Tim’s Allen’s found a formula that works for him, and he’s sticking with it. The Home Improvement star is returning to his roots with upcoming ABC series Shifting Gears, which will celebrate 33 years of Allen playing a grouchy dad.
In the incoming series, Allen plays Matt, the “stubborn, widowed owner of a classic car restoration shop.” After struggling through a contentious relationship with his daughter for years, the young Riley — played by Kat Dennings — married the boyfriend he hated and moved away. More than a decade later, Riley is divorced, and forced to return home to her dad with two teenage kids in tow. As the film’s official logline states, “When Matt’s estranged daughter and her teenage kids move into his house, the real restoration begins,” which is so hilariously close to Allen’s previous projects that it must be good.
Say what you will about the 70-year-old star, but he knows how to make a family sitcom shine. Both Home Improvement and Last Man Standing — a pair of shows that share a massive amount of real estate with the incoming Shifting Gears — were thoroughly popular among audiences, and chances are good that Shifting Gears will prove just as successful.
Do we know when Shifting Gears is releasing?
Dennings only recently signed onto Shifting Gears, and the series is still in pre-production, which means were still a good while out from it landing on ABC. The team behind the fresh release seem to be working hard and fast, however, as multiple outlets are reporting a Fall 2024 release date. It’ll be a sprint for them to fully develop the series in such a short amount of time, but the show was already delayed once — due to 2023’s dual strikes — so it will likely avoid another delay at all costs.
Should the show manage to get through pre-production and all the way to release by Fall of 2024, we could have Shifting Gears on our screens as soon as September. Should it need a few additional months to iron out the many steps involved in making a televised series, however, it may see another minor delay that pushes its release back to the winter months of 2024 or even spring of 2025.
