With so many big reboots and revivals happening all across the small screen, it can be hard to keep up. But the quickest way to get from one end of that spectrum to the next is, of course, a magic school bus. Or rather, THE magic school bus, and Netflix's upcoming reimagining of the educational children's series, The Magic School Bus Rides Again, just dropped a new trailer that not only gives fans a great idea of what to expect, but it also unveiled the updated theme song, as sung by Hamilton standout Lin-Manuel Miranda. Check it out!
Now, it might be true that the Magic School Bus theme doesn't get everyone hollering in quite the same way that the DuckTales reboot had us all belting out that particular classic track, but there are undoubtedly a ton of fans out there who were snapping and singing along to Lin-Manuel Miranda's revised take just now. And if you're like me, you probably put all your talents into the line, "You might get baked into a pie!" Especially as we watched the Bus-orb actually rise up out of a blueberry pie. (I may or may not have been slightly bothered by the concept of being baked into a pie as a child.)
Perhaps unsurprisingly, The Magic School Bus Rides Again doesn't do a whole lot to modify the original theme song, appropriately titled "Ride On the Magic School Bus." I mean, when you're following a performance from Little Richard, it's kind of impossible to go bigger or bolder, so I think it was a good move to just modernize the music itself, and to let Lin-Manuel Miranda's killer vocal chops shine in a natural way. Would I have enjoyed a short interlude where he got to spit 16 bars about underwater creatures, outer space, and math formulas? Of course, but that's not for everyone.
The Magic School Bus Rides Again also looks like it'll be sticking pretty close to the tone of the original, though perhaps with the overall mindset that today's younger generations are more world-savvy than those who watched the initial run starting back in 1994. I'm never a fan of newer kid-oriented series that are built on a platform of snark, so it's good to see kids being inquisitive here.
Another big difference in this updated toon is Saturday Night Live star Kate McKinnon stepping in as the new teacher Miss Frizzle, although her older sister, who now goes by Professor Frizzle, will be back as well, with the great Lily Tomlin reprising the role. It's also been reported that some of the classmates from the original series are involved with new roles, and that fans can expect to see a selection of interesting celebrity cameos. Hopefully McKinnon was able to talk some of her SNL cohorts into lending their voices.
Get your mystical tokens ready, because The Magic School Bus Rides Again will be sipping across time and space when it hits Netflix on Friday, September 29, at 12:01 a.m. PT. To see everything else hitting the streaming service in the coming months, head to our 2017 Netflix premiere guide, and for the rest of the small screen's future offerings, our fall TV schedule will set you up nicely.
