Sequels you dislike compared to the origi

[formulanone]

The sequels being worse than the original is the rule.  We could have a much shorter thread writing about sequels that are better than the original. 

Hmm, I think Odyssey is a more interesting epic than the Iliad.

Breakin' 2: Electric Boogaloo

I'm struggling to think of many sequels that were better, or even as good as the initial one.

There's a good argument that Godfather II and The Empire Strikes Back were better movies than the originals, but the originals weren't trash. The initial success probably gave them the greater financial backing and bravado to create the productions they wanted with fewer restrictions. Pretty much each of the movies in the Lord of the Rings series is on equal footing, though I've not seen them all more than twice.

There are a small number of sequels that I think are actually better than the original:

X-Men 2: X-Men United was better than X-Men, for me.  X-Men 3 is best forgotten about, though.

Ok, there's another one. (I forget if I actually saw the third one.)

[hotdogPi]

Any video game examples? (I play specific games, not a wide variety, so I have no examples of my own.)

[wanderer2575]

The sequels being worse than the original is the rule.  We could have a much shorter thread writing about sequels that are better than the original. 

The overall opinion of Star Trek: The Motion Picture has grown more favorable over the years.  Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan still blows it away.  TWOK is probably the best of all the franchise's films, period.

[Max Rockatansky]

All the original The Fly sequels were a big drop from the original.  The 80s The Fly remake had a decent sequel in The Fly II but it's a huge leap down from the original.  I can't say I dislike it but it's probably only because of the top notch gore. 

Iron Man 2 and Iron Man 3 were pretty bad compared to the original. 

Super Man 3 and 4 were some of the worst all time super hero movies.  Batman Forever and Batman & Robin are also very trashy. 

Mortal Kombat Annihilation is one of the worst movies ever made whereas as the original was passable. 

Spider Man 3 is another that movie that I can't stand.  People complain about Venom but they miss the real villain in Mary Jane Watson. 

Also, I did expect to see someone else say that they liked Halloween 3.  Totally underrated movie and not afraid to go after anyone. 

[kphoger]

As a general rule, I don't watch anything that's billed as a "reboot".  Just give me the original, or at least a "remake".

[OCGuy81]

Any video game examples? (I play specific games, not a wide variety, so I have no examples of my own.)

Super Mario Bros 2, Zelda 2: The Adventure of Link.

Neither were bad games, but not as good as their predecessors. Both franchises, however, had amazing 3rd titles in the series.

[Max Rockatansky]

Any video game examples? (I play specific games, not a wide variety, so I have no examples of my own.)

Super Mario Bros 2, Zelda 2: The Adventure of Link.

Neither were bad games, but not as good as their predecessors. Both franchises, however, had amazing 3rd titles in the series.

Amusingly I absolutely love Zelda 2.  I got so good at it once that I was able to beat it without using a continue.  That game is over the top absurdly difficult though. 

[vdeane]

Yep! The first Abrams Star Trek, IMO, was a huge middle finger to long term fans.

"Let's take the history all you Trek fans know, and chuck it out the window ASAP. Also, let's make the bridge of the Enterprise look like an Apple store and ensure nobody in the Federation is over 30!"

And then Into Darkness was even worse, with them developing an interesting plot, only to chuck it out the window in favor of re-doing Khan.  To make matters worse, the producers spent months outright lying to everyone regarding Khan because they didn't like that the fans figured out what they were going to do.  And it still felt like college students in space, even though they should have been more experienced than in 2009.

Any video game examples? (I play specific games, not a wide variety, so I have no examples of my own.)

Life is Strange.  The prequel Before the Storm is controversial, and Life is Strange 2 (with completely different characters) has some fans but was overall a let-down - nothing has really taken off as much as the original.

Also the SimCity series - people loved SimCity 4, but SimCity: Societies and SimCity 2013 both failed to take off.  And then EA basically killed it off.

[triplemultiplex]

As a general rule, any sequel that wasn't part of a designed trilogy (or similar) is trash compared to the original.  There are exceptions like Wrath of Khan or Terminator 2, but the vast majority of the time, the sequel will suck.

The reason is simple; sequels are blatant cash grabs by studios trying to bleed an idea dry.  They're rehashing the same story as the original, or using lamer bad guys.  Or worst of all, they undo the ending of the original so they can have the same character do the same things again.  Comedy sequels are big offenders of this.
"We want Austin Powers to creep on women again in this one, so let's get rid of the chick he married in the first one.  Because being a horny sleaze ball is funny, but not if he's cheating on his wife." -big studio

Some franchises manage to find a little mojo with a third movie that was lost in a second movie.  Usually by pairing the hero with another strong character.  Like Indiana Jones.  Last Crusade was way better than Temple of Doom because of Sean Connery.  Or Die Hard.  First movie: great; all time classic.  Second movie: meh; too much the result of thinking "how about Die Hard, but in an airport?"  Then the third one comes along and pairs John McClain with Samuel L. Jackson and its a much better movie.  Not as good as the first one, of course, but very watchable.

