I think there should be a rule in Hollywood: if Kurt Russell starred in the 1980s version of a film, don’t even think about rebooting or remaking it. This is especially vital if that film was directed by John Carpenter.

Yet, the idea of remakes, spinoffs, and sequels are currently being floated around for these three:

The Thing

Ironically, The Thing was an 80s remake of the 1951 classic The Thing From Another World partly written by Howard Hawks.John Carpenter’s practical effects gorefest, filled with disturbing visuals and intense scenes, made it a horror classic in itself. Much of it was due to the casting of actors like Keith David, Wilford Brimley and most importantly, Kurt Russell leading the pack as MacReady.

There was a “prequel” of the same name in 2011 with an entirely different cast, but it bombed horribly. It did so bad, you might not even know it existed.

Now there are current talks of Carpenter doing a new Thing project. Thankfully, we can breathe some fresh air that THIS monstrosity that his social media earlier this month was a really well done April Fool’s Day joke:

Can you imagine? That idea would have been uglier than the shapeshifting horror in the first film.

Actually happening is Carpenter and Blumhouse may be partnering on a new The Thing-adjacent film inspired by Frozen Hell (the novel both the 50s and 80s films drew from). Carpenter knows his horror, but I still don’t think this is needed.

Escape from New York

Carpenter’s and Russell’s 1981 venture created one of the coolest dystopian antiheroes of the 80s: Snake Plissken. Ex decorated veteran-cum-nihalistic criminal having to rescue a rando U.S. President of whom he couldn’t care less. There was one sequel from the mid-90s, Escape from L.A. It was what it was. Not as cool as the first, but still fun. I did have Russell reprising his role as Plissken, so that gave it merit.

There have already been other directors dancing around the Escape from New York reboot idea for some time, including Robert Rodriguez, Joel Silver and the filmmaking team Radio Silence, but those big dreams were never realized. Last week, indie company Studiocanal, announced during Cinemacon they are working on a reboot, and they own the rights to the original movie.

It’s bad enough the idea of a prison colony that is New York City seems a little too real today, but we don’t need anyone else…I mean anyone else…playing Snake Plissken.

Finally, there is one I really don’t want to see them mess with:

Big Trouble in Little China

The 1986 action comedy is everything great about the 80s film world It has campy humor, epic action and fight scenes, a supernatural mystic element, and the legendary James Hong. Russell is the only one who could fill the musclebound goofball Jack Burton’s iconic tank top….but the idea of a sequel has been out there since around 2015. It would potentially star Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson as new character, and at one point Carpenter might have remained somewhat involved. Russell said he might return as an older Burton if the script was good. So far, all this talk is frozen in time. The amount of time it has taken to bring this idea as been in production purgatory makes it unlikely anything good could come of it.

Leave it be, because it was hilariously groovy the way it is:

I don’t know for sure if any of these new productions will come to pass anytime soon, but the mainstream reboot world is tenacious and chronically lacking of self awareness. They haven’t figured out there isn’t a big audience anymore for remakes of films that represent a different generation.

Write new stories, or find untouched source material, but for the love of all that is holy, leave the Kurt Russell/John Carpenter films alone.