Reboot Culture!
We've seen it all before.
“History doesn’t repeat itself, but it often rhymes.” - Mark Twain, probably.
Back in the Roaring ‘Twenties, the prelude to The Great Depression was a time of wild financial exuberance. Having survived both a major pandemic and a World War, the US stock market roared to new highs, as an over-leveraged populace bought hundreds of millions of shares on margin, in anticipation of continued happy returns. A sober reckoning generally follows all bouts of wild exuberance, and the party came to an end with a major stock market crash in the Fall of 1929. A bad situation was then made worse by a fledgling Federal Reserve, which essentially stood by and watched the banking system collapse in deflation. This series of events resulted in a decade-long worldwide recession, characterized by a decline in output and global trade, as well as high unemployment.
Nearly 100 years and a second pandemic later, it’s hard not to feel like the clouds are gathering for the second half of this rhyming couplet. This time around, the Federal Reserve acted boldly and decisively to prevent a meltdown after the crash of 2020, providing liquidity through an impressive array of actions and enacting an expansionary monetary policy to stimulate the economy and restore confidence in markets. However, the rapid recovery that followed came with its own brand of wild exuberance in the form of an “everything bubble,” and its own bugbear, in the form of high inflation. Now, the Fed’s looming and arguably long-overdue interest rate hikes — combined with widespread, major disruptions to global supply chains — has many wondering if we aren’t living inside of yet another lesser reboot of a movie we’ve seen before. Of course, I can not tell you if this is the case, and I’m not one to speculate here; I’m a ragtime pianist, not an economist or simulation hypothesis adherent. I will offer, though, that such a scenario would be completely in step with our current pop culture zeitgeist.
Indeed; there is seemingly no end to the amount of rebooted franchises to be found in the annals of the New ‘Twenties. Today, a visit to the homepage of any streaming site sometimes looks as though the last fifty years of film and television history have been packaged together in one last Hollywood fire sale; an extinction burst of nostalgia designed to shake us from our doom-scrolling stupor with the promise of reconnecting with the inspiring and brilliant stories of our youth. And why not bring these stories and characters back? These are the same beloved franchises that appeared on our lunchboxes and pinball machines and faded hipster T-shirts! What could possibly go wrong…?
Unfortunately, a lot can go wrong in any attempt to repeat history. The sheer majority of these recent reboots manage to do little more than remind us how much better the original version was — even if its production values paled in comparison to the special effects and stunt crews of today. While we may appreciate the new model out of pure nostalgia and might chuckle at a knowingly-self-referential inside joke or two, we usually finish with the same sense of ennui that we get after binging on fast food, by the time the end credits roll. I’ve personally adapted to this near-constant feeling of reboot disappointment by internally reciting the following reminder before viewing: “That thing you used to like just isn’t the same anymore.” Think of it as the New ‘Twenties update of “be kind, rewind.”
Technically, these new movies and television series are sound; the story hits all the marks, the cast and crew is talented, and the budget is often light years beyond that of the original. The problem is not in the execution, but in the vision. Almost invariably, these reboots lack teeth when compared with the original. They lack the spark of madness that drove the original creator to spend countless sleepless nights toiling in a dark room to envision a world so unlike anything that had been conceived before. They lack the hair-raising tightrope walk that happens when a director asks the audience to suspend their disbelief and enter a brand new world for the very first time, without first knowing if said audience will accept such a bold proposition. The sense of trailblazing isn’t there; if the original caught lightning in a bottle, the reboot takes the far easier approach of connecting directly to an existing power grid.
