This post’s title is a bit vague. Someone familiar with my interests might suppose it has something to do with the Well World series by Jack L. Chalker — I’ve posted about it before. I won’t draw out whatever suspense you might have — the well in question is humanity’s wellspring of stories.
The revisiting is our love of nostalgia in all the sequels, serials, remakes, reboots, adaptations, borrowings, homages, parodies, and pastiches. To name but some. And make no mistake, all stories have elements of other stories. Boil stories down enough and the reductions begin to look similar (the infamous seven plots).
But I find myself bemused by how obsessed we get about drinking from the same well over and over when there are so many other interesting wells.
Some time ago, I published a series of posts about live-action adaptations of well-established graphic media (from comic books to animation). [The ten posts starting with this one and ending with this one.] I think these adaptations are usually a Bad Idea, which is why so many fail.
The focus here is on stories that explicitly (or clearly implicitly) claim to be a retelling of an existing story, typically a well-known one. And hence, a key aspect of the story is the retelling. If the original story is largely unknown, I’d call that more of a borrowing, using, or stealing, depending on your perspective. So an adaptation, because of this claim, is necessarily judged against its source.
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As always, it’s good to start by defining our terminology:
Remake: a faithful retelling; an homage. All the terms below are remakes in some sense. Even a sequel is a kind of remake.
Reboot: a more revisionist retelling.
Adaptation: a remake in a different medium. Often also a reboot, but some stories have moved seamlessly from one medium to another. The first Star Trek movies are something of an example, although they’re better seen as reboots than sequels. Depends on strength of the link to the original.
Sequel: same reality, same characters. In some cases, a continuation of a previous “chapter”. That said, there are examples of works that call themselves sequels but have little or no connection to the original. A prequel is a sequel that takes place before the events of original.
Spinoff: same reality but with minor characters center stage. The Tom Stoppard play, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead (1966), is an early example of a spinoff. Star Wars has had a ton of spin-offs.
Also: homage (a loving retelling), imitation (a lazy retelling), “cheap copy” (an even lazier retelling), “cash grab” (a laziest possible retelling), pastiche (a thinly veiled homage), parody (a mocking retelling), satire (a humorous parody), deconstruction (an analytical retelling), and revision (an anti-retelling). Retellings all.
Some examples:
The classic cultural milestone Star Trek: The Original Series is, as its retrofitted title says, an original. (Except that Roddenberry framed it as Wagon Train to the stars, so it has borrowings, even homages.) ST: The Animated Series was a reboot. So was ST: The Next Generation. Both were, in fact, pretty good. ST:TNG was often very good. ST: Enterprise was a reboot prequel (I liked it, many didn’t). ST: Deep Space Nine and ST: Voyager were spinoffs. The first ten movies were adaptations as well as reboot sequels. The later movies (new Kirk and crew) were reboots (and not sequels). ST: Discovery and ST: Picard are cynical (and awful) sad imitations that never should have been made. There is also some recent fluff of little account. (I decided, at the 50-year anniversary of the original series that I’d had enough Star Trek for one lifetime.)
The Peter Jackson Lord of the Rings trilogy is an adaptation. A really damned good one. His The Hobbit trilogy is a cash-grab. (Or, just maybe, a labor of love corrupted by studio stupidity and greed. It was definitely a bloated mess.)
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In all cases listed above, the new is an intended copy of the old. Which necessarily raises the question: “Why?” What is the reason for returning to the well rather than drilling a new hole? Often the answer is “Cash!” but sometimes it’s “Love!” It’s not uncommon for the former to fail and the latter to succeed. Audiences can often detect cynicism.
There is something of a dilemma here. Revisiting a well, especially a popular one, brings with it all those who loved that water. The hope is that fans crave another sip from their beloved well. (The other edge of that sword is disappointing their expectations or even angering them.) Conversely, being original — a heartfelt drive of any artist — risks being ignored or disliked.
Arthur Conan Doyle came to dislike his famous character, Sherlock Holmes, and wanted to write more serious fiction. But readers clamored for Holmes and largely ignored Doyle’s more literary efforts. He killed Holmes but was forced to bring him back “due to popular demand.” An especially popular character or story setting can be a trap.
