[grumbel]

Those remakes are exactly why it shouldn't last much longer. As those remakes aren't actually about the work itself, but about the brand recognition that work has in the public consciousness. It's just free advertisement that you don't get with an original work, which is why remakes and sequels are so popular, even if the connection to the original is little more than the title.

It's not the job of copyright to allow people to get lazy or companies profiting forever from the rights they bought. The goal should be to encourage original works and current copyright isn't very good at doing so.

Also it's not like the author would go completely penniless here. Just because everybody can make a StarWars doesn't mean there won't still be a George Lucas approved canon-StarWars. Slapping the authors name on your product to declare it the "Read Thing™" might still be worth a bit and might frankly be better than today's sequels that happen completely without any of the original creators being involved.