I occasionally write a deep dive called Nobody Asked Me, where I pitch big ideas to companies that did not invite me into the room, have no obligation to listen, and are more than successful enough to ignore me entirely. Still, the ground under all of us is moving.
Almost a year ago I published a thought exercise about Miami Vice, exploring what I might do with a legendary legacy brand in the open garden. At the time it was purely speculative because nobody was actually rebooting Miami Vice.
Lately, while working through marketing plans on some of our own shows, I’ve been thinking about that piece again. The more I do this, the more it feels like marketing isn’t separate from the show anymore. The DNA of the story starts showing up everywhere in different ways. It’s really just the same creative process expressed across different platforms, each one expanding the world of the story and growing a community at the center of it.
Now someone is rebooting Baywatch, and the choices they’re making deserve attention.
Fox Cast the Internet
Fox has assembled what may be the most internet-native cast in the history of broadcast television. Shay Mitchell and Noah Beck lead the charge with 35 million Instagram and 33 million TikTok followers respectively, with Beck also holding the distinction of starring in Tubi’s most-watched original film franchise. Livvy Dunne brings more than 15 million combined followers as a former LSU gymnast and Sports Illustrated Swimsuit cover model. Brooks Nader and Stephen Amell round out the ensemble, with Amell anchoring the show as the lead, Hobie Buchannon. Their combined social reach now exceeds 112 million. With McG directing the pilot and the original creators returning as executive producers, the series begins filming in Venice Beach this month.
On paper this may be the most ambitious legacy reboot strategy television has attempted in years. It combines a globally iconic brand with a cast that carries its own distribution and a network that has already tested its lead actor inside its own streaming ecosystem. But television history is full of social media castings that did not convert. Followers are rented attention. When the credits roll, they return to their feeds.
The real challenge isn’t casting, it’s infrastructure.
Baywatch once reached more people every week than any show in television history. That kind of audience doesn’t exist anymore. What exists now is a completely different distribution system and a new set of opportunities to build not just a show, but an ecosystem. The internet isn’t where you market culture. It’s where culture is made.
The way Fox has cast this reboot suggests they know that. It signals a more innovative approach than most legacy reboots attempt. So I’m going to offer a few ideas about how that world might actually get built. Even though, obviously… nobody… ahh, you get it.
But before getting into what the future of the show might look like, it’s worth remembering how unusual its past actually was.
The Biggest Show Nobody Fully Understands
Greg Bonann was a Los Angeles County lifeguard when he conceived the show. His connection to the material wasn’t theoretical. He had spent years working the beaches and believed the world of lifeguarding — the rescues, the training, the strange mix of danger and beauty — could translate to television.
The idea took shape after Bonann rescued two children caught in a riptide whose father happened to work in television. That moment opened a door. Over the next decade Bonann kept refining the concept, originally titled A.C.E.S. (Aquatic Corps for Emergency Service) before eventually renaming it Baywatch after the rescue boats that patrol Santa Monica Bay.
(Full disclosure: Greg is an old friend and a reader of the stack. He had no idea I was writing this and is probably discovering it right now.)
NBC picked up the show in 1989 and canceled it after one season, where it ranked 73rd out of 103 programs. The production company behind the series collapsed soon after. By every traditional measure the show was finished.
What happened next is the part that matters.
The Creator Economy, circa 1991
Bonann and his partners regained control of the rights and rebuilt the show independently. They cut the production budget, financed the next season largely through international pre-sales where the show was already performing, and sold the series directly into first-run syndication across the United States. There was no network and no guaranteed slot, only a bet that the global audience already watching the show would finance the next wave.
They were right on a scale nobody predicted. (And because of this innovative structure, they own the show.)
By 1996 Baywatch had an estimated weekly audience of roughly 1.1 billion viewers across 142 countries, a figure that led Guinness World Records to name it the most-watched television series in history. The show ultimately aired in 148 countries and was translated into 44 languages.
