “Almost Family” after “Friday Night Lights,” is also back for the reboot as an executive producer. He and Berg are joined by Brian Grazer, who served as an executive producer on the first series and has produced shows like “Arrested Development” and “Empire,” as well as movies like “Tick, Tick… Boom!” and “The Spy Who Dumped Me.” Kristen Zolner, who has produced some of the best stand-up comedy specials of the past decade like “Ali Wong: Baby Cobra” and “Bo Burnham: Make Happy,” along with shows like “Big Mouth” and “Friends from College,” is also an executive producer.