where did i say that transformers was supposed to be gritty ?
i said it was remarkably mature
its a science fiction series that happens to have living mecha

Oy. I wasn't talking about Transformers still, I moved on to a different subject.
I don't know enough about the franchise to say anything about it. The most I know of them is they had some series in the 80s and I watched the first movie, the entirety of which I've forgotten about.

franchise has been alive ever since 1984 with no breaks what so ever ;p

It depends, but in general I'd say let it go to newer generations: you keep most of your fans happy through not making large, sweeping changes to a franchise they used to love, you keep newer fans from feeling left out by a franchise that's not really "theirs", and best of all, you avoid the dork age that comes with most children franchises aiming towards a teenaged crowd, AKA the Poochie.

Plus, what should happen to franchises which outlive most if not all of their original fanbase, like LotR or Foundation? or hell, Sherlock Holmes? No, they don't go away... but neither do its sequels. And so, what for their original audience was a long and torturous road of many years waiting for the next installment to appear, for newer generations it's just a weekend of binge reading/watching/playing before they get up to scratch with the franchise and begin to crave, just as we did back then, for more... only they're still as young as we were back when we'd just discovered the series.

And what direction should those newer, highly in-demand installments take is the subject of this thread. I think it's the opposite: many times works aimed squarely at adults have less death and sacrifice, but are instead slower, driven not by overt conflict but more nuanced "mutual incompatibilities" the likes of which would be resolved in two minutes if that on simpler works. For a somewhat silly example, I'd mention the manhwa "My Young Cat and My Old Dog", which is about... the daily life of a girl who owns a young cat and an old dog. I adore it, but I'm sure even my mascot-loving daughter wouldn't get past ch.50 before crying out "nothing ever happens in this borefest!".

Gore, angst and overblown *DRAMA* are rather the hallmarks of works aimed at teenagers, I'd say. I just can't picture a 50-something picking up Postal on release day thinking "finally a game that I can relate with".

Hmmm this very much seems like a trick question...

No series can last forever, and those that try lose more and more relevance as they push on. Assassin's Creed is one such example.


I can only think of Nintendo though with this question, where everyone grew up and Nintendo catered to everyone... and then they threw EVERYONE away because they wanted to target your children, kids without jobs who have to beg and plead and get gifts from parents rather than the adults who they had in the bag and who had the cash and jobs to buy their products...


Some series can evolve, but most likely it would finish up or die long before it needs to really evolve. Forced rehashing of series I don't think really count. Looking to any Mario games I can't help but shake my head and just walk away, they are the exact same with some minor change in them but otherwise it's identical story, identical graphics, identical play style, and has no in depth substance. Would an adult Mario game work? I don't know, not with the cartoony look, and making it more realistic like they did with Sonic didn't fit well so that's a bad direction to go.

However: Megaman is a series that grew up. At least a bit. Going to Megaman 9 and then X and X-2 it was more gritty and sorta adult while holding onto it's values and improving. After X-2? Meh, it just forced itself into iterations rather than being good and isn't really worth playing at that point.

So that's sorta my 2¢ on it all.

I still stand by my original statement that I think it's fine for a franchise to grow up (while agreeing with what Breja/Zeogold subsequently stated - something that appears to different ages certainly is the best way to go).
I wonder though what age of children we are actually talking about - when I was a kid I certainly didn't binge watch/read/play to the extent I burned through a whole franchise within one weekend?

Maybe I'm just not enough of a hardcore fan though to really get upset about a franchise changing direction - I find it fairly easy to move on or pretend something doesn't exist (like that awful Last Airbender movie) if I really dislike it. I find the whole reaction to Star Wars pretty interesting, for example, seeing that apparently both the prequels and sequels are fairly disliked by fans of the original trilogy. Me - I enjoyed the originials, thought the prequels were alright, never watched the sequels. It's just that easy for me ;)

Since Power Rangers have been brought up - I never liked those, even as a child I thought the show was silly and kinda stupid. I saw the trailer in the cinema now, and it looked ok. I'm not going to watch it, though. Are childhood fans of the show going to watch this? If it had been a movie "meant for kids", would they have gone to see it then? Do today's kids even know who the Power Rangers are?
I guess what I'm wondering about is, if a kids-only (and fairly "old") franchise stays kids-only, is there actually a target audience?

That's a pretty interesting thought. Thinking about movies in particular now, though, I find it hard to come up with an example that fits that definition of "adult" (while mostly excluding teenage audiences). Could it be the divide there is more about genres/target audiences than simply age groups? As in, "if you like superhero movies, you like guys in capes smashing stuff" and "if you like movies about the human condition you like seeing someone sitting around moping while nothing much happens"?

Either way is ok, depending which way the rights holder thinks he will make more money.

With some franchises it might make sense to bring it to the new generation, while with some others it might make sense to try to grow up with your existing fans, as the new generation is less likely to get interested in your old franchise anymore, they already have their new things.

A bit like with music. Was it a good or bad thing that Pink Floyd, Supertramp, David Bowie etc. tried to "update" their music for the 80s? Maybe it brought them new fans, maybe not?

An older Bowie or Supertramp fan wasn't necessarily that excited of these:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N4d7Wp9kKjA

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VrERLeFseDA

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cvfoyXfcwVU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FByK6klYkkY

...but maybe the kids liked them then who felt their older music was "old man music".

"I used my eyes for a long time, and they have wored off as well. But it's alright, since I have a nose.
If my nose wears off, I still have ears.
If my ears wears off, I still have flesh.
Since all the cherished things have become my everything, I know them by anything."