Sometimes, though, it’s a wonderful marriage. I don’t think Terry Pratchett ever tired of writing his Discworld books. We readers certainly never tired of reading them. I think a big part of that was his large cast of characters and the way each book had its own underlying theme.
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There is an important distinction between remakes and sequels. The former tells the same story whereas the latter tells a new story. Some sequels are part of a continuing story (the John Wick movies are a good example) and some are distinct stories (the Jack Reacher series, in fact most detective series, are good examples).
There is also the notion of following the artist (be it Mozart, Picasso, Stephen King, Fleetwood Mac, or Quentin Tarantino). When we’ve come to like someone’s work, we want to see (or read or listen to) it all. Of course we do!
In a similar vein, people might love and follow a character. Superman is a good example. Hundreds (if not thousands) of artists have produced Superman stories over the decades. One can also follow a genre, murder mysteries, for example. Or jazz.
These are all cases of revisiting the well, and many of them involve retellings to some degree, but none are obvious remakes or adaptations. (Except for Tarantino’s Jackie Brown (1997), which is a very good adaptation of Elmore Leonard’s Rum Punch.)
The point being that all stories borrow to some degree, but overt remakes and adaptations are more extreme — and thus more questionable — in that borrowing. They are far more likely to be cynical cash grabs. Some sequels are just as bad (Star Wars and Marvel, looking squarely at you — Disney, once a fount of creativity, has become downright egregious and moribund).
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A rough draft of this post — more a set of notes and notions — has squatted in my Drafts folder since the ten-post series mentioned above. Some of the notes go back even further. The topic of adaptations and remakes is such a big one I can’t hope to cover it all in one post. (So, I will probably revisit this well!)
There is so much to say that it’s hard to organize it coherently. One could spend a year writing a book on the topic. Which I have no desire to do. To get this out the door, the rest of this post is observations on some specific revisits to wells.
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A Christmas Carol (1843), Charles Dickens. One of my favorite stories and my only real Christmas tradition. Wikipedia has an entire page devoted to adaptations of this great story. They run the gamut from serious to comic, but most of them are homages. One of my favorites is the Mr. Magoo animation from 1962. I also have a soft spot for the modernized Scrooged (1988) with Bill Murray. That said, I have the highest regard for the faithful adaptations [see these posts].
Sherlock Holmes (1887-1927), A.C. Doyle. A set of (mostly disconnected) sequels. An often-imitated trope and wellspring of adaptations, homages, and pastiches. Wikipedia has one page for adaptations and another for pastiches. Another personal favorite [see these posts].
Harry Potter (1997-2007), J.K. Rowling. Seven books, each with their own story but with an overall arc. Worthy movie adaptations. Should have ended when it ended, though. Fantastic Beasts is pretty awful, especially in comparison. Perhaps we can add Rowling to George Lucas and Peter Jackson on the list of creators with a forever milestone followed by an effort many saw as forever crap. Icarus in action, perhaps.
Star Wars (1977-????), originally George Lucas, now a committee and a community. A New Hope (episode IV) blew me away. It forever changed the SF movie landscape. The two that followed were worthy sequels. The less said about the prequel trilogy the better. I refuse to recognize any others exist. (Talk about cynical badly done cash grabs.)
Cowboy Bebop (2021), Christopher Yost. A remake of the 1998 classic Cowboy Bebop. More critically, a live-action adaptation of a classic animation. Despite its attempt to be faithful, it was a quickly cancelled disaster because it didn’t truly understand the original. It never should have been made in the first place and absolutely not like it was [see this post].
Blade Runner 2049 (2017), Denis Villeneuve. A sequel to the 1982 Ridley Scott classic Blade Runner (which is an adaptation of the 1968 novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by the great Philip K. Dick). It wasn’t horrible so much as unnecessary and quickly forgotten in the deluge of modern garbage. As with the Cowboy Bebop adaptation, it tarnishes the memory of a great classic [see this post].
Westworld (2016-2022), Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy. A reboot and TV series adaptation of the movies Westworld (1973) and Futureworld (1976). [It takes its name from the former but is loosely based on the latter.] The first season was excellent, the second went downhill, the third and fourth were increasingly bad, and HBO rightfully cancelled it before the fifth [see these posts].
