Disney releases teaser for Doogie Howser reboot, Doogie Kamealoha, M.D.
Disney+ begins streaming Doogie Howser reboot, entitled Doogie Kaemaloha, M.D. on September 8
TV News Doogie
Disney is throwing a lot of things at the wall for Disney+. Sure, a Falcon And Winter Soldier series makes sense if you have to do something with the Bucky Barnes character. But Turner & Hooch? Who knows why that was at the top of the heap.
Speaking of the top of the heap, Doogie Howser, M.D.was Neil Patrick Harris’ claim to fame before Harold & Kumar allowed him to side-step onto Tony Awards stages and How I Met Your Mother. The show about a 10-year-old physician kind of lingers in the zeitgeist—though it would feel weird to make a Doogie Howser joke in the year of our lord 2021. Still, people love smart kids, don’t they?
This brings us to Doogie Kamealoha, M.D. The Disney reboot of Doogie Howser is about a 16-year-old child prodigy practicing medicine in Hawai’i while dealing with the pressures of being a teenage girl. Created by Kourtney Kang from How I Met Your Mother and Fresh Off The Boat, the series stars Peyton Elizabeth Lee as Lahela “Doogie” Kamealoha. Here’s how Disney describes the reboot:
“Doogie Kamealoha, M.D.” – a coming-of-age dramedy inspired by the hit medical series “Doogie Howser, M.D.” – follows Lahela “Doogie” Kamealoha, a 16-year-old prodigy juggling a budding medical career and life as a teenager. With the support of her caring and comical ‘ohana (family) and friends, Lahela is determined to make the most of her teenage years and forge her own path.
Guiding Lahela (and also complicating things) is her career-driven mother Dr. Clara Hannon who’s also her supervisor at the hospital, her doting father Benny who helps keep her connected to what matters most, her free-spirited older brother Kai, her gregarious younger brother Brian Patrick, her best friend Steph, her surfer crush Walter and her fellow hospital colleagues, Dr. Lee, Charles and Noelani.
Unlike other reboots that attempt to cash in on nostalgia in hopes of getting millennials to watch, Doogie Kamealoha seems pretty focused on a family audience, as it should. After all, the child doctor premise is a rich vein that must be tapped. Who doesn’t love a smart kid? Hey, maybe they should reboot Smart Guy!
Doogie Kamealoha, M.D., begins streaming on Disney+ on September 8.
116 Comments
I can only stretch my suspension of disbelief so far. There is just no way that there are two child prodigy doctors named Doogie.
It’s federal law that all doctors under the age of 18 are to be nicknamed Doogie.
Something the Dems & GOP can agree on!
It’s actually one of the stages of being a doctor. Intern, attending, doogie, resident.
I’m assuming this show takes place in the same universe as the original – so it’s not out of the realm of possibility that they call her “Doogie” after the original Doogie (who presumably went on to be a super famous doctor).
I had been wondering about the origin of her nickname but hadn’t even considered your theory. You are quite possibly right.
That went through my mind but was quickly followed by “no, that’s dumb.”
Or a killing spree, let’s say he went on a killing spree, and that’s why he’s famous.
KID DOCTOR CAN’T BUY BEER, HAS MURDERED AND MUTILATED DOZENS VIA UNNECESSARY “PROCEEDURES”!!!
This should be everyone’s headcanon.
Famous super doctor? No, he became a drunk, drugged up womanizer with stormtrooper armor ad he tried to ruin Aunt Robin!
We now see the Doogieverse. Or the Howser Cinematic Universe.
Or maybe, in a fit of “writer’s room cleverness”, they go full meta and have the show take place where Doogie Howser existed as a fictional show. Thus, her nickname is an in-universe pop culture reference.
And to go even more crazy, this show actual takes place in the “How I am met your Mother” universe and Barney Stinson is a reoccurring character.
And in the end, it will all be revealed as the fantasy of a child staring at a snowglobe.
Or, even more interestingly, what if it is in a universe in which the show actually aired as in ours — so people are calling her that in reference to the character.
this meme is the only good to come from this otherwise bad idea. B+
“The gift shop is out of ‘Congratulations on Completing Medical School as a Teenager, Doogie’ cards. I repeat, we are out of ‘Congratulations, Doogie’ cards.”
It’s her nickname.
It was his too. I think his name was Douglas.
The only thing I’m curious about is how “Lahela Kamealoha” got that nickname.
The original Doogie Howser also began when he was 16. Not sure where the idea that he was 10 came from.
