Home Improvement’s Taran Noah Smith Explains ‘Very Awkward’ Reason Character Went Goth

Taran Noah Smith, the actor who played Mark Taylor on Home Improvement, recently explained the reasoning behind his character’s “very awkward” goth moment, during a recent appearance on The Best Show with Tom Scharpling podcast.

Smith, who played the youngest son of Tim (Tim Allen) and Jill (Patricia Richardson) on the sitcom, said that while it seemed like his character turned goth out of nowhere, it was actually inspired by the head writer on the show’s own son.

“So, it wasn’t mine,” said Smith, who starred on the show from age 6 to 16, while laughing. “The whole storyline of the older brothers beating up on me or teasing me didn’t really work anymore because now I was taller than both of them.”

While the the decision to change his character’s look was made in the break between seasons 6 and 7, it wasn’t until later that he realized where the idea likely came from.

“I found out later the head writer on the show, he had a son that was right around my age,” he explained, adding, “and after about halfway through the season, I’m in wardrobe, black fingernails, and dog collar and all the stuff on, and I went backstage and came face to face with his son, who was not in wardrobe, but looked just like me, and we had this very awkward moment of like, ‘Oh, I’m your dad’s way of kind of dealing with you, sorry.'”

Home Improvement followed Allen’s Tim Taylor, host of the home improvement show “Tool Time,” and his life with wife Jill and their three boys, Brad (Zachery Ty Bryan), Randy (Jonathan Taylor Thomas), and Mark (Smith). It ran for eight seasons on ABC, with talks of a possible reunion over the years.

“One of the conversations we’ve had recently is how weird it would be if Home Improvement would be about the kids’ kids,” Allen told The Messenger in 2023. “Like if all of them had children, and I’m a grandparent. Home Re-Improvement or something like that. It’s come up.”

Getting Smith onboard might be hard, however, with the 40-year-old actor leaving Hollywood after the series ended its run in 1999.

Since then he’s pursued various other ventures, including running a vegan restaurant, doing humanitarian work in the Philippines, and teaching people how to pilot submarines with the Community Submersibles Project.