When Disney bought 20th Century Fox back in 2019, it ended up owning the rights and licenses to an absolutely gobsmacking number of TV shows and films, many of which we can’t imagine it had any idea what to do with. Leave aside those wildly off-brand shows that were still in production, like It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia. What is The House Of Mouse to do with a series like Will Forte’s wonderfully bizarre The Last Man On Earth, which ran for four seasons of frequently wacky, frequently depressing apocalypse comedy on Fox, before wrapping up in 2017? What can you do with Phil “Tandy” Miller and his frequently eyebrow-free adventures? Sell them off to the French?
Anyway, Disney has now sold The Last Man On Earth off to the French, with Variety reporting that a remake of the series was announced at a Parisian showcase of new Disney+ shows on Thursday night. The series—about a guy who survives a global pandemic, and is forced to try to survive and restart civilization despite being a lazy, emotionally immature slacker—will be revived for French audiences with comedian Artus now in the Will Forte role.
A synopsis released for the new show leans into the wish fulfillment element that made up basically the bulk of its pilot episode, before all involved (including Forte and co-creators Chris Miller and Phil Lord) decided it’d be a lot more fun to have “hero” Phil Miller contend with other survivors, like Kristen Schaal, instead. (We don’t know if France has a Kristen Schaal, but if not, they should get one. She’s great!) Here’s the description: “After traveling across the country, Adam must face the facts: he is the last man on Earth. Free from everything, he enjoys the advantages of solitude… but remains desperately alone. However, he still holds out hope that another survivor exists. And perhaps even a female survivor.”
Artus, for his part, is a pretty major comedy star in France at the moment; his 2024 comedy film A Little Something Extra, about a pair of criminals who go undercover in a summer camp for young adults for disabilities, quickly became one of the highest-grossing movies in the country’s history.
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