Not all sequels are created equal. Some are so great that theysurpass their predecessors, like The Empire Strikes Back, while others are so dismal that they make you wonder if the people who made them did so under duress, like Son of the Mask. Bad or good, sequels are more often than not the victims of expectations. By their very nature, they come attached with preconceived notions of what audiences expect to see.
When these expectations are high, whether it’s because the first film was such a monumental success or it’s a years-later follow-up in a beloved franchise, it’s hard for the sequels to live up to them. There have been those sequels that have lived up to the hype, but just as many, if not more, have come crashing down because of it. It’s not always a sign of poor quality, but rather just an unfortunate comparison to a much better film. Good or bad, right or wrong, these ten sequels were all massive disappointments.
10
‘The Matrix Reloaded’ (2003)
There are many people who would sing the praises of the Wachowskis first sequel to their sci-fi action masterpiece,The Matrix, fewer who would for the threequel, The Matrix Revolutions, and almost none who would forthe legacy sequel seemingly made out of spite, The Matrix Resurrections. Individual quality aside, the latter two came with managed expectations because audiences had already been let down by The Matrix Reloaded.
Reloaded doubles down on everything from the first film. The action, bullet time, and especially the nonsensical philosophizing. It’s The Matrix to the max, best exemplified by the fight scene between Neo and one hundred Agent Smiths. It’s a fun action movie, with some cool set pieces, but there’s no way it could ever recreate the cultural phenomenon that surrounded the first movie. Many likely hoped it was a minor misstep that would be corrected in the next sequel. Unfortunately,it turned out to be a harbinger of very bad things to come.
9
‘Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull’ (2008)
Steven Spielberg is no stranger to disappointing sequels. Though loved by many fans now, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom was considered a major disappointment after Raiders of the Lost Ark. Years later, Spielberg would fall prey to sequelitis again with The Lost World: Jurassic Park. Those were both mere precursors to his most disappointing sequel of all, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.
It may have a larger fan following now, especially after the abject failure of Dial of Destiny, but the vitriol that was spewed on Crystal Skull in 2008 was far more toxic. While the film got decent reviews, fan backlash was swift and got so blown out of proportion that the phrase “nuking the fridge” became a replacement for “jumping the shark,” and even South Parkfelt obliged to comment on it with a very notorious episode. Was it all a bit much from fans, who had already been burned by Lucasfilm with the Star Wars prequels? Sure, but there’s no doubt that the Indiana Jones franchise, much like Shia LaBeoufswinging like Tarzan with CGI monkeys, had gotten a little lost in the jungle.
8
‘Spectre’ (2015)
Daniel Craig’s tenure as Bond was full of ups and downs. After his auspicious debut in Casino Royale, he came back with Quantum of Solace, a film that even its defenders would agree was a major comedown. Then, Craig came back better than ever in an elevation of the entire franchise with Skyfall, a more emotional Bond movie from a prestige director with gorgeous visuals. It was a step very much back in the right direction, and then they immediately face planted with Spectre.
Despite having nearly the same entire creative team behind it as Skyfall, Spectre never once manages to replicate the excitement and daring of that film. It’s the dullest Bond movie ever made, and it manages a double disservice in wasting Christoph Waltz in a poorly executed resurrection of Bond’s biggest villain, Ernst Stavro Blofeld. Quantum of Solace at least could blame some of its problems on the writers’ strike that saw it rushed into production. However, Spectre feels like everyone involved was just going through the motions.
7
‘Halloween Ends’ (2022)
Image via Universal Pictures
Either sequel to David Gordon Green’s Halloweenlegacy reboot could probably qualify here. Halloween Kills is a very odd and messy movie that has its own chaotic charms and definitely was disappointing, but it did promise a climactic showdown between Michael Myers and Laurie Strode in its final moments. Technically, Halloween Ends does feature a showdown, it’s just that it only lasts a few minutes and comes after more than an hour and a half of both Laurie and Michael being sidelined in favor of a weird pseudo psycho romance movie.
While I might personally argue that Halloween Ends was the most interesting film of the franchise since Halloween III: Season of the Witch, it’s barely a Halloween movie. The marketing also seriously downplayed that the real protagonist of the film was a social pariah named Corey Cunningham, who falls for Laurie’s granddaughter before discovering Michael, who’s been living in a sewer for years, and becomes his apprentice. That all sounds insane, and that’s the best part about Halloween Ends, but it absolutely failed and disappointed fans by not giving them the proper climax they had been promised.
6
‘Spider-Man 3’ (2007)
Disappointing superhero threequels used to be a common trend in the days before cinematic universes obliterated the idea of what constitutes a direct sequel.X-Men: The Last Stand, The Dark Knight Rises, Blade Trinity — all were considered disappointing compared to the respective films that came before them, which were all generally hailed as the high points of their franchises. They all got totally normal and measured responses from fans, too, who almost never overreact to anything, but none got the reaction that Spider-Man 3 did.
