This is a key point, sort of the insane, futile genius of Arrested Development—a show that demanded the kind of giddy Internet dissections we do regularly now, but before there was any real forum in which to conduct them. The show was full of crazily subtle in-jokes you had to watch every episode over and over to catch, from the out-of-season seasonal clothing the Bluths made their housekeeper wear to Cloudmir Vodka, a brand that shows up in the background of at least a half-dozen scenes. We’d catch those immediately now, and every different Bluth family member’s chicken impression would be gif’d within seconds of airing. It was a show made to be looped and recapped and deep-dived into, anticipating the current cultural moment without ever being able to benefit from it. A show for 2013 made in 2005.

Then, of course, we knew not of GIFs. What we did know was that what Arrested Development was doing was so revolutionary and different it felt like public access, and it was on freaking Fox. (I remember Joe Buck and Troy Aikman plugging Arrested Development during the NFC Championship Game, for crying out loud.) And obsessing over Arrested Develop­ment made us feel better, smarter, cooler than all those dopes busy watching Two and a Half Men. In this way, Arrested Development didn’t just foretell the viewing culture of 2013; it might have created it. The television world is so fractured and niche now that the shows we watch have become an important signifier of who we are—who we want to be seen as, anyway. I’m a Louie person but not a Community person. I’m a Breaking Bad person but not a Homeland one. And if I saw on your Facebook wall that you were an Arrested Development fan, well, I could bet you and I were gonna get along just fine. Which we did: That incredible ­camaraderie within the accidental, haphazard, seemingly pointless community of Arrested Developmentobsessives is one large reason the show eventually got resurrected. That kind of collective action would have been insane to imagine in 2006. That a tiny fan base could rally to revive a show a season after it went off the air? Maybe. But seven years later? It feels like a major evolutionary event.

I still haven't seen the new episodes. I'm excited to do so.

Will they make even more?

in talks for season 5 now

Excellent.