There’s a good reason movie studios can’t stop making sequels to popular films.
Return on Investment.
Or, at the very least, they’re less risky than original stories. Just ask the minds behind 2023’s well-regarded thriller “The Creator” how that works.
That explains the flood of new movie projects announced this week.
Sequels. Prequels. Reboots.
It’s actually more like a cinematic tsunami. The news comes courtesy of this week’s CinemaCon, a star-studded event meant to showcase the titles coming to theaters over the next few years.
Let’s start with the least necessary of them all.
The “Scary Movie” franchise cranked out five installments before audiences tired of its shtick. The films mocked horror movie tropes in the grand “Airplane!” style, but the series wasn’t meant to last forever.
The saga featured two comic visionaries – the Wayans family and “Airplane!” alum David Zucker – behind the scenes.
Now, it’s back.
There’s no word about the creators behind the sixth installment, just rough start and release dates. Who needs a vision when there’s a franchise to reboot?
This news comes weeks after Liam Neeson signed on to a “Naked Gun” reboot, another saga tied to Zucker. It’s unclear if Zucker will have a hand in either reboot.
He should.
“It” actor Glen Powell, coming off both “Top Gun: Maverick” and “Anyone But You,” will headline a remake of the Arnold Schwarzenegger thriller “The Running Man.” The original, based on a Stephen King story, featured Richard Dawson as a scene-stealing game show host in a dystopian future.
The CinemaCon event also featured trailers for sequels and prequels coming our way this year, including “Gladiator 2,” “Transformers One” and “A Quiet Place: Day One.”
The animated landscape will be chock full of familiar faces.
We’ll see a trio of animated films based on “The Last Airbender” saga. Dave Bautista’s pipes will flesh out the saga’s villain.
We’re also getting more “Smurfs” than we ever needed. “The Smurfs Movie” will feature Rihanna among others in a tale Variety teases will answer the immortal question, “What is a Smurf?
Doesn’t seem Sphinx-like in its nature, to be honest.
Other announced films include “Paw Patrol 3,” The SpongeBob Movie: Search for Squarepants” and “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem 2.”
Need more TMNT? We’ll also see a live-action, R-rated take of the saga. “Teenage Mutant Nina Turtles: The Last Ronin” takes its cues from a dark part of the comic book property’s lore.
The CinemaCon updates came after we learned about a live-action “Popeye” feature. The first version, starring Robin Williams as the squinty-eyed sailor, proved an epic dud in the early 1980s.
There’s a huge red flag waving in front of these news nuggets.
Audiences sent Hollywood a stern message in 2023. We won’t always show up for any ol’ franchise. The diminished returns for “The Marvels,” “Haunted Mansion,” “Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny,” “Fast X” and “Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One” should have given industry bean counters pause.
Even a quasi-original like “The Flash” flopped with fans. More recently, the new “Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire” will struggle to break the $100 million mark stateside.
Did Hollywood learn any lessons from that grab bag of failures and disappointments?
Hardly.
Then again, the recent “Road House” reboot scored with viewers, showing there’s still some interest in beloved properties.
The trick is to find titles that still have a cultural hold over us.
The poor box office showing for “The First Omen” wasn’t a shock. That franchise is as old as mix tapes and parachute pants. Today’s teens have little connection to the series, let alone the 1976 original.
The “TMNT,” by comparison, have never fallen out of style.
Hollywood doesn’t seem to differentiate between enduring IPs and ones with a definitive expiration date.
They may learn the very hard way.
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