It hasn’t helped matters that some of the recent reboots have shoehorned in contemporary cultural and political issues in facepalming-ly clumsy ways; the same kind of out-of-touch, “faculty lounge” approach that brought us “Latinx” and the new Google Docs “inclusive language” warning tool. While some of the original versions of these films did indeed exhibit episodes of cultural insensitivity, a more artful approach to atoning for these unfortunate moments would be to lead by example and create truly three-dimensional versions of the kind of diverse characters and storylines that haven’t been previously celebrated on film, without all the unnecessary posturing and virtue signaling. We should strive to expand the creative possibilities of the stories we tell, not box ourselves in by forcing superficial buzzwords and of-the-moment political tropes into every new piece of art we create. Doing the former gives new characters the same dignity of being treated as unique individuals that all of our most iconic film characters in history have received. Doing the latter reduces them to mere exercises in box-checking.
While some of the problems with contemporary reboots are seemingly easy to remedy, other problems are quite intractable. In many cases, these reboots are created without much — or any — input from the writers that penned the original. Creating a sequel to the masterwork of another artist is a bit like painting a sequel to a Van Gogh (Starry Night 2: Electric Boogaloo, anyone?). The very notion would be viewed as blasphemous, had it not become so common. By definition, any Star Wars iteration post-George Lucas will never be valued as highly as that of the original trilogy — no matter how well-scripted, well-directed, or well-acted. Any writer tasked with continuing the work of another is forced into an unenviable decision: either play things safe and honor the legacy of the original artist, or insert their own artistic vision into the proceedings and run roughshod over said legacy. Most often, it’s a no-win situation.
Big budgets can also have a constraining effect on originality. Much like a superhero movie, some of the greatest success stories in film have emerged from shockingly humble origins. As I’ve written here previously, I believe that to be a feature, not a bug. A smaller budget allows a filmmaker the freedom to adjust and pivot without navigating a sea of bureaucracy, and removes much of the pressure to make the end result palatable for a mainstream audience. There is also a bit of natural selection at play here; the filmmakers that become unlikely success stories invariably have a level of drive, focus, and creativity that allows them to surmount the various obstacles — budgetary or otherwise — that would prevent others without such attributes from reaching their goals.
All of that changes when the budgets increase by several decimal places. As more investors fund a project, more people have a say in the creative process itself, no matter how minuscule. The popular phrase “death by a thousand paper cuts” comes to mind here; as directors are asked to make accommodations for new stars, new subplots, and new sponsors, the creative spark of a visionary writer or director is often muted. Instead of using the full canvas, they are forced to color within the lines to satisfy an increasing amount of restrictions. Although we may catch glimpses of their brilliance in the resulting work, we can’t help but wonder what might have been, had they been given full license to create to their fullest potential [for an excellent — if exaggerated for comic effect — representation of how this process plays out, check out Ricky Gervais’ 2005 sitcom, Extras].
There are, of course, ways to incorporate nostalgia into new works without sacrificing creativity and artistic intent. America has a long, rich history of combining existing work together in surprising ways, to create something entirely new. This Remix Culture was the guiding spirit in the melting pot of early 20th Century New Orleans, where Western European and African musical traditions combined — with a sprinkling of French Creole and Afro-Latin influences — to form jazz, America’s great art form. Decades later, Remix Culture also manifested in 1970s New York City, when DJ Kool Herc spun funk and soul records in a way that extended the breaks — the rhythmic breakdowns that often occurred in the middle of the records — at a house party in the Bronx. That night — August 11, 1973 — is widely credited as the night that hiphop — a genre that fused classic soul breaks and “MCing” (rapping) with the aesthetic of ‘70s breakdance culture — was born. The genres spawned by Remix Culture were no mere trends sustained by wild exuberance alone; they were open-ended creative movements that continue to develop and blossom to this very day.
If Reboot Culture is filling in the blanks of a Mad Libs story, Remix Culture is cutting up the entire book of Mad Libs and pasting the cutouts onto The Brothers Karamazov. It is wise, yet irreverent; erudite yet iconoclastic. It is the pastiche of sounds heard in the Beatles’ White Album and Pete Rock & CL Smooth’s Mecca and the Soul Brother. It is the fusion of cinematic motifs found in a Quentin Tarantino movie, and the fusion of musical motifs found in West Side Story. Remix Culture does not attempt to repeat history, or force history to rhyme against its will. Remix Culture takes the past and present and constructs a brand new world, with a history all its own. Although it may not be considered suitable for churning out quick, prefabricated movies and TV shows on modern-day streaming sites, there is little question that Remix Culture dwarfs Reboot Culture in every other way.
