Justin Hires is staying in the CBS fold with another reboot of a famous action franchise. Hires, who toplined CBS’ series Rush Hour last season, is set to co-star opposite Lucas Till and George Eads in the network’s new fall series MacGyver, a reimagining of the 1985 show about a resourceful and ingenious agent who improvises his way out of sticky situations using everyday items like rubber bands, chewing gum and a Swiss Army knife.

Hires will play one of four new series regular characters added after the pilot as the project is being revamped by Hawaii Five-0 showrunner Peter Lenkov, with only Till and Eads staying on from the original pilot.

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Hires will play Wilt Bozer, MacGyver’s ambitious roommate.

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via Deadline: http://deadline.com/2016/06/macgyver-rush-...oot-1201771878/

Hah! I new something was up when Peter and Justin started following each other on Twitter two days ago.

I don't know him at all and "Rush Hour" isn't available in my country... what do you think of him?

He is a great actor. But was lost in a leading role in Rush Hour. The part was too big for him. So hence why Rush Hour failed.

But put a long side Till and Eads, he has a better chance to succeed and probably play a much stronger role.

I think he is a great fit for the show. Love that they are calling him Wilt Bozer, a nice nod to the past.

Interesting that his name is Wilt Bozer. Maybe that answers the question about whether this new show is a "re-imaging of the original" or if it's about Mac's son. It's extremely unlikely that Mac's son would also have a neighbor (or roommate) named Wilt Bozer, just like his dad did, so most likely, this is a re-imagining of the original show.

Could be just a nod to the original character. lol Wilt goes from neighbor to roommate, eh? XD Oh lordy...

To cowboy villain...

That's what I thought off when I read the article - how does that cowboy guy fit this reboot? Totally forgot he was once a neighbour...

I find it odd that the neighbor from season 4 is back and yet not Thorton and Dalton.... Hmm but still I am hopeful

The article states something about four new regulars being added... so I guess there's still hope.

4 new regulars? Interesting...

Comic refief?

Justin Hires posted a video on FB today - seems he does some kind of live videoblog/podcast every now and then.

He talks about looking for a place to live in Atlanta for the MacGyver shoot and that he's playing Wilt Bozer, MacGyver's roomate and best friend.

The video is still up on his FB account: https://www.facebook.com/justinhires/?fref=ts

"Show about a dude who make explosives out of bubble gun, toothpicks...and... roaches"

really?

That's as far as I could get without wanting to slit my wrists.

Well, I tried to tell my self that I don't have to take him seriously because he's a) a comedian and b) he was probably high when he recorded that because I found that video quite weird *lol*

Did anyone else pick up on this?

He mentioned (albeit not coherently, or with any degree of definity), that there was 13 episodes of MacGyver?

I don't know how true this is? Doesn't sound correct. Normally it's 22 episodes for a full CBS series.

Plus it's been reported that they are filming until December. Which would sound like their doing more than 13.

The show hasn't been picked up in Germany yet, but one of the biggest German websites covering TV shows (don't remember which, but probably serienjunkies.de) also listed 13 episodes since the announcement that CBS had picked up the pilot.

I never brought that information here because I couldn't find any confirmation for this.

But if Justin says the same, it's probably true.

If they're filming from July to December; that means they have 2 weeks to film an episode - a lot of shows only have 7 or 8 days for an episode (e.g. Stargate), but I guess if they have lot's of stunts they might to need some more time?

They still have the old cast listed, but filmstarts.de (one of the biggest German sites about movies and shows) also states that there are 13 episodes.

It must have been in one of the press releases for international media...

Who knows? If this is as successful, as I keep building it up to be... They could begin filming the remaining 9 episodes (in a conventional 22 ep run) after Christmas.

Fingers crossed that's what happens!

But if that isn't the case - I'd rather a strong shorter run, than a longer weaker season

I'm sure others will agree with me.

13 eps is entirely possible, especially here in LA. It could be a money concern, they don't want to commit until they know it's worth it. It could be a scheduling thing, or any myriad of other reasons. Split seasons are also very common here. After a show starts airing, they could decide to go forward with the other nine eps. Or not. Things change quickly.

I'm fine with 13 episodes. Many tv series these days have only 13 episodes per season (Walking Dead, Homeland, Game Of Thrones, Daredevil, etc, etc), and it works out very well. It cuts down on the filler episodes. And since it sounds like each season will have one primary villain, I think short seasons will work better. It's hard to drag out one central story for longer than 13 episodes and keep it well-paced.

If I remember correctly, Lucas Till was scheduled to shoot another movie in September and was announced as a co-producer or something (back in April or May). I guess now that the show was picked up, he might have agreed to shoot that other movie after shooting MacGyver.

I think that movie is some sci-fi stuff, so they probably will shoot mostly indoors anyway and don't need the warmer months for outdoor scenes?

Maybe they're thinking they should do just 13 because maybe they think it would be a waste to put good MacGyverisms in bland filler episodes just to complete the 20+ episodes. I guess they don't want the MacGyverisms to go dull early in the show's run so they have to manage their ideas into a short season.

Not that im saying this is the case here, but many networks order few episodes a season for a show to test the waters. If it becomes successful they generally order more and raise the budget for the next season. Also comes the whole viewership analysis is the US. Most shows film the mid season and get rated, if the ratings continue to be adequate, they order the rest of the season. If not, they cancel the show. Sometimes giving the creators a few episodes to close the show.

Good point.
I remember that happened with "24." The first season was only greenlit for 13 episodes, and it's actually quite noticeable when re-watching the show, since the main storyline gets wrapped up in episode 13, and then you can tell the writers are kind of stumbling around for a bit, trying to figure out how to extend the show to 24 episodes after Fox gave them the go-ahead to the do the full season.

I wonder how a similar situation would affect MacGyver. If it's true that they're going to have one main villain per season, will that villain be defeated in episode 13? And then what happens if CBS says, "Ok, people like it, do another 10 episodes"? That's the one downside to shows that have long story arcs-- if the show has an uncertain future, it sometimes makes it dfficult for the writers to tell a properly-paced story.

News just in, that is unrelated. CBS' new series Star Trek will also be 13 episodes long for first season. And it too will have one story, that arcs the entire season.

Similar to MacGyver, perhaps the future is shorter runs.

Could this means bigger budgets per episode, meaning bigger and better MacGyverisms?



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Justin is working today:


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