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An Imaginary Discussion About Remakes and Reboots

"It looks like we're going to have to remake Spiderman."
"Didn't we just remake Spiderman?"
"No, we rebooted it."
"Huh?"
"New cast, new director--"
"But we told the same story we told in the first one."
"Exactly.  We rebooted it.  When you reboot, you have to go back to the beginning."
"Okay."
"Or 'a' beginning.  You can't just pick up where you left off."
"So Superman Returns was a--"
"Continuation."
"And Batman Begins was a--"
"Reboot."
"And Sparkle?"
"Remake."
"And when a rapper redoes a hit song?"
"Remix."
"Why don't we just come up with something new?"
"Look, nobody wants to stop making Spiderman movies more than me, but whenever we make one, people go see it, so we can't stop making them."
"So why not just continue the story?"
"Because people might have missed it the last time it came out.  You have to cater to the new people."
"But won't that just make the old people mad?"
"We don't care about old people.  Old people are not our concern."
"I don't mean actual old people, I just mean people who have an actual investment in the franchise."
"They'll still show up."
"Why?"
"So they can complain about what we've done to their franchise."
"So what else are you planning to reboot?"
"Harry Potter."
"What was wrong with the way it ended?"
"It ended.  That's what was wrong with it.  When something is profitable, you don't just end it.  Do you any business owner who says--'You know what?  We made a lot of money this year.  Let's just quit while we're ahead.'"
"How are you going to reboot it?"
"We're going to have a kid in America named Harry find out he's a vampire and fight zombies."
"That doesn't sound anything like Harry Potter."
"Sure it does.  His name is Harry and he fights things."
"Can't you just leave it alone?"
"We really can't."
"Or at least remake it."
"We would, but none of us want to go back and watch the original."
"Because you don't want to see how you're destroying its legacy?"
"No, we're just lazy."
"That sounds about right."

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