Play Movieline's Tournament of Champions: Franchise Survival Edition!

Looking back through the 1989 debut issue of Movieline, it's striking to read critic and biographer David Thomson's take on "The Culture of Reincarnation" -- a contemplation of Hollywood's obsession with remakes, revivals, sequels and the like. Yet while Thomson and I share a healthy skepticism about what's essentially the End of Ideas, I doubt his prescience extended to the vast, unkillable franchise epidemic afflicting moviegoers today. As such, an updating is in order. And you're going to help.

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