Are you a hack ass Hollywood executive looking for your next big script? Are you bankrupt of creativity and vision? Do you like knives and recycling old IP? If you said yes to any of the above, then I’ve got a list for you. If you’re running a major studio, you know developing and releasing new IP is so hard. Not to mention you also have to market it and find a stupid audience. Fret not my fellow nepo babies. The public domain is here to save the day! Below are the top 10 properties in the public domain (or soon to be) that are ripe for a stabby reimagining.
10. The Great Gatsby
What if we added murder to F. Scott Fitzgerald’s roaring 20s classic? Instead of being caught up on one broad and throwing parties to win her over, what if Jay Gatsby went on a killing spree to impress her? No one on East Egg or West Egg would be safe from his bloodlust. To make it a little more artsy-fartsy we can have Jay paint the green light on the dock red, with the blood of his victims. Guaranteed box office smash.
EDIT: My editor has informed me there is already murder in the book. Sorry, I never finished reading it, but it sounds like the murder I’m proposing is much sexier than what Mr. Fitzgerald wrote.
9. Steamboat Willie
I know, I know. It’s already been done, but hear me out. Two words, elevated horror. All the kids are raging about it. We’ve got our best AI applications, er I mean workers already working out how to define “elevated horror”. So far they’ve got less stabbing, more thinking. I know thinking is below your pay grade, but try this on for size. We have Steamboat Willie be a representation of something. It’s like a metaphor, you know? We’ll let the writers figure that out. They love subtext.
8. Archie Comics
You know what you need for successful horror cinema? Sexy teenagers on the pointy end of a knife. Hollywood is flush with sexy twenty-somethings ready to play sexy teenagers at the drop of a hat. Just imagine Glen Powell as Jughead. Sure, it’s a little shaky what we actually can and can’t use from Archie comics, but they’re print media, so fuck’em.
EDIT: My editor has informed me that Glen Powell is not a sexy twenty-something. He’s a sexy thirty-something.
7. Peter Pan
You know what’s good for business? Dead kids. Imagine, if instead of luring kids to Neverland, where they never grow up, Peter Pan instead stabs children and they in turn, never grow up.
6. Sleeping Beauty
What if true love’s kiss doesn’t awaken beauty? What if true love’s kiss instead awakens a nightmare? Aurora awakens to a new world around her. Not only has she discovered her whole life has been a lie, but now this lizard lipped prince is hovering over her, disturbing the best sleep she’s ever gotten. You can’t blame her when she grabs the Prince’s sword and lobs his head off, thus beginning a killing spree that can only be stopped by true love’s kiss.
5. The Wizard of Oz
I smell a franchise with this one. We’ve already got a phenomenal final girl in Dorothy. We just need to pick a killer and hand them a Victorinox or a Cutco Knife (whichever knife company your corporation owns). The higher ups will be thrillified by our corporate synergy.
4. DareDevil
Hold off true believers, this is not who you think it is. This is Lev Gleason Publication’s Golden Age, boomerang-wielding vigilante, DareDevil. His alter-ego, Bart Hill, fell mute after witnessing his father’s murder and grows up to take out bad guys with a giant boomerang. For our public domain cash grab we’re going to make old Bart the villain and change his boomerang into a sharp glaive. Also, legal says we have to change his superhero name to avoid upsetting “The Mouse”. I think we can get away with D4R3D3V1L.
3. Night of the Living Dead
We got zombies! We can do zombies! The movie basically writes itself. Do we give the zombies kives? No no no, that’s too much. We’ll give one zombie one knife and call it a day.
2. The Beverly Hillbillies (Season 1 Only)
Jed Clampett is a fool. As a fellow Missourian myself, if I strike oil while hunting a rabbit, I am not moving my daughter, my mother-in-law, and my slack-jawed, mouth breathing cousins into a mansion in Beverly Hills with me. I’m going solo. The only reason I could think Jed would stick it out with his family is that he feared the law taking chunks of his newfound wealth from him. With that in mind, I present The Beverly Hillbillies Massacre. When Jed strikes gold he sees a future for himself outside of Missouri. The only thing that stands between him and his happiness is his coatriding kin.
1. Calvin and Hobbes
Ok, the rights on this one are dicey. We can use Bill Watterson’s lovable comic strip characters, but there’s a catch. They’re technically not in the public domain, but we can use them as long as we depict them urinating on something. We can’t steal from Watterson, but we can steal from those who have already stolen from Watterson. So let’s do a dark humor film where our killer, after having murdered a victim (with one of your corporation’s knives) he pisses on them.
EDIT: My editor has informed me this will be my last list with the site.
