“No man, woman, or child is going to be able to call me a fake Frasier fan,” said Kilometers.
Photo by Amit Roth
The first two episodes of the 2023 Frasier reboot, which were released on October 12, have been met with reception. Rotten Tomatahs rated the show as 52% “fine,” based on five critical reviews and 1,203 user reviews. Viewers expressed myriad ways in which Frasier eventually met their expectations, even if they “attempted to not let it do so.” “Now that I’ve accepted that a show which bears only a superficial resemblance to Frasier is for some reason being called Frasier, I watch it daily,” said Miles Kilometers, an amateur collector of low-definition screenshots of Eddie. “It’s just a trick to weed out the fake fans who have no perseverance. I find the episodes best viewed with my eyes closed and the TV muted.”
Others have created fan theories in response to the reboot. “I sensed this show was going to be lukewarm six months before its release, so I immediately immersed myself in the Frasier I’ve been constructing in my mind for the last five years of not actually watching Frasier but remembering that I enjoyed it,” said Fern Lambust, whose favorite musical is reportedly Spamalot. She continued, “Impervious to the reality of the Frasier reboot, I was able to slog through 24 minutes of lightly sentimental entertainment to use it as fuel for mind-Frasier. I got the most mileage out of looking for evidence that the Niles stand-in is Sheldon Cooper’s illegitimate child.”
Another viewer, Green Applesauce, described how her interpretation of the Frasier reboot instead subtextually hints at one of the main characters being gay. “The farce begins when Freddy, Frasier’s son, lies and says he’s dating his female roommate. I thought she was his beard, and I was like, hell yeah, I want to see this show stumble through Frasier having a gay son,” said Applesauce. Applesauce is the editor of several Niles Crane fancams, which are short videos where she puts a rainbow filter over tightly edited clips of Niles acting “fussily, cowardly, or delivering Wildean-style quips.” Applesauce continued, “It turned out Freddy was lying because his roommate is his late best friend’s widow and he didn’t want to tell his dad about his grief. None of that rules out the beard possibility, though.”
Viewer Grelsey Stammer, who identifies himself as “a fan completely unaffiliated with the show or Kelsey Grammer who superbly plays the titular Frasier,” described his own interpretation of the reboot. “I knew this show was going to be good. It was so… poignant. Have you ever wondered how Freddy feels about his conflicting class identities? How his and Frasier’s different relationships to paternal authority figures shape their reticence with each other? Or did you people forget Frasier had a son because you’re callous charlatans who don’t care about anything remotely heterosexual?”
Meanwhile, Kelsey Grammer, who was only able to be reached for comment through Morse code delivered between lighthouses on opposite sides of the Adriatic Sea, said, “My Wikipedia page clearly states that I support gay marriage and that I supported Ben Carson in 2016. Let’s talk about how this is a fresh, heartful, and modern take on Frasier. And if you can’t do that, let’s talk about how at least Roz is
coming back.”