One data point reframes everything about the brand. The audience was roughly 65 percent female, and the number-one demographic was women between 18 and 34. Years of focus groups revealed that the appeal was not what the jokes suggested. It was that the women were strong, independent heroes who were saving lives.
The DNA of Baywatch was sincere heroism. Aspirational, physical, sun-drenched, and globally legible. Rescue. Beauty. Danger. Belonging to something bigger than yourself.
A creator bought back his own IP from a network that didn’t believe in it and built the most-watched show in the world which they still own.
That’s not really a legacy media story.
It’s a creator-economy story decades before we called it that. The original “F*ck it, if we build it they might come” attitude.
Fox Has the Lifeguards. Now It Needs the Rescue Plan
The producers instincts here are good. Filming in Venice Beach preserves the authenticity of place that defined the original series, and the production secured a $21.1 million California tax credit to make it happen.
The return of the original creators as executive producers provides institutional memory. Matt Nix, who ran Burn Notice for seven seasons, understands ensemble procedural storytelling. McG directing the pilot brings visual energy. A 12-episode straight-to-series order signals real commitment.
The casting strategy is also informed by data Fox already owns. A Wattpad web novel, The QB Bad Boy and Me, became a Tubi original film. Sidelined, which attracted roughly 20 million viewers, generated billions of social impressions, earned a sequel, and ultimately helped turn Noah Beck into a Baywatch cast member.
Casting the Internet Is the Easy Part
Social media casting has also produced a long list of disappointments. Studios cast for reach, the reach does not convert, and everyone concludes the talent was wrong. The real lesson is infrastructure. Followers belong to the creator, not the show.
Unless the show builds a world that competes for daily attention rather than weekly appointment viewing, the reach advantage disappears.
Fox has cast the internet. The real question is whether they will build for it.
It’s also worth noting that Fox has been moving deliberately in this direction. The company recently hired Billy Parks to lead a new division called Fox Creator Studios, a digital-first initiative designed to work directly with creators and develop formats and IP that can move fluidly between social platforms, streaming, and television. That effort sits alongside other bets Fox has already made in the creator economy, including its investment in the microdrama platform Holywater and its use of Tubi as a testing ground for new talent and formats. In other words, many of the ingredients for a modern entertainment ecosystem already exist inside the company.
Which is what makes the Baywatch opportunity so interesting. Fox already has many of the pieces.
The BaywatchVerse
Take the TV show away for a moment and look at what Baywatch actually is. A beach. Lifeguards. Physical culture. Ocean rescue. Sun, fitness, and first responders. A team of people whose job is running toward danger while everyone else runs away.
That combination travels easily because it already exists in the real world. Millions of people surf, train on the beach, follow lifeguards on social media, or watch the creators who document that life every day. Baywatch didn’t invent that culture. It tapped into something that was already there.
The opportunity now is not simply launching another season of television. It is building the infrastructure around that culture so the audience can move through it across platforms, between episodes, and long before the broadcast premiere arrives.
And the order matters.
Layer 1 — Build the Lifeguard Tower
Before any ecosystem spins up, Fox needs to capture the audience.
Legacy television marketing is built around awareness. The modern internet runs on ownership. The difference is first-party data.
Baywatch has a rare advantage here because the culture around it already exists. There are millions of fans of the original show scattered across YouTube comment sections, nostalgia forums, TikTok edits, and Facebook groups dedicated to the series. Those people should be found and recruited early.
Not as viewers. As ambassadors.
Fox could identify the most active fans of the original show across social platforms and bring them into the ecosystem before the reboot even premieres. Invite them into private communities. Give them early access to behind-the-scenes content. Let them help shape the conversation around the new show.
At the same time, every real-world activation should double as a data engine. Beach events, creator workouts, lifeguard demonstrations, and programming can all capture first-party audience relationships through sign-ups, exclusive drops, and access to content that only exists inside the Baywatch community.
Television ratings measure attention for a moment.
First-party data builds a relationship that lasts for years.
