Dick Thomas Johnson from Tokyo, Japan · CC BY 2.0

Abrams built a career on rebooting things other people were afraid to touch: he relaunched Star Trek in 2009 and then, in 2015, directed The Force Awakens, the film that restarted the Star Wars franchise and became the sixth-highest-grossing movie of all time. On television he co-created Felicity, Alias, Lost, and Fringe, winning two Emmy Awards for directing and producing Lost. His films have grossed more than $4 billion combined, making him one of the ten highest-grossing directors in history.