The Hilarious World of Failed Reboots

A Tour Through Failed Reboots

Diamondbolt delivers a sarcastic tour through failed reboots, arguing that studios keep reviving old franchises even when they seem to have run out of ideas. He jokes that remakes spend more money recreating something familiar, while reboots change things just enough to keep fans arguing online for decades. Revivals, meanwhile, pick up where the original left off—sometimes only to be cancelled on a cliffhanger.

Childhood Favorites and Reimagined Franchises

Diamondbolt looks back at franchises he grew up with, including Bionicle and Bakugan. Bionicle’s elaborate lore and annual waves of toys made its characters feel like old friends, but its later reboot struggled to win over longtime fans or younger kids. Bakugan’s newer incarnations fare no better in his telling: he compares one reboot’s Drago design to a questionable fan-art commission.

He also pokes fun at the odd experience of checking in on childhood favorites and finding them redesigned for a new generation.

Other examples include Sonic Boom, whose stretched-out character designs initially seemed ominous but eventually became part of a short-lived side project. Diamondbolt also looks at the wave of dark, gritty reboots that followed the success of early Batman films, skewering the trend of making familiar characters grim and violent—from Shadow the Hedgehog to increasingly monstrous Batman villains.

The 2016 Ghostbusters Reboot

The 2016 Ghostbusters reboot gets a particularly sharp segment. Diamondbolt mocks the backlash to its all-women cast, then argues that the movie’s problem wasn’t its casting but that its comedy simply didn’t land. A clip about a dog named “Mike Hat” serves as his example.

He notes that the next film effectively moved on from that reboot and returned to the earlier continuity.

War of the Worlds Starring Ice Cube

The video’s big finale is a roast of the recent ** War of the Worlds ** movie starring Ice Cube. Diamondbolt describes it as an alien invasion told through computer screens, with Ice Cube playing a government surveillance analyst who spends as much time nagging his family as responding to the crisis.

He mocks scenes where the character monitors his pregnant daughter’s eating habits, deletes his son’s Minecraft game, and gets distracted during an FBI raid. He also points out apparent continuity and editing gaffes, including the movie’s time jumping backward and Ice Cube filming himself with a phone visibly perched on another phone.

In Diamondbolt’s summary, the alien threat is defeated through an absurd sequence involving a computer virus on a USB drive, an Amazon drone, and a homeless man who’s offered a gift card—only to realize he needs an address to use it.

Closing Thoughts

The review closes on a more hopeful note. After years of gritty reboots and recycled ideas, Diamondbolt appreciates movies that don’t leave him feeling miserable. He ends by joking that he hopes Ice Cube turns up in whatever comes next.

Personalities and Characters Featured or Quoted

Diamondbolt (the narrator), Ice Cube, Melissa McCarthy, Chris Hemsworth, Kristen Wiig, Bill Murray, Cubot, Orbot, and Shadow the Hedgehog.