If Fox wants Baywatch to become a modern entertainment ecosystem rather than just another reboot, that relationship has to be built before the first episode ever airs.
Layer 2 — The Story Behind the Red Swimsuit
Before any ecosystem spins up, the most obvious content already exists: the making of the original Baywatch.
It’s as dramatic as the rescues in its most popular episodes. A network cancellation. A bankrupt studio. A group of creators buying back the rights. International sales financing the resurrection. A show mocked by critics quietly becoming the most-watched series on earth.
Then there is all the behind the scenes, E! True Hollywood story fodder…
That lore alone is a fun, fast paced ripped from the headlines docu-series. And they should produce one…
A ten-episode series featuring writers, lifeguards, stunt coordinators, and cast telling the real story. The fights with NBC. The syndication gamble that saved the show. Hasselhoff putting his own money and salary on the line to keep it alive. The strange moment when Germany fell in love with Baywatch before America did. The sudden global fame that turned the cast into tabloid fixtures. On-set relationships, Pamela Anderson dating world-champion surfer Kelly Slater, and the cultural chaos of the Tommy Lee era. The challenges of filming rescues in real surf where the crew occasionally had to respond to actual emergencies. The behind-the-scenes stories of a show that somehow became the biggest thing in the world.
TV Studios often resist ambitious projects like this because they are not structured to pay for them out of their marketing budget. But this is not promotion. It is a business. Build it for Tubi. Sell advertising around it. Let the mythology of the franchise reintroduce itself before the reboot arrives.
Layer 3 — The Beach Goes Digital First
Fox has months before the premiere. The traditional move for networks is to go quiet during production and drop a trailer shortly before launch. A better approach would be to start now.
Short-form platforms should be flooded with the feeling of the show rather than clips from the show. Modern beach culture cut against classic Baywatch imagery. The tower. The red suit. The sunset. Contemporary music and fast edits bridging nostalgia and modern rhythm.
Then go deeper. Partner with actual LA County lifeguards for documentary-style content showing training, rescues, and the reality of the job. This becomes the credibility layer that earns the reboot the right to tell these stories.
Most importantly, activate the cast’s existing channels. Not with scripted promotional posts, but with permission to document their entry into the world of lifeguarding. Noah Beck learning rescue drills. Livvy Dunne training physically for the role.
The audience does not want polished marketing. They want the process.
Layer 4 — The Creator Coastline
Fox has cast social media stars in the show. The next step is building a creator ecosystem around the franchise.
Fitness creators designing Baywatch-inspired workouts. Surf and beach lifestyle accounts integrating the aesthetic into their feeds. First-responder creators reacting to rescue sequences. Fashion creators breaking down the wardrobe.
Pay them. Give them access. Let them keep their voice.
When dozens of creators across fitness, surf culture, fashion, and rescue communities are all engaging with the same world, the audience begins to perceive something larger forming around it.
That shift is the difference between awareness and culture.
Layer 5 — The Holywater Wave
One of those pieces is Holywater, the microdrama platform Fox invested in to experiment with serialized mobile storytelling.
This is where Baywatch could expand its universe quickly and inexpensively.
Imagine a sixty-episode microdrama telling the origin story of Livvy Dunne’s character. Training. Rivalries. Early rescues. Small character stories that deepen the world and introduce the audience to the ecosystem before the broadcast show even arrives.
Microdramas typically cost between $150K and $250K to produce for roughly sixty episodes, plus marketing. In television economics that’s almost negligible. They can monetize through ads and sponsorship while quietly building intrigue around the main series.
One executive at the microdrama platform ReelShort told me something interesting: when they release microdramas based on books, the book sales often spike dramatically, even when the microdrama itself isn’t a major hit. It’s not a perfect analogy, but it’s a useful signal. These formats don’t just tell stories. They activate audiences.
Instead of waiting for viewers to form an attachment after the broadcast premiere, microdramas allow the world of the show to start expanding before it even arrives.
