The dead are coming back — but not like you’ve seen before.
SYFY’s new series Revival kicks off on Thursday, June 12 at 10/9c with a premise that’s more intimate than apocalyptic: in a small Midwestern town, 47 people suddenly return from the dead.
They’re not monsters. They’re themselves. But that’s where the mystery begins.
Executive producers and showrunners Aaron B. Koontz and Luke Boyce leaned into the emotional core of the story — adapted from the Image Comics series by Tim Seeley and Mike Norton — and brought their personal experiences growing up in rural towns to the screen.
“You’re completely right. It is the emotion,” Koontz said when asked what made Revival stand out.
“It was there in the comic. There was something that was embedded in what Tim and Mike had created — that was the sister story. I thought it was really wonderful.”
That emotional thread runs through a complex tapestry of tone.
“You take that,” Koontz continued, “and then you add in these really weird characters that just feel like they’re out of a Coen brothers film… and it’s a murder mystery where the person is now alive and trying to solve their own murder. It’s like, whoa — that is now an entirely different hook.”
For Boyce, the show’s Midwestern setting was more than a backdrop — it was personal. “It was imperative,” he said. “It’s why I wanted to do this. I know that world. I grew up in a super small town in the Midwest, surrounded by farms, landlocked — and weird stuff happens.”
Boyce revealed that creator Tim Seeley based much of the original comic on his own hometown of Wausau, Wisconsin.
“A lot of the stuff that happens in the book actually happened to him,” he said. “Obviously the dead didn’t come back to life — that’s not real — but it’s a very lived-in story. A very real story. And that’s a big part of what drew me to it.”
The show blends horror, sci-fi, and thriller elements, but the emotional stakes stay front and center — even amid the chaos.
There’s chaotic cremations, creepy revivers, and alongside that are two daughters who just want to please their dad. That tension between big swings and small truths was by design.
“One of the mottoes we always have is ‘horror with heart,’” Koontz said. “That’s what we were trying to push the entire time here, where there’s emotion to it, there’s stakes to it.
“But at the same time, we wanted to play with tone. We were not afraid of making this, ”Okay, this part’s going to be really ridiculous and fun and comedic even. But now we’re going to deal with real melodrama and real stakes.’”
He added that keeping the audience off balance in the best way was part of the fun. “Tone can be such a fun way to change the audience’s expectations of what it is they’re watching…
“Even if we didn’t know what to do, it was an opportunity. We’d ask, ‘Can we add some characterization to this scene? Can we layer it and layer it and layer it and try to create something that can become more engaging?’”
Because ultimately, he said, “TV is about the characters. It just 100% is. It sounds like a cliché when people say it, but when I was a kid and I was watching Friends and Seinfeld, I didn’t care what their hijinks were — I cared about what they wanted to do within those hijinks.”
Koontz said that same emotional connection is what makes modern genre storytelling resonate. “When I watched Last of Us, it’s not about the undead, it’s about Joel and Ellie. And every time he says, ‘Baby girl,’ I want to cry. That’s what pulls me in.”
For Revival, that kind of emotional undercurrent is everywhere — even in a simple car conversation.
“One of my favorite moments of episode one is actually the conversation of Dana and him in the car,” Koontz said, referencing the dynamic between Dana Cypress (Melanie Scrofano) and her father, Wayne (David James Elliott).
“There’s so much emotion. There’s so much going on. And there are things that are set up there that you’ll find out in much later episodes. That was the hook from the get-go.”
So while Revival might start with a resurrection, the show is more interested in what happens next, when the town, the family, and the characters can’t go back to the way things were.
Revival premieres Thursday, June 12 at 10/9c on SYFY.
We’ve got more interviews coming this week with the cast, including Melanie Scrofano, Romy Weltman, and David James Elliott, so stay tuned for more from the folks bringing Revival to life.
Will you be watching? Hit the comments below to share your thoughts.
And don’t be shy. If you enjoyed this interview, please share it on social media and send it to a friend. You’re the glue that keeps us going!
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