We’ve had a lot of reboots, reimagings, and remakes recently. A lot of them have sucked, but they don’t always have to. The Wizard of Oz, The Departed, The Thing, The Fly, all remakes of other films. Likewise, we’ve seen many different versions of X-Men, Transformers, Ghostbusters, GIJoe, Thundercats, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and other popular cartoons. Sure, some have been crap, but others have actually been pretty good.

I don’t mind a remake as long as it’s done good, and there is a reason for it, whether it’s because the original is dated or the just because James Bond has been running around for 60 years and needs a reboot.  

There’s actually a few shows I grew up with that I wouldn’t mind getting rebooted these days.

Conan the Adventurer

It’s the story of Conan, except with less death. In fact, I don’t think anybody dies. Even Conan’s parents are just turned to stone. Conan seeks for a way to turn them back, joining up with Zula, a prince and warrior of the Wasai tribe, and Jezmine a beautiful circus performer. His main enemies are the followers of Set, serpent men that can take the form of humans, lead by Wrath-Amon. Both sides seek out star metal. Conan needs it as it’s presence will force the serpent men to take their true form, and it’s mere touch will send them back to Abyss (they don’t actually die), and Wrath-Amon needs it to free his god Set from the same Abyss. All the good guys have weapons of star metal, Conan has a sword, Zula has a bola, Jezmine has throwing stars, even Conan’s horse has star metal horse shoes. The only one without any star metal is Needle, but he’s a phoenix, so he doesn’t really need any.

How I’d Reboot it: I’d get rid of star metal. I’d also make the villians more in line with those from Robert E. Howard’s original stories. Instead of Wrath-Amon, he’d fight Thoth-Amon, the Stygian wizard and follower of Set. Thusa Doom would appear to be a large man with a face like a skull and eyes of fire.

I’d make sure that Conan was as smart as Howard made him also. He wasn’t just a huge man that would punch his way out of problems, he was also pretty smart, so he would figure out the best way to punch his way out of problems. And I’d make sure that when Conan fight’s, and he will actually actually kill the serpent men, monsters or enemy soldiers. Instead of just touching them with his sword, he would slash and run them through. I wouldn’t make it gory, but I wouldn’t let it just be a slap fight. Plus, I’d bring back some of the early connections between Robert E. Howard and H.P. Lovecraft’s works.

Gargoyles

 

Cursed to remain in their stone form until their castle were to rise among the clouds, they find that after a thousand years, their castle has done just that.  A billionaire, David Xanatos, with a penchant for the occult transported the castle, stone by stone, to the top of his tower in New York City.  Believing their rescuer to be evil, they take up residence in a clock tower and befriend a cop named Elisa Maza, and proceed to take up their original duties of defending the city by night, while Elisa watches after them by day.

The show included much of Shakespeare’s works, making Macbeth into an warrior cursed with immortality, and the fairy folk of A Mid Summer Night’s Dream, as well as delving into Arthurian legend by traveling to Avalon and meeting the gargoyles charged with guarding Arthur’s body.

How I’d reboot it: I really wouldn’t change much of anything on this show.  The animation needs some cleaning up, but otherwise the look is great.  The only other thing that would be needed is to update the show for the current time.

Hell, I may not even make it a series, since I think they still air re-runs on the Disney Chanel, and just make it a feature length animated movie.  Put out remastered versions of the cartoon as marketing, and have the movie pick up after the series with maybe a short recap of how they got there at the very beginning.

Plus, if we bring back Gargoyles, it would probably mean more Demona cosplayers…

Inhumanoids

Inhumanoids starts off with the transportation of a new archaeological find, a giant dinosaur encased in amber.  At the same time, a well is being drilled by a shady eye patched character.  The drill breaks into a vault two miles below the earths surface.  From that vault comes Tendril, a giant tentacled plant monster.  He then releases D’Compose, the half rotting lord of the undead, from his amber prison, and together they search out their leader Metlar, who is locked in the earths core.

