Summer is just around the corner, and with it comes summer blockbusters! This year’s lineup is packed with familiar IPs as franchises once again fill the calendar with sequels, spinoffs, and long-awaited returns. In the next few weeks alone, Toy Story 5 and The Mandalorian and Grogu are set to hit theaters, continuing two of the biggest entertainment franchises of the last few decades. (And are definitely hoping to benefit from the theater-going boom.) But with these franchises now on their fifth, tenth, or even twentieth installment, do they still have Gen Z fans they can count on to show up? Conversations around “franchise fatigue” have only gotten louder recently. Many say young audiences are frustrated by endless reboots, live-action remakes, and sequels that can feel more focused on just delivering familiar IP than telling a genuinely fresh story. There’s also a growing sense that some franchises rely too heavily on “nostalgia bait,” turning some young people off from the franchise entirely. But this isn’t always the case. In...
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