Ok, maybe starting off with an internet meme is not the cleverest way to do it, but I can think of no other way to describe the absolute deluge of reboots coming at us from all directions. There have been so many reboots in the film industry alone that it's hard to keep track of everything. Hollywood has been rebooting everything from classic films like Ben Hur to sci-fi cult hits such as Total Recall and Robocop. I could write an entire post about the horror franchises that are being rebooted, but I won't. That's someone else's schtick
But for those of you who may not be in the know, there are a lot of other reboots happening in other mediums. For example, in the world of animation, classic popular '80's properties are being rebooted. My Little Pony, Transformers, and Ninja Turtles all have new shows in production, which started airing at the start of the New Tens. All these shows have been met with mostly positive responses from fans, especially My Little Pony, which shocked a lot people by developing a very large and vocal fan base of older adult males (of which I am a proud member).
It seems like with each passing month, more and more reboots keep appearing on the horizon. New versions of Powerpuff Girls, Magic School Bus (I pray that Lily Tomlin comes back to voice The Friz!) and Ducktales have been announced.
Yes, Ducktales! Even knowing how popular the show was back in the day, I'm still reeling from that announcement. I mean, holy shit, talk about a surprise! Scooby Doo has been rebooted and spun-off so many times that it's almost not worth mentioning the latest iteration. It feels completely routine at this point.
Over in Japan, it seems producers are catching wind of what's happening over here in North America. Classic '90's anime shows that our generation grew up with are being rebooted as well. Digimon, Sailor Moon and Dragonball are easily the most notable of the bunch.
In comics, DC and Marvel rebooting their respective universes, Marvel doing so in mind-blowing fashion by creating a literally multiverse-shattering event know as Secret Wars.
So, why has all this happened in the last few years? Is it simple greed, the nostalgic longing of fans reaching a tipping point, or because the Gen Xers and Millennials have grown up and started having kids, who have no previous attachment or loyalty to these properties?
To keep this post concise (too late?) I'm going to be looking at two franchises in particular that are close to my animation obsessed heart: the Disney Live Action Universe (for simplicity's sake referred to the DLAU from now on) and the new Looney Tunes show, Wabbit.
There will be no bashing or whining of any kind (there may however be rantings ahead). I'm just examining why reboots happen, and whether they are on the whole necessary at all. Hopefully we'll all have a good time in the process.
Ok, first of all, the profit motive. The entertainment business, like all businesses, are trying to get the maximum amount of money and the maximum amount of buying consumers. Rebooting popular franchises is a way to get more money from older fans, while increasing the fan base by bringing in new fans, and thus more profit.
Second, "older" stuff must be updated for newer generations. There is a belief, whether right or wrong, that there exists a "generation gap" for any given property/story. Whether it be the visuals, characters, or tropes, younger kids cannot "get" he stuff we or our parents grew up on. Better to just update it so that our kids will like the stuff we like.
This type of thiking really bothers me. If this belief was in any way true, how could I, a Millennial, enjoy classic comedy films like Abbott & Costello or The Marx Bros so much? Sure, quite a few of the references may go over my head to this day, but I still laugh at a lot of the jokes. I'm a firm believer that great art, regardless of the time or place it is made, has a timeless quality to it. It's a belief that has been drilled into my head through countless English classes and reinforced by experience.
Hell, just read a synopsis of Don Quixote to get what I mean. The story could just as easily be about a guy who suffers a mental breakdown, thinks he's a real Jedi Knight, and has a series of wacky adventures with his best friend (note to self: that is an awesome idea!) Or an even even better example: Sherlock Holmes. It's as popular now as was when the fist story was published in 1887; even a man as amazing as Benedict Cumberbatch did not make Holmes awesome on his own.
Third, it's easier & safer to rely on what has worked in the past, than to be different.
Trying something new is a gamble, we don't know whether it will pay off for any of us. We all know this is true from experience, but when a studio is thinking of putting hundreds of millions of dollars into a project, you can forgive them for being wary of risks.
Blade Runner and Kiss Kiss Bang Bang are great movies, but both of them bombed hard at the box office. For whatever reason, audiences at the time didn't get it or just weren't seeing it. Every now and then it's takes time for brilliance to be revealed, I guess.
So, studios are rebooting because, hey, it made a lot of money before, and people still love it, so why not go with what we know works?
