The Inbetweeners is making a comeback with the principle forged concerned

The Inbetweeners could be making a return to screens as one of the main stars revealed that talks of a reboot are underway.

Joe Thomas, 40, who portrayed Simon in the hit coming-of-age comedy, said all of the main cast are on board to get back together, a decade after the last film was released. 

The actor suggested that another movie is more likely than a new TV series and would follow the group of lads away from school. 

Speaking on the Always Be Comedy podcast, Joe was asked whether conversations have taken place regarding a comeback, he said: ‘Yes, it’s happened in various forms. All of us feel it would be nice to do.’

He revealed he is still good pals with the cast, including James Buckley (Jay), Simon Bird (Will) and Blake Harrison (Neil), and admitted they are worried whether it ‘will be as good’ as the original series.

He teased ‘some of the ideas out there’ for a revival included a stag do in Vegas.

The four lads would also meet for five-a-side football rather than in the school common room.

But Joe admitted: ‘Everybody’s anxiety would be, ‘Will it be as good?’. That is what we would be going in with.’

The comedy, which also starred Emily Atack as Charlotte, ran for three series between 2008 and 2010, but it was the two films in 2011 and 2014 that gave The Inbetweeners widespread popularity.

The Inbetweeners 2, which saw the infantile foursome travel to Australia, broke the first movie’s box office record by taking £2.75million on its opening day.

Joe continued: ‘We’re all still around, we’re all still in each other’s lives. We all still like each other. And if it was something that came up, I think we would want to do it.

‘I feel like we all still really like each other.

‘We’ve all been able to go away and get various monkeys off our backs, in terms of things that we felt we needed to do other than The Inbetweeners to prove something to ourselves.’

Joe even met his wife Hannah Tointon on the show over 15 years ago and the couple have since welcomed their first child.

Hannah and Joe met after she played his character Simon’s on-screen girlfriend Tara during series three of the Inbetweeners.

Joe confirmed they were dating back in 2010 but admitted he was bemused as to how their relationship blossomed after their scenes together on the show.

He said: ‘I can’t really see how those scenes kindled romance because they were all her being sick into my mouth… but I’m really into that so obviously it was fine!

‘It’s quite an intense thing being on set, so maybe that contributes, but we’re not basing our relationship on the relationship of Simon and Tara in the show.’ 

In 2018 the couple appeared in summer comedy The Festival together, and at the time Joe told Christine Bleakley on ITV’s Lorraine that he loved starring with his fiancee again, eight years after their first worked together.

He quipped: ‘I’ve got to the stage like she’s in everything, it went very well I think!’

Simon Bird – who starred as the studious Will McKenzie – went on to play a long-running role in Friday Night Dinner, while Blake appeared opposite Brenda Blethyn in the short-lived ITV sitcom Kate and Koji and Joe starred in White Gold.

James has ‘surprised’ himself by becoming the highest-paid star on Cameo, having raked in £1 million dishing out personalised messages for fans on the celebrity greetings website. 

The actor recently explained that despite the success of the series, a reboot could never be on the cards because the jokes could not be done these days.

He said: ‘It was all justified because they were never the heroes. They were idiots and they got what they deserved. 

‘That’s why it can’t come back – you can’t have men in their late thirties acting like they’re in sixth form and getting away with that stuff.’

James added that despite being constantly asked about bringing the show back, there is ‘no amount of money’ that would make him agree to it.  

‘I always get asked if I’d ever do more and I said ‘For no amount of money’ and that quote got run away. I didn’t mean about money – it means more to me than money. I’m always surprised by the success of anything.’

While the famous foursome are yet to sign on for a new film or TV series, the cast did return for a reunion special back in 2019.

However, it was slammed by devoted fans following its New Year’s Day airing.

Flooding Twitter with angry responses, viewers lashed out at the Jimmy Carr-fronted show, which saw stars Simon Bird, Joe Thomas, Blake Harrison and James Buckley join together to run through a retrospective of the cult classic. 

While some branded the programme ‘toe-curling, painful, awkward and cringeworthy’, others were left agitated at the concept as they believed the comedy was set to be a new episode rather than a chat show. 

Twitter users penned: ‘Lukewarm thoughts on the Inbetweeners reunion, nice throwback & really enjoyed the section in the car…

‘However Jimmy Carr was an awful host & talked over everyone. The 4 of them looked like they didn’t want to be there some of the time, and some of it was super cringe… #FwendsReunited was painfully bad. Greg Davies should’ve hosted it…

‘#Inbetweeners… First let down of 2019 was thinking the inbetweeners special was going to be an episode when really it was a best bits of the show…

‘The Inbetweeners reunion was toe-curling… The biggest disappointment of 2019 has already happened, Inbetweeners Friends Reunited, what is this s**t ffs… 

‘Format of this show is f**king awful. Get rid of Jimmy Carr, get rid of the pointless awards and lets just have the cast anecdotes #fwendsreunited’.

Another problem arose in fans’ confusion over the premise of the programme, as users wrote: ‘I can’t be the only one who thought The Inbetweeners was going to be a 2 hour “special episode” instead of a Jimmy Carr panel show…

‘Can we all agree that the inbetweeners reunion was false advertising?’

Despite this, others made it clear they were aware of the concept, writing: ‘Blimey people are really losing their s**t on here about that #inbetweeners special that was on C4 last night!… 

‘If i see one more person complain that the Inbetweeners reunion wasn’t a new episode i might delete my whole account because it was made so clear that it was a reunion. roll on 2020…’

In 2020, it was also feared that The Inbetweeners had been axed from YouTube, as its channel has had all episodes taken down amid claims its ‘offensive’ content sparked compaints.

Social media users are speculating that it was taken down for its juvenile shock humour, with episodes including a frisbee hitting a disabled woman in the head and Bird’s character Will abusing schoolmate Neil’s dad for being a homosexual, which he is not.

It comes after Little Britain vanished from BBC iPlayer due to David Walliams playing a morbidly obese black woman in a sketch and painting his skin for the role. Walliams’ and Matt Lucas’ Come Fly With Me was taken down for the same reason.

One fan tweeted: ‘The Inbetweeners is one of the funniest shows ever made. The humour is funny because it’s offensive. This generation would rather be angry than laugh & it shows.’

But others are tweeting that the show’s content was actually taken down due to copyright reasons, as it migrated to Britbox. 

A spokesperson for Google says that it was not YouTube that removed the content from The Inbetweeners. 

A Channel 4 spokesperson said: ‘The rights owner of The Inbetweeners (outside the UK) has changed from DRG to Banijay Group, so the standalone YouTube channel showing The Inbetweeners content has been taken down for the time being. The Inbetweeners full episodes are still available on All 4.’