Is originality as hard to come by as everybody says? Today, it seems as though originality is not as necessary, although increasingly more coveted. The film industry, the music industry, honestly — in every aspect of the arts — originality is sought after like never before.
The desire for originality is understandable. In a world congested with AI, song credit disputes, terrible movie sequels and even worse TV reboots, the lack of creativity is agonizingly felt. I cannot help but wonder why this is. We cannot have possibly exhausted every single great idea, right?
I have trouble believing the problem is with a lack of potential ideas, rather than with society’s production and consumption of media. As I thought this over, I came up with a few rules that I believe to fit relatively well into the world’s view of original media.
Rules of Originality
- We do not want the same thing over and over again.
- We do not want something new if it feels too similar to something prior.
- We do want something familiar, because it brings us a sense of nostalgia.
So, where is the line? What is the perfect balance of old and new?
Recently, I had the idea to go through a list of all the Disney movies released in the last decade. I expected to see a bit of a pattern, as Disney is a top offender in unoriginality (as much as I enjoy Disney movies, it is true). However, I was stunned at the sheer amount of sequels, live-actions and spin-offs. As I went down the list, even though I had not actually seen a good amount of the movies, I recognized almost all of the titles from earlier franchises or series. As I thought about it, my initial surprise plunged. Of course they are making these movies — these movies do well.
Audiences are more easily convinced to go and see a new movie if they have already connected with the characters or storyline. Inversely, an entirely new movie is always going to be a gamble — for the audience and the producers.
So, I ask: will the monetary benefits and safety of making sequels or remakes continue to rob us of original art?
Originality is not only dwindling in the film industry, but in the music industry as well. We look at originality a bit differently here, because music is deeply entwined with inspiration and influences of earlier artists. Artists are not purely original, but a combination of musicians before them. Still, the internet loves to engage with copyright disputes — or when a melody or lyric sounds too similar to another artist’s. For example, recently, American singer-songwriter Stella Lefty faced scrutiny when many of her songs seemed to be heavily influenced by other artists. Noah Kahan, for instance, was even added as a co-writer for her song, “Boston” after his team noticed the melodic similarities of their songs. For music lovers, there seems to be a fine line when it comes to inspiration versus theft.
How do we know where to draw that line?
This question of inspiration has been made all the more complicated with the rise of AI. As AI has improved and gotten even more uncanny, it has been incorporated into various aspects of media. AI is all over social media apps, occasionally is used as the replacement of CGI in filmmaking and is even used to produce songs. Now, it is hard to tell what is real, human-created media and what is artificially programmed to seem to be. If we cannot even tell what is real anymore, it gives little hope for actual, genuine creativity and originality.
As much as we increasingly strive for originality in today’s world, it seems that it is out of our grasp.
And, even though we crave new ideas, we also crave something else: the past. Nostalgia has always been obsessed over, but now more than ever. We desire things that remind us of past times, experiences or feelings. If we crave familiarity this deeply, is it fair to expect that the world will focus time and money into creating something novel to us?
It is okay to want both; to crave originality, while at the same time, be able to scratch that itch of nostalgia every now and then. We should be given a balance, not a deficit in one area or the other. We do not need pointless television revivals, unneeded sequels or stolen melodies. We need more options.
Being original has never been harder than in 2026. The many reasons for this difficulty aside, it is important to keep fighting for originality. We cannot allow media to rework itself into a printer, producing copy after copy. Art is sacred, beautiful and inspired by our ability to think in creative ways — ways that a machine should never replicate.