The remake of '80s fight fest "Poltergeist" hits theaters this Friday: Can it match the original? Seems doubtful, since horror remakes so seldom deliver.

Occasionally, a remake raises the bar and becomes an entirely new film: Case in point, John Carpenter's now-classic shape-shifting alien thriller "The Thing" (1982), a gorier and more psychological remake of the Howard Hawks film "The Thing From Another World" (1951). But revisiting a classic is usually just a waste of time. Even if the remake is halfway watchable, wouldn't you rather just see the original again?

Here are some of the most unnecessary horror remakes of all time. (We're not including the 2011 version of "The Thing" since, even though it's pretty pointless, it was a prequel, not a remake.)