Huge Movie Franchises That Hollywood Hasn't Rebooted Yet

Some people decry Hollywood's lack of originality, and one of the most blatantly obvious examples of this supposed culture of bankrupt ideas is the reboot. Not quite a remake, the reboot is a way for the entertainment industry to capitalize on existing "IP" while exercising a freedom to update, re-cast and take it in new directions.

While the reboot may seem like just another attempt for Hollywood to wring as much money as it can out of a beloved series, sometimes reboots ("Battlestar Galactica") or quasi-reboots ( "Cobra Kai," "Ghostbusters: Afterlife") are actually good, making the whole matter even more complicated. When a reboot is given the same care and attention as its originator, and new life is breathed into a series and new fans feel that same rush of excitement as their parents (and/or grandparents) once did, is that really such a bad thing?

That being said, there are some series that just don't need to be rebooted. It's something the folks behind franchises like "The Terminator," "Alien," "Tomb Raider" and "Men in Black" series have learned the hard way in recent years — when a series once captured the right iconic talent at the right time, it's nearly impossible to recapture that lightning in a bottle with someone else. Not that they won't keep trying, however.

With that in mind, below is a list of franchises that would be a waste of everyone's time and money to reboot. Once upon a time, they had the perfect stars and the perfect people behind the camera — and now, for whatever reason, those people have moved on, lost their inspiration to revisit the material and/or are past their creative prime. To paraphrase Idina Menzel: Hey Hollywood, let it go.

Based on the series of novels by Robert Ludlum, the "Bourne" films depicted Jason Bourne, a CIA assassin suffering from dissociative amnesia, portrayed by Matt Damon. The series has already inspired five films, a brief TV spinoff — and perhaps, the action movie trend of editing shaky action scenes in ways the audience will never get a good look at the fight choreography. 

The "Bourne" franchise has gone on to gross more than $1.6 billion around the globe, garnering mostly positive (albeit, less so in seemingly each iteration) reviews. Bourne became an American-ized James Bond, and the result was an engaging story, thrilling suspense, and use of practical effects and stunt work thanks to the efforts of talented folks like Doug Liman, Tony Gilroy and Paul Greengrass. Of course, "Bourne" also gave Matt Damon a signature role, one that turned him into an international action star.

In some ways, "Bourne" has already been rebooted, albeit in a Hollywood way that equates to dipping your small toe into a swimming pool to see if the water temp is inviting. In resounding fashion, audiences have given an icy response.

2012's "The Bourne Legacy," which cast a just-starting-as-"Hawkeye" Jeremy Renner as an on-the-run black ops agent whose story is influenced by Damon's previous adventures, hovers in the mid-50s on RottenTomatoes by critics and audiences alike; if you've forgotten that the franchise produced a Damon-less 2019 TV prequel called "Treadstone," consider yourself lucky.

Speaking of "Unforgiven," most people saw that four-time-Oscar-winning Eastwood-directed film as an unofficial goodbye to (and a final word on the repercussions of the violent life led by) The Man With No Name. While not a franchise in the classic sense (then again, it was the early '60s, so film "franchises" were few and far between), Sergio Leone's "A Fistful of Dollars," "For a Few Dollars More," and "The Good, the Bad and the Ugly" focused on this Eastwood institution while earning a well-deserved reputation as not only some of the best westerns ever made, but some of the best movies ever made.

The films were made entirely in Italy, with a largely Italian cast and crew, as Eastwood attempted to navigate a post-"Rawhide" crossover into a film career. Series creator Leone managed to forge a distinctly American mythology, while also employing a more artistic style from the European film tradition.

These films offer would-be rebooters the insurmountable double whammy of an iconic performance and iconic filmmaking. For anyone to even go near this third rail would feel on par with Gus Van Sant remaking "Psycho," so it seems unlikely that even the most money-hungry executives in Hollywood would dare touch them. You'd also have Eastwood to contend with — and he doesn't seem like the type of guy who'd quietly allow such a trampling on his legacy.

This one is another bit of a cop-out — does "The Hobbit" trilogy count as a reboot, or a continuation? — but the original "Lord of the Rings" film trilogy ("The Fellowship of the Ring," "The Two Towers," and "The Return of the King") is unlikely to be full-on rebooted anytime in the near future, even if a TV series in the same realm is on the way.

The early '00s, Peter Jackson-helmed movies became so popular that they would have probably won if they ran for president. Not only did Jackson stay extremely faithful to J.R.R. Tolkien's classic fantasy series, but he also developed numerous revolutionary special effects techniques while making the films, with each installment winning the Academy Award for Best Visual Effects and the third film even winning Best Picture — an unprecedented achievement for the third film in a trilogy.

That trilogy, of course, was followed by the "Hobbit" films (with Jackson taking a page out of the George Lucas playbook while making a prequel trilogy after the first trilogy), which didn't fare quite as well with audiences. However, these two trios of films have contributed so much to the film industry and pop culture that the idea of rebooting them into further films feels unthinkable. You'd certainly, at the very least, need Jackson's approval – as well as source material from Tolkien, who died in 1971.

