Paul Reubens a chain reaction of national media attention that changed the general public's view of Reubens and Pee-wee. The arrest postponed Reubens' involvement in major projects until 1999 when he appeared in several big-budget projects including "Mystery Men" and "Blow" and started giving interviews as himself rather than as Pee-wee. Since 2006, Reubens has been making cameos and guest appearances in numerous projects, such as "Reno 911!", "30 Rock", "Dirt", "Pushing Daisies", and "The Blacklist". Since the 1990s, he has worked on two possible Pee-wee films: one dark and adult, dubbed "The Pee-wee Herman Story", and one a family-friendly epic adventure
Paul Reubens that using CGI for "updating" the puppets' looks could be an option, but it all depended on the budget the films would have. Reubens once mentioned the possibility of doing one of the two as an animated film along the lines of "The Polar Express", which uses performance capture technology, incorporating the movements of live actors into animated characters. Reubens approached "Pee-wee's Big Adventure" director Tim Burton with one of the scripts and talked to Johnny Depp about the possibility of having him portray Pee-wee, but Burton was too busy, and Depp said he would have to think about it.