The expectation of a movie sequel more often than not, despite what movie trailers and posters might tell you, is that they’re basically going to be greedy cash-grabs, keen to shove the same product down the viewer’s throat for a second, third, fourth, even fifth time for a quick buck.
One need only look at the hilariously overplayed glut of Saw sequels, or recent action follow-ups like Taken 2 and A Good Day To Die Hard to see how bad things can get, though on a very odd occasion, there will be a sequel that will manage to outdo its (already great, even brilliant) original.
It’s a rare feat, and takes a special kind of directorial ingenuity, usually going in a completely different direction and simply offering up an alternative experience for viewers rather then rehashing the same narrative.
However they managed to achieve it, here are 10 movie sequels that did the seemingly impossible and outdid the original…
Spider-Man 2
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After X-2 hit at the box office, Spider-Man 2 was the next comic book film to prove that these types of pictures could be grand and majestic, not simply silly and gratuitous.
Though it gets a tad tiresome seeing another villain who is all-too sympathetic, Alfred Molina does a bang-up job playing Doc Ock, and the film makes considerable effort to develop Peter (Tobey Maguire) as a character, nagged by self-doubt as well as his personal commitments to Aunt May and Mary-Jane (Kirsten Dunst). Furthermore, we get to see Harry Osborne (James Franco) sliding ever closer towards the dark side as he mourns his father’s demise.
While the original was a firm foundation on which to build a franchise, the second film truly feels like a director hitting his stride. There are so many exhilarating scenes in this film – the subway fight and ensuing fallout is a classic of action cinema – that it easily bests the original, and even after two follow-ups (one sequel and one reboot), it remains the best of the series.
Aliens
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Another instance that strikes up fervent debate, there’s simply no doubting that Ridley Scott’s Alien and James Cameron’s Aliens are both stunning films and easily the best entries into the entire franchise. Deciding what’s the better of the two get a little dicey, though; the first is slower and a more deliberate horror suspense film, whereas Aliens is a full-tilt action movie with fetishised weaponry, larger-than-life characters, and perhaps surprisingly, a whole lot of heart as well.
Though I love Alien, for me Aliens just about clinches it; the beefy action sequences notwithstanding, the film makes an extremely concerted effort to develop Ripley (Sigourney Weaver) as a human being.
Particularly in the Director’s Cut, we’re able to feel the disconnect she has due to the death of her daughter while she was in stasis, and how this transpires through to the touching maternal bond she has with young colony survivor Newt. So well-received was Weaver’s performance that she ended up being nominated for a Best Actress Oscar, a milestone in this science-fiction and action genres that has yet to be met.
Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back
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We all love the original Star Wars, but even ardent fanboys tend to agree that the second film, The Empire Strikes Back, is an improvement, delivering a ridiculous number of iconic scenes, the most memorable of which is unquestionably Darth Vader’s utterance of “No, I am your father”.
With the wealth of fuzzy Ewoks and awesome space battles, Star Wars all comes down to this single quote, which has essentially given the franchise its longevity – the entire prequel trilogy is about how Darth Vader went to the dark side in the first place – and ensures it has remained a pop culture staple.
And of course, how could we forget the introduction of Yoda, easily the most colorful addition to this sequel, whose famed quote “Do, or do not. There is no try” will forever live on in the annals of film history. Often it is great characters who can help propel a sequel to exceed the original film, and perhaps no more is that true in than in our next entry…
The Dark Knight
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Batman Begins was a fantastic film in its own right, reinventing Batman for a new generation and doing away with the silliness that came to define Joel Schumacher’s take on the character. Christopher Nolan created a serious, dark, gritty world in which Bruce Wayne’s existential issues could play out parallel with his quest to save Gotham City from a reign of terror. How could they top this for the sequel, The Dark Knight? It’s all about a playing card…
Yes, the Joker card at the end of the first film was a haunting hint of what to come, though few could have expected that it would have been quite this successful. Even though Nolan turned to the likes of Heat and The Departed to fashion a movie that was less a superhero action film and more a crime drama epic with overtones of a Greek tragedy, it was Heath Ledger’s show-stopping portrayal of The Joