One Direction fans had a glimmer of hope this week that there would be a reunion on the farewell episode of The Late Late Show with James Corden.
“WHAT?! don’t play with my feelings b***hes,” read one reaction on Twitter. Someone else tweeted: “One Direction having a reunion will solve 100% of my problems.”
Gossip account DeuxMoi claimed that Harry Styles, Niall Horan, Liam Payne, Louis Tomlinson and Zayn Malik would get together again for the finale airing on April 27.
The show's executive producer Ben Winston quickly denied the claim, responding to tweets from hopeful fans on April 9 with: "I wish! Sadly not going to happen!"
But, four days after Winston said there would be no 1D reunion on the show, the Daily Mail and other media outlets picked up the story anyway. “One Direction ‘to reunite in FULL for the first time in 8 years for James Corden’s last ever Late Late Show,'" read the headline at the Daily Mail on Thursday. The Mirror declared: “One Direction ‘to reunite in full’ for James Corden’s last ever Late Late Show.”
On Thursday, The Late Late Show shot down the rumour for good. "Nobody loves the boys more than us … but this story just isn’t true,” read a tweet on the show’s official account.
One Direction split in 2015. Ever since, the group's members have spoken publicly about possibly coming together again.
"We'd be absolutely ridiculous not to reform the band,” Horan told RTE in 2020. “We haven’t really spoken about the ‘when's' but we do know we will. We have all said individually that we will and I think it would be stupid if we didn’t.”
In 2019, Tomlinson told The Sun a reunion is “no brainer.” He added: “Honestly I'll be the first name on the team sheet, I'll be signing it straight away I tell you. You feel like we’ve got a responsibility actually to come back to these people.”
Simon Cowell, who put the group together, told a British radio station in 2019: “My gut feeling is … yeah, I do think it will happen. It would be nuts not to. Even if it was a one-off event or something, it’s just too big of an opportunity not to do.”
Last month, Styles sparked speculation by sharing a selfie in an Instagram Story in which he is wearing a T-shirt from 1D’s 2012 Up All Night Tour.