He was supposed to have graduated from Princeton at age 10.
Sure, but finished medical school four years later, at 14, and the show starts when he is 16. Therefore it is most certainly not a “show about a 10-year-old physician.”
A good thing too. I can just about imagine being okay with a 16 year old physician, but I don’t care how much of a genius he is, 10 is too young. I don’t want to be treated by someone who might have had a juice box at lunch and still hasn’t come down from the sugar-high.
For sure. I was just responding about where they got the 10 Years from.
A friend of mine got one gift from her eccentric mother on her 18th birthday: a DVD box set of Doogie Howser, a show she had barely heard of and never expressed interest in. This was in 2007, so we had an inkling from Harold & Kumar what Doogie’s deal was, but otherwise totally baffling.
That was roughly the same year that my mother got me season 4 of Everbody Loves Raymond on DVD. I did not have seasons 1-3.
Is Abed your brother? Did you have a psychic breakdown where you and your friends all appeared to be stop motion animated?
Well, yeah. You can skip the first three seasons, but season 4 is where the deep psychological subtext and deconstruction of suburban apathy really kicks in.
anybody else need to share random-ass DVD’s they got as gifts?
Here’s what I don’t get. As an Asian myself, why not just come up with a new IP using the same idea instead of riding off the coattails of an already existing character? It does a greater disservice in trying to diversify things. It’s lazy. Create new characters wholesale.
Because new ideas don’t get greenlit. Simple as that. We have a constant sea of remakes because that is what studios feel safe sinking their money into.
I can assure you every writer on this dreamt of doing something original instead of ‘a reboot of Doogie Howser’ – but, end of the day, they still have to pay the bills like the rest of us.
It pisses me off. These networks have more money than God, but they’re too pussy to risk a tiny fraction of it on anything that isn’t a carbon copy of an earlier show. Fuckin’ assholes.
If it was an original “kid doctor” show it would get compared to Doogie anyway. Might as well use the existing IP for the initial marketing boost and hope the show holds up on its own.
I’m not sure what your being Asian has to do with anything, but the entertainment landscape is so vast that attaching to something pre-existing and therefore familiar is a leg up on the competition. The broader audience, where most of the eyes lie, are less inclined to watch things remotely novel. They need *something* to reassure them they’re not risking their time or money. So, “This show I can watch with my family stars absolutely no one I know but is by Disney and appears to be a new version of something I saw or knew of years ago? Sure. I’ll give it a try.”
Because if I didn’t say I was then I’d get people saying I’m just mad about diversity or some shit like that.
Riding on the coattails is cheaper and easier. “Dr. Sandy Smith”? Whatever, nobody’s tuning in. But you put “Doogie” and “MD” in a title, and there’s automatic brand recognition. They’ve got a foot in the door before they’ve shown you a single frame of footage. Sure, it’s lazy, but new IP’s have a harder time gaining traction, and studios aren’t waiting around for that anymore (see Universe, Dark). There’s a reason it’s called show BUSINESS.
Because you need that recognizable IP to get that Disney+ money. That’s why we have a Turner & Hooch show too instead of anything else. Disney isn’t in the business of new ideas.
Note, something being lazy (a reboot of a show from the ‘80s that people only remember as being stupid) does not necessarily make it a disservice to the people represented by it. Because it is still an opening for the actors who star, and to get attention to a more diverse talent pool, whether or not the show is actually any good. Peyton Elizabeth Lee could one day get an ironic role in a stoner comedy and leverage that to build a career in sitcoms and musicals.
The Anna Faris Business Model?
That was my thought regarding Jordan Peele’s Twilight Zone and the upcoming Wonder Years show.
TZ doesn’t really fit because it’s an anthology show not a show about the same characters over and over again.
why not just come up with a new IP using the same idea instead of riding off the coattails of an already existing character?
Because if they did that people would just bitch that it’s a “woke ripoff” of Doogie Howser instead and wonder why Disney didn’t just reboot Doogie instead of making it.Like, it’s been a hot minute. People have figured out how complainers play the game and we’re not humoring it anymore.
Its what the audience wants sorry demands. We only want the comfortable not the new.
In the next year or two, probably, I look forward to Young Dr. House.
I would only watch that if it also starred Hugh Laurie in the title role, walking around on his knees like Dorf.
“It’s never cooties.”
It should crossover with Young Sheldon.
it should cross over to somewhere no one has to see it or think about it.
Well, YS should. I guess I should reserve judgment on the Doog until I see it.
