Is Prime Video’s Biggest Thriller Quietly Remaking Two Iconic ’90s Morgan Freeman Classics?

Prime Video keeps turning big airport novels into bigger streaming shows. Reacher cracked the formula in 2022, Scarpetta is queued up for 2026, and now Cross has jumped into the mix. Which raises a spicy question: should Cross circle back and redo Morgan Freeman's old Alex Cross movies? On paper, probably not. In practice, there is a real case for it. Quick refresher: what Cross is doing now Cross is Prime Video's take on James Patterson's bestselling series, with Aldis Hodge as the titular forensic psychologist and detective in Washington, DC. His Cross is brilliant, volatile, and even more combustible after his wife's murder. The guy is constantly boxed in by dirty cops on one side and big-brain villains on the other, so trust is basically off the table. The show runs one high-stakes case per season. Hodge is not the first or even the second actor to play Alex Cross. Morgan Freeman originated the role on the big screen in the 90s and early 2000s with Kiss the Girls (1997) and Along Came a Spider ( 2001). The Freeman films: fun, flawed, and very 90s Freeman's Cross was less brawler, more razor blade. Kiss the Girls adapted the second Alex Cross novel and played as a tight, twisty serial killer thriller. Then came the weird bit: Along Came a Spider arrived four years later but was actually based on the first book in the series. Mixed reviews both times, but they settled into that culty, guilty-pleasure corner of 90s thrillers — the same shelf as Copycat, The Bone Collector, Fallen, and yes, Freeman's own Se7en. Why the show probably won't touch them Reacher set the precedent here. The series did not retread the same books that got turned into unrelated Tom Cruise movies. Cross has dozens of untouched Patterson novels to choose from, so there is zero practical need to remake Kiss the Girls or Along Came a Spider just to prove a point. And yet... it might be a smart move anyway Hear me out. The 90s serial-killer wave heavily shaped those films. They were built to fit a trend. A modern redo could zig where the movies zagged and actually lean into Patterson's books. Plus, Hodge plays Cross with a different energy than Freeman — less reserved, more raw — which changes the temperature of these stories in a good way. Those films were tuned for 90s box office tastes; a series can deliver a more faithful, less horror- leaning version of the books. Hodge's Cross is looser and more emotionally combustible than Freeman's more detached take, which could give familiar cases fresh bite. Neither Kiss the Girls nor Along Came a Spider is sacred text; both are solid watches but hardly untouchable. Time helps: Freeman's Cross movies hit theaters 25 and 29 years ago, which is more than enough runway for a fresh adaptation. The season-per-case structure makes it easy to slot these stories in without derailing the larger plan. Where this leaves Cross The safe bet is the show keeps mining the many Alex Cross novels the movies never touched. But if the writers feel like swinging big, revisiting Kiss the Girls or Along Came a Spider is not some sacrilege. It is an opportunity — to correct for 90s trend-chasing, to play closer to Patterson, and to let Hodge's version of the character put his own stamp on two of the most recognizable Cross cases.

Is Prime Video’s Biggest Thriller Quietly Remaking Two Iconic ’90s Morgan Freeman Classics?

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