This kind of thinking is both good and bad. As I mentioned above, looking back to the past is hardly a bad thing in and of itself. The problem, is when people start blatantly taking things that audiences have seen already, and you don't try to do anything different with the characters, the stories or your visuals. Jennifer Lawrence may be following in the footsteps Linda Hamilton or Sigourney Weaver (maybe even Lucy Lawless or Sarah Michelle Geller if we include TV), but she is still a unique feminist action icon as Katniss. Similar, yet different. I admit it's a very tricky balancing act, but it can be done.
Ok, now onto Disney.
Let me start by saying that I am a HUGE Disney fanboy. Like the last few generations of humanity, Disney has been part of my childhood, and thanks to Disney owning everything from TV networks to superheroes and Jedi, will probably have a significant impact on the rest of my life.
The company has created so many icons (and has bought the rights to so many others), that they seem to be the the last studio that would need to reboot their IPs to stay relevant. Well, Ok sure, they've rebooted their properties before (Duck Tales & Goof Troop anyone?) but keep in mind that a lot of the company's success was sparked but not only switching from 2D to 3D, but also giving us kids a lot of new stuff to enjoy in '90's. Sometimes the experiments have paid off (Hunchback of Notre Dame & The Lion King are both pretty dark films covering some complex ideas) and sometimes it has not worked, in fact, someties you might wonder "WTF Disney?!" to yourself (Home on the Range and Chicken Little has way too many problems to count, but I'll leave it to the Unshaved Mouse to fill you in on the horrible details). But the point is, they have continued to do new stuff since the '90's. So why is the company rebooting more than Windows Vista all of a sudden?
Well let's look back at the first point I talked about again. When Tim Burton's re-imagining of Alice in Wonderland made over a billion dollars at the box office in 2010, some Disney execs probably realized that they had a lot of iconic properties in their vault, so they could make potentially many more billions with all their classic films. Not to mentions Disney has created a ginormous amount of nostalgia to exploit from three older generations of fans. As to point #2, what better way to appeal to kids than making those old animated films live-action & CGI?
Out of the cascade of the live action adaptions that have been announced to be in production, I'm only looking forward to three: Mulan, The Jungle Book, and Sword in the Stone. I have multiple reasons for supporting these films.
For one thing, all these stories are in the public domain, and they have been adapted at least several times. I think all three films would work arguably work better in live action than animated. I was on the fence with the Jungle Book for months, but the CGI looks stunning and it seems they are being more faithful to the original book as well. That trailer got me hook, line and barrell. I got chills when I first heard Johansson as Kaa. I mean, damn, that is not a comedy relief character like in the original movie.
Sword in the Stone is itself a modern re-telling of the Arthurian legend, so I'm willing to see what they will do with the story on the big screen this time around. As for Mulan, I think the fight scenes would look great in live action. I mean sure the Huns might still be CG models, but at least the action might be bigger and more intense.
So what's my problems with the others? Most of them are unnecessary and a blatant cash grab. And the ones I've seen are hardly Oscar worthy entertainment Maleficent made too many changes to the original animated film, changing one of the most iconic villains who revels in being evil into a tragic anti-hero just doesn't work, screenwriters. I love the three fairies in the original movies. The idea of changing the funny, sweet, competent heroines of the original story into bickering idiotic comedic relief characters made me angry. If it wasn't for Angelina Jolie's awesome performance, I would've outright hated the movie.
With Cinderella, on the other hand, they changed too little. It's still just as bland and forgettable. Ever After re-told the story much better, giving us a likeable, relatable main character, added more complexity to the story, the humour worked, the romance worked, it was just on the whole a very solid film. The 2015 film is just another step backwards.
On top of that, Alice in Wonderland, which started this whole trend, isn't that good in my opinion, regardless of it's success. It goes against the spirit and tone of the original story. Instead of a series of comedic and surreal episodes taking place in a strange world, the movie creates this generic epic fantasy plot that is utterly forgettable. The cast was good, but how could they kill the Jabberwocky (which makes no sense, because the Jabberwocky is not technically an actual character, he's just mentioned in a poem Alice reads in Alice Through the Looking Glass), but you have Christopher Lee voice him, but have him killed off with barely any dialogue or screen time?! Most of the cast is underused like this See Doug Walker's review for a brilliant demolition of the movie.
So that's three strikes, not the best track record. And some of the choices don't make sense. I mean, just..I...dammit...Dumbo?! C'mon, freaking Dumbo?!?! Are you serious?! They hired Burton to direct again?! What makes them think he could possibly do this, he hasn't done anything different in over 30 years!
The only thing that hasn't aged well from the original movie is the crows, and keep in mind, they may be racial stereotypes, but they were portrayed positively! They help Dumbo, and not only that, they have the second best song in the entire movie. What could they possibly improve by making it live action?! That kind of story just doesn't work as well in the "real world" with CGI. Either make it all CGI or don't bother!
Beauty and the Beast is a great film, a masterpiece. Even if the upcoming adaptation turns out to be really good, we'll be just paying for tickets to the same movie again. That's my biggest problem. Disney is blatantly taking advantage of our nostalgia. Wreck-It-Ralph had the decency to do something new and use the audience's nostalgia to it's best possible advantage.
With these movies, with the DCLAU, Disney is blatantly copy-and pasting too much from their previous work. It seems the people running the studio desperately want us to e-watch and re-buy stuff that we already have. What I've seen so far does not inspire confidence. These projects seem far too lazy and openly motivated by greed for me to support these movies at this time.
Ok, ok, damn this next part is gonna be hard to get through. When I said I was a huge Disney fanboy, I was being 100% honest. But Looney Tunes is not only the first thing I remember watching on TV, I have rewatched the classic episodes over and over and over. And over. I never get tired of them. Looney Tunes is THE BEST animated series of all time in my opinion. I sort of like it, if you catch my drift.
There have been many, many great shows over the years, but not even The Simpsons, Futurama, Avatar: The Last Airbender, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (2003), Batman TAS, Gargoyles, Animaniacs, Dexter's Lab, My Little Pony Friendship is Magic (yes, I'm serious!) Hey Arnold! or Recess, ever have taken the #1 spot away from Bugs Bunny and friends in my heart of hearts, and I love all these shows! I re-watch them quite often whenever I'm not trying to watch the latest anime. So keep in mind that what I'm going to say next may be heavily biased.
When Wabbit: A Looney Tunes Production was announced, you can probably guess I was nervous. Not as nervous as when The Looney Tunes Show came out. But I was very glad that it was more zany and over-the-top like the original shorts instead of trying to put the Looney Tunes in a sitcom, like it's predecessor.
I've watched a few episodes, and...it's...ok. That's my honest opinion. It's ok. It doesn't hold a candle to the originals, but at least there's effort involved with this thing. The quality varies from episode to episode, but tha's hardly the worst thing that could happen. It's impossible not to compare them to the originals though; how could a Looney Tunes fan do otherwise?
Now, I will say this. Anyone who complains about yet another reboot of this franchise, let's be honest here. Looney Tunes has been rebooted successfully twice in the past. Animaniacs and Tiny Toons. So who's to say it can't bone three times, or 10? Oh, Duck Dodgers might count, but's easier to make the argument with the other two shows considering their respective acclaim and popularity. Besides, I'm not saying the show isn't good, but it's a sci-fi comedy that just happens to share characters from the Looney Tunes ensemble. I see it as more of a spin-off than a reboot.
Animaniacs is that very rare miracle of lightning striking twice. The cast and crew somehow managed to recapture the genius of Chuck Jones, Tex Avery, Bob Clampett, Friz Freleng Robert Mckimson and , not to mention the great Mel Blanc & June Foray, and successfully converted it into a more "up-to-date". No easy feat when you remember that Animaniacs had to more of an "edutainment"-type of show. Tiny Toons, while very good in of itself, just wasn't as consistently great as the former in my opinion. It's a bit too early to tell if Wabbit can be anywhere near as good as good, and I might too blinded by nostalgia to give a fair assessment regardless.
So to answer the question, yes we can be looney again, We can re-capture the magic of whatever franchise we love. It can be done, my friends. 2015 has proven that, beyond any doubt, for many, including me. If I hadn't watched The Peanuts Movie, or Creed or Fury Road, I might be right there with the haters, tearing my hair out and screaming bloody vengeance to the heavens for my ruined childhood.
Are reboots ever absolutely necessary? No, not exactly, but that doesn't mean they can't be done well at least. I can't tell you whether anyone wanted a Jem and the Holograms movie, but fans and non-fans can agree that it's a Texas-sized turd. If you're not gonna try to make it even resemble the show, then WHY THE FUCK did you bother making it in the first place, you morons?!?!?!
Even Transformers had giant robots fighting each other! That is just too ridiculously, blatantly, disgustingly, insulting!! This movie makes it soooooooo tempting, but at least these other movies came out and cured our cynicism and hate for Hollywood execs and producers (at least temporarily).
THANK. YOU. GOD!
Ahem, sorry, got distracted there for a minute.
But I've decided to take a more moderate approach. I think on a case by case basis, we should consider not whether we can reboot something, for of course we could potentially reboot everything under the sun, by we must always consider whether we should reboot something. Cause the classics stay the classics, and for the most part, that is enough.
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