• Fondots@lemmy.world
    8·
    1 month ago

    The big ones that really cross at least a few age brackets, have wide general recognition and probably aren’t going anywhere in the near future (I may take some liberties with what I consider to be a franchise) in no particular order-

    Star wars

    James Bond

    Lord of the rings

    Sherlock Holmes

    Batman

    Superman

    Spiderman

    Mission Impossible

    Mario

    Zelda

    Pokemon

    Indiana Jones

    Back to the Future

    The Karate Kid

    A Nightmare on Elm Street

    Friday the 13th

    Child’s Play

    It

    Rambo

    Rocky

    Jurassic Park

    The Matrix

    The Terminator

    Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles

    Transformers

    The Simpsons

    Barbie

    GI Joe

    He-Man/Masters of the universe

    Mickey Mouse

    Toy Story

    Looney Tunes

    King Kong

    Godzilla

    Planet of the Apes

    Mad Max

    The Muppets

    The Godfather

    Ghostbusters

    Alien

    Star Trek

    Robocop

    Frankenstein

    Dracula

    Tarzan

    Conan the Barbarian

    Jaws

    Harry Potter

    The Incredible Hulk

    The Dollars Trilogy

    Sesame Street

    The Hannibal Lecter series

    MASH

    I think in general, most people have at least heard of these properties, would probably recognize at least a few of the main characters, objects, logos, memes, quotes, the theme song, etc. they’ve probably made some reference to them, and could give at least a vague explanation about what they’re about or what the major themes are whether or not they’ve actually seen/read the source material

    In general, I’m kind of counting a franchise as something that has had at least 3 major installments, iterations, episodes, series, remakes, reboots, etc. so a stand alone book, movie, etc. wouldn’t count, nor would a book or movie and a sequel, a book and a movie adaptation, etc. A book, a movie adaptation, and a reboot movie would, a film trilogy would,a tv series would, a movie that’s been rebooted/remade a couple times would.

    Barbie feels like a weird one on this list to me, unlike GI Joe who’s had pretty big movies and cartoons and such that make it pretty hard to argue that it’s a franchise, most of Barbie’s notoriety comes from the dolls themselves and I’d be kind of hesitant to label a line of toys as a franchise instead of a brand, sure there’s been animated movies and video games and such, but none of them had really been particularly noteworthy. And I wouldn’t feel quite right labeling, for example, Lego as a franchise despite having had pretty considerable success with movies and video games and such. But the character of Barbie, branding, marketing, etc. kind of puts her in the same league as Mickey mouse and I just felt like she belonged on the list.

    Some of the classic characters - Frankenstein, Dracula, Sherlock Holmes, are arguably not really a franchise, there’s not necessarily one company or person who owns their likeness and is marketing them, but they loom large enough in the public consciousness that I think they deserve to be mentioned in this list as well

    I tried to keep this relatively universal, though I’m sure my biases as a cis straight white American millennial male showed through in places. There’s a lot of franchises that form pillars of pop culture for specific demographics but not necessarily in general, and I tried to stay away from them, but a few of them just felt significant enough to me to warrant inclusion, in particular I kind of question how much general appeal He-Man has, for example, but I feel like if you say “He-Man” everyone has a mental image of the character seared into their brain (personally, I’m not sure I’ve ever even seen a whole episode of He-Man or really engaged with any masters of the universe media in general, but there he is in my brain and I don’t really know how he got there)

    • paddirn@lemmy.worldEnglish
      1·
      1 month ago

      As a 40+ year old white American, I agree with most of this list (I’d reduce “Hannibal Lecter series” down to just “Silence of the Lambs”), but if I were to ask my 6–12 year old kids about these, I feel like they wouldn’t know who 1/3rd of these are. I’d be curious to see if there was a common thread or set of threads between all of these that point to what traits our Western society value/avoid or what makes a successful franchise in the West.

      • Fondots@lemmy.world
        1·
        1 month ago

        They probably haven’t seen a lot of them and may not recognize the names off the top of their head, but I have a hunch that if/when they do see them, damn each and every one is going to give them a couple little aha moments where they recognize that something else they’ve seen has parodied or referenced these movies, or that it’s where a meme comes from.

        And I’d agree that Silence of the Lambs is probably the most important of the series by a longshot, but one book and a movie adaptation does not a franchise make in my mind and I think that Hannibal Lecter is a big enough character in the public mind (because the Silence of the Lambs movie) that the series as a whole kind of gets a pass

    • Blue_Morpho@lemmy.world
      12·
      1 month ago

      Thrones is fading fast. It will be gone in ten years. Unlike Lord of the Rings, there’s no new generation watching it.

  • DandomRude@lemmy.worldEnglish
    2·
    1 month ago

    Alien because of HR Giger’s iconic art style, among other things. Also Frank Herbert’s Dune, the first planned film adaptation of which Giger also worked on (sometimes considered as the best movie that was never made). In addition to the cultural influence that the book series already had, Dune also more or less spawned the real-time strategy computer game genre (with Westwood Studios’ Dune II).

  • Mothra@mander.xyz
    2·
    1 month ago

    The Simpsons

    Star Wars

    LOTR

    MCU / DC (both franchises are huge and span decades)

    Barbie ( girls have been playing with these dolls and following their trends for generations)

    Disney Classics (not sure if this counts as a franchise?)

    I can think of at least ten more franchises that are solid and influential but that either need a couple more decades or a bigger following to match the aforementioned ones

  • eightpix@lemmy.world
    1·
    1 month ago

    This is an impossible question to answer. But, I’ll give it a shot anyway. I’ve expanded the meaning of “franchise” to include “all properties sublicensable for the purposes of profiteering.”

    If “popular culture” refers to the recognizable and persistent elements of living in society that the majority people share in common without having to communicate that recognition, I’d regard the following franchises as having broad impact worldwide:

    • McDonalds/Subway and all attendant advertising as a signpost for food. Franchises abound.

    • Esso/Shell/BP as gateways to modern conveniences and transportation. Every gas station, residence, farm house, hen house, outhouse, and dog house is connected to these franchises in some way.

    • G4S/Securitas/Garda as the front line protecting the ‘haves’ from the ‘have-nots’. Franchises abound.

    • Most athletic, luxury vehicle, and brands as the status symbols they want themselves to be. Franchisees promote the brands as a means of collecting clients.

    If, on the other hand, “popular culture” is, ‘traditions and material culture of a particular society. In the modern West, pop culture refers to cultural products such as music, art, literature, fashion, dance, film, cyberculture, television, and radio that are consumed by the majority of a society’s population. … types of media that have mass accessibility and appeal’ (ThoughtCo.) then the following are some fairly strong indicators of popular culture:

    • Hello Kitty (be pleasant)

    • Pokémon (pursue goals)

    • Superman/Batman (masculinity, vigilantism)

    • Paw Patrol (institutions are essential)

    • the Olympics (do athletics)

    • Michael Jordan (be excellent)

    • Mickey Mouse (dream big)

    • Star Wars/The Bible (G vs. E)

    The ones I wish would take hold and have more of an influence:

    • X-men (biodiversity is good)

    • the Expanse

    • Battlestar Galactica (genocide, rebellion, impersonation, terrorism, coups d’état, civil war, infidelity, succession, military conflict, asymmetrical warfare, treason, mutiny, pirate broadcasts, nuclear warfare… and that’s just the first half of the series)

    • Tony’s Chocolonely (ethical economics)