Summer 2025 Is Full of Reboots and Remakes and Millennials Are Getting Resentful

Nobody loves a trip down memory lane more than I do.

Like many millennials, I was raised on peak high-stakes TV and major movie blockbusters. Every summer, I knew there was gonna be something to latch onto — a fashion trend to experiment with, a new movie that my friends and I could quote endlessly, or a summer song that I could call into the radio station and request because I couldn’t get it out of my head. It was a magical time.

However, somewhere between that and the pandemic, we ushered in this current reboot era that has had a hold on our viewing experiences and hasn’t let go. And while I can say it was fun at first, the idea of bringing back old shows and movies and sampling old songs is slowly losing its luster. I find myself craving more original content and not wanting to go into the theaters to pay for films I watched for free — because I was my mom’s broke bestie — the first time around.

The 2025 theatrical slate, for starters, has been rife with reboots, remakes, sequels and everything in between. First came what felt like the 1000th Final Destination film in May (okay, it was the seventh, but let us continue). And while it was filled with the suspense and jump scares I loved about the original films, it still felt a bit … lacking. This franchise, in particular, feels to me as though it’s traded intentional storytelling for gore and shock.

Maybe it was because I was younger or maybe it was the novelty of the concept, but I was gripped by the premise of the original films. Don’t the odds of a log truck coming undone and causing mega highway pile-up feel plausible, compared to a gust of wind blowing a weather vane that bounces off a fire extinguisher to then eviscerate my grandmother from the back of the head, killing her on the spot? It felt too far-fetched and didn’t prey on my mundane, everyday fears enough.

In the same month, Tom Cruise (possibly) delivered his final Mission: Impossible; after scaling a skyscraper and crawling on the wings of a moving plane, we can all agree he has done enough.

Next came Megan 2.0, an unnecessary follow-up to the original film (and audiences seemed to agree). Megan 2.0 was then followed by other retro-inspired fare such as Lilo & Stitch, How to Train Your Dragon, Jurassic Park: Rebirth and Superman. By the time we got to I Know What You Did Last Summer on July 18, I was fatigued by the nostalgia of it all.

It’s not that these films are bad! I did enjoy the new Final Destination and, more recently, critics have given raves to Jurassic Park and The Fantastic Four: First Steps. I Know What You Did Last Summer has old and new fans praising it for striking a great balance between humor, nostalgia and suspense. And the latest Superman had dog lovers across the world swooning over Krypto.

However, as an avid media consumer and entertainment editor, I can’t help but wonder where all the good original content has gone. Is it that audiences are not showing up for the original titles? Is it that they’re not marketed enough? Have studios learned that nostalgia-baiting sells, so they’re going to ride that train until the wheels fall off?

Back in my day, it felt as though movie studios competed to see who would release the most creative, most experimental and most audience-enticing film of the summer. I can remember when The 40-Year-Old Virgin came out in 2005, Step Up in 2006 and Superbad in 2007. It was all anyone could talk about. And while the title alone let me know I was too young for The 40-Year-Old Virgin, I remember watching Superbad on a bootleg DVD I borrowed from my neighbor because it was that serious.

I just don’t see that equivalent for my 16-year-old nephew.

Maybe I’m just his old aunt Steph, who’s out of touch, but one of my summer highlights was picking a date for all my friends to meet up for the movie of the summer — and it wasn’t made by Marvel. Even franchises such as Harry Potter are being revisited and remade.

So what is Gen Z’s equivalent? What’s Gen Alpha’s? What are they all buying into, reading or listening to the way we did? What’s forming their core memories? Who is their McLovin’? What song has them hooked the way Step Up’s “(When You Gonna) Give It Up to Me” by Sean Paul ft. Keisha Cole had us hooked the summer of 2006?

In a lot of ways, that movie-going experience was a great equalizer because it allowed everyone to get on the same page. Not long ago, said nephew asked me for the password to my HBO Max account because he wanted to watch some Studio Ghibli.

This is a person who has access to Disney+, Hulu, Netflix, even Prime Video. Yet, he needed another platform to watch what his friends were watching. I’ve convinced myself that the nature of my job requires me to have all these streaming platforms, but I genuinely wonder: if I didn’t have HBO Max already, and couldn’t get it, what then? Would he become a pariah among his friends? Or is there so much content it wouldn’t have even mattered?

This isn’t to undermine anyone’s hard work or the dedication it takes to make one of these blockbusters. I went to film school, and making a five-minute short almost wrecked my friendships, so I know that putting together a 90-minute film can’t be easy. My point, though, is that in a world where Ryan Coogler can make Sinners and have it be original IP, that moves and inspires people, why can’t there be more films like that?

I love that we get to resuscitate some of the magic of the past, but I miss going to the movies with the excitement and anticipation of knowing I’m about to experience something new. Instead, so many of today’s entertainment selections give, “Remember when you were 13 and you were really into Zac Efron’s swoop bangs? Well, here’s the 2025 version of that.” I love my childhood, but enough already.

Let’s be honest: I will be fully seated to watch Lindsay Lohan and Jamie Lee Curtis in Freakier Friday. But I just want to point out how great these two are when even when they’re not recreating the roles that make us feel warm and fuzzy about our adolescence. Jamie Lee Curtis got an Oscar for her role in Everything Everywhere All at Once, a deliciously bizarre and fresh take on the action-comedy genre. And Lindsay Lohan delighted us all as the queen of Christmas in Our Little Secret and went back to her rom-com roots in Irish Wish.

I vote for more of that, and fewer newer takes on things we’ve seen before.