To stop them, the Earth Corps, a group of conservation scientists with bulky suits of robot armor and very 80′s looking vehicles, team up with the Mutores, a group consisting of sentient trees, rock people, and Magnokor, a creature composed of two halvs (one rock, the other magma) that combine into one creature that has the ability to control magnetism. The Mutores being the ones who locked up the Inhumanoids before man even set foot on the Earth’s surface.

The show was pretty unique at the time with it’s darker story line that flowed across the series instead of each episode being a stand alone story. Likewise, they didn’t try to hide any of the gore that comes with battles either, showing Tendril getting chopped in half or getting limbs chopped off, watching monsters get dissolved in acid, or watching soldiers transform into rotting monsters.

How I’d reboot it: Think Halo meets Lovecraft. You don’t have to do much, it’s already pretty close to being that anyways. The first thing I would do is make them super soldiers instead of scientists. I’d also change their armor from the clunky 80′s gadget gear to a more modern streamlined cyborg suit. I’d change the vehicles as well, giving them actual tanks instead of what ever this thing is:

I’d go so far as to include mechs, but more along the lines of Mech Warrior, not Gundams.

The Inhumanoids wouldn’t fight all at once like they did in the original series, instead, they would fight one specific Inhumanoid and their forces at a time.  They may team up on occasion, as they jockey for power, but normally they would all have their own schemes.

Metlar would be the leader.  He would look like something composed directly from the Earths molten iron core.  Large iron scales, metallic teeth and claws, and he would be hot, able to breath fire or drool a lava like substance.  I’d take away his weakness to magnetism that allowed anybody to control him like a puppet with a few kitchen magnets, or at the least, make him more difficult to manipulate using it.  He would have the power to give life to base elements.  He would make his troops out of rocks and metal or any other large ore deposits.  Concrete, plastic and alloys not occurring naturally would be beyond his control though.

D’Compose would still be a large zombie like reptilian monster, but I would refine it more than his previous incarnation with more realistic bone structures and detail to his decaying form.  He’d keep his decomposing touch that changes mortals into undead monsters, as well as have an army of the dead that he has amassed over the centuries under ground.  He would be second to Metlar, but always seeking ways to gain more power to become the master himself.

Tendril would remain pretty much unchanged.  A large plant like monster with low intelligence.  He would be more like a force of nature gone wrong, a tumorous growth on mother nature.  Like a weed seeking to supplant all life on earth with his own.  Like in the original series, any piece cut off from him would have the ability to grow into another.  There would always be one main Tendril, but also several smaller ones that would make up his forces. Any time the main Tendril is killed, one of his young grow to take his place. He may be the weakest, but he is much harder to kill.  Even though he is the least intelligent, the speed at which he reproduces, and the fact that he is almost impossible to kill make him the most dangerous, with maybe a later episode showcasing this by having his minions almost take overrun the world.

The mutores would consist of just two groups. First are the Granites, initially created my Metlar, but given too much power so they rebelled. Second are the Red Woods (but I would name them either Jurupa or Pando), the sentient plants that existed before man. Tendril himself came from them, but where as they are majestic trees, he is a spreading weed. For years the Mutore Alliance had watched mankind’s rise to power, and waited for their eventual demise so they could reclaim their kingdoms. The release of the ancient evil Inhumanoids has caused them to reveal themselves however, so they can put a stop to them. The Mutores would have an uneasy alliance with man, neither side trusting the other, and at times plotting against each other. The Granites would demand that drilling and mining cease in their domains, while the Red Woods would kick mankind out of ancient jungles and forests.

Episodes would track the war. The main focus would be the Earth Corps Special Forces team and their missions, but there would be plenty of room for other stories to tell. There would be huge battles where human forces square off against their own dead, rain forests would be perverted and replaced by Tendril.

Plus, a couple of people have already done the work of making new scary versions of the Inhumanoids, and they look awesome.