Here’s a reimagined/crossover/mashup:
Doogie, Dharma, Greg & A Pizza Place
I look forward to Young Dr. House His original substance abuse problems stemming from an addiction to Capri Suns….
“Hey, Sunny D, alright!”
“Everybody is a liar, liar, pants-on-fire.”
I suppose I have gotten old and literal, but you can’t actually practice medicine before you are a legal adult, no matter how smart you are.
Dr. Mike discussed this in his review of the first episode, that even if a kid was smart enough to pass the entrance exam, med school still takes emotional development into account so they wouldn’t be allowed in. Neil Patrick Harris has kinda maybe joked that it was the first show created on a dare.
And even if they had the emotional development, there are just legal issues. You can’t trust patient care to someone who is not a legally responsible entity. This person can’t even sign their name on a release form to go zip lining, let alone sign off on a prescription.
“Thank you so much for curing my cancer, Dr. Doogie!”“Your welcome! And while this might seem ironic, if you really want to show gratitude, you’d go down with me to the corner store and buy me some smokes!”(Hey, way more people were smoking in the early 90’s)
Please this is 2021 “Your welcome! Pose for a selfie. Now lets do a Fortnight dance and record it on Tik Tok brah!! Now can you buy me some vape juice?”
“med school still takes emotional development into account”
oh, so maybe he could’ve been a cop.
For sure this is an issue, it’d be more likely a kid would go on to become a prof or something. But, Doogie Whomever, PhD in behavioural neuroscience and early stage PI trying to get grants to fund their lab while learning very special lessons about x and y seems like something most people wouldn’t watch.
Fine, we’ll give him a sassy BFF:
It’s a little surprising this concept hasn’t recently been mashed up with Sherlock Holmes for some Kid Sherlock action.
And sports cars can’t talk, rich mature white men don’t adopt black kids, NO ONE would tolerate Steve Urkel for more than 5 minutes (though I’d marry Kimmy Gibbler), there is no such place as Mypos and your mother is assuredly NOT a car!
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balamurali_Ambati
Started residency at 18.
Honestly the biggest hurdle would be your primary schooling in the US these days. If you were in a private or home schooled environment, it could be possible to blow through the requirements for each grade and get to college asap. But if the kid is in a public school, there just is no way it would happenHaving kids skip grades is very uncommon these days. They may have kids gop to higher level classes but moving them a grade or graduating early is unheard of these days. Mostly because so much of schools evaluations revolve around standardized testing, so if you have a genius student you don’t want them to fast track out of your school.
I skipped two grades, but that was back in the 70s, early 80s. Even with that, I still started college just after turning 16, not tremendously different than my peers (although I don’t recommend it). Normal schools have no capacity to support the needs of a very young child in middle and high school. An 8-10 year old is going to have trouble navigating a typical high school, no matter how smart they are and how easily they can handle the academic material.
Exactly, it was more common back then. These days there are a lot of factors on why they don’t do it. Some of them are valid, like concerns about socialization between age groups. But the testing is also a big factor. What you see a lot with very smart kids is they keep them in the same grade but they allow them to go to other class rooms or even bus them over to a different school for a higher level class. My sons junior high has a program where they will bus over really smart kids three days a week to take certain high school courses but the vast majority of their days are spent with kids their own age and the extra course high end courses allow them to take more classed when they get to Highschool and if they continue to be ahead of the curve, may start taking online college courses in Junior or Senior year of Highschool.
Also, contrary to a half-dozen movies, animals aren’t allowed to play on sports teams either.
Those things are purely fantastical. But I do have to say that it’s pretty shitty when a team gets a friggin’ dog to be their ringer in some sport, and it’s usually a kids team, which makes it worse. That’s just cheating, and it sends the message that the team should do whatever they can to win (even manipulate and abuse and animal). It’s a really stupid trope.
And that’s why the world is in the toilet these days!
Oh, and the stupidest thing about Doogie Howser was not the idea that a 16 year old could be a practicing physician. It’s that he decided to use the nickname “Doogie” professionally. He would have started suing his real name, Douglas, or maybe Doug. Still, I’ll give it a pass because it gave us NPH.
I never think it’s worthwhile criticising a show’s central premise. That’s the buy-in: you accept that the world of the story is the same as ours except for one vital difference that is what makes the narrative possible. I think it’s fair to do that even for “realistic” (not sci-fi/fantasy/magic realism) shows. The way that the premise is executed is important – Doogie shouldn’t, for example, cure stage 4 renal cancer with the power of friendship – but you can accept “sixteen year-old can become a doctor” so you can explore the idea of a sixteen year-old doctor.
