CT: A Reboot Tantrum

Ok, dear readers, I try never to do this but I'm gonna rant for a moment. I know, I know, I'm the coolheaded one. The one that always keeps her feelings in check, the one that sees both sides of a situation, the one... Yeah, I don't really believe that either. It was a nice try, though.

Here's what really gets me: I especially don't like it when people rant about the entertainment industry and how it's ruining everything. I shake my head at those people. I talk all the time about how progress often looks like "ruining everything". But here I am, ranting mad about almost that very thing. It all started with a series of emails I received:


"Well that's a weird choice..."

"But, but, you're going to RUIN it... again!"
*Throws self on the floor*


ENOUGH. Eeeeeenoooough (she whined, like a teeny tiny child). Stop with the reboots. Unless there is a social or political reason that you need to tell that story again, or unless you have a really really kick-awesome new take on that story (looking at you, Hannibal) STOP REBOOTING THINGS.

Stop deciding that it's easier and safer to tell a story that everyone has already seen. Stop pandering to your audiences by assuming that they can't get into something new. Stop encouraging writers to look solely at the past, instead of letting writers expose audiences to a new world, new characters, new ideas.

Now look, I'm not naive. I get that Jurassic World made approximately all of the money. And believe me, I get that first and foremost the entertainment industry is a business that's about making money. I don't even hate all of that. I want to be a writer who makes my living by working inside that very industry.
And because yes, we all paid $16 just to see this. 

Here's what I do hate. This year at WonderCon during a Showrunner's panel someone asked, "Why do you think there have been so many reboots/remakes lately?" And one of the panelists answered, "Because there are no more original ideas in Hollywood."

That gets my cowgirl up in a big way. In a "hold my earrings" kind of way. Because you better believe that OF COURSE there are originals ideas in Hollywood. Cait and I work inside a creative community that is chock full of ideas that blow our minds, ideas that we are desperate to see up on screen. They might not be the kinds of ideas that look like everything we've seen before. Most of them aren't. Most of them come from artists whose backgrounds differ wildly from the people that have seen most of the success in Hollywood in the past.

So enough with the reboots already. Even if some of them turn out to be awesome projects, let's be an industry that takes a chance on something original.

That's my two cents, anyway. Okay, ranting over. Back to writing.

Happy Fourth of July!!
CT

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