Nancy Drew continues thriving in Season 3 by refusing to be a faithful adaptation

Paste Magazine

"Known quantities are all the rage in our current television landscape," says Lacy Baugher Milas. "It’s why Sex and the City is, somehow, inexplicably returning to our screens nearly two decades after it first ended. It’s the reason we’re getting more Dexter, even though the original series had one of the absolute worst endings of any television show ever made. Gossip Girl is terrifying a new generation at Constance Billiard over on HBO Max, teen horror staple I Know What You Did Last Summer is getting reinvented as an Amazon Video limited series, and updates on familiar titles like The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, Clueless, and Cruel Intentions are all in the works. Everything old really is new again, and to be honest, it’s kind of exhausting. Because the problem with many (most?) of these remakes, reboots, and revivals is that, as a rule, they’re merely trying to capitalize on the known quantity of it all without actually doing much in the way of exploring, interrogating, or otherwise reinventing the things the original property (be it a show, a book, or something else) set out to do. They don’t really have anything new to say, nor do they provide us with any further understanding of the characters or stories we once loved, seemingly content to simply rehash that which has come before." That isn't the case with Nancy Drew, which returned Friday for its third season on The CW. "So maybe it shouldn’t be as surprising as it is that although The CW’s Nancy Drew (now entering its third season) isn’t exactly what you’d call a strict, by-the-numbers adaptation of the beloved Carolyn Keene novels, that’s one of the absolute best things about it—even if it’s also the thing die-hard purists will find the hardest to embrace," says Milas. "In this version of the story, ghosts and other supernatural forces are definitely real, and much more likely to be behind the strange noise coming from your attic than a stray cat or a nosy neighbor." ALSO: Nancy Drew showrunners tease Season 3 love triangle.