Ghostbusters (2016), Paul Feig. A gender-swapping reboot of the classic 1984 Ghostbusters by Ivan Reitman, Dan Aykroyd, and Harold Ramis. The original has a 1989 sequel and a 2021 sequel (which I haven’t seen but have heard is okay). Another sequel comes out in December. There are also animations and TV shows based on the original. The reboot attracted a lot of misogynistic criticism, but the true crime is that it was poorly written and executed. That said, I’m one of the few that didn’t hate it (perhaps because I was never a big fan of the original).
Lost in Space (2018-2021) and Lost in Space (1998). Both reboots of the same-named TV series that ran from 1965-1968 (which was based on the 1812 novel, The Swiss Family Robinson). The old TV series was okay for its time (I had a major crush on Judy Robinson) but the show got increasingly cheesy. Started dramatic but devolved into comedy. The movie adaptation was forgettable, the TV reboot even more so (I bailed after the first season).
Bewitched (2005), Nora Ephron. A movie adaptation and reboot of the same-named TV series that ran from 1964 to 1972. It starred Nicole Kidman and Will Ferrell and wasn’t horrible. Kinda cute, actually. Mentioned here mostly because Samantha Stevens (Elizabeth Montgomery) was my other big childhood crush.
Murphy Brown (2018) and Will & Grace (2017-2020). Both revivals (sequels) of their same-named originals (which ran 1988-1997 and 1998-2006, respectively). The revivals brought back the original stars, and it was nice to see them again. But the Murphy Brown revival was awful, unwatchable, and quickly cancelled. The Will & Grace revival was better. Both suffered from being no longer relevant.
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Rarely, revisiting the well with an adaptation is successful:
Watchmen (2009), Zack Snyder. A live-action film adaptation of the 1987 Alan Moore/David Gibbons classic graphic novel, Watchmen. The original was groundbreaking and a major influence on comics. The film adaptation was extremely faithful visually and structurally. In places, the cinematography clearly uses the comic as a storyboard. The story is very faithful as well, and I would argue the change to the ending improves the story. Thumbs up!
Sin City (2005), Robert Rodriguez and Frank Miller. A live-action adaptation of Miller’s 1992 graphic novel, Sin City. Both the film and the gnovel are visually noteworthy, and the adaptation is faithful visually and in terms of story and tone. Another rare successful live-action adaption.
What stand out in both cases, in the gnovels and their adaptations, is how adult the writing is in comparison with most modern fare. It is possible to create good adaptations, it’s just not common anymore.
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These have all just scratched the surface of the many remakes, reboots, sequels, and adaptations. The ones touched on here are near and dear, and even so, I’ve left many out.
The bottom line is that there’s quite a spectrum from fair to foul, but it’s hard to create a worthy revisit. Most are forgettable, some are travesties, and some are rare gems. Personally, I think our love of more of the same speaks poorly of us.
Stay original, my friends! Go forth and spread beauty and light.
∇
Logos con carne 
May 28th, 2023 at 10:09 am
Hmmm. Not sure I stuck the landing on this one. Multiple edit sessions didn’t pull it together the way I wanted. It comes off as more of a ramble but whatever.
May 28th, 2023 at 10:11 am
At least it’s out of my Drafts folder! I’ll take that win.
May 28th, 2023 at 10:14 am
I suppose my ambiguity here is related to mixed feelings. I generally prefer original material — my primary ask of any story has long been for it to take me somewhere new (which is hard for adaptations and sequels) — but there are some wells I haven’t minded revisiting.
All the Jack Reacher novels, for instance. Eagerly awaiting more of those. And I wish Terry Pratchett was still around to write more Discworld books. So, yeah, definitely mixed feelings on the topic.
May 28th, 2023 at 10:16 am
An important point: With the Reacher and Discworld novels, the authors do take me somewhere new even inside the confines of their character (Reacher) or setting (Discworld). In contrast, the Marvel movies and others (like Star Wars) seem to beat the same drum.
May 28th, 2023 at 10:37 am
That was certainly exhaustive. Nice compendium of movie marketing terminology.
I recently read about “Puffs” – a parody of the Potterverse. It’s a play that is popular in high school musicals that, so far, has yet to get sued by that avaricious bitch-pair JKRowling & Warner Bros.
The playwright went to extremes to create obviously referable material that somehow avoids trademark & © infringement.
May 28th, 2023 at 10:44 am
Thanks!