A lot of criticism is about the central premise. Not all premises work. Sometimes high concept is crappy concept. That said, my offhand comment (written from my point of view as a medical school professor) is generating far more serious discussion than I anticipated.
Yes, suspending your disbelief for a central premise is just the cost of admission.
Cool hope it does well, I loved the original growing up, I hope this can capture a new audience in the same way.
Not going to weigh in on whether it’s good or bad — much too early in the day for that — but I appreciate the re-orchestration of the theme song to give it a Hawaiian twist.
Came here to say that. When the clip said it was the opening, I thought, “Man, that original song was pretty good for what it was meant to convey.” And this one did the same thing.
Andi Mack! Forgot all about that show. Wish it had not gotten cut short.
Remember when Doogie almost got to fuck his babysitter?
We already got a reboot of Smart Guy, It’s called Malcome in the Middle!
And the inevitable porn parody:
Mal, Cum In The Middle
Still, people love smart kids, don’t they?
Not in my experience.
“There’s a lot to unpack here!”
I for one am looking forward to an entire shared universe of ethnically diverse precocious doctors incongruously named “Doogie.”
I’m not sure there are any ethnicities for whom the name ‘Doogie’ wouldn’t be incongruous. At least if it was going on a birth certificate.
Yes, though my meaning was unclear, I meant to convey that anyone named Doogie is incongruously named Doogie.
It’s a nickname for Douglas.
No one was ever named Doogie on the BC.
There’s no other way to be named Doogie, now is there?
…aaand, Disney just bought it!
‘Doogie Howser: Enter the Doogie-Verse’.
And now Adventures In Creative Editing:
dating her father Benny who helps keep her connected to what matters most, her free-spirited older surfer crush Walter
One of the main arguments my wife deploys against me in my ongoing, half-serious quest for us to move to Hawaii is that “the hospitals are terrible.” This show is not helping my odds.
When I bring up the same thing to my wife all she has to do is mention centipedes and cockroaches the size of small airplanes.
Nothing wrong with the roaches. They’re the state bird!
But no gators, so one up on Florida, at least.
FloridaThe only place where alligators and crocodiles both live in the wild together.
I’d be equally concerned about the high cost of living and the big racism issue…
Well, no wonder, if this show is any indication. They employ underage doctors in their hospitals!
Exactly my point!Though, her other argument against me is that “the school’s are terrible.” If I can convince her our kid could become a doctor by 16 with Hawaii’s public school system…
Good. Another generation gets to try, and fail, to live up to their parents’ cartoonish expectations about their academic performance. “Doogie Howser graduated from college at 10, and you can’t even finish your math homework!”“Mom, it’s a TV show.”
“That’s the same excuse you gave when I suggested you fight in the Korean War, steal your dead CO’s identity and work for an ad agency in Manhattan!”
Oh, it’s the girl from Andi Mack! They grow up so fast.
Setting it in Hawaii is a great way to set up the inevitable Doogie & Stitch crossover.
I’m mostly neutral on this, but I don’t love that the credits are just old Doogie redux. Even with the recycled premise you’d think they would want to differentiate the new character more early on. But it’s all good as long as they manage to score a NPH cameo sometime during the first season.
I wonder if she’ll type in her journal what she learned at the end of the episode?
Regardless of the details, if you send a child with a stethoscope into my room, I’m leaving your hospital. I don’t care how many books they’ve read.
Just because you have the degree doesn’t mean you have the emotional development:
So do they call her “Doogie” after the existing character, meaning that the original show is a TV show in the current show’s universe? Or maybe “Doogie Howser” is a famous real doctor in-show?If that’s the only connection to the original IP they could have just made a new show with a less stupid name. Try to grab some of those “Young Sheldon” viewers or whatever the fuck it’s called.
So we’re all just okay with a chinese/white actress playing a kanaka maoli, hawaiian name and everything? Good to know everyone’s still cool with my race being erased.
EDITORIAL POINT OF ORDER:
Your desire to correctly punctuate “Hawai‘i” is appreciated, but it’s not an apostrophe that gets used there. That mark is called an ‘okina, it represents a hard vocal stop in the middle (or right at the beginning) of a word. The easiest way to approximate it within the typical unicode typeset is with a “single left quotation” mark.
That’s all, carry on.
I think they could have played with the premise a bit more by choosing another super prestigious profession. How about ‘Doogie Kamealoha, Supreme Court Justice’?
Does she like beer?