Layer 6 — Bring the Show to the Sand
Baywatch has a structural advantage almost no legacy IP possesses. Its setting is real.
Beaches already exist. The event does not need to be invented. It only needs to be claimed.
Venice Beach, Santa Monica, Huntington Beach, Miami Beach, Waikiki. Lifeguard demonstrations, fitness activations, cast appearances, creator meetups.
The key partner should be the lifeguarding community itself. Many lifeguards already post regularly on social media about training, rescues, and ocean safety. These programs may be some of the best recruitment material the profession could ask for.
Fox also has a physical piece of creator infrastructure sitting just blocks away. Through its advertising division the company invested in The Lighthouse in Venice. That campus could easily become a pre-launch activation hub for Baywatch, bringing beach culture, creators, and the show’s cast together before the premiere even arrives. Imagine a few days of programming built around beach life. Surf sessions. Lifeguard demonstrations. Training challenges. Creator-led workouts. Events flowing between Venice Beach and the Lighthouse.
It also opens the door for the most natural sponsors in the world of the show. Sunscreen brands like Sun Bum, Supergoop, or Banana Boat. Swim and beachwear brands like Speedo, Billabong, Roxy, or Vilebrequin. Wellness and fitness companies like Alo Yoga or Vuori. Hydration brands like Liquid I.V. or Gatorade. Surf companies like Hurley or Quiksilver.
The activation becomes a living version of the Baywatch world, where brands, creators, and the cast are all participating in the same culture before the series even premieres.
Fox does not operate a global broadcast network, so the show will ultimately be sold territory by territory to international buyers. A strong U.S. cultural launch gives those partners momentum to build from.
Layer 7 — The Red Swimsuit Economy
The red Baywatch swimsuit is one of the most recognizable costumes in television history.
That recognition can extend far beyond traditional licensing. Instead of simply reproducing the suit, Fox could treat it as a design language and invite fashion creators to reinterpret it in collaboration with major swimwear and lifestyle brands. Surf designers, fashion TikTokers, and beachwear creators could develop limited drops that remix the iconic silhouette for modern beach culture. Different creators. Different aesthetics. Different audiences discovering the brand through the people they already follow.
The result isn’t just merchandise. It’s a creator-driven fashion ecosystem orbiting the show.
The fitness layer is equally natural. The training regimens of the cast could evolve into a Baywatch Training Program, developed with fitness creators who already specialize in beach workouts, ocean swimming, and lifeguard-style conditioning. What would normally be promotional content becomes something the audience participates in.
The show runs once a week. The culture around it runs every day.
The Second Rescue
None of this guarantees success. Social media followers do not automatically convert into broadcast viewers, and building ecosystems requires alignment across divisions that were never designed to work together.
But the opportunity is real.
Baywatch once reached more people every week than any show in television history because its premise traveled everywhere.
The premise still works.
In my own work producing television, I’ve often pushed for experiments like this. Building ecosystems instead of just shows. Starting the audience before the premiere. Letting creators, events, and commerce live alongside the story.
The reality is that networks and platforms have not traditionally been structured to finance that kind of holistic approach. And honestly, I understand why. These companies are large ships. Changing direction requires new incentives, new departments, and a willingness to fund pieces of a system that don’t always look like television.
It’s easy to say they can’t afford not to do it. In practice, the turn is much harder than that.
But Baywatch may be one of the rare brands where the pieces already exist.
The beach.
The culture.
The creators.
The audience.
The question is whether Fox builds the system around it.
Nobody asked them to. But the beach is right there
They should ask Ben for his opinion, as Ben knows AND is smart.
Hi Ben, I completely agree with the layers' structure you proposed. Right now, the main thing is to create, develop, and nurture a community, and to learn and grow with it. Honestly, I was never a Baywatch watcher; I was more a Buffy Vampire Slayer and Saint Seiya community. Except for Saint Seiya, Baywatch is a great bet! Thanks for the insightful analysis you give us.