19 movie actors who reprised roles decades later

Movie break: 13 years (1987-2010)

Does anyone want to see Wall Street's "greed is good" advocate Gordon Gekko be redeemed as a human being? Nope? Us neither. Oliver Stone had the opportunity to make a statement about the banking crisis with Money Never Sleeps but couldn't make it pay off. Charlie Sheen was also in both films, but his role in the sequel was a cameo only.

Movie break: 15 years (1981-1996)

Escape from New York's anti-hero Snake Plissken would have got his own franchise if he'd been brought to the screen in the '90s. Instead, we had to wait until Escape from LA in 1996 to see him return and by then he was lost in a crowd of action stars. 

Movie break: 16 years (1974-1990)

Having appeared in two of the greatest films ever made in the opening instalments of The Godfather, it's unlikely there would have been a third film in the series without Pacino. Most fans would have preferred him to have passed up the role and scuppered the disappointing final entry to the series, tbh. 

Movie break: 16 years (1974-1990)

Noir thriller Chinatown is a stone-cold, 100 per cent classic. Fans were hyped when they heard the characters would be revisited in The Two Jakes but the resulting sequel (which Nicholson directed) was a shadow of the original film. Shame, as he delivered two of his most iconic roles either side of this let down, in 1989's Batman and 1992's A Few Good Men. 

Movie break: 18 years (1991-2009)

There aren't many original Star Trek actors who could appear in JJ Abrams' rebooted movie series but future Spock – or Spock Prime as he's officially known in the Kelvin timeline – did successfully cross over. Not bad for a character who was last seen in Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country alongside his ageing TOS cast mates. 

Movie break: 19 years (1989-2008)

In order for there to be an Indiana Jones movie there has to be full agreement on the project between Harrison Ford, George Lucas and Steven Spielberg. No wonder it took so long to move from The Last Crusade to Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, and why the fifth film is now expected to miss its 2020 release date. 

Movie break: 20 years (1996-2016)

You knew those pesky aliens would be back, right? We may have kicked them off our planet in Independence Day but battle resumed two decades later in Resurgence. With Will Smith not on board, Goldblum and Pullman were the returning A-listers, although Brent Spiner, Judd Hirsch and numerous others also reprised their roles. 

Movie break: 20 years (1994-2014)

If you thought Harry and Lloyd couldn't get any stupider, you were hugely mistaken! Sadly, their Dumb & Dumber shenanigans hadn't aged well and this follow-up was roundly condemned by critics and audiences alike. 

Movie break: 20 years (1988-2008)

Not content with the 16-year wait for more boxing action with Rocky, Stallone had more characters in his locker to reboot. Rambo III seemed to epitomise the over-the-top '80s actioner and was lambasted by the media for its violence. Who knows how those critics would have reacted if they'd known the character would star in an über-brutal sequel – Rambo – two decades later? 

Movie break: 21 years (1986-2007)

Cullen got to continue with his version of Optimus Prime in the TV cartoon for a few more years following Transformers: The Movie but had to wait more than two decades to bring the leader of the Autobots back to the big screen in Michael Bay's Transformers. Voicing Eeyore from Winnie the Pooh kept him busy in the meantime. 

Movie break: 23 years (1960-1983)

Psycho 2 may never hit the heights of the Hitchcock original, but it was a more thoughtful film in a period that saw numerous slashers hit the cinema. That was largely down to another brilliant turn by Perkins. 

Movie break: 28 years (1982-2010)

Ahead of its time in terms of movie technology, the digital world of Tron was finally brought back to life almost three decades later with Tron: Legacy. That gave Bridges the chance to play both creator Flynn and evil alter ego Clu for a second time, undergoing some computerised cosmetic surgery along the way.