Disney+ Reboots 'Turner & Hooch' As A TV Series With Josh Peck In The Lead
There's a new canine cop in town, and Josh Peck will be his unwilling partner in the new Turner & Hooch TV series. Disney+ has picked up a reboot of the classic 1989 buddy cop comedy movie and will adapt it into a 12-episode series starring Peck in the role originated by Tom Hanks. The Turner and Hooch TV series reboot will be the latest of many dog-related original titles on the streaming service, which include the Lady and the Tramp remake and the Willem Dafoe-starring Togo.
Deadline reports that Disney has tapped Josh Peck to play the lead in Turner & Hooch, a TV series reboot of the 1989 buddy cop comedy movie originally starring Tom Hanks as an uptight police officer who gets partnered with a dog. The character has been upgraded to a U.S. marshal in the series, with Peck set to play U.S. Marshal Scott Turner, "an ambitious, buttoned-up U.S. marshal (Peck) [who] inherits a big unruly dog, he soon realizes the pet he didn't want may be the partner he needs."
The hour-long series is created by Burn Notice creator Matt Nix and 20th Century Fox TV, under which Nix has an overall deal. The deal falls under Disney, as 20th Century Fox TV is now a part of Disney TV Studios. Josh Levy (Bones) is co-executive producer. It has received a formal 12-episode series order from Disney+.
The original 1989 movie starred Hanks as Detective Scott Turner and Beasley the Dog as Hooch, a big, slobbery canine who comes under Scott's ownership after the murder of his longtime friend and the dog's owner. Directed by Roger Spottiswoode, Turner & Hooch was a box office hit, raking in $71 million and more than making back its $13 million budget, and became a pop culture phenomenon that is still frequently alluded to and referenced in movies and TV today.
This isn't the first time that a Turner & Hooch TV series has been attempted. ABC tried once before in 1990, airing a half-hour pilot with Thomas F. Wilson in the detective role and Beasley the Dog reprising his role, but the series didn't get picked up. Beasley the Dog obviously won't get to return in this reboot, though with Disney's recent track record of creating CG-animated animals, it's uncertain whether we'll get a real dog in the role at all — under the tight constraints of a TV series and a smaller budget, it may be easier to just animate a dog. But that would be a shame, since the entire appeal of the original film was seeing Hanks trying to wrangle with an unruly dog. Peck, who has proven his comedic talents on TV with shows like Drake and Josh, would be fun to see opposite a real dog.