Justin Bruening                          Emile Hirsch                   Thomas Dekker
    the new Knight Rider                      Speed Racer              Terminator's John Connor

 Add 28-year old Justin Bruening to the list of young, hot and sexy actors who are being cast in upgraded remakes of familiar TV and movie franchises. Bruening has been cast as Michael Knight in a new NBC two-hour Knight Rider pilot based on the 1980s series starring David Hasselhoff. Bruening, who plays Jamie on ABC soap All My Children, will be playing the son of Hasselhoff's character.
 
 The original Knight Rider featured Hasselhoff as a crimefighter teamed up with a talking car (pre-Onstar obviously)and lasted for several seasons in the mid-80s, spawning TV-movies and a spinoff.  With the box-office success of Transformers this past summer producers hope to cash in on it with a similarly updated series. Also, since Bionic Woman's revival has gone pretty well we figure NBC thinks it has a new formua for success.

 Hollywood has been very busy lately reviving its old properties and injecting them with new blood to bring in the bucks. This isn't a new formula for success by any means (remember Young Indiana Jones? Hayden Christianson as a hot-headed studly Anakin Sywalker, pre Darth Vader in the Star Wars movies?) but it sure seems to be coming fast and furious lately.

  First there was the succcesful updating of Battlestar Galactica featuring a sexy cast of unkowns. Then it was regarded as innovative casting. Now the studios are going even younger!

 There's Shia LaBeouf who starred in that Transformers blockbuster and is in the upcoming Indiana Jones movie. He's not playing Indy's son but you can bet that he's being featured to get a new generation interested in the franchise.

 Then there's Emile Hirsch in the title role in next spring's Speed Racer. Hirsch, who starred in the critically acclaimed Into the Wild, will be playing opposite Lost's Matthew Fox as Racer X.  Interesting that the filmmakers are covering all their bets by putting in slightly older but established hotties  like Fox and Josh Duhamel (who co-starred in Transformers)

 There's also a new Terminator spinoff TV series in the works now with a younger android villain (Garret Dillahunt) and featuring Thomas Dekker as John Connor. You may remember Dekker as Claire's geeky (maybe gay) pal Zach
in season one of Heroes.

 And who can forget that the new Star Trek film will feature younger versions of Kirk, Spock, etc and featuring a who's who of young hottie talent like Chris Pine, Zachary Quinto, etc .

 Even failed revivals are getting new blood. There was a WB pilot of a revival of 60s gothic soap opera Dark Shadows that wasn't picked up as a series. But Johnny Depp comes to the rescue and decided HE wants to make it into a movie!

  So as long as there's a franchise or property sitting unused in a studio ot TV network's vault there's a new revival waiting to be born. Don't be surprised if you see more announced within the next year.