Although Raven’s Home has been airing since 2017, Raven Baxter is back in full effect for season 5 of the fan-favorite Disney Channel show.
A nostalgic spinoff of the iconic Disney Channel series That’s So Raven (2003-2007), the hit comedy Raven’s Home is returning this season with a slightly new premise. Fans of the original series will be delighted to see Raven and her son Booker back in familiar territory – Raven’s old San Fransisco home, complete with her father Victor in tow.
But lead actress and millennial icon Raven-Symoné was initially careful not to call this iteration of Raven’s story a “reboot.” After all, much of this is new territory for the Baxter family.
“We tried our best not to use the word reboot when we started Raven’s Home, because we knew it wasn’t a true reboot,” she said. Now in the show’s fifth season, there is more of the original story and cast of characters to expand and explore.
“It feels so good to be able to see the journey of Raven Baxter as she is raising a teenage son, is taking care of her father, and finding who she is,” Raven-Symoné says. “I think that story can resonate with a lot of mothers as
their children grow up. Just seeing what that means for her and how she decides to tackle life in that manner.”
Part of that journey includes Raven providing care for her own child, who shares her gift of being able to glimpse into the future, while also tending to her newly ailing father.
Season five finds Raven and Booker moving back to San Francisco to help take care of her dad after he suffers a mild heart attack. Actor Rondell Sheridan returns to reprise his role as Raven’s father, and now a grandfather to Raven’s son Booker as he adjusts to a new life, trying to fit in with a new group of friends while hiding his future vision.
“I think that’s the goal with any show that I’m a part of in the capacity that I’m in, when I’m directing EP-ing and acting, I want to make sure that it’s a show that any generation can watch and see and learn from and be entertained by,” Raven-Symoné said. “I don’t feel like we are modernizing it to where people who watched That’s So Raven won’t recognize it, but it also doesn’t feel old.”
“We say ‘no cap’ in it, and I still don’t know what that means so that just means I’m old. I don’t know the new language,” she laughed.
To the end of joining the modern era, Raven-Symoné is getting used to being a meme and gif darling and welcomes the renewed interest in the show that it can bring for a younger generation.
“I think it’s pretty awesome,” she says of the Raven memes. “You’re being nostalgic with these memes, but also you’re also being very relevant and current because the new generation is now understanding it. So the new kids have ask, ‘Hey mom, what’s that from?’ and watch it. But now they can say, ‘oh Raven Baxter, I know that one’ and more generations can come together and have this communication.”
“On the other level, whoever took my image and made all those memes, where’s my check?” she said teasingly.
Raven’s Home premieres Friday March 11th on Disney Channel.