Is Originality a Thing of the Past?

[on:]

We live in a world full of sequels, remakes, movies based on books, movies based on true events, movies based on tv shows, and cliched movies. So this brings me to my question: Is originality a thing of the past? For an example (or examples as you could say) let's look at last week's top ten:

1.The Hulk-Based on Comic Book
2.Finding Nemo-Original
3.2Fast2Furious-Sequel
4.Bruce Almighty-Original
5.The Italian Job-Remake
6.Rugrats Go Wild-Based on TV Series
7.Alex & Emma-Cliched (Man and woman pretend to hate each other while working together on the same project but ultimately can't deny their feelings for one another.)
8.Hollywood Homicide-Somewhat Cliched (Experienced cop shows wild young cop the ropes.)
9.Dumb and Dumberer-Prequel
10.The Matrix Reloaded-Sequel
^These are the top ten in the US. Countries may differ

Notice anything? Only two of these movies are truly original with new basic ideas (Alhough the moral of Bruce Almighty ,how humans are not perfect and could/should never take the role of God, is sort of cliched. But that's just the moral)
What happened to the film writers of yore who cranked out new and intresting stories by the dozens? Are we coming close to the wells of creativity drying up? Or will some new writers finally give us some new stories? Discuss your opinions.

(P.S. I didn't mean to insult the other movies on the list. Just because something is a remake, sequel, or based on [insert something here] doesn't mean it's bad. Personally I liked the Hulk.)

[Reply #1 on:]

"Is originality a thing of the past"

One word answer yes, they went down the drain when Hollywood discovered that people don't enjoy anything original or different. People may feel intimadated by something that hasn't been done before.

[Reply #2 on:]

Look at Vampire Hunter D. Then look at the sequel, Vampire Hunter D: Bloodlust. Completely original (and MUCH BETTER) storyline. You don't even have to have seen the first Vampire Hunter D to get it. The problem is when sequels are manufactured fairly quickly. But this year is the year of sequels in movies, last year was the year for the original movies....

[Reply #3 on:]

Yes one word, 'Yes'.

[Reply #4 on:]

American Fanfic writers in Anime use SI's of two types.

The annoying Martial Artist type.
The annoying guy with Techno-Suit type.

And look at the Simpson's, yes. It is dead.

[Reply #5 on:]

Humans have been around for 2 million years, and our scope of experience is somewhat limited. We'd have to run out of Ideas eventually.

[Reply #6 on:]

Everything goes through stages of repeating the past, look at fashion. Music will get there eventually (when people exhaust every single beat, riff and lyric - and they gotta make a cover of somebody else's). I think more likely with TV and movies is that directors and producers watched the original film when they where younger and thought they could make it better (like a childhood fantasy)... spice it up with bigger breasted women and computer effects.

[Reply #7 on:]

There has never been much orginality in the media. Once someone finds something that works they'll play it to death. I mean, very few Shakepeare plays are actually original (Romeo and Juliet is based upon an old Greek story) but he's supposedly the greatest playwright who ever lived. Same with movies- lots of early movies are adaptions because it was easier just to film something that was already written. Very little is original any more.

[Reply #8 on:]

Yes, i always felt ancient greece never got enuff play.

[Reply #9 on:]

"TV adience don't wanna see anything original, they wanna see the same thing they've seen a thousand times before"
"Clever things make people feel stupid, and unexpected things make them feel scared!"

Nothing is original, it's impossible to be 100% original because everything we do or create is based on/inspired by something else. The Light bulb was just an upgrade of the candle.
This said, there are many many impressive and original concepts and ideas being produced in the world today. Ranging from movies, music, and culture in general.

Things that I consider as inovative/original as possible in their own particualr field are...

The Internet
Futurama
The Matrix
AI
Momento
Michael Jackson
The Office
Recycling (I know that's an Oxymoron, as the concept of recycling means to reuse old stuff, but I mean the initial idea of reusing old products)...

[Reply #10 on:]

What was fire up from, huh, HUH?