Dino Riders

The show begins with the noble Valorians being attacked by the animal like Rulons. In an attempt to escape the battle, one ship activates an experimental device called the Space Time Energy Projector. Seeing their prey escaping, Krulos, the leader of the Rulons, has his ship fire a tractor beam at their prey, which in turn drags both ships across space and time to prehistoric Earth. Here the Valorians use their powers of telepathy to tame and train dinosaurs, the Rulons however, attach mind control devices called Brain Boxes to them before riding them into battle. The Valorians do what they can to prevent the Krulos from obtaining the S.T.E.P. while trying to repair it so they can use it themselves.

It was a show that featured dinosaurs with freaking lasers on their freaking heads. What wasn’t to love.

Now, Terra Nova was probably my only shot at this, and as such, should have watched it, but I want real Dino Riders.

How I’d reboot it: I’d keep it mostly the same, and hopefully, I’d also keep it as a cartoon. With the war going poorly, the Valorian royal family has a colony ship built around their experimental S.T.E.P. engine. They gather around a thousand or so of their people and attempt an escape, which is detected by the Rulon capital ship. They fire off the tractor beam, connecting to the escaping colony ship just as the S.T.E.P. is activated. Both ships damaged by the trip, they try to get to the only habitable planet in the system. The ships barely survive re-entry, with neither group knowing if the other made it.

While the Valorians ship had everything needed to create a colony, much of their equipment has been damaged, which they make up for by taming the local dinosaur population. The Rulons have it a bit worse off, as their ship is purely a military vessel, and lacks any equipment necessary to rebuild. They do have their Brain Boxes though, and they use them to enslave the dinosaurs. Eventually scouts from each side discover the location of the other. The peace loving Valorians hope that the ill prepared Rulons will be spending too much time trying to survive to attack them. The peace is short lived as an army of laser laden dinosaurs come thundering through the jungle to attack and the war is back on.

I’d keep it as the same type of show, only maybe upping the action and removing some of the goofiness that you found in comics of the time.  Aim it towards children, but give it enough depth for teens and adults to enjoy as well.

The only other thing I would do is make sure that the dinosaurs are updated to match our current understand of them, feathers and all. When the original series was out, the toys were some of the most realistic dinosaurs figures you could buy. In fact, the Smithsonian licensed them (sans lasers) to sell in their gift shops.

The Pirates of Dark Water

The poisonous Dark Water, a seemingly living oil like substance, is spreading across the 20 seas of the planet Mer. Ren, discovers that he is the lost son of King Primus, and heir to the ruined kingdom of Octopon. He then takes his fathers broken sword as his own, and sets off to collect the Thirteen Treasures of Rule, the only things that can push back the spread of Dark Water. Along the way, he joins up with Ioz, a pirate and scoundrel, Tula, a barmaid turned ecomancer, and Niddler, a monkeybird (think wizard of OZ, only more colorful) who can’t get enough minga melons. Together they fight agains Bloth, a and his crew of evil pirates who want the treasures for their own purposes.

How I’d reboot it: The series itself was amazing except for two things. First, the animation wasn’t all that great. The animators didn’t really have any sense of perspective, so in once scene, Ren’s broken sword is little bigger than a butter knife, then when he is fighting Bloth, it grows to be long enough to counter Bloth’s giant cutlass. The animation wasn’t always the smoothest either. I’d make sure that it is up to today’s standards. The other major change I’d make is to ensure that all the treasures are jewels. Every treasure they find in the series is a jewel of some kind, except the 7th, which is some kind of annoying koala looking thing. They already have a funny animal sidekick with Niddler, there is no need to add another.  The only reason to add another is to try and attract little kids, but since there were plenty of deaths on this show, including deaths where people were covered and dissolved by Dark Water, it’s not a kids show.

The setting for this one was beautiful.

Bloth’s ship, which was made from the carcass of a giant leviathan, looked terrifying, like a skeletal harbinger of death. There were a few people with advanced technology, like robotic arms, I’d maybe think of changing them to a more steampunk look, as it may blend with the rest of the setting more though.

The cultural diversity crowd would love this on too, since I don’t think there are even five characters on the show that I’d call Caucasian.  Plus, it’s another show that would greatly benefit from more cosplayers if it get’s rebooted.