Although our pop culture may continue to rhyme for the time being, we still have reason to be hopeful for the future. A new generation of talented authors, playwrights, and directors are coming into prominence, telling new stories through new mediums that can reach the masses without any green lighting from big-name Hollywood executives. The industry is taking notes, as well; creative works like Lin Manuel Miranda’s Hamilton — itself a definitive example of Remix Culture — have already proved beyond any shadow of a doubt that original musicals can result in enormous financial windfalls on Broadway, and there is a similar market incentive in film and television to identify other groundbreaking original works and bring them to a mainstream audience.
There are also a handful of series that demonstrate that contemporary reboots need not fall into the traps I’ve detailed above — and that those that avoid such pitfalls often go on to be rewarded handsomely. Netflix’s hit series, Cobra Kai — the latest iteration of The Karate Kid franchise — is one of them, in my opinion. In addition to re-examining the hero / villain dichotomy presented in the original movie with a surprising degree of nuance, Cobra Kai also brings the franchise into the present day without unmooring it from the values espoused in the original. The series studiously avoids the aforementioned posturing that abounds in other series, preferring instead to present themes of timeless wisdom. Discussions of personal responsibility, merit, honor, and the importance of family abound — with a strong helping of ‘80s cheese, to keep things light and Gen X-parent-friendly. The characters are of diverse backgrounds, and each one has their own individual circumstances and challenges with which they must contend, and learn to overcome them through lessons of empowerment and self-worth. In any other time, this would be nothing groundbreaking; in the present day, keeping the spirit of the original movie and changing with the times while staying out of the culture wars is particularly commendable and — dare I say — refreshing.
In the end, it will be the artists, themselves, that help us to collectively rediscover our own creativity — just as economists will help us to make sense of any potential economic troubles ahead. The word “Reboot” in the title of this piece, then, is not meant to be taken as a descriptor, but instead as a command to artists and creatives of all kinds. Let’s find a way to resist the pull of algorithmic determinism and get back to making great art once more. Art that is courageous. Art that inspires us. Art that challenges us.
Reboot Culture! Yes — let’s.
-SB
4/24/22 - The Reader’s Mailbag was heavier than usual following last week’s musing, A Contrarian’s Guide to Understanding Contrarians. I expected as much, of course; few issues today have been more polarizing than COVID-19. In the piece, I wrote that the pandemic has largely served as a Rorschach test of our own individual beliefs about the role that government is meant to play in our society, and the range of responses I received certainly supported that idea.
In addition to the messaging issue that I raised, readers brought up a whole host of issues that I deliberately left out of my piece. While I do have my own opinions about mandates, “vaccine passports” and the like, those fall outside the purview of this blog. For one thing, I try to only speak on subjects that I understand well and have thought through enough to hold a well-reasoned and well-defended perspective on, and for another thing, I’m simply uninterested in joining any “teams,” or in using this space to convince others to join any teams, themselves. I’m more interested in exploring the many reasonable things on which we can all agree, no matter our Rorschach test results. However, I always enjoy hearing readers’ perspectives on these and other issues.
For something completely off-topic: we just announced new US Fall tour dates for Postmodern Jukebox. Our Spring tour was one of our best yet, and we’re looking forward to crafting a brand new show for our Life In The Past Lane tour. The show will be coming to a number of major cities, beginning in early October, and tickets can be found here.
As always, feel free to write me directly by replying to this email. Word-of-mouth is the only marketing I do for this newsletter, so please feel free to spread the word by forwarding this piece to anyone that you think might enjoy it!
Enjoy your week,
Scott