Hollywood hasn't got an original thought in its entire collective brain. If the only originally conceived blockbuster they can come up with this summer, or for the next four months, is "Dunkirk," then we seriously have a problem here. If all they can do is regurgitate sequels, prequels, remakes and reboots whilst ripping off everything from comics to TV to games, then this will be the result and it will be all come crashing down like the Hiddenburgh. The scourge of the bean-counter has hit them as much as anywhere else and producers need to start thinking out of the box again and encouraging new writers and fresh, original screenplays.
The Independent:
“Some of the tent poles are just not as strong this year,” 20th Century Fox head of domestic distribution Chris Aronson says. “Pirates of the Caribbean? It's the fifth one. Transformers? It’s the fifth one.”
'Fox has just released their sixth instalment in the Alien franchise — Alien: Covenant — and are releasing the third in the rebooted Planet of the Apes series, War for the Planet of the Apes."
I always go back to this Steven Spielberg quote, which seems to become more prophetic by the year:
"There's eventually going to be an implosion — or a big meltdown. There's going to be an implosion where three or four or maybe even a half-dozen megabudget movies are going to go crashing into the ground, and that's going to change the paradigm. We were around when the Western died and there will be a time when the superhero movie goes the way of the Western. It doesn't mean there won't be another occasion where the Western comes back and the superhero movie someday returns." - Steven Spielberg to THR