Reboots and Retroactive Continuity

Abstract

There are similarities between rebooting and retconing: historically, both originate from the medium of superhero comics; both are "makeover modalities"; and both revise pre-established "facts" about an imaginary world, but do so in different ways, to different degrees, and for different reasons. Given that there has been a broad and inexact use of these terms in popular and academic circles, it is necessary to historicize their origins and then move on from there, for, as Roberta Pearson rightly states, "those who cannot remember the past are condemned to misunderstand the present". This chapter takes each of the concepts in turn, beginning with the most misunderstood of these "strategies of regeneration" (Proctor, forthcoming), that of the reboot. The reboot process begins with the collapse of the imaginary system, followed by a program of recreation, of rebuilding.

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