MTV is bringing back TRL for one day only -- except not really.
MTV announced today that they were bringing back the legendary music countdown series ... but it would be in a half-hour format, be dedicated entirely to the music of Ariana Grande (with a "special" announcement to be made) and be titled Total Ariana Live, and not have a countdown. So, not TRL at all.
An MTV spokesperson defended the rejiggering, telling Mashable: "It's a re-invention of TRL format with Ariana front and center. TRL stood for so much more than video countdown, the video piece of TRL became secondary to the artist performances, interviews and shenanigans."
We should note that frequent TRL contributor and current MTV News EP Sway Calloway will host the program. So there's that.
Total Request Live, later rebranded TRL, ran for over 2,000 episodes from 1998-2008. At the time, it was a North Star of sorts for fans of popular music, but a program Carson Daly told Mashable back in 2012 that he wasn't sure would work in the current TV landscape.
TAL airs July 2 at 7pm ET.
Brian Anthony Hernandez contributed to this report.