21 Unnecessary Film Sequels That Are Great Anyway

Can ANY sequel truly be thought of as necessary? Surely there are only a few original films made to naturally make the existence of a second or third film needed?

I haven’t seen all of those (and forgotten some that I have.). Of those that I remember I would largely agree, they’re great. Not so sure about Gremlins 2 though. It was entertaining enough, some scenes were extremely funny, but it was way behind the magic of the first.

> (Which is what you?re arguing as well, I?m sure. I just want to be a dick to you during the holiday season.)

:(

But, yeah, I guess my main point was that the vast majority of sequels could be classed as unnecessary, to the point where the list may-as-well have been called “21 sequels that are great”.

Aliens was very necessary.
Toy Story 2 was good. (I THINK. It’s been a while.)
Army Of Darkness: essential.

Also, the second one in any trilogy: necessary (duh!)

Sister Act 2: Back In The Habit needs re-evaluating

the best sequel is easy, Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan (ducks or the cover once more) but it shows how a good story can be told, with an average budget.
Back To The Future, Part 2 is also a good film, though it does pack to much in to a short running time, it’s deserves a longer Director’s Cut, so that the pace can be fixed.

If a film is only necessary if its predecessor’s end made its creation inevitable, and a necessary film is only to be considered a sequel if it wasn’t planned from the start (like in a trilogy) – logic says that no film can be “sequel” and “necessary” at the same time.

Am I missing something?

> If a film is only necessary if its predecessor?s end made its creation inevitable

Well, not inevitable ? desirable, and required for ‘completion’. Look at the animated Lord of the Rings.

Only money and legality makes these things almost-inevitable. Creative issues…meh, not so much.

> and a necessary film is only to be considered a sequel if it wasn?t planned from the start (like in a trilogy)

A sequel can be called a sequel whether it was planned from the start or if it wasn’t. Who says you can’t? And what do you call the planned follow-up movie if not ‘a sequel’?!

> logic says that no film can be ?sequel? and ?necessary? at the same time.

No it doesn’t. :-p

> Can ANY sequel truly be thought of as necessary? Surely there are only a few original films made to naturally make the existence of a second or third film needed?

Um… THE DARK KNIGHT.

>t gets interesting when you come to ?endings? that were changed into ?cliffhangers?. BTTF – that?s the end, right? We?d have happily let that be it? Evil Dead 2, too.

That’s a good point. I’m glad they picked up with Ash in Army of Darkness (much as I hope that if ED4 happens they’ll pick up with him in the future ending… although I imagine they’ll follow the US Theatrical cut instead) but it certainly works as it is.

I guess the same could be said for The Evil Dead and Evil Dead 2. (Taking into account the sequel proper happens after the morning possession scene.)

> Um? THE DARK KNIGHT.

I agree with you! Begins is one of the few.

The Dark Knight *spoiler if you haven’t seen it, and why haven’t you, you utter utter spleen-muncher* is a great example of how to end a ‘franchise’ film without a cliffhanger that needs to be resolved. Harvey Dent is dead. The Joker is presumably locked up in Arkham, never to be seen again (Ledger’s death IMO scuppers any Joker return. After such a performance it would be so pointless to have another actor take the role, unless it was a NEW Joker). Batman is in hiding. Gotham’s future looks promising. It could end there and it would be absolutely fine, unlike e.g. Empire Strikes Back where there’s actual plot that needs to be dealt with, making the sequel necessary and inevitable. There’s nothing inevitable about a third Nolan Batman film.

The same goes for Quantum of Solace. Bond could end right there and it wouldn’t be the end of the world. Supposedly there was a cliffhanger ending shot for it which was later scrapped because they now want the next one to be a totally fresh story.

> Gotham is how it was pre-Joker,

I think Gotham’s in a better position, now, as the pre-Joker era is pretty much the pre-Dent era, too, and that ending was all about taking the momentum Dent built up by Harvey and continuing the good work. Most of the mob are still in handcuffs, a high ranking corrupt cop is rumbled and the “cops and lawyers” are no longer scared to do their jobs.

> You know, I never thought I?d see you type that!

Take the words ‘off’ and ‘fuck’, switch them around a bit.

> Clearly my mind can?t cope with the idea of a Gotham that?s ?basically okay?

Gotham should never be in a good state. Surely there are always going to be crime families corrupting and causing chaos, regardless of how many were put away or killed in TDK. I thought TDK did a brilliant job of dealing with how the people are never going to realistically look to a Bat-like masked vigilante to save them. Superman has the advantage of being able to act as a ‘White Knight’ figure as well as dealing out justice. Gotham needs that figure too and gets it with super-D.A. Harvey Dent. Him dying at the end is almost akin to Superman dying in their eyes. Batman must remain very much a villain in the people’s eyes and it would be a mistake IMO to go in any other direction (e.g. the people applauding Batman en masse)

> The irony being that before the edit his post was for Back to the Future? ;-)

Shut up :P

It was also before I read the entire thread ;-) I still think BTTF to a degree. Yes it works as a stand-alone movie, but as per my ‘franchise hero’ comment above it sets itself up with an icon, in this case the car. Then the final scene says to us what we’ve already been thinking… we’ve seen the past, but hey this is a time-machine now let’s see the future. As a child BTTF2 was a huge necessity!

QoS absolutely puts a cap on the story it was telling – the birth of the character – but, as with Batman Begins, once you’ve shown the birth aren’t you kind of obliged to show the full-formed character in action? Certainly the Quantum organisation needs investigating…at least in this version of Bond, which has much tighter continuity than the original series. (Which, to be fair, were trying – but it all fell apart six films in.)

So, er, we’ve all seen the Sun’s utterly ridiculous Batman story today, then?

While watching TDK again, Julian and I were discussing our perfect third film. Basically, it would have the Riddler as the villain (obv) and focus far more on the detective work. Begins did the “ninja”, TDK did the “fighting” and “chaos”, what I want to see now is Batman establishing himself as the world’s finest detective, and actually solving crimes. Oh, and the Batmobile would be a simple black sports car (like the one he drives when saving Bloke-Who-Isn’t-Riddler), emphasising the different approach. You may not think they could make that a particularly compelling film, but you wouldn’t have got particularly great odds on an overlong, intelligent, darker-than-any-before superhero film being one of the biggest of all time either, so I have confidence in Nolan.

> So, er, we?ve all seen the Sun?s utterly ridiculous Batman story today, then?

http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/showbiz/bizarre/article2048300.ece

Oh my, that’s hilarious.

Tennant 4 Riddler 4 Eva

I’d trust the Nolan vision enough to take something as outrageous as Murphy as The Riddler and spin out something fantastic. When Ledger was announced as the Joker it was a pretty big suprise and raised eyebrows. Of course as soon as the article mentions Robin it all becomes very silly indeed.

I?m not sure if Frasier would fit in the world of Batman.

I just laughed so much I choked on my sammidge!