As anyone who watches Furious 7 will notice, it pivots on competition between the old and the new—between a predator drone and a ’60s muscle car, between an omniscient surveillance chip and urban street savvy. The film, which can be seen as a sentimental tribute to Paul Walker, is poignant also in its juxtaposition of new and old questions about what audiences expect from film stars.

Whose body and whose face is it there on the screen? Who holds the rights to these images, to these performances? Tom Cruise was recorded performing in a motion capture suit for the movie Oblivion (2013), but after it opened in theaters, Cruise acquired the rights to all data recorded during his performance. It’s unknown whether he did this to enable future use or to prevent future use, but less-established actors might not have as much clout in this kind of decision.

And then there is the question of what will prove acceptable to the fan base of an actor (and of a movie franchise). To what extent are the re-animators of Paul Walker bound by public perception of the actor? And to what extent are they constrained by available technology? Will other filmmakers resort to casting from the beyond, and how will audiences react?