The Thundermans: Our Kid Reporter Grills Kira Kosarin and Jack Griffo About the Revival Movie, Evil Bunnies and More — Watch
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When The Thundermans aired its final episode on Nickelodeon in 2018, it went out the way it came in five years before: as a laugh-track-studded, half-hour comedy about a family of superheroes living in a fictional suburb called Hiddenville. The jokes were plentiful. The vibes were warm. The pet bunny was evil. (More on that in a moment.)
But when the idea of a reunion movie first came up years later, says Kira Kosarin, who played Thunderman teen daughter Phoebe in the original series, things looked and felt a lot different.
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“I want to be honest about the way it all happened, but I also don’t ever want to shade anyone, because everybody who had a hand in the show, ever, was so wonderful. Like, we really, truly got so lucky,” she tells TVLine. “But I will say, the original version that came to us was a dark, gritty, single-cam movie reboot to be shot in Canada, probably.”
This time around, though, both Kosarin and co-star Jack Griffo, who played Phoebe’s twin brother Max, were to serve as executive-producers on the movie — meaning they had more say than they used to in how things unfolded.
“There’s a chance that [the darker version] would’ve been really fun and cool. And had I been in a different place in my career, and had we not had such a wonderful time shooting The Thundermans the first time around, maybe I would’ve been comfortable going in that direction,” Kosarin continues. “But I felt really strongly, also for the sake of the fans, that the movie should have the same feel as the show. So my main, big demand was that it was a multi-cam with a laugh track, and that it felt like the original series and that we got to shoot it the way we shot the original.”
All of those requests were met, she adds. And: “They took it one step further, and we were albe to even film it at Paramount Studios, where we filmed the original, which was really special.”
Another sticking point: A very early version of the script was focused solely on Max and Phoebe, Kosarin says, “and I was like, ‘No, it’s not The Thundermans unless everybody comes back.’” Rest assured, all of the family members — Rosa Blasi as mom Barb, Chris Tallman as dad Hank, and Addison Riecke, Diego Velázquez and Maya Le Clark as Thunderman siblings Nora, Billy and Chloe, respectively — returned for the film, as did many other members of the cast.
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“Having everyone in the movie, like Kira said, was really important for us, for the fans, for the show, the heart,” Griffo says. “It was a superhero show, but it was really about the family, you know?”
Griffo and Kosarin stopped by TVLine’s New York offices to talk all things Thundermans, from The Thundermans Return (now streaming on Paramount+) to some of their favorite (and least favorite) memories of shooting the original series. Then they proved their super mettle by sticking around to field questions — including one about the cute yet devious rabbit Dr. Colosso — from a young Thundermans super fan.
Press PLAY on the video above to watch Kosarin and Griffo in action, then hit the comments with your thoughts!
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