The Middle – Sue Heck spin-off with Eden Sher officially gets pilot order

It’s now official: ABC is moving forward with a potential spin-off for The Middle that stars original series star Eden Sher.

According to Deadline, the network is making a pilot commitment for a new comedy series starring Sher as Sue Heck. Save for the following logline, there isn’t too much else in the way of information out there just yet: “The half-hour single camera comedy follows the twentysomething adventures of eternal optimist Sue Heck (Sher) as she leaves the small town of Orson to navigate the ups and downs of a career and young adulthood in the big city of Chicago.”

Basically, the idea here seems to be a fish-out-of-water sort of situation where you see how Sue handles living in a completely different world surrounded by different people. Depending on the strength of the script and the supporting cast, it could be a winner. We definitely think that there will be a little bit of attention given to it, mostly because The Middle was one of the most consistent and successful shows for ABC for many years. It managed to garner both critical acclaim and a sizable fan base, and we like to think that most of them would be on board for a new series.

Is it possible for Sue’s series to garner its own audience? Sure, with Frasier being a great example of that. The challenge with these sort of shows is that they need to be similar enough so that you can get viewers who were fans of the original series, but also new people who may not know The Middle at all who are watching mostly out of curiosity.

We don’t foresee this spin-off premiering at any point in 2018 but after that, who knows? We do think that a 2019 launch for the series, if ABC likes the pilot, could be in the cards.

What do you think about this spin-off getting the green light? Be sure to share right away in the attached comments!