2008 Comeback Stories: Recycled movie heroes

Updated

This post is part of our series on people, places and things finding new life in 2008.

Call it "green" or think of it as post-modern, but Hollywood seems to be deeply committed to recycling.

Indiana Jones, X-Files, Batman, the Hulk, Harry Potter, and the Mummy will all soon be returning to the big screen. Even Star Trek will boldly go where it has gone, uh, ten times before.

I admit, I am a-tingle about the return of Indy and (hopefully) his bullwhip. I was a teenage girl during the original trilogy run, and Harrison Ford's performance imprinted on me as the very definition of masculine sexy. Me and Dr. Jones, we had a thing going on. And although Batman has never moved me in that way, I will probably go see Dark Knight out of respect for the late, great Heath Ledger's swan song as the Joker.

But some of these comebacks, like X-Files, make me feel the way I do when I happen to be listening to an "oldies" station and hear the Barenaked Ladies. Or when VH1 rolled out I Love the 90s. Dude. It's too soon.

Nostalgia can't be rushed to the table. Pop culture, the good stuff, needs to be left alone in the dark and forgotten about, before you can uncork it as vintage. The bad kind never does get any better.

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