Re-make, re-boot, re-wind

Dredd. Total Recall. Robocop. Starship Troopers. All in various stages of being re-made or re-booted. Spider-man is doing pretty well at the cinema with his own little re-boot. Obviously Nolan is blazing a pretty firey trail with his Batman trilogy. The terms themselves are not massively difficult concepts. Massively annoying, in some cases, yes. I am more than willing to admit that it concerns me when one of my warm and fuzzy celluloid landscapes is next up for a new outing. It's also true that, for example, Verhoeven's Starship Troopers is not exactly a masterpiece, but Jesus Christ on rubber crutches, it's a fun film. Same for Robocop (not for Dredd though, you can keep that one, thanks very much). We will never get those camp, ultra-violent, ridiculously fun films that we used to stay up late to watch, interrupted god knows how many adverts (we would stop the video recording for the duration of the ads, exponentially increasing second viewing pleasure)...

What I am trying to say is that although the thought of all these shiny new films appearing from Hollywood's 'oh shit, got no new ideas' drawer is horrible, I do understand why they are doing it. It seems pointless to worry that they are besmirching the holy purity of our childhood entertainment: in no way will it affect how we felt, and feel, about the 'classics'. They will still be there. They don't suddenly pop out of existence when the new one comes along. What it may do, perhaps, and I do say perhaps,  is add something to the legend. We can nod sagely when someone mentions  Total Recall and say, "ah, but have you seen the original?". You see, you didn't think you would ever have to defend "you make me wish I had three hands" did you.

Anyway, my point here is less that I think all these prequels, re-boots and re-makes are good or bad; necessary or not. I seriously think we, myself included, need to get over it. You know who made me realise that? Catwoman. To be more precise. Anne Hathaway. When asked what she thought about her Catwoman versus Pfeiffer's in the latest Empire, she said that "Catwoman depends on the Gotham City she lives in".  She evens says she doesn't want to sound like a tool saying it, but I understand it and totally agree. Yes, Nolan has created a Gotham that was different, darker, than Burton's Gotham, so his Catwoman needs to match that. But it goes beyond that. It is indicative of the real world, our world, where we have to have a more deranged, more disturbed villain; where no-one (by which I mean young people) can deal with ridiculous scientists in PVC nazi outfits shouting about "brain bugs" (seriously, Neil Patrick Harris is a freaking genius). We have changed, and so must our film appetite.