10 Movie Franchises That Rebooted Way Too Soon

Has Hollywood lost all originality?

By Samuel Clements /

Hollywood is infatuated with franchises; that is where the money is. However, every now and then the studios feel that the safest way to create a franchise is to update a pre-existing one. This does not always work; look at Tim Burton€™s flawed 2001 reboot of Planet of the Apes. Some of these reboots occur within years of the original. Others have rebooted much loved franchises that could never have been topped. Some of the biggest films this year have been reboots; Godzilla, Rise of the Planet of the Apes and The Amazing Spider-Man 2. Rebooting is not always negative, and some of these films have been spectacular. Despite this, it is impossible not to think that some of these reboots have occurred slightly too soon. Occasionally Hollywood studios reboot a movie to atone for previously poorly received films. Although in some cases these result in great films, the memory of the poor film will always be in the minds of the audience. Finally we have the frankly obscure reboots of critically and financially successful films. Quite why studios do this is impossible to decipher; rights, money and publicity probably all play a part, but the reboots will rarely be better than the original. Here's 10 occasions when Hollywood pressed that ever so tempting reboot button way too early.