Honey, I Shrunk the Kids Reboot to See Rick Moranis Return

Honey, I Shrunk the Kids is getting a reboot movie – tentatively titled Shrunk – over at Disney.

It’s not exactly breaking news that the Mouse House has been planning to reboot or remake a whole bunch of its older live-action movies (in addition to its animated movies), many of which will hit streaming platform Disney+ (especially with reboots of Honey contemporaries Three Men and a Baby and Father of the Bride also in development,) but the reboot of the classic size-adjustable family classic is apparently heading to cinemas after it was initially planned as a direct-to-streaming project.

Josh Gad (Frozen, Beauty and the Beast) stars here as an older version of Nick Szalinski, Wayne Szalinski’s spectacled son in the original 1989 film; a concept that, technically, classifies Shrunk as a sequel. However, “reboot” seems to be the dominant taxonomy for this project at the moment.

Joe Johnston, director of the original 1989 movie, will resume that duty (over three decades later,) on this new movie, as Variety first reported. While the studio reportedly met with other directors, it became clear that Johnston was the perfect fit for the job. He’ll work off a script by up-and-coming scribe Todd Rosenberg, also joined by producer David Hoberman.

Honey, I Shrunk the Kids Reboot Cast

Rick Moranis is returning to the Honey franchise to reprise his role as shrink ray inventor Wayne Szalinski, according to THR. The role will have his Wayne as the father to Josh Gad’s Nick, who was originally played by Robert Oliveri in the 1989 film and its 1992 sequel, Honey, I Blew Up the Kid.

Not only is this good news for the credibility of the franchise revival, but it’s a heartwarming development, since it will serve as a long-awaited return to acting for the iconic Ghostbusters, Little Shop of Horrors, Parenthood and SCTV comedic actor after his 1997 retirement; a decision he came to make in order to better raise his two children after the untimely 1991 death of his wife. – Said retirement, of course, was 23 years ago, and Moranis’s return to acting occurs after he’s spent the past few decades fielding sporadic voice work, most recently heard uttering lines as his Spaceballs character, Dark Helmet, in a 2018 episode of The Goldbergs. Poetically enough, Moranis’s last onscreen role was for the 1997 direct-to-video threequel, Honey, We Shrunk Ourselves.

As star Josh Gad lauds in a tweet reacting to Moranis’s casting:

“To say it is a dream come true to once again see Rick Moranis on the big screen is the understatement of the decade. But to say, I get an up seat view of him returning to play one of his most iconic roles is the understatement of the Century. Welcome back hero! #Shrunk“

Further Reading: Disney+ Streaming Service: Launch Date, Price, Movies, and Shows

Honey, I Shrunk the Kids Reboot Details

Besides the Honey Trilogy launcher, Joe Johnson’s directorial CV consists of high-profile pictures (some of which are masterpieces,) such as The Rocketeer, Jumanji, Jurassic Park III, Hidalgo, The Wolfman and helped set the early Marvel Cinematic Universe mold as director of Captain America: The First Avenger. His last effort was 2018 Christmas movie The Nutcracker and the Four Realms, for which he handled reshoots that yielded him co-director credit with Lasse Hallström. Additionally, in a bit of trivia that any discerning geek should know, Johnston got his industry start on the effects team of 1977’s original Star Wars, in which he also played a Spacetrooper who can briefly seen outside the Death Star as the Millennium Falcon was brought into the hangar.

The 1989 Johnston-directed Honey, I Shrunk the Kids starred Rick Moranis as Wayne Szalinski, an inventor who accidentally shrinks his and his neighbor’s children down to a teeny-tiny size. Szalinski then unwittingly throws the kids outside, where the previously-benign contents of their back garden present them with new and dangerous problems. Shrunk will continue in the vein of the previous films by using the same set-up, with Nick accidentally shrinking his own children.

Disney had a massive sleeper hit with Honey, I Shrunk the Kids when it was first released, with the film racking up $222 million globally. It would become – thanks, in part, to its theatrical pairing with Roger Rabbit short Tummy Trouble – the highest-grossing live-action Disney film that the studio had managed up until that point, and it held onto that record for another five years. Two subsequent sequels – 1992’s Honey, I Blew Up the Kid and 1997’s Honey, We Shrunk Ourselves – didn’t fare as well, with the latter going straight to video. After that, television adaptation Honey, I Shrunk the Kids: The TV Show also manifested, which starred Peter Scolari as Wayne Szalinski, and ran for three seasons on Disney Channel from 1997-2000.

Regardless, Disney clearly feels that there’s still more gas in the tank for a continuation of the story.

Joseph Baxter is a contributor for Den of Geek and Syfy Wire. You can find his work here. Follow him on Twitter @josbaxter.