Which brings us to the hundreds-of-millions-of-dollars-budgeted "Lord of the Rings" series Amazon is currently hard at work on. It takes place before the events of both "Lord of the Rings" and "Hobbit" trilogies, and has the approval of Peter Jackson. Although not technically a reboot, it's another example of a franchise avoiding the word while striving to create a self-sustaining slice of IP that reinvents, reinvigorates and re-asserts itself without end.

Since 1981, the "Indiana Jones" franchise has followed the globe-trotting exploits of Dr. Henry Walton "Indiana" Jones, Jr., a professor of archeology who hunts for mystical objects — when he's not boring students at the university where he teaches, which has somehow never caught wind of the countless international laws he has violated in his spare time.

Over the course of a largely cherished trilogy from the '80s, a panned 2008 sequel, and a respected-but-largely-forgotten TV series in the '90s, audiences followed Jones as he searched for ancient artifacts around the world, happily punching any Nazi, commie, or ancient curse that got in his way. The brainchild of cinema giants George Lucas and Steven Spielberg, the films updated classic adventure movie serials with bigger budgets, action scenes, and special effects.

As it turns out, there is little need to reboot the "Indiana Jones" franchise because 79-year-old Harrison Ford isn't ready to hand over the whip just yet; for better or worse, a fifth film is on the way. There were rumors of Chris Pratt taking over the role a few years back that didn't amount to anything — and as for future filmmakers, if you're crazy enough to think you can do better than Spielberg, Lucas and Harrison Ford, and step over all the carcasses of those who've tried and failed, good luck with that.

The "Star Wars" franchise needs no introduction, which is a credit to its everlasting power considering it has been going strong since before most of its fans were even born. Not only one of the most cherished and lucrative film franchises of all time, "Star Wars" launched a veritable empire of storytelling that spread into video games, novels, comic books, and more.

Then there's the merchandising. Before "Star Wars" hit screens in 1977, it was rare for films to be marketed to children through lunchboxes, action figures, t-shirts, and the like. But now, it's the norm. Who knew that a simple story about an estranged family set in space could be so influential?

While some of the recent films have become divisive among fandom, the love for the original trilogy remains strong, and heck, even George Lucas' controversial prequel trilogy is starting to receive some belated love. Also worth noting is the popularity of the series' foray into television with Disney+'s "The Mandalorian" and "The Book of Boba Fett."

Even though the series as a whole has experienced some bumps, it would be foolhardy to simply wipe all of "Star Wars" blank and start casting new actors as Luke Skywalker and Han Solo to tell tales that contradict all we've seen on screen before. In fact, if there's one series on this list whose continuity seems untouchable — simply because the universe is big enough to tell more stories rather than re-tell the old ones — it would be "Star Wars."

Steven Spielberg's "Jurassic Park" series chronicles scientists' attempts to play god ... only to get eaten in the end. That's the series in a nutshell, and the formula has repeated some variation on itself 5 times now, with "Jurassic World Dominion" on the way.

So, why would anybody be talking about a reboot now? Weren't 2015's "Jurassic World" and 2018's "Fallen Kingdom" reboots with Chris Pratt and Bryce Dallas Howard? Technically, no (they still exist in the same continuity as the original films), but ostensibly yes. To further complicate matters, "Dominion" features appearances by original series stars Sam Neill, Jeff Goldblum and Laura Dern, doubling down on the "this is not a reboot" slippery slope of modern-day blockbusters. 

Because these new "Jurassic" films are so reliant on fans' nostalgia for the initial entry, because they are still making money and because Spielberg has stuck around as an executive producer, Hollywood won't be completely scrapping this existing continuity anytime soon. Someday, they'll likely get around to it, but to paraphrase Goldblum's Ian Malcolm character: "Just because you could, doesn't mean you should."

1999's "The Matrix" was the perfect blend of science fiction, action, groundbreaking visual effects, and high-impact storytelling. It remains one of the most vivid depictions of the dangers of artificial intelligence, a defining film in the cyberpunk subgenre. "The Matrix" wasn't just a hit sci-fi action flick; it was a pop culture landmark whose influence can still be felt today.

Unfortunately, the film was followed up by three sequels (including 2021's "The Matrix Resurrections") that failed to live up to the first film's promise. Various attempts in animation, comics, and video games projects have also been set in the same universe and been disappointing to various degrees. So, where does it all go from here?

It's no secret that by 2015, Lilly Wachowski was calling the idea of more "Matrix" movies a "particularly repelling idea" while Lana believed the studio was looking to replace them; Lana seemingly made "Resurrections" because it was otherwise destined to be rebooted without Wachowski involvement (and there are many jokes in "Resurrections" indicating as much).

"Yeah. That was real," producer James McTeigue said of 2017 rumors that included reboot talks starring Michael B. Jordan. "There were versions out there. But I guess the fates dictated that Lana's story came at the right time, and Warner Brothers were willing to move forward with that story."

In the same interview, McTeigue seemed to indicate that "Resurrections" would be the final word the Wachowskis had on the franchise. "We've got no prequel in mind. We've got no sequel in mind," he said. "We've got no further trilogy."

Which would seem to put the "Matrix" franchise right back where it was in 2017, with a floundering franchise ("Resurrections" was largely viewed as a disappointment both critically and financially) and a studio wanting to return it to glory — ripe conditions for a reboot. Perhaps somebody at Warner Bros. is scrambling through a desk drawer right now, trying to remember where they put Michael B. Jordan's phone number.