I'm not a fan of reboots period, if a franchise is moribund than let it die don't reboot it every generation.
Nostalgia for the 24th Century
- Thread starter Emperor Norton
- Start date
Man. THIS ist the moment I'm most nostalgic for after all the reboots, prequels and quasi-reboots!
The movie before (Nemesis) was shit. But this right here is Star Trek: It's moved on from the TNG's bulky-ness of design. It was new, exciting, more advanced than everything before, but still realisticly "our" futre. Even felt a little TOS retro-y. The universe was open and wide. Time was moving on. And we were craving for the next adventure. We didn't know what to expect, what would happen, or how the next story would end or in what direction the universe was going. We just knew we were there, in this little moment, all possibilities open, and eager to explore the unknown, strange new worlds and new civilisations. I cannot wait until we will pick up from this point in time again, and go forward into the unknown!
By that reasoning, we should have let Zorro die in the silent era, after only two movies? And never made another Superman movie or TV series after the Kirk Alyn serial in the 1940s? Or the George Reeves TV series? (Sorry, Christopher Reeve; we don't need your darn reboot.) Or had classic remakes like the THE THING or THE FLY or THE MALTESE FALCON or THE WIZARD OF OZ or SOME LIKE IT HOT or VICTORIA/VICTORIA? Or THE TEN COMMANDMENTS or ONE MILLION YEARS B.C.?
I just rewatched the original 1974 TV-movie version of DOCTOR STRANGE. Should Hollywood have given up on the character forever after that movie tanked in the ratings? (Trust me, the reboot is better.) Heck, it took Hollywood at least four tries, and nearly seventy years, to get CAPTAIN AMERICA right . . ..
Stories get retold and reinvented. We've been doing it since our ancestors first told stories around the campfire about a saber-tooth tiger eating the moon. Reboots are just the modern-day equivalent of a new production of "Hamlet" or "Carmen" or whatever.
I think that we have to many reboots at the moment, like two Spiderman reboots in 10 years.
And I woulnd't mind to see characters/ actors grow older.
And I woulnd't mind to see characters/ actors grow older.
But how soon is too soon? Granted, there was a larger gap between the Nicholas Hammond SPIDER-MAN and the Tobey Maguire version, but I've seen some fans object to reboots of properties that were at least thirty years old.
Seriously, just yesterday, I saw somebody rolling their eyes at a WONDER WOMAN reboot, even though the "classic" Lynda Carter TV show was some forty years ago!
I think ten years is too soon.
If a movie fails I don't think Its necessary to reboot everything.
Maybe people are tired of all the reboots in general?
If a movie fails I don't think Its necessary to reboot everything.
Maybe people are tired of all the reboots in general?
So you're not going to check out RIVERDALE then? 
(Seriously, a moody, noirish reboot of ARCHIE? Consider me intrigued.)
My attitude is that I've seen so many old favorites rebooted over years, often quite successfully, that I tend to give each new one the benefit of the doubt. It's not like there can only one "true" version of any given property, nor do we have to choose between them. There's no rule that says you can't like Dirk Benedict and Katee Sackhoff as Starbuck.
I had this odd conversation with a fan at a convention recently, where he told me that he really wanted the new GHOSTBUSTERS to be bad, and was disappointed to hear that I liked it, because "I love the original so much."
I honestly don't get that mentality. What does one have to do with the other? Enjoying a new version doesn't mean that you have to stop loving the original. You're not "cheating" on an old favorite by appreciating a new and different version. And why would you want root for a new movie to be bad, not just to fail commercially, but to actually be a bad movie . . . just because of a nostalgic attachment to an earlier version?
I mean, I love the old Universal MUMMY movies, and was rewatching THE MUMMY'S GHOST with Lon Chaney Jr. just a few nights ago, but that's not going to stop me from checking out that latest reboot with Sofia Boutella as the Mummy this summer.
The more the merrier.
(Seriously, a moody, noirish reboot of ARCHIE? Consider me intrigued.)
