Perhaps the most unhinged character on “King of the Hill” during that show’s original run from 1997 to 2009 was pest exterminator and out-there conspiracy theorist Dale Gribble. As originally voiced by the late Johnny Hardwick, Dale’s fringe viewpoints — which frequently centered on government cover-ups and doomsday prepping — were seen as a bit of harmless fun.
Cut to 2025, and “King of the Hill” is back on television for a long-awaited Season 14 on Hulu. A lot has changed, and perhaps most notably, Dale’s views are now more mainstream than many would care to admit.
“Nationally, we’ve made a turn towards Dale,” says Toby Huss, who took over as the voice of the character in Episode 7 of the new season, following Hardwick’s death. “I hope we’re all OK with that.”
Of course, in its early-21st-century run on Fox, “King of the Hill” was never an overtly political show. There was that episode in 2000 where Hank Hill wavered in voting for George W. Bush due to the former Texas governor’s weak hand- shake, but that was about it.
The “King of the Hill” revival — don’t call it a reboot, but rather an update of what Hank and his family and friends are up to more than a decade and a half later — doesn’t deal in politics either; the animated series has always been about a mild-mannered man a bit confused by the changing world around him. And in 2025 Arlen, Texas, as in the rest of the U.S., things sure are different. That allows for plenty of social commentary, and the show’s cast and creators all agree that now more than in its original run, there’s value to viewing American culture through the unique lens of “King of the Hill.”
“Hank always represented such a commonsense, practical approach to cultural things and societal things,” says the revival’s showrunner, Saladin K. Patterson. “Whether it leaned left of middle or right of middle, it always was something that was respectful and made sense.”
According to co-creator (and voice of Hank) Mike Judge, he and co-creator Greg Daniels started kicking around ideas for bringing the show back after they saw the fan response to a live reading of an episode featuring the original cast at the SF Sketchfest in 2017. But it wasn’t until they got the notion to age up Hank, wife Peggy, son Bobby and the rest of the characters by bringing them into the present that the ideas really started flowing.
More from Variety
Joining them in imagining the modern-day Hills was Patterson, who is new to “King of the Hill” — but it turns out he has a long history with the show. During a late-’90s stint in a Disney writing program, Patterson tried to convince those in charge to let him write a spec for the just-launched “King of the Hill.”
“The execs at the time were like, ‘Oh, that’s just a cartoon.’ I said, ‘No, it’s not just a cartoon, guys! You don’t get it!’” Patterson says.
As fate would have it, Patterson was offered an opportunity to write for “King of the Hill” during its original run. He turned down the job, however, in favor of a gig on “Frasier.” Patterson doesn’t regret the choice, but says that Daniels is fond of reminding him of it.
“He likes bringing it up anytime I start to feel too good about myself,” Patterson says, laughing.
Patterson and Daniels ultimately worked together on the ill-fated animated series “The Cops.” That show hailed from Louis C.K. and was set to air on TBS, but the network pulled the plug after sexual misconduct allegations against C.K. became public. Daniels kept looking for other ways to work with Patterson and recommended him to Judge when talk of a “King of the Hill” revival started picking up steam. Judge and Patterson hit it off, partly because they happen to share a background in engineering: Patterson studied the subject at MIT, while Judge worked in mechanical engineering after getting his B.S. in physics from UC San Diego.
While joining a well-established returning series like “King of the Hill” might seem daunting, all agree that Patterson was up to the challenge.
“He’s very focused. He knows what he wants. He doesn’t waste our time,” says Kathy Najimy, who voices Peggy. “He will laugh so you can hear him laugh, which is really important. I think he got handed something that could have been really overwhelming, and he handled it just beautifully.”
In the new batch of 10 episodes — set to premiere all at once on Aug. 4 — Hank and Peggy return to Arlen after a decade in Saudi Arabia, where Hank was working for the Aramco oil company as the “assistant manager in charge of Arabian propane and Arabian propane accessories.”
“We looked up these Aramco bases in Saudi Arabia, and they’re built to look like the idyllic, perfect American city,” Judge says. “And we just really liked that. [Hank] was sort of stuck in time in this artificial little American city.”
As for the rest of the Rainey Street gang, Bobby (voiced by Pamela Adlon) now runs a Japanese-German fusion restaurant in Dallas and is living with his best friend, Joseph; Dale was briefly the mayor of Arlen; Bill (Stephen Root) has been living as a shut-in since COVID; Boomhauer (also voiced by Judge) is helping to raise his girlfriend’s teenage son; and Connie (Lauren Tom) is studying engineering at UT Dallas.