The worst thing is the nostalgia sequels.  It's been 10+ years since the original and someone gets it in their head that we need to check in on Harry and Lloyd or Bill and Ted and that is always going to suck.  Let's pull John McClain out of retirement and stick him in a fighter jet with that kid who did those Apple commercials and convince ourselves it won't suck.

[TheHighwayMan3561]

My major criticism of Star Wars 7-9 was that it was just a basic poor man's retelling of 4-6 with different characters. I didn't even care that they stunk because I'd seen these movies before. It begins with a young, ignorant person trapped on a desert planet, has them getting trained in the middle movie by a mentor who wants to show them what an ignorant dumbass they really are while their friends get beaten up by the bad guys, and then ends with Lando Calrissian leading a hopeless assault on an impenetrable base in the Millennium Falcon. And that's just a very basic summary; I could type an entire list detailing every story crossover.

[kkt]

Pretty much each of the movies in the Lord of the Rings series is on equal footing, though I've not seen them all more than twice.

The Two Towers and Return of the King weren't really sequels, though.  LOTR was one film in three parts, written as one, financed as one, three film commitment from the actors and creative staff...

[Max Rockatansky]

Pretty much each of the movies in the Lord of the Rings series is on equal footing, though I've not seen them all more than twice.

The Two Towers and Return of the King weren't really sequels, though.  LOTR was one film in three parts, written as one, financed as one, three film commitment from the actors and creative staff...

Even still, the strongest of the three IMO is The Fellowship of the Ring.  My preference slides down hill in the two progressing movies.  To be fair, that isn't an insinuation that the movies were bad...the Hobbit movies on the other hand were.  The Hobbit should have been a single movie and felt obviously stretched out as a money grab. 

[texaskdog]

The sequels being worse than the original is the rule.  We could have a much shorter thread writing about sequels that are better than the original. 

Hmm, I the Odyssey is a more interesting epic than the Iliad.

Lethal Weapon was with good sequels and II was better than the original.

didn't like I, loved 2-4

[Max Rockatansky]

The sequels being worse than the original is the rule.  We could have a much shorter thread writing about sequels that are better than the original. 

Hmm, I the Odyssey is a more interesting epic than the Iliad.

Lethal Weapon was with good sequels and II was better than the original.

didn't like I, loved 2-4

I liked 2 and 3 but 4 is a little weak IMO, not terrible though.  I kind of find myself surprised when I watch the Lethal Weapon movies nowadays how good they were.

[texaskdog]

My major criticism of Star Wars 7-9 was that it was just a basic poor man's retelling of 4-6 with different characters. I didn't even care that they stunk because I'd seen these movies before. It begins with a young, ignorant person trapped on a desert planet, has them getting trained in the middle movie by a mentor who wants to show them what an ignorant dumbass they really are while their friends get beaten up by the bad guys, and then ends with Lando Calrissian leading a hopeless assault on an impenetrable base in the Millennium Falcon. And that's just a very basic summary; I could type an entire list detailing every story crossover.

I don't know why Star Wars gets away with that.  Jedi had to copy the same ending as the original.  Can't ever write some original scripts.

[US 89]

Pretty much each of the movies in the Lord of the Rings series is on equal footing, though I've not seen them all more than twice.

The Two Towers and Return of the King weren't really sequels, though.  LOTR was one film in three parts, written as one, financed as one, three film commitment from the actors and creative staff...

Even still, the strongest of the three IMO is The Fellowship of the Ring.  My preference slides down hill in the two progressing movies.  To be fair, that isn't an insinuation that the movies were bad...the Hobbit movies on the other hand were.  The Hobbit should have been a single movie and felt obviously stretched out as a money grab.

Agreed. If you look at the lengths of the original books, the Hobbit is more or less the same length as one Lord of the Rings volume. Since there are three of those, and one movie for each one, shouldn't there have been one Hobbit movie?

Apparently not. The problem is when you stretch a story out like that, you have to come up with a whole lot of plot for the movie that didn't exist in the book - one of the worst things you can do in my opinion. I get that in some cases you have to change up the plot a bit due to time/length constraints, but this should never be done in a way that completely changes the story. The second and third Hobbit movies wound up being okay but the first one was so bad it's almost unwatchable.

[kkt]

My major criticism of Star Wars 7-9 was that it was just a basic poor man's retelling of 4-6 with different characters. I didn't even care that they stunk because I'd seen these movies before. It begins with a young, ignorant person trapped on a desert planet, has them getting trained in the middle movie by a mentor who wants to show them what an ignorant dumbass they really are while their friends get beaten up by the bad guys, and then ends with Lando Calrissian leading a hopeless assault on an impenetrable base in the Millennium Falcon. And that's just a very basic summary; I could type an entire list detailing every story crossover.

