Netflix Comeback Continues as Company Gets ‘Arrested’

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Lucy Nicholson / REUTERS

Score another one for the Netflix comeback; the company has outbid cable company Showtime to win the rights for the much-anticipated new season of Arrested Development, which will premiere as streaming content on the service in early 2013.

Details about the new season are still unclear, including how many episodes it’ll involve. Creator Mitch Hurwitz has previously suggested that we can expect somewhere around 10 new episodes, with each episode centered around what’s happened to one member of the Bluth family in the five years since the show’s cancellation, leading up to a cast reunion in a mooted movie to be released in summer 2013.

(MORE: Hulu vs. Netflix: Who Will Get ‘Arrested’?)

20th Century Fox, the studio behind the show, confirmed the Netflix deal late Friday, with Fox Filmed Entertainment president of new media and digital distribution Peter Levinsohn calling it “an exciting new opportunity for our two companies”:

Bringing a classic show back to production on new episodes exclusively for Netflix customers is a game changer, and illustrates the incredible potential the new digital landscape affords great content providers like 20th Century Fox Television and [production company] Imagine.

20th Century Fox TV Chairmen Dana Walden and Gary Newman also offered a statement saying that the deal represented “a new business model that is extremely exciting and opens the door for a wide range of new collaborations,” suggesting that the studio may be looking to resurrect other cult favorite shows via Netflix in the future.

The deal adds a third exclusive show to Netflix’s library, following the political thriller House of Cards and new comedy Orange is the New Black.

MORE: Don’t Call It a Comeback: What Netflix Did Next

Graeme McMillan is a reporter at TIME. Find him on Twitter at @Graemem or on Facebook at Facebook/Graeme.McMillan. You can also continue the discussion on TIME’s Facebook page and on Twitter at @TIME.