As Miranda Cosgrove sings in the ear worm that is the iCarly theme song, “Some things are meant to be.” She wasn’t referencing the long-awaited Carly Shay and Freddie Benson romance seen in Season 3 of the iCarly Paramount+ reboot, but isn’t it sweet to think she was? Nathan Kress‘s Freddie spent all of Nickelodeon‘s iCarly confessing his love for the titular character. Now, as adults, he finally got to hear her say it back in Season 3 Episode 4 (on a livestream of their web show, in true iCarly fashion).
TV Insider caught up with Cosgrove to ask why Season 3 was the perfect time to make iCarly fans’ #Creddie dreams a reality after eight collective seasons and 16 years of waiting. From where she’s standing, Creddie was always “meant to be,” but it feels so wonderful to see the positive fan reaction to this slow-burn romance that has the potential to be one of TV’s most memorable.
Lisa Rose/Nickelodeon/Everett Collection
The iCarly reboot maintains the signature humor and tomfoolery of its predecessor while allowing its characters to be realistic adults. With its talk of romance, sex, divorce, step-children, and more, it’s an unexpectedly adult series. Rebooting a legendary teen series into a show for adults is not common in our current reboot era, but it stands as the best argument that Disney+ should have let Hilary Duff make the grownup Lizzie McGuire of her and fans’ dreams.
A Creddie romance may have been a presumed given for this series. Knowing that, Cosgrove (who also is an executive producer), Kress (who produces, as does Jerry Trainor), and the writers wanted to make sure they didn’t make that storyline happen too soon. Despite taking things slow, Cosgrove says she and Kress were “a little worried” about fan reception.
“When we decided to do the revival in the first place, we were kind of scared of touching on that,” she tells TV Insider. “The first season, we wanted to really have the characters more established and figure out exactly what the new show was going to look like. And then we were like, maybe we’ll talk about it at some point down the line, but we weren’t really sure about ever doing it. So to finally do it this season and have the pressure of trying to make it just right after making people wait for 16 years, that was kind of a big concern. We just wanted to make sure that it was right. So it felt really good that it seems like people really enjoyed it.”
The Creddie romance was considered for Seasons 1 and 2, but “it just felt right” to do it in Season 3, says the Drake & Josh alum. “It felt like the show is established enough, and it’s been such a long time. And also just the way the story went, it seems like the characters were meant to be together.”
Fans certainly agree. Seeing Carly defend her man in Season 3 Episode 5, “iFaked It,” streaming as of June 22, against an unauthorized deep-fake spurred a string of excited tweets from viewers. “Carly in her protective girlfriend era. Don’t mess with her man,” one tweet reads. Cosgrove cracks up as the tweet is read during our interview and says it’s a fun time to be making this show.
We spoke with @MirandaCosgrove about Carly & Freddie FINALLY becoming #Creddie on #season3 of @iCarly, now streaming on @paramountplus. pic.twitter.com/sPWhliilQ9
— TV Insider (@TVInsider) June 22, 2023
“Carly and Freddie are both such nerds that it’s fun getting to be nerdy like that,” she says with a smile. “Because even though the characters are so close and they’re friends, I feel like in a relationship and as a couple, they’re constantly making fun of each other and being silly together. They get each other’s weirdness, which is the dream for any relationship, to be able to be your weirdest self and have the other person be just as weird back and get you. So I love that about them together. And I think that it’s just been fun seeing a new side of their relationship within the show.”
Outside of “tiny moments” here and there, Cosgrove says the writers were careful not to hint at any budding romance in the first two seasons. “We really try to just focus on the characters now, where their lives have taken them, and also the friendship between Freddie and Carly. I think that’s a huge part of why their relationship works. They really do both respect each other so much and value their friendship so much that it almost seems like it’s the biggest reason why they were apart for so long.”
“They didn’t want to mess that up or risk it,” she continues. “I’m glad that the writers finally wrote this episode and that they did risk it, because I think they’re really a good couple and they’re kind of meant to be together.” But it’s not all smooth sailing from here. Expect Carly and Freddie’s honeymoon phase bubble to be popped later this season.
“We have some episodes where some things go down with Freddie’s mom accepting Carly since she’s always had a hard time doing that and letting go of her baby,” Cosgrove warns. “We also touch on Millicent [Jaidyn Triplett], the whole situation with the fact that Freddie has a stepdaughter, he has an ex-wife, and he has a lot of responsibility there. We have a whole episode about that. We definitely get more into the real, serious things that would really happen if the relationship took off.”
Lisa Rose/Paramount+
iCarly has always been tech-forward and ahead of its time, but the AI and deep-fake technology issues raised in “iFaked It” are particularly relevant given the WGA writers strike (AI technology is a major concern for the union). Having been famous her whole life, Cosgrove strongly relates to Carly’s concerns about living life on the internet (playing this character is often a meta experience for the star, who says her personal experiences often align with her character’s).
She’s also all too familiar with seeing her face pop up ad nauseam on the internet. While she’s been the star of countless memes for most of her adult life, going viral for her “probably f**k” comment on TikTok in 2022 was a particularly hilarious experience.
“I never know what the internet is going to do to me,” she jokes, “and I’m continuously humbled by the internet and in shock, usually. … It was really funny. I had a really good time watching. I literally went on TikTok and I watched so many of the different people’s videos they made. I think they turned it into a song at one point. People were belly dancing to it. I watched a lot of those. I’m always excited to see what the internet is going to do next.”
As for what she wants the show to do next, she’d love to see more iCarly guest characters come back for the revival. “There was a character named Mandy [Aria Summer Wallace] that was on the original show who was like, their biggest fan, and I think that’d be really fun to have her back,” she shares. “I think Emily Ratajkowski has mentioned [interest in guest starring], because she was in the original show. I think it would be amazing to have her again. That’d be really fun to see what happened with her relationship with Gibby [Noah Munck].”
“Nevel [Reed Alexander] is definitely my favorite villain, and he’s been in two episodes now in the revival. So I’d love to have him back again with Prunella [Bailey Stender], his wife,” she adds. “Oh, and Mrs. Briggs [Mindy Sterling]. She’s not really a villain, but she was a little bit of a bad guy because she was the crazy teacher in the original. I think she’d be great to have back too.”
iCarly, Thursdays, Paramount+