There is considerable latitude when it comes to parodies and other derivative works. I think it has to do with whether a work comments on the original rather than just copying, cloning, or aping it in some way.
May 28th, 2023 at 10:47 am
Which, incidentally, is why my post about Gary Larson’s Far Side should fall under fair use — I’m commenting on the cartoons, not capitalizing on them.
May 28th, 2023 at 12:58 pm
Excellent essay today! You clearly put a great deal of thought into it. Like you I was blown away by the first (1977) Star Wars movie. Gosh! I was almost half a century younger back then. It was truly an amped up Saturday afternoon adventure flick! But, also like you, I tired of the series after the first trilogy—it felt too childish for my maturing tastes. However, after Disney bought the franchise (and perhaps unexpectedly) Disney commissioned a gem. Tony Gilroy was hired to write Rogue One as a prequel to the very first movie and took a different and unexpected approach—a story without light saber duels, star fighter dog fights, or magic tricks with the force. Instead Gilroy introduced themes about the complex ambiguities of power politics and revolution. And the acting, especially Diego Luna, was very good. I was hooked! And Disney was smart enough to commission Gilroy to write a prequel series to the prequel movie where he could explore those themes—Andor. As I said, I’m hooked and I cannot wait for season two of Andor.
May 28th, 2023 at 8:46 pm
Thanks! It’s something I’ve pondered for quite a while, going back to all the Star Trek shows. There have long been sequels — Sherlock Holmes and Perils of Pauline — but this notion of major franchises that crank out an endless stream seems to date from about that time. Those spin-offs of Star Trek (DS9 and Voyager), for instance.
The thing that was so cool for me about Episode IV of Star Wars was that it showed the bean counters that this geeky niche science fiction stuff could be a money-maker. I was a fan of SF since the early 1960s, so it was like manna from heaven. Good SF before that was very sparse. 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) was the only really decent major SF film until then. Serious game-changer.
That said, as you mentioned, Star Trek was much more my métier than Star Wars. I think it says it all that little kids love and get Star Wars but Star Trek is more for adults. (Or at least it used to be. The modern implementations not so much.)
I do recall liking Rogue One (and the Clone Wars animation). I’ve heard that Andor is pretty good. (I don’t have Disney+, so it’s out of reach for me.) Apparently the first two seasons of The Mandalorian (but not the third) are also pretty good. It is possible to do space opera right!
May 29th, 2023 at 5:46 am
Yes, George Lukas proved that SF with good production values could be profitable and definitely changed the game. No more cheesy Buck Rogers! However, the original Star Trek, in spite of cheap sets, told good stories about our human condition—little well-written moral essays. George Lukas made a breakthrough in quality but he did so with the old Saturday afternoon matinee adventure. In spite of his efforts to incorporate the mythic insights of Joseph Campbell, it was still just Buck Rogers with good production values. That is why I was so pleasantly surprised with the Star Wars Andor series—Rogue One being a transition. Finally the Franchise, through Tony Gilroy’s efforts, was grappling with complex moral ambiguities. If you remember Cassian Andor murders (of necessity?) one of his fellow rebels early on in Rogue One. That’s when I sat up and started to pay attention! (BTW, Gilroy wrote and directed the George Clooney film Michael Clayton—another great moral tale.)
Sorry, but the Mandalorian series is just more Buck Rogers with heavy emphasis on CGI and less on story.
May 29th, 2023 at 8:42 am
I quite agree with your assessment of both Star Trek and Star Wars. I’ve long seen the latter as essentially a fairy tale. It has a princess, a lost prince, an evil emperor, an evil wizard, a kindly wizard, and a knight on his white charger (complete with (hairy) squire). Simple, even simplistic, values, clear good and evil, no ambiguity. Exactly why little kids get Star Wars. (And, good Lord, the Ewoks.) In contrast, Star Trek, as you say, did stories that were about something. (It was a dictate of Rodenberry’s that every script must be about something. Apparently, many scripts were rejected for failing that standard.)
It also had in common with early Doctor Who (and some other more obscure early SF) that they didn’t let the low budgets and often rough production values deter from really good storytelling. Doctor Who and an unregarded (but actually excellent) early SF movie, Zardoz (1974), gave me the notion of (typically British, but original Star Trek, too) “hi tech/lo tech” — simple things that were presented as ultra-high tech. In Zardoz, for instance, a large (palm-sized) gem is a super-computer. I still find original Trek the most re-watchable of any of the Trek shows that followed. Story matters!
