King of the Hill is coming back to screens with a new revival series streaming with Hulu later this Summer, and the first look at the new episodes has raised a rather big question about Dale. Original series creators Mike Judge and Greg Daniels are returning for a new take on King of the Hill over 15 years since the original series came to an end. Rather than try and pick up from where everything originally left off, however, this new King of the Hill revival is going in a completely unexpected direction as it’s made a big time jump from that original show.
King of the Hill has shared the first look at its new revival series ahead of its premiere with Hulu, and with it has confirmed that this new wave of episodes will be taking place years after the events of the original series. It’s yet to be revealed if it will be the same 15 years since the original series ended, but what it has also done was raised a rather big question about Dale with the first look at his new design. Has Dale truly given up smoking after all these years? And if so, why?
What’s Going on With Dale in New King of the Hill?
In the first look at the new King of the Hill revival, Hank is surrounded by Bill, Dale and Boomhauer as each of them are using new technologies that have popped up in the years since the original show ended. In Dale’s case, he’s not only using a virtual reality headset but he’s also shown to be using a vaping device as well. The virtual reality headset does make sense as Dale would seemingly be the kind of person that would enjoy a window into another kind of world, but the vaping is at the center of a much bigger, more crucial character issue.
While Dale was always naturally questioning the world around him, at his core he had a few naive beliefs. One of those was his love of cigarettes. It was to the point where he smoked so much, he eventually used that to try and sue the Manitoba Tobacco Corporation to make money to help his wife Nancy. It was revealed during the episode that not only has Dale smoked an inhuman amount of cigarettes, but he closely loved the brand himself to a level that no one else really has before. He’s even been infamous “Smoking Bandit” around town due to the fact he’s one of the last people to actually still smoke in the series itself.
If he has indeed shifting over to vaping for this new series, and it’s not just a fun visual for the promotional poster, then it raises some big questions about what’s happened to Dale since the events of the original. Considering there were some heavy clouds over the character heading into the new episodes already, and they could paint a picture of how much Dale has changed if his core beliefs have been shaken to such an extent. This might even tease an even bigger shift to Dale than you’d expect.
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Why Does This Matter for Dale?
If Dale gave up something he had a core belief in like cigarettes, it could mean that he’s starting to look at himself through a much different lens overall. It could be that he’s discovered that vaping might be better than cigarettes (due to a naive belief in Manitoba’s product placements), or it could be that he’s challenging everything else he thought to be true after finding out what’s happened between him and Nancy. Because as of the end of the original King of the Hill, Dale still doesn’t know he’s not Joseph’s biological father. What if he found out in this time jump?
King of the Hill has jumped forward several years, and with it the show could use that opportunity to settle some of the original show’s biggest stories. John Redcorn and Nancy’s affair was one of the big things hanging over Dale, and his naive belief in those he loves never had him second guess that everyone was telling him the truth. But if he found out about this affair, it would be a huge rocking to Dale in general and cause him to look at things he knows differently. We’ve seen Dale go through this several times in the original show (such as when he loved America for an episode after second guessing the Kennedy assassination), so it’s not hard to imagine the same here.
With a new voice actor likely taking over for Dale in the new King of the Hill following original voice Johnny Hardwick’s passing, we could see a whole character change coming for the mainstay in ways that we didn’t expect. But this is only one of the major changes coming in the new show too, and we’ll get to see for ourselves what that all looks like later this year.
