Comebacks

I wrote this piece a little while ago. I think the reason I didn't post it yet is, I didn't quite finish it. Now I can't remember why I thought more needed to be added before throwing it out online, or what I wanted to add. It doesn't matter, here it is anyway.



Comebacks
The last few evenings I’ve been indulging in reducing into a 13-year old gibbering version of myself. For the 3rd time (I think) in 2 years I’m revisiting the ol’ good days of Take That. Well, I’m looking back, not really staring. For some reason I started to watch Gary Barlow/Robbie Williams interviews from the period when their Brokeback Mountain-ish ‘Shame’ was just released. What struck me was how genuine they seemed to be about the sticky period in which supposedly Gary and Robbie were at war with each other. Then I remembered having bought the documentary ‘Look back, Don’t Stare’ and being rather impressed by it, so I stuck it back into my computer DVD-drive and watched it again. I enjoyed just as much and maybe even more rewinding bits and pieces to rewatch one frame at a time. And eventually, I watched one of their concerts of their Progress tour and I was back in. Especially the whole dance routine during Pray warms my heart, because I’m quite sure it’s the exact same dance routine they used to do back in the days.

But this is not what this blog is about. This blog is supposed to be about comebacks. And I will talk about comebacks.

We entered a period in entertainment time were comebacks are the rule rather than the exception. Popular characters return to their proper TV-home in series (Doctor Who). Films get remade, series get remade, etc. It almost sounds as if we reached the limit of our imaginations so we start treading old and familiar grounds.

The problems with reunions and revivals are, they tend to be less successful than the original run. Only very few manage to become equally or even more successful than in the first attempt. Doctor Who did, obviously, and Take That. Incidentally two of my loves. Or is it that incidentally?

What ingredients do you need to make a comeback successful?

The Start
I believe it starts at the start. With that I mean, the concept has to be absolutely right in the first place. Also the quality has to be up to par during the first run. Defining what makes a successful concept can be tricky. Fans, media and specialists have been discussing why Doctor Who works for decades. Still there is no definitive answer. Why did Take That work in the first place? I’m not completely up-to-date in this discussion, but I believe opinions differ on this subject as well. Not a discussion to have within the discussions of comebacks.

A faithful and sentimental fanbase helps a lot too.

the Comeback
Playing on sentiments is a good start, but you have to keep in mind that not only for you time elapsed, so it did for your fans. They’re not the young people they used to be; they’ve grown and developed themselves. Next to that, they’re not the only people on the world, in fact, they very probably only make up a minority of your potential audience. You have to think of how to pull in new fans.

Quality & Credibility
Credibility is closely related to quality. Credibility is, for a great deal, created by the quality of the work. Not only the quality of the work is important for credibility, but also the own input, sincerity, originality and noticeable development.

Heart
Something that is important in every kind of art is with how much heart the art is created. People often recognize when an artist put a lot of love in his work. When the heart shines through people easily warm to it and are more likely to appreciate the work.