My attitude is that I've seen so many old favorites rebooted over years, often quite successfully, that I tend to give each new one the benefit of the doubt. It's not like there can only one "true" version of any given property, nor do we have to choose between them. There's no rule that says you can't like Dirk Benedict and Katee Sackhoff as Starbuck.
I had this odd conversation with a fan at a convention recently, where he told me that he really wanted the new GHOSTBUSTERS to be bad, and was disappointed to hear that I liked it, because "I love the original so much."
I honestly don't get that mentality. What does one have to do with the other? Enjoying a new version doesn't mean that you have to stop loving the original. You're not "cheating" on an old favorite by appreciating a new and different version. And why would you want root for a new movie to be bad, not just to fail commercially, but to actually be a bad movie . . . just because of a nostalgic attachment to an earlier version?
I mean, I love the old Universal MUMMY movies, and was rewatching THE MUMMY'S GHOST with Lon Chaney Jr. just a few nights ago, but that's not going to stop me from checking out that latest reboot with Sofia Boutella as the Mummy this summer.
The more the merrier.
I personally do not understand this mentality either. Some how, liking one means not liking the other? It confuses me to know end. Similarly, the whole "Kirk vs. Picard" or "Pine Kirk vs. Shatner Kirk" debates baffle me to no end.So you're not going to check out RIVERDALE then?
(Seriously, a moody, noirish reboot of ARCHIE? Consider me intrigued.)
My attitude is that I've seen so many old favorites rebooted over years, often quite successfully, that I tend to give each new one the benefit of the doubt. It's not like there can only one "true" version of any given property, nor do we have to choose between them. There's no rule that says you can't like Dirk Benedict and Katee Sackhoff as Starbuck.
I had this odd conversation with a fan at a convention recently, where he told me that he really wanted the new GHOSTBUSTERS to be bad, and was disappointed to hear that I liked it, because "I love the original so much."
I honestly don't get that mentality. What does one have to do with the other? Enjoying a new version doesn't mean that you have to stop loving the original. You're not "cheating" on an old favorite by appreciating a new and different version. And why would you want root for a new movie to be bad, not just to fail commercially, but to actually be a bad movie . . . just because of a nostalgic attachment to an earlier version?
I mean, I love the old Universal MUMMY movies, and was rewatching THE MUMMY'S GHOST with Lon Chaney Jr. just a few nights ago, but that's not going to stop me from checking out that latest reboot with Sofia Boutella as the Mummy this summer.
The more the merrier.
Even GR acknowledged that some day someone would come along and retell Star Trek to suit the audience and day and age in which it was produced, and he welcomed it.
The idea of reboots having a certain time frame between them is one that I get and don't get all at the same time. If they want to reboot a franchise then why not? I'll give that one as equal a shot as I did the original. I did it with Battlestar, with Spider-man (and will do again) as well as Star Trek. Some I liked (Spider-man) and some I didn't (Battlestar) but I'll give each their equal shot.
Or "Star Trek vs. Star Wars" or "Marvel vs. DC" or whatever.
They're not rival sports teams or political parties . . . or religions.
(But I will go to my grave insisting that Julie Newmar is the one true Catwoman, just to be totally hypocritical here.)
No love for Lee Meriwether or Eartha Kitt?Or "Star Trek vs. Star Wars" or "Marvel vs. DC" or whatever.
They're not rival sports teams or political parties . . . or religions.
(But I will go to my grave insisting that Julie Newmar is the one true Catwoman, just to be totally hypocritical here.)
Cold, just cold.
It's a tie between Captain Sisko and Captain Robau, the latter of which I'm not convinced isn't an ancestor of Sisko. It's either Robau or B.A. from the A-Team.Naturally, because Sisko is best
I'm sick of reboots as well.
Plenty of love. For Michelle pfeiffer as well, or Anne Hathaway, or any number of voice actresses that have voiced that roll.
But there sometimes is such a thing as perfection in a role. And that is Julie Newmar as Catwoman.