While most of the characters are back, the show has lost a number of original cast members over the years. Brittany Murphy, who voiced Luanne, died in 2009, not long after the original show ended. Dennis Burkley, who voiced Carl Moss, the principal at Tom Landry Middle School, died in 2013. Rock legend Tom Petty, who voiced Luanne’s eventual husband Lucky, died in 2017. Then there are the most recent ones: Hardwick was found dead in his home in Austin in 2023 (having already taped the revival’s first six episodes). And right after he crashed a “King” panel at the ATX TV Festival in Austin in June, John Redcorn voice actor Jonathan Joss was killed in an altercation with a neighbor in San Antonio.
Like Hardwick, Joss finished work on multiple episodes before his death, although Huss took over voicing Dale for four of the 10 episodes. “Johnny was the expert on Dale,” says Huss, who had voiced Cotton Hill and Kahn Souphanousinphone in the original series. “So all I can do is try to learn from what Johnny did and not be the expert on Dale … but do my version of where Johnny was going with him.”
Adlon sheds tears as she discusses Hardwick’s death but says that cast and crew from the show were able to gather and pay tribute at the home of Ashley Gardner, who voices Dale’s wife, Nancy.
“We had a memorial for him at Ashley’s house, and it was beautiful,” Adlon says. “We just needed some place to put our feelings and our grief. And Ashley’s husband made a Dale’s Dead-Bug van and parked it in the driveway for the memorial. It was fucking amazing.”
Regarding how the revival would handle Luanne’s absence, Patterson says, “I think it’s honest to say that there is no quote-unquote one right way to handle it. I think there were a few ways that would have been equally respectful and loving, and people would have understood. … So what we ended up doing, fans will see the character referenced in a very loving, respectful way in an episode that gives a nod to how special she was, both to our characters in the show’s world but also in real life.”
The loss of key cast members deeply affected the “King of the Hill” family, and they are a family. Those interviewed glowingly say that they have maintained the relationships they forged on the show. Says Root: “We started in ’96, so after 13 seasons of this show, we have seen births and deaths and marriages and divorces and real life through all the people that have done this show.”
Judge says that one of his great joys was seeing how working on the show improved the lives of the cast and crew. “After a year or two, you’re seeing them driving to work with much nicer cars and buying houses and getting married,” he says. “It was really, really great to see a lot of people who really deserved it becoming successful.”
Cast members say they still regularly meet for dinner or catch up at Hollywood events, where they will find themselves slipping into the voices of their characters. “It’s kind of a sickness,” Adlon says. “If I see a picture of Bobby, I feel like I’m looking at a picture of myself, because it’s such a part of me and us.”
The “King of the Hill” revival Is not the first time some core cast and crew have revisited iconic characters in the past few years. Judge famously revived “Beavis and Butt-Head” (which also featured Huss) on MTV in 2011, and then again with Paramount in 2022; a new season is scheduled to hit Comedy Central in 2025. Najimy, meanwhile, revisited her role from the 1993 Halloween movie “Hocus Pocus” in a long-awaited sequel that came out in 2022. And of course, Daniels is about to revisit “The Office” universe with his new Peacock series “The Paper.”
For Tom, who voices Minh Souphanousinphone in addition to Connie, this is now her second animated character from a Fox show to return on Hulu. She also voices Amy Wong on “Futurama,” which was revived on the streamer in 2023.
“I just thank my lucky stars,” Tom says. “I feel so blessed, especially because I’ve got about three more years to pay these insanely high tuitions for my kids, but also just to be able to see all my family and friends again and be able to kind of revisit these characters.”
While the reboot/revival wave has largely crashed, the early rabid reaction (via news, teaser clips and that ATX panel) from fans indicates that they’re eager to see more “King of the Hill.” The cast and creators credit that response to the show’s authenticity. While many animated series push the bounds of reality, “King of the Hill” tells grounded stories — slices of life that people from all over the world can relate to in some way.
“I just am so grateful that it’s coming out right now, because America needs to be able to feel safe, laugh and not judge themselves,” Adlon says. “And there is no judgment with this show, and there is no agenda at all.”
And maybe with the help of Dale Gribble, we can all unite to make wackadoodle conspiracy theories fringe again.
A version of this story first appeared in the July 30 issue of Variety
Best of Variety
Sign up for Variety's Newsletter. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
Comments