'The View' Co-Hosts Toast to Barbara Walters as They Reunite for the First Time Since March 2020

The View co-hosts are reunited at last.

Ahead of the show's upcoming 25th season, Whoopi Goldberg, Joy Behar, Sunny Hostin and Sara Haines saw each other for the first time in over a year, since the COVID-19 pandemic shut down in-person filming in March 2020.

"Oh my god," Behar, 78, exclaims when she sees Hostin, 52, and Haines, 43 in PEOPLE's exclusive sneak peek at the reunion.

"It's been a minute," Haines adds before embracing Behar, who quips, "Don't mess up my hair."

When Goldberg, 65, walks in the room, they all begin a round of applause for their final panelist as Haines goes in for another hug. "Sara's a hugger," Hostin notes.

Later in the video, the co-hosts reflect on The View's 25th anniversary.

"I can't believe it's 25 years," Behar says. "I'm still trying to finish a sentence I started in 1997!"

"These are the jokes, okay motherf------," she adds. "This is it."

The foursome then raise a champagne toast to 25 years — and to original host Barbara Walters, who put together the initial panel of women in 1997 and served on it herself until her retirement in 2014.

"For you Barbara!" they say in unison.

Last month, Meghan McCain announced her exit from the show after four seasons as a panelist, citing her life in Washington, D.C. with husband Ben Domenech as a reason for her departure. The couple welcomed their first child, daughter Liberty, last September.

"This was not an easy decision," she said at the top of the July 1 episode. "It took a lot of thought and counsel and prayer, and talking to my family and my close friends, and, you know, look — COVID has changed the world for all of us and it changed the way, at least for me, the way I am looking at life, the way I'm living my life, the way I want my life to look like."

McCain's final episode aired Aug. 6. "This has been a really wild ride the past four years of my life," she said in her farewell to viewers.

She continued, "It's been, honestly, the best of times in all ways, on and off the show. And it's been a really incredible, liberating experience and I will always cherish the time I spent with all of you."

Season 25 of The View is set to premiere Tuesday, Sept. 7 (11 a.m. ET) on ABC.