Comic fans apparently love reruns

I was just looking at some of the comics out there right now, and was shocked at how much of today's comics are just retellings of the past.

Look at Marvel for instance:

- The Ultimate line is like a greatest hits or remix of things that have come before. The very same elements, characters, just given a sort of darker twist and the story drawn out a lot more than the original was.

Which doesn't really add much of anything new or inventive, but instead seems to be a place for fanfiction/writer'strange tangents to fit in. Sort of like telling what you watched on the hotel TV, if you vacationed in Hawaii.

- The Marvel Age line, which are retellings of the "classic" stories, with a lighter mood, designed to get younger readers to hopefully pay attention.

- Then there is talk of bringing back the "What If?" series, which is also just repackedged stories.

Add in many of the regular Marvel U. books, and you have three or more entire lines telling the SAME STORIES. With readers seemingly lapping it up, and asking for more.

I know these characters have been around for ages, and that there is very little new things to do with them. Yet realizing just how much of today's material is so similar just has me scratching my head wondering how it came to be this way.

I know some people like superhero comics, because they want to be reminded of their childhood. Yet I begin to wonder if it wouldn't be cheaper and easier for them to just reread their back issues instead.