Hollywood’s Next Hit Strategy Isn’t More Sequels, It’s Smarter Nostalgia
Picture this: elevated fashion wowing onlookers with immediate trend-setting appeal. A who’s who collection of star-power shining so brightly that someone should warn NASA. No, I’m not talking about the recent Academy Awards. I’m talking about May’s The Devil Wears Prada 2. The highly-anticipated legacy sequel, which is already tracking like a surefire hit, arrives 20 years after the original. But what’s even more impressive than the attractive ensembles adorning its original cast is how the film serves as a microcosm for an important trend.
Franchise fatigue is a real threat in Hollywood, but often misdiagnosed. The Devil Wears Prada 2 exists because there is still enduring demand for the original despite two decades without any continuations. Meanwhile, a meaningful portion of audiences say they’re no more likely to watch new entries from long-running active franchises like Marvel (36 percent), Game of Thrones (49 percent), The Walking Dead (54 percent), according to Hub Entertainment Research. The audience issue isn’t with general franchises. It’s with franchises they consider to be oversaturated and creatively exhausted. (With all due respect to the absolutely fantastic A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms and Wonder Man).
In a market that’s been far too concentrated on the same small handful of franchises for years, The Devil Wears Prada 2 feels like a breath of fresh nostalgic air rather than bloated overexposure.
I asked Parrot Analytics to compare the most in-demand film/TV concepts that haven’t released a new installment in at least 10 years to the top active franchises. The gap between the former (20 times more in-demand than the average title) and the latter (24.6x) was much smaller than expected, suggesting inactive IP can rival in-the-moment franchises.
Standout examples included LOST (the 34th most in-demand TV series globally), Interstellar (4th among films), The Truman Show (20th) and Inception (24th). The TV side of the equation was dominated by genre storytelling (LOST, Hannibal, Person of Interest, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Stargate)—exactly what fatigued episodic franchises used to deliver well. (It’s worth noting that a recent Buffy revival was scrapped by Hulu). On the film side, the aforementioned high-concept and sci-fi titles mixed with historical epics (Troy) and war stories (Black Hawk Down) are among the leaders.
It’s not as if Christopher Nolan is returning for sequels anytime soon. But studios can build out these worlds with creatively justifiable continuations. Many of these titles have remained in the cultural consciousness not just through sheer quality, but optimal placement in a crowded media warzone.
Studios are underestimating the sizable fanbases for older one-off films and/or legacy TV series. Chatter surrounding a potential LOST continuation has soldiered on for years without any tangible movement, while false rumours lit Film Twitter ablaze in 2020, suggesting Tenet was set in the world of Inception. Why is that?
There are roughly 42 million U.S. consumers aged 35-plus who are nostalgic moviegoers of older titles and are likely to attend opening weekend, per Greenlight. Older millennials and younger Gen Xers are premium demographics with disposable income. But they’re mostly targeted via family entertainment that studios hope they’ll take their children to. Yes, adult-skewing dramas have become volatile box office bets. But that’s partly because Hollywood is aiming in the wrong direction.
Hollywood has eaten itself alive spending the last 15 years squeezing every last drop out of notable franchises. Meanwhile, social platforms such as TikTok and YouTube have served as crucial discovery and reactivation tools for concepts that haven’t been over-exposed. There are nearly 114 million adult sci-fi moviegoers in the U.S., and many of them are heavy users of YouTube, per Greenlight, where fan culture is organically sustaining demand and engagement for titles like Interstellar. A viral TikTok/YouTube video, a news hook, a celebrity mention, a platform push—all of these elements can drive renewed surges.
Streaming data tells what audiences want
As the market-leader, Netflix is the default streamer. Its viewership serves as an important behavioral signal and not just empty nostalgia. Licensed titles are constantly rotating on and off the platform at varying intervals due to differing contractual agreements, but the streamer’s bi-annual engagement reports speak volumes about viewer appetites.
Between 2023 and 2025, the first three seasons of LOST accumulated nearly 800 million global viewership hours (hat tip to What’s on Netflix). Interstellar (101 million hours) and The Truman Show (31 million hours) showed strong completion rates (total hours viewed divided by total runtime). That speaks to how immersive these stories remain years later.
Every Netflix view becomes a potential fan for a future installment. Around 65 percent of people rarely (or never) watch a sequel without seeing the original, according to Greenlight Analytics, where I work as Director of Insights & Content Strategy. Streaming is quietly building legions of new fans for dormant IP while owners collect lucrative licensing revenue. It’s a win-win.
Troy’s demand peaked at 58 percent above its own already-elevated average in the past year, followed by The Truman Show (46 percent), per Parrot. Other prime candidates for dormant IP continuation include Scrubs and Malcolm in the Middle (both of which have received revivals), as well as Scarface (a film reboot in the works) and V for Vendetta (an HBO adaptation in development).
These types of titles are waiting to re-explode when re-activated by the right digital switch. Hollywood has more than enough IP to choose from, but lacks the compass to navigate it effectively. Studios chasing the sixth sequel of a tired series are fighting over shrinking slices of diminishing returns. The people who want a mix of classic and new, the audiences who only watch sequels to films they’ve seen, and the 800 million global hours of viewership dedicated to LOST seem to tell a consistent story.