Naked Gun, Superman, Freakier Friday: Why are we so drawn to reruns, remakes, and sequels?

In a world of non-stop negative news cycles, are we all collectively self-soothing by immersing ourselves in reruns, remakes, and sequels? Suzanne Harrington on the allure of nostalgia

"So we’re collectively self-soothing by immersing ourselves in reruns, remakes, reissues, sequels, and prequels. Lovely easy familiarity."

IN a global era where we are being ruled by psychopaths and led by donkeys, where nobody can afford anything anymore and our distrust of each other is being weaponised against us for unscrupulous political gain, where a formerly utopian internet is being replaced by the creeping dystopia of AI, all of which is playing out against the ominous thrum of climate crisis, it’s no wonder we’re becoming nostalgia ostriches. There’s only so much news cycle a central nervous system can take.

Yay then for burying our heads in the warm, fuzzy distraction of nostalgia. Allowing it to blanket us in feelings of comfort and safety, shepherd us towards softer, more innocent times where all we had to contend with was George W Bush, lad mag sexism, and old-fashioned racism and homophobia. Where genocide was not being livestreamed daily on our phones, incels and the manosphere were not yet born, and a personality-disordered white supremacist was not in charge in the White House.