[Reply #11 on:]

Well there has to be a starting point for everything. Since fire is one of the elements it's what everything else is based on.
So fire is one of the few truely 100% original things.

[Reply #12 on:]

Fire is one of the elements? I think you must have failed chemistry class.

[Reply #13 on:]

Fire was one of the four Alchemical elements. Like in the Fifth element?
Alchemy was more a religion than a science, but its still interesting and relevant from a spiritual point of view

[Reply #14 on:]

Don't ask for originality if you're watching Voyager. It is basically a TNG clone with no Enterprise and no Enterprise crew. Aside from that, the stories are pretty much the same...

[Reply #15 on:]

As said before, originality is basically dead. Everything has been done in one way or another. Now originality lies in the way the used idea is handled. This says it all. There are no new ideas, but there are different ways to handle those ideas.

[Reply #16 on:]

Originality isn't dead.  Every day we seem to be bombarded with more and more media, and the creative pool is only so deep.  Originality is spread so thin all it looks like is a vain attempt at facsimilizing (great non-word) previous works.  All art is inspired by other art, but artists of the past slaved away at their works for the better parts of their lives making their works their own.  Nowadays we have writers who live in an economy based on volume.  Art must be mass-produced in an age of mass media.  Think of how many television stations there are with cable and satellite networks becoming standard equiptment in households across the land (not in mine...sigh).  Many of these stations are on for twenty-four hours a day, that is an insane number of spots to try to fill every week.  It's no wonder why so many movies and television shows look like they came off of the same assembly line...it's because they did.

[Reply #17 on:]

Hollywood = idea production line.
Complete with conveyor belt churning out good and bad notions.

[Reply #18 on:]

In some ways, it is. A lot of 60s or older films seem to be remade at the moment - 'The Italian Job' and 'Down With Love' are the only 2 I can think of. But yet there are still good ideas being made into films.

[Reply #19 on:]

Meh. Originality ain't dead, it just doesn't sell. So the innovative products get shunted aside. Then, a product is noticed years down the line, at which point the corpse is dug up and subjected to a focus group. The focus group comprises of people with wide-ranging tastes, beliefs, backgrounds, cultures and ages and so naturally they agree on nothing. The product's concepts are broadly transplanted into a new vehicle, undergoing a charm overhaul on the way.

New product arrives, is hailed as a success by the mainstream, is looked down upon by the critical elite, and is despised by an insular and lonely internet community who 'liked the original better'. And thus originality works it'sway into the hearts of us all.

Note: Nothing i've said here hasn't been said better before.

[Reply #20 on:]

I felt like bringin this up. I saw a comic strip briefly showing the history of what's 'in' in popular music, with a singer singing the lyrics.

1950's: Love me tender...
1960's: Love me do...
1970's: Love Myself...
1980's: Hate Myself For Loving You...
1990's: Hate Myself...
2000's: HATE THE F@*#% WORLD!
2010's: (Activate robot to begin music)
2020's: Love me Tender...

In short, what was original will eventually come back whenever popular culture wants something that's 'different'. With movies and songs, everything is a reincarnation of past cultures, but using different technology and cultural values.

[Reply #21 on:]

According to that if all eight of those lyrics were in order and in a loop then HATE THE F@*#% WORLD! would've been popular in the '30s. But I do get what you are saying. History does repeat itself but in subtle ways so people don't notice it much and by the time that it's identical (like 1950's and 2010's) to the first time it happened it will probably be forgotten. This is especially true with fashions and trends.

[Reply #22 on:]

Matt Greoning say that "Immitation is the most honest form of plagiarism" Which kind of justifies many jokes and situations on The Simpsons and Futurama.

[Reply #23 on:]

Hooray! Hooray for banality!

[Reply #24 on:]

 

The Barenaked Ladies sang:
Woohoohoo, it's all been done
Woohoohoo, it's all been done
Woohoohoo, it's all been done before

 

King Solomon wrote a few thousand years earlier:
There is nothing new under the sun.