15 Movies That Sucked So Hard They Murdered Their Own Sequels
People often complain that there are no new ideas in Hollywood, and that everything is a remake or a sequel. Yeah, fair enough, most of it is, but there are excellent remakes and excellent sequels. Back to the Future Part II is a masterpiece. The planned Men in Black / 21 Jump Street crossover would have been so good.
Where it goes wrong is coke-fueled Hollywood executives being so rampantly confident that they plan for a sequel before the first movie is even out in the world. You just can’t do that. You might have an incredible group of people working their hardest on an amazing script — and the vast majority of movies have neither of those things — and still end up with something that, to use a technical term, sucks a big poop out of a dirty dog’s ass.
It’s cocky. The Godfather wasn’t pitched as a trilogy. Star Wars was shot as one film. Jaws didn’t have a post-credits scene setting up the main characters of Jaws 3D. It used to be that you made a movie, and then if it did well, you made another one.
It was probably Lord of the Rings that changed things — three movies, shot back-to-back in one monster filming session, one massive project released over three Christmases. Studios suddenly realized, “Oh shit, we can get more bang for our buck by doubling or tripling up.” But it just doesn’t work like that, as many found out a year or so later when they had to explain why their movie sucked and they wouldn’t be making any more.
Showbiz, eh?
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Tom Cruise’s ‘Mummy’ Saw Off a Whole Dark Universe
The 2017 The Mummy was meant to kickstart a shared universe based on Universal Monsters, including remakes of Frankenstein and The Invisible Man. However, due to it being absolutely garbage, the whole multi-movie plan was shelved indefinitely.
‘The Lone Ranger’ Will Remain Forever Alone
2013’s The Lone Ranger was intended as a franchise-starter like Jerry Bruckheimer, Gore Verbinski and Johnny Depp’s previous collaboration, Pirates of the Caribbean. However, the lengthy run time, Depp playing a Native American and an inconsistent tone nixed that idea.
‘Battleship’ Was Bad and Shit
A Battleship movie was a hell of a swing, but there were high hopes, including a sequel teased at the end. However, damning reviews, dismal domestic box-office returns and the unstoppable Avengers out at the same time sank all of those hopes.
‘Green Lantern’ Flickered Out
The Deadpool movies have had fun pointing out how shitty Green Lantern was, but damn, it’s shitty. Nonetheless, a sequel script was written before it came out, and only after bad reviews and dick-all money were trilogy plans totally abandoned.
‘Batman & Robin’s Megabucks Follow-up
While still filming Batman & Robin, Joel Schumacher was hired to direct a follow-up, Batman Unchained, featuring every villain from the four-movie franchise returning in a Scarecrow-induced hallucination. When Batman & Robin was almost universally hated, everything was spiked.
‘Battlefield Earth’ Was T-revolting
The Battlefield Earth movie only covers the first 400 pages of the 1,000-page book, so a sequel was written into everyone’s contract. Sadly, 600 pages will remain unfilmed as the resulting movie was legendarily a fat load of toilet.
‘Independence Day: Resurgence’ Didn’t Lead Anything to Resurge
The final shot of Independence Day: Resurgence sets up a sequel that will likely never come due, ironically, to terrible reviews often focusing on how desperate the movie seemed to set up a series of sequels.
He-Man? He Sucked!
Cannon Films were determined to make a Masters of the Universe sequel, and had a script all ready, but the film’s poor box-office take led to a tricky situation with Mattel. The sets and costumes were instead used for the awesome Jean-Claude Van Damme movie Cyborg.
‘The Divergent’ Series Ended in a Cliffhanger
The third book in the Divergent trilogy was to be split into two movies, a la Harry Potter and Twilight. However, the first part of it made so little money that the second was canceled — three books, three films, a greedily incomplete story. Dicks.
‘Assassin’s Creed’ Fell Off a Cliff
There are 12 Assassin’s Creed games, and hopes for a giant big-screen franchise. Despite Michael Fassbender doing his best in the hoodie, the film was deeply, deeply boring. The sequels were scrapped, and everyone had to console themselves (game joke!).
‘John Carter’ Was Treated Like a John-Blocker
While John Carter didn’t actually suck, it cost so much money to make that it didn’t just have to not suck to succeed, it had to be a phenomenon. A trilogy had always been planned, plans that got thrown into the trash when nobody went to see it.
The Sad Song of ‘The Mortal Instruments’
The six Mortal Instruments books were set for long-running big-screen success, but only one film was made — City of Bones made little enough impact that, after kicking the can down the road promising sequels would still happen, everyone just gave up instead.
‘Percy Jackson’ and the Boring Sequel
The six Percy Jackson books made it two movies into their big-screen adaptation, but no further — the second was seen as unremarkable, by-the-numbers filler, compared unfavorably to Harry Potter. The rights later changed hands, confirming it was all over.
‘Jumper’ Wasn’t Worth Catching
The Jumper filmmakers were very ambitious, working on a multi-film story and setting up several plot lines for future installments. A 15 percent Rotten Tomatoes score and reviews with words like “uncharismatic” and “incoherent” killed that, though.
There’ll Never Be an ‘I Am Number Four’ Number Two
Another YA series with ready-made franchise potential, I Am Number Four was like a sci-fi Twilight. Ten books were planned, and as many movies as they could make. That number was one — it lost shit-tons of money and sucked. D’oh!
