Tim Allen will star in the pilot for new ABC comedy series Shifting Gears

Home Improvement and Last Man Standing star Tim Allen returns to ABC with a new sitcom. The network has given a pilot order for a family comedy starring the actor-comedian as the lead.

The project, tentatively titled Shifting Gears, comes from Duncanville co-creators Mike Scully and Julie Thacker Sully, who along with Last Man Standing executive producers Allen, Marty Adelstein, Becky Clements, Richard Baker and Rick Messina and the series' studio, 20th Television, producing the series.



Shifting Gears is written by the Scully's and centers on Matt (Allen, pictured), a stubborn, widowed owner of a classic car restoration shop. When Matt's estranged daughter and her teenage children move into his house, the real restoration begins.

Allen is currently starring and executive producing the Disney+ series The Santa Clauses, which returned for a second season in November. The Calvin family comedy hasn't heard anything about a third season renewal yet, and we've heard that there won't be a new season for the upcoming holidays, but it could return in 2025.

If that happens and Shifting Gears is also made into series, Allen could do both. They are produced by the same studio, 20th Television.

This is the first pilot order for ABC this season. The network has switched to year-round development and focuses on two launch pads, fall and shoulder season.

Allen's last network comedy, Last Man Standing, started on ABC where it aired for six seasons before being canceled. It was then picked up by Fox (then a sister network of 20th Television before the studio was acquired by ABC parent Disney) and ran for three more seasons.