To be fair to the fans, it is an embarrassing movie that wastes Venom as a villain, has too many goofy dance sequences in it, as well as a very cringey performance from Tobey Maguire. To be fair to Spider-Man 3, Sam Raimi’s web-slinging franchise had always been a little goofy and cringey. They’re superhero movies that wear their heart on their sleeves and never feel like they need to undercut their sincerity with snarky jokes. Spider-Man 3 isn’t doing anything different than what the two previous films did; it’s just doing the worst possible version of it.
5
‘The Godfather Part III’ (1990)
The Godfather Part III may be the best film on this entire list. It got decent reviews, has received a small revival of appreciation in recent years, and was even nominated for Best Picture. However, the gulf of quality that exists between this third film and the first two masterpieces in Francis Ford Coppola‘s saga is so large that it dwarfs the gap of every sequel listed prior to it here.
The Godfatherand its first sequel are classics, essential American movies with writing, acting and directing that are as near perfect as any film has ever had. The Godfather Part IIIfeels like it’s practically a parody at some points. The movies had always been operatic, but the third film amplifies that to such a degree that it feels cartoonish in comparison. Most of the acting, with the exception of Sofia Coppola being put in an unfortunate position to play Michael Corleone’s daughter at the last minute, is good, but it’s all much bigger than before, and less effective. It’s a disappointing epilogue to one of the greatest crime sagas in film history.
4
‘Alien: Covenant’ (2017)
It would be fair to say that Prometheus was a disappointing Alienprequel, if for no other reason, because people could never quite decide if it was a prequel or not at the time, including the filmmakers. It still has fans who rank it fairly high within the franchise, and it has some very interesting ideas that it presents. Unfortunately, we never got to see any of those ideas play out, because we got Alien: Covenant instead.
Trying to serve as both a sequel to Prometheus and a new Alien film, Covenant ends up failing as both. It’s got a plot that feels like it’s just speedrunning through familiar franchise moments when it’s not taking odd detours like having Michael Fassbender flirt with himself in a dual role as two androids. Fassbender’s performance, and his weird sexual chemistry with himself, is the most interesting thing about Covenant, and when your Alien film’s best quality is its ability to inspire some very specific forms of fan fiction, that’s a big problem.
3
‘Speed 2: Cruise Control’ (1997)
Speed is a nineties action classic. Successfully importing some of the Die Hardformula onto a bus, along with a heavy influence from Runaway Train, the Keanu Reeves actioner is a white-knuckle thrill ride worth getting a ticket for. It’s Keanu-less sequel, Speed 2: Cruise Control, is about as much fun as going on an actual cruise while sober, and the ship is sinking, too.
Sandra Bullock returns from the first film, this time opposite Jason Patric as her new cop boyfriend. Meanwhile, Willem Dafoe takes over from Dennis Hopper as an over-the-top leech-loving villain. It’s one of the worst Die Hard knockoffs, has a truly fatal flaw in that a cruise ship is not an exciting or dangerous mode of transportation, unless you were on the Poop Cruise, and was just one big, slow-moving disappointment.
2
‘Exorcist II: The Heretic’ (1977)
It’s very arguable that there should never have been a sequel to The Exorcist. It’s a perfectly contained horror movie and doesn’t require further elaboration. If there is a sequel that should’ve been made, if absolutely necessary, then it’s The Exorcist III, which is a very solid horror film in its own right, with one hell of a jump scare, that follows only some of the supporting characters from the first film. Exorcist II: The Heretic brought poor Linda Blair back for even more torture than she took in the first film, though nothing could be worse than being the star of Exorcist II: The Heretic.
Following up with Regan McNeil a few years later, the movie’s plot is a big old grab bag of crazy, featuring hypnosis and lots of locusts. It’s all the metaphysical gobbledygook that attracted director John Boorman in the first place, since he had turned down the offer to direct the first film because he found it repulsive. Years later, Boorman would admit that even though he liked things about his film, he didn’t deliver what audiences wanted. The film likewise was savaged by critics and even the first film’s director, William Friedkin, who said it was made by a demented mind.
1
‘Blues Brothers 2000’ (1998)
Belated sequels to beloved cult comedies almost always end in disappointment. Bad Santa 2, Super Troopers 2, and Dumb and Dumber To are all pale imitations of their predecessors. Still, those movies are all laugh riots in comparison to Blue Brothers 2000, which is a phenomenal soundtrack surrounded by a terrible movie. Even a murderer’s row of musical artists can’t fix a movie that is basically one big compromise of a studio note.
John Landis, a director with clearly the best judgment ever, said they had always planned on making a sequel featuring original star John Belushi,who tragically died only a couple of years after the first film’s release. He’s replaced in the sequel by John Goodman, a fantastic comedic talent, for sure, but with a very different energy than Belushi. Goodman is the least of the film’s problems, though, as it sands off all the edges of the first film’s sometimes abrasive tone for a PG-13 rating, complete with a kid sidekick. It’s the studio-approved version of a comedy classic that feels about as generic and gentrified as White people whose favorite Blues artist is The Blues Brothers.
