I get what you're trying to say, but you're missing what I'm saying. I know they're doing AI of familiar actors because it will appeal to the people where he is Thing They Know. I'm saying that they can establish Thing They Know going forward with something cheaper, that they have complete control over, will never age, owe nothing to the unions, and it won't embarrass itself on social media.

But you've got a fair point. Dead actors are also free of those constraints and still familiar.

The thing I'm missing about what you're saying is what your over-arching argument or overall point is.

It appears to be something along the lines of "this would be easier/cheaper to do with something that never was a living actor."

To which my recurring rejoinder is "Okay," for a reason. Because it's money lying on the table. They can do it your way, but it's also lucrative to do it with dead actors. Maybe there are ways in which your schema brings benefits. But doing it the other way does too--which is why they're doing it.

I'll admit to being halfway lost here, as I really don't understand your argumentative thrust. Your initial post said "Why," and I answered plausibly "because x etc."

That there are other ways of doing things in the world is really neither here nor there. Sure, they could do anything else. But instead they're doing this, for reasons I hazarded. They're decided to puppeteer the corpse of Val Kilmer. They could've...rented a billboard, and put original IP or a completely new, completely invented character on it. But they didn't. It's not necessary to explain why not. This was about why.