Wednesday 2 March 2016

What was the first instance of a movie reboot?

Apparently so called reboots are the new answer to Hollywood running out of original ideas.


In the last years several franchises have been "rebooted" such as Spider-man, Batman, Star Trek and so on.


I am not generally criticizing reboots, retelling a great story with modern touch and technology has brought us some great movies lately, but I'm afraid the success of this can put things a little bit out of hand.


While Nolan's Batman story is still not finished, there already seems to be the next Batman reboot underway. Also I heard of a Fantastic Four reboot and seriously, who needs that?




What I would like to know is:


What started this reboot madness? Which was the first movie that can be counted as a reboot of some previously existing franchise?


To clarify, the term reboot in this question refers to a movie that:



  • differs from the previously existing canon in a significant way, and

  • starts over a continued story of some sort, so more than just one isolated movie.


That's how I would distinguish it from a remake, even though I doubt that this is a definition everyone agrees with.


Answer


This originates in the world of comics, and there have been many "reboots" of comics turned into TV series and/or TV series turned into films.


But assuming your definition is restricted to movies rebooted from other movies only, Wikipedia tells us Godzilla is the earliest. First made in 1954, and rebooted at least in 1984 and 2000.


As new directors came in over the years, the style and story changed considerably. (See the question on this site asking if the monster Godzilla is good or evil.)


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