'Bunk’d', Disney Channel’s Longest-Running Live Action Series, Ending After 7 Seasons In 2024

The seventh and final season has been given a 2-episode extension, likely for a gracious wrap-up

From Learning the Ropes to learning to cope. Bunk’d, Disney Channel’s longest-running live-action series, has its end in its sights. The network has announced that the current seventh season will be its last, and for it, the 20-episode season has been extended to 22.

“With a fantastic cast of characters and hilarious and heartful storylines, it’s no wonder Bunk’d has been one of Disney Channel’s longest-running and successful live-action series,” Ayo Davis, who is President of Disney Branded Television, said in a statement. “We’d like to thank our talented cast, creative team and crew for bringing tremendous joy and laughter to kids for seven incredible seasons.”

Season 7 premiered in July, and aired all 12 of the episodes that were completed before production was suspended when the writers began striking in May. The final two episodes of the batch were the 150th episode, which aired in September, and the Christmas episode which aired at the very start of this month. Production was suspended with eight episodes left to film, but with it resumed, there are now two additional episodes, bringing it to ten total. All ten are expected to air by the end of 2024.

Created by Pamela Eells O’Connell, Bunk’d premiered in 2015 as a spin-off of the Debby Ryan vehicle Jessie, which premiered in 2011, running for 4 seasons and 98 episodes until October 2015, just a few months after Bunk’d premiered. The spinning off was for three of the Ross children Jessie had been nanny to: Emma played by Peyton List, Ravi played by Karan Brar, and Zuri played by Skai Jackson. They become counselors in training at Camp Kikiwaka, and meet the true main character of the series, camp counselor Lou Hockhauser, played by Miranda May, who has been on the series to this day. When the camp is abandoned after a fire between seasons 2 and 3, the Ross family buys the camp and Emma, Ravi and Zuri run it until the end of the season, leaving to follow their career aspirations. Lou became head of the camp in season 4. The next most senior series regular is Mallory James Mahoney as Destiny Baker, a former pageant girl who was a camper in her season 3 debut as part of the first group of “next class”, now a counselor. The other current series regulars include Israel Johnson as Noah Lambert, Shiloh Verrico as Winnie Webber, Alfred Lewis as Bill Pickett, Luke Busey as Jake Jacobs and Trevor Tordjman as Parker Preston, whose family bought Camp Kikiwaka in season 5, and opened Kikiwaka Ranch for him in season 6 because he and Lou weren’t gelling. It is with this that the show gained the subtitle Learning the Ropes.

Over the course of its run, Bunk’d had many main and recurring campers, such as Once Upon a Time’s Raphael Alejandro and Lucifer and Ultra Violet & Black Scorpion‘s Scarlett Estevez, and staff including Mary Scheer and Kevin Quinn. O’Connell served as executive producer for the first three seasons. Phil Baker and Erin Dunlap took over as showrunners for Season 4, but Dunlap went solo as executive producer and showrunner starting the following season and for the rest of the series.

Spanning multiple generations of Disney Channel live action sitcoms, Bunk’d broke the mold of longevity for these series, being the first to be renewed for a fifth season (and so on) followed by Raven’s Home, which has run six. The two series even crossed over, reinforcing the existence of Disney Channel’s convoluted live action universe. Bunk’d has been on for so long that the series streams on Netflix, because that’s where Disney Channel shows landed before Disney+ was a thing. In the current cable climate, only Raven’s Home has a chance of catching Bunk’d and might need an eighth season to do it.

As of writing, there are two other live action sitcoms on Disney Channel: The Villains of Valley View and Pretty Freekin Scary. Their renewal statuses aren’t known, but even with three on the slate, growth is in order, and the next generation of multi-camera comedies for the channel’s 6-11 demographic is a priority for Davis’ creative team, namely Charlie Andrews, Executive Vice President of Live Action and Unscripted Programming. His recently hired second-in-command, Jenna Boyd, a veteran executive of kids’ and family entertainment, is very much working on developing that healthy slate.

Source: Deadline