Rebooting a movie franchise is without question one of the toughest, most thankless tasks facing filmmakers today; fans of the previous films are going to staunchly oppose you whatever you make - unless your name is Christopher Nolan, it seems - and it often proves difficult to escape the charge that the final product is simply a lazy rehash of what's come before but with slightly different bells and whistles. Reboots and remakes often get lumped in together, and that's because often there's very little between them in definitions; at the best of times, a remake will be a retelling of the same story and characters with different actors, whereas a reboot will tell a thematically similar story that has its differences and
usually - but not always - will feature different characters. It's a complex stew, and the term "reboot" is typically reserved for films that are hoping to kick-start a new franchise of some kind. With Zack Snyder's divisive Man of Steel opening in cinemas nationwide tomorrow, what better opportunity to examine 9 movie reboots that were shameless ripoffs, going beyond merely repeating a similar arc to downright pilfering from what came before...
9. Friday the 13th
To be fair to this reboot, it totally nailed the tone of the original Friday the 13th franchise, even if it did attempt to re-imagine Jason Voorhees as a more mobile, quick-footed monster. The problem is with how shamelessly it derives from nearly half its predecessors; prominent plot points from the first four films such as Jason's mother being murdered, Jason wearing a bag on his face, Jason acquiring a hockey mask, and the obligatory rampant murder of nubile teens all amount to a film that is essentially "previously on Friday the 13th..." Try and think of a single original idea, location or character in this movie; there are none, and though it fills the very basic requisites of a Friday the 13th film, the overall feeling is that it was just a rather pointless, crassly cynical attempt to shake down an oblivious generation for some easy cash. And indeed, the film made $91m against a $19m budget, so Bravo.