Speaking of Lucas, last night I watched American Graffiti. Probably for the first time since it came out in 1973. It’s aged okay, and it was interesting to see those actors so young. Lotta water over the damn since then.
Ha, and speaking of Joseph Campbell, the ghost of Campbell appeared in an episode of Rick and Morty last season (S6E7, Full Meta Jackrick — one of their more meta episodes).
Tony Gilroy rang a loud bell, so I looked up his filmography. Not just Michael Clayton (which I agree was excellent; his first stint as a director), he wrote the screenplay for all three of the Matt Damon Bourne movies. (He wrote and directed the fourth with Jeremy Renner.) He also wrote Extreme Measures (1996), The Devil’s Advocate (1997), Proof of Life (2000), and other notable screenplays. No wonder his name was familiar.
As for The Mandalorian, I have the impression those touting it as good do so more in contrast with all the bad Star Wars TV shows and movies we’ve been plagued with. The sequel trilogy was pretty awful (and incredibly forgettable). I have a theory I call “crap-covered raisins” — that fans of particular raisins put up with a coating of crap because they love the raisins so much. Sometimes a very thick coating of crap. (But, hey, more raisins!) That love of more of the same can involve eating a lot of crap. (The Marvel movies are another good example. So is most modern Star Trek.) Andor, on the other hand, seems to have earned genuine respect.
May 29th, 2023 at 1:18 pm
You are spot on with your fairy tale analysis for Star Wars! And American Graffiti! OMG! Now I have to see it again—Harrison Ford’s baptism into film.
May 29th, 2023 at 8:51 pm
Ford is so young in that as to be almost unrecognizable. Richard Dreyfuss and Ron Howard, also!
May 28th, 2023 at 4:02 pm
“I think our love of more of the same speaks poorly of us.” Why? Us/We are the most successful of all creatures. We can live anywhere. Yes, we repeat that which works. Why wouldn’t we?
Until it doesn’t. And then … what happens?
May 28th, 2023 at 8:57 pm
Well, context is everything! I was speaking there specifically about stories and audience tastes. It’s pretty clear that audiences want more of the same — can’t get enough of their James Bond or superheroes or Star Wars. Hollywood has even learned that audiences want spoilers in movie previews so they know exactly what they’re getting. (If you’ve ever wondered why so many previews give away important plot points, that’s why.)
It’s not new — as I mentioned in the post, popular demand brought Sherlock Holmes back from the dead. But it seems to have become more of a thing in recent history. For a long time, there were jokes about Jaws XXIII or Rocky XVII. But given the 32 (and counting) Marvel movies, and all the Star Trek/Wars shows and movies, it isn’t much of a joke anymore, it’s reality. And my comment addresses my perception that people generally fear new and original but prefer the safe and known.
As far as repeating what works, to the contrary, what makes us such a powerful species is that we constantly improve on tools and ideas. The whole “standing on the shoulders of giants” thing. We constantly innovate and explore. That’s why we took over the planet.
May 30th, 2023 at 3:02 pm
People are different. That’s why we took over the planet. And yet in many ways we are the same. You and I disagree on many things – yet I enjoy reading your posts. Carry on.
May 30th, 2023 at 4:23 pm
I think our differences often tend to be more divisive than helpful. Our success comes from our ability to innovate. Even chimps and apes can’t do that.
May 29th, 2023 at 9:07 am
I loved reading this post! Lots to think about as I consider the authors, genres, character archetypes, themes/plots, etc., that I return to time and again.
May 29th, 2023 at 9:17 am
Thanks! I’m delighted that you got something out of it!
June 6th, 2023 at 10:35 am
[…] I’ve said many times (here and IRL), my primary ask with stories is: take me someplace new. I posted recently about our love of sequels and adaptations — a love I don’t share, at least not in full measure. In part because sequels and […]
July 29th, 2023 at 11:11 am
[…] away so much of the plot is that Hollywood has found that audiences want to know. The attraction of revisiting the well is the same […]
December 19th, 2023 at 4:07 pm
[…] limited to, remakes and reboots, but generally don’t include sequels or spin-offs [see Revisiting the Well for details on the […]