I don't know why Star Wars gets away with that.  Jedi had to copy the same ending as the original.  Can't ever write some original scripts.

"Darn!  My zillion credit Death Star just got blown to smithereens by Rebels in cheap snub fighters!  What to do.  I know!  I'll build a NEW Death Star with the same plans and the same vulnerabilities!  And this time, nothing can go wrong!"

[oscar]

The original Death Wish series went downhill after the first one. When I watched Death Wish V, I thought "please, put this series out of its misery". I got my wish on that one, though the Death Wish franchise was later revived -- I didn't see any of those.

The original Star Trek movies, the even-numbered ones were better than the odds, with V particularly awful. But II was a classic, while the first one I found forgettable. III was also pretty good.

[TheHighwayMan3561]

The only non-Abrams Trek movie I really have no feeling toward is Nemesis. It seemed the franchise could never win; either the movie was criticized for being too un-Trek like, or especially with Generations and Insurrection that they were *too* much like a two-hour TV episode. The franchise just never really translated well to the big screen other than II.

I came to appreciate V a lot more over time for the fact it was the only one of the six movies that felt like the whole crew together having an adventure on the Enterprise. The rest of the films had the crew split up for large parts of the movie, and the one other movie they were all together (IV) had no Enterprise.

[Max Rockatansky]

The original Death Wish series went downhill after the first one. When I watched Death Wish V, I thought "please, put this series out of its misery". I got my wish on that one, though the Death Wish franchise was later revived -- I didn't see any of those.

The sequels were just excuses for Charles Bronson to kill lots of people on screen.  The way his daughter died in the second movie is so over the top that it is impossible to take those movies serious from that point after. 

[Scott5114]

The original Star Trek movies, the even-numbered ones were better than the odds, with V particularly awful. But II was a classic, while the first one I found forgettable. III was also pretty good.

Probably because the main thrust of Star Trek: The Motion Picture was "check out this sweet new Enterprise model we got". I swear, the scene where they were booting up the ship and pulling out of Spacedock took at least 20 minutes because of all of the establishing shots of the ship model. (To be fair, it was a cool-looking model.) I think they got enough footage from that, they didn't even need to shoot any exterior solo shots of the ship for the next two movies. (And then I think they got to reuse some of them for V and VI as long as they didn't show the registry number.)

Star Trek I, of course, inspired us to rename the original forum admin, Cody (username: voyager), to V'Ger when he was no longer welcome on the forum.

[roadman65]

The original Death Wish series went downhill after the first one. When I watched Death Wish V, I thought "please, put this series out of its misery". I got my wish on that one, though the Death Wish franchise was later revived -- I didn't see any of those.

The sequels were just excuses for Charles Bronson to kill lots of people on screen.  The way his daughter died in the second movie is so over the top that it is impossible to take those movies serious from that point after. 

They should get Christopher Meloni to have Elliot Stabler take over and do what Elliot on SVU would ideally like and kill all sex perverts.

[TheHighwayMan3561]

The original Star Trek movies, the even-numbered ones were better than the odds, with V particularly awful. But II was a classic, while the first one I found forgettable. III was also pretty good.

Probably because the main thrust of Star Trek: The Motion Picture was "check out this sweet new Enterprise model we got". I swear, the scene where they were booting up the ship and pulling out of Spacedock took at least 20 minutes because of all of the establishing shots of the ship model. (To be fair, it was a cool-looking model.) I think they got enough footage from that, they didn't even need to shoot any exterior solo shots of the ship for the next two movies. (And then I think they got to reuse some of them for V and VI as long as they didn't show the registry number.)

Star Trek I, of course, inspired us to rename the original forum admin, Cody (username: voyager), to V'Ger when he was no longer welcome on the forum.

I was reading someone's retrospective on seeing it in theaters when it came out. He made a point it was the first time in 10 years anyone had seen the Enterprise at that time, so to him the extra porn and pomp on that scene made sense.

[OCGuy81]

So can we consider the Hobbit movies as sequels, even though they're prequels? They were released after and aren't near as good as LOTR, in my opinion

[Max Rockatansky]

So can we consider the Hobbit movies as sequels, even though they're prequels? They were released after and aren't near as good as LOTR, in my opinion

Admittedly they are prequels in every sense of the word, but they were only made because they were cashing in on the success of the LOTR movies.  The Hobbit has a huge issue in that it was intended to be a children's novel when the Lord of the Rings was decidedly adult oriented.  Trying to the scale up The Hobbit to something adult oriented just didn't work.  So really The Hobbit movies aren't really true as they should be to the source material whereas the LOTR movies were.