As for reboots and the like, I presently like the path they are taking with Star Wars, in keeping the universe intact while adding elements and both keeping the original actors when possible, using CGI when it seems logical to have the character look the same as they did at a certain time, or recasting for when they are younger, or when the actor that played the younger version gets as old as the original actor at the time (still waiting for Ewan McGregor to show up again as Obi-wan Kenobi, and look even more startlingly like Alec Guinness. Because I can almost bet on their being a remake of Star Wars in the future...and new "New Hope" staring Ewan McGregor as Kenobi. But that still maybe a decade away.
Now if you want to see an excellent remake, see "Space Battleship Yamato 2199" from 2012. It is as good or even better than its original from 1974, and I would consider a high standard that Hollywood tends to miss when doing remakes. The idea of keeping the flavor and feel of the thing, while also improving on it and using different actors and the like.
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You're completely right as it regards them as works of art. Where your unfortunate Ghostbusters fan *might* have an inkling of a point is when it comes to the influence that the marketing people and other "suits" have on the creation of works. The idea is that if I LOVE Primeverse Trek, but I support Kelvinverse Trek by contributing to its box office numbers and such, then I'm sending a message to the people who only care about things like "market share" and raw profit that I am a Trek fan that can be satisfied with Kelvinverse Trek - and there is therefore no need to ever make more Primeverse Trek. So Kelvinverse Trek is THE ENEMY of the Trek that I love, right?
This idea has a fatal flaw, of course, which is that the tightrope line between making it seem like Kelvinverse Trek is unpopular and unprofitable *while still allowing Trek, as a whole, to seem like a viable product* - so that they might make more Primeverse Trek - is so invisibly thin as to be almost be entirely unwalkable.
So in the end, all they're doing is giving up a chance to enjoy something new AND actually hurting the thing they claim to love. (After all, if the new product is popular enough, the marketing people might look for additional products to offer in the line - including, possibly, going back to an older form. Like Pepsi Throwback.
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I use the term "comic book" not as a pejorative but like a pejorative only because I personally dislike them. And I don't hold Star Trek to a higher standard, just a different one. Star Trek is not a TV space opera. It's science fiction. It's not hard science fiction, but it's actually more serious science fiction than you'll usually find on TV, and it thus treats its world building more realistically than do comic books and space operas. Star Wars is a different and rather more complicated matter, but suffice to say, in the 90s, when I became an adolescent Star Wars fan, Lucas was presenting Star Wars as a coherent story of six parts (contrary to some things he said earlier), so that's still what I think Star Wars should be.
And when I say I don't want the Star Trek franchise rebooted, I'm not concerned with continuity or canon. I have no objection to Khan remembering Chekhov or the look of Starfleet changing or Archer seeing Klingons or the Franklin being the first warp 4 ship. Those are just details. As long as the premise remains that Star Trek stories are part of one coherent fictional world that looks generically like science fiction, I'm happy.
And there we are. But thankfully, the nature of Shakespeare (like King Arthur and some of your other examples of old stories reimagined) is such that there will always be the kinds of productions that interest you and the different kinds of productions that interest me (though, I'll hypocritically admit that I'd like to see a Klingon Macbeth). With Star Trek, by contrast, if anyone ever pulls the full reboot trigger, the idea of a coherent Trek universe (or multiverse) will probably never govern a Trek story again. So with so many reboots dominating the Hollywood market right now, why can't the Trek multiverse retain its identity, for the sake of variety if not nostalgia. Seriously, a whole science-fictional multiverse isn't a big enough fictional playground for you?
With regards to Star Wars I know it had its origins in Flash Gordon serials. And skeptical audiences might only see space pew pew and weird mumbo jumbo but it's more there is depth and philosophy-Campbell, luminous beings we are, and so on. The Old EU had a tremendous amount of worldbuilding with novels like HTTE pushing plot structures beyond movie limitations and series like NJO having far more mature thematic arcs and points. Traitor being the shining example. Disney treats it as another marvel franchise to be endlessly rebooted and sustained with nostalgia and female protagonists.
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