If you were born in the mid to late 1970s and were a kid in the 1980s and 1990s, you may feel like having a constant deja vu when taking a look at a good part of today's available entertainment offering. Netflix's "Stranger Things" triggered a wave of TV series set in the 1980s, some better, others worse.
There is a brand new Star Trek series on the air, with two spinoffs upcoming. Another famous TV series from our childhood, "Lost in Space", is also back on the air - the planet is different, the robot is alien... but Dr. Smith is still evil (even if she's a woman in the revived Netflix production).
And Disney is preparing to release a set of new and improved features: The Lion King and Aladdin are getting revived this year. Retro, it seems, comes in waves... and now it's time for another wave to sweep across popular culture.
Music
Metallica, one of the heavy metal bands that defined the 1980s and 1990s, is on tour again in 2019. A few years ago, Guns 'n' Roses reunited in 2015, then went on a two-year tour in their original format, with Axl Rose, Slash and Duff McKagan on the stage. All over Europe, the determinative acts of the 1980s as well as dance and Eurodance sensations from the 1990s are either back on the stage or are revived by tribute bands - think George Michael, Blondie, and David Bowie tribute bands, as well as dance, acts like Snap!, Corona, Magic Affair, and Fun Factory.
Plus, an entire genre was appropriated by a bunch of teenagers: K-pop, the genre that starts to gain a lot of following outside South Korea, is identical to what famous boy bands like the New Kids On The Block, Backstreet Boys, and Worlds Apart did more than two decades ago.
Video games
Some say that the 1990s were the third golden age of video games - the first one was the emergence of the arcades, the second was the invention of the gaming console, and the third was the time when some of the most memorable video game franchises and genres were born: shooters, point-and-click adventures, role-playing games, and their likes. The 1990s was a time when a myriad of great video games was born - and some of them are being revived as we speak.
The last few years have seen an entire series of Wolfenstein games hit the market - they were a unique combination of action and interactive storytelling. Other titles from the 1990s are also making a comeback: Homeworld, launched in 1999, has got a remastered version a few years ago, and System Shock, the archetype of the first-person cyberpunk role-playing genre, is being remade as we speak.
As humanity nears the moment of its greatest achievement so far - becoming a multi-planetary species - an ever-increasing number of people seem to find fascination with the past.
