10 franchises that are crying out for a reboot

Simon Brew

Here are our ideas for some movie and television franchises that could benefit from a reboot. Scarily, some of them are only a couple of years old...

Published on May 23, 2008

One or two of these are already being sorted – but here’s a list of some movie and TV shows that really need a fresh surge of energy…

Predator
We’ve come to the conclusion that we don’t need any more Alien films, because the story there has perhaps been told as well as it’s ever going to be. But what about Predator? One half of a pair of crappy blockbusters in recent years, what we’d like to see is a genuine Predator 3, that heads back to McTiernan’s original, and does its best to wipe out thoughts of AvP and its follow-up.

Terminator
We’re well aware that Terminator: Salvation is currently in production, and we’re also well aware that Christian Bale has signed on for three films. However, we’re not sure that Salvation is the kind of reboot we’re looking for. After all, heading for a PG-13 rating is not the road that fans of the Terminator franchise want to hear that it’s going down, and a return to the more hard-edged, sci-fi driven first two movies is surely, surely, the better path to tread?

Spider-man
This one needs a new take simply for different reasons: that by the end of Spider-man 3, you couldn’t help but think that Sam Raimi had taken things as far as he could. Maybe it’s now the time to bring in a new director, and set them off on a fresh story arc for the webslinger? Given the fact that Tobey Maguire isn’t yet attached to the lead role, they may choose to start it all over again…

Shrek
After the cynical, Police Academy-sequel-esque Shrek The Third made a truckload of money, DreamWorks was never going to leave the green ogre in peace. But for heaven’s sake, please just take some time and write a clever script again, the one that sat underneath the first film and made all sorts of references to fairy stories of old. If ever a franchise has been quickly diluted by success, it’s this one.

Pirates Of The Caribbean
When the second movie raked in over a billion dollars at the worldwide box office, the world of Jack Sparrow was seemingly set in a bubble that would never burst. Yet by sucking most of the fun of the first film out and instead delivering a piss-poor montage of special effects and batty subplots, it started to lose its audience. Was anyone really surprised when, one year later, Pirates 3 made a lot less cash?

Robocop
A new Robocop is reportedly in the works at MGM, although we don’t know too much about it right now. But here’s a franchise where perhaps it’s best to write the second and third movies off altogether, and get back to the core underlying satire of the original. Heck, get Paul Verhoeven back into the sci-fi fold at the same time, and it could well be reboot gold…

24
Once the most exciting, twist-laden programme on television, 24 has simply got muddled up in the midst of all the strands its left lying around. As a result, the last series – with umpteen villains, ill-though through plot points and lots of Kiefer Sutherland looking, well, pissed off – was easily the worst. Get back to an understandable narrative with some strong characters for the next series, or 24 won’t be around much longer…

Die Hard
Die Hard 4.0 was not a bad film. We expected it to be a bad film, but Bruce Willis doing his stuff proved to be one of the surprise pleasures of 2007’s blockbusters. Yet it was as far removed from a Die Hard film as it was possible to get. The original one man against the odds in a building concept has long since been chucked out of the window, and it’s be great to get back to that kind of core for any future Die Hard 5.

Heroes
Staggeringly, after just two series of what was once the must-watch geek TV show, the third series of Heroes is being talked about as a reboot already. And with some good reason: the meandering, ponderous second series wasn’t the finest hour of everyone concerned, and a bit more of the thinking that underpinned the first series will do things no harm whatsoever.

The Matrix
We’re torn here. There are, surely, more stories to be told of the world of The Matrix, but given the disappointment of the back two films, should they be allowed to be told? The original majesty of The Matrix, sadly, has been diluted by what has followed, so while we’d love to see another great Matrix movie, the risk that they’d mess it all up again is surely one that can’t be ignored…

Users Comments

Re: 10 franchises that are crying out for a reboot
Posted By twosheds 1 May 24, 2008 07:36:18 AM

Hey, what's this 'we' shit on no more Alien movies? I just want to see them stop making those bloody awful AVP films. I'd still like Scott to take Weaver back to the Alien source planet...