Wow, this is seriously depressing. I can see the appeal, but definitely not to be read during times of emotional turmoil ;)

I'm not sure teenagers really wouldn't enjoy it, though - I loved reading depressing books and listening to sad songs during those ever-awful transitioning years.
"The facts of this world seen clearly are seen through tears; why tell me then there is something wrong with my eyes?"
Ah, good times...

Just like there's only one (well three) Voltrons, and one Transor-Z.
My parents took me to see Superman (1976) and there was the scene near the end when Lois Lane (before her car began to fall within the crack of the fault) listening to Supertramp's "Give a Little Bit" on the radio in the car.

There was something about that song which I remembered, watching the movie many years later when it was released and I made the connection between that and Supertramp, whose album "Breakfast in America" my dad owned (The "Logical Song" one of my favorites).

There was something recognizable by the singer and to find this was amazing so many years later.

I wasn't really introduced to Supertramp and Pink Floyd until in the early 90s or so (by a friend of mine), but I could instantly tell which stuff of them I liked the best, and especially with Supertramp, which songs from them I didn't like at all (like those aforementioned "dance pop" ones).

I am sure I had heard some ST and PF tunes before but they didn't get me interested back then. Maybe I was too young, but it also happens to be that I don't e.g. like that much the most famous Pink Floyd songs like "Another brick in the wall" and "Money", I actually find those two tunes very boring. PF has so much better stuff elsewhere.

It also reminds me how, as a tiny kid, I always kept marvelling at one particular LP album cover on my big brother's LP collection, which had this pig flying on the sky. I never listened to that LP, just kept watching that picture. Only later (in the 90s) I then saw it again when I bought the Animals CD (Pink Floyd), and it included one song that is in my mind possibly the best Pink Floyd song ever (Sheep).

It was my wife who actually coined the term "old man music". I'd quite often listen to my favorite Pink Floyd and Supertramp tracks on the car stereo, and sometime she said "You always listen to such old man music.". I think at the time she liked e.g. Lady Gaga, go figure.

I think you're making two assumptions that can't be taken for granted: That most grown up fans would want their favorite series to grow up with them instead of offering a nostalgic, escapist throwback to their childhood, and that creators like Frank Miller care about what fans of the franchise expect from them instead of just doing what they're interested in.

Well, you could play some Handel, Mozart, Bach, Beethoven or Chopin. Imagine if they all jammed together in Joe's garage.

1978
superman is from 1978
superman 2 is from 1980 and it took so long because despite 1 and 2 being shot back to back the producers and the director had ..."creative"differences and donner was sacked and replaced by richard lester who had to reshoot 60% of the movie to get his name on the credits as the director

You... didn't? xD I was thinking 7-8 years old, BTW, an age where at least *I* did burn through any franchise that interested me.

I think it comes down to whether you think a franchise changing directions or people moving away to other franchises as their taste change as the "bigger sin" of the two. Even if, like most of not all people in this thread, you don't get that upset with either; haven't seen anyone calling for the deaths of either J.K. Rowlings or Shigeru Miyamoto thus far, even if the former moved with the times and the latter hasn't.

Guess the more apt term would be "target demographics" in this case; though I don't know whether current theories on Marketing make the distinction.

An example that comes to mind is The Man From Earth, an excellent... sci-fi-ish? movie almost entirely about a group of adults sitting in a house, talking while packing stuff (there's also a couple scenes of people driving, hence the "almost"). In videogames it could be something like Gone Home, or for a more obscure example, The Graveyard, which made a few waves when it was released... for being "boring" and "a non-game", according to most people who became enticed by its free version way back when.

There's a division on genre as well, as you note, but the issue on audiences and demographics is still there; even if exceptions exist, it's a numbers game and most fans of BBC Sherlock won't be interchangeable with fans for a new Nancy Drew book, even if both theoretically belong to the same Mystery genre.

When I was 7 or 8 we still had a black and white tv that only ever aired a couple of kids' shows (and one of them was the Sandmännchen ) ;)
Thinking about this now, though - from the few shows I did watch way back then, I actually do remember quite a lot of the plot and characters, whereas I couldn't tell you which Ninja Turtle was "the smart one" if my life depended on it.
I do feel like kids media is a lot flashier (and kind of shittier) nowadays, although it's probably impossible to be any kind of objective regarding the topic.


Mhm, yeah, I see what you mean. I haven't heard of The Man From Earth or The Graveyard - maybe I'll check them out, if time allows ;) Having had some time to ponder, I came up with maybe Lost in Translation and About Schmidt (both rather depressing, though), that are kind of slow moving and probably mostly uninteresting to younger audiences (to a fair share of adults as well though, I assume).

Gone Home, which I have played, is mostly addressing the YA crowd, I'd say, although opinions may differ on that.

At any rate, I guess you're right in that there is both an age and genre divide, although there might be some overlap. I went to the cinema to see both Suicide Squad and Dr Strange (someone made me, I swear!), and I'm pretty sure I was the oldest member of the audience... It almost feels like a guilty pleasure at this point, which might be indicative of some sort of vicious circle... While I guess it is possible to address adult themes in superhero movies, it's certainly not how things are done (sticking by the "death and drama is YA stuff" definition), and overall they remain rather lightweight fare... Maybe that's why I don't mind franchises "growing up" - I just want to watch a superhero movie I can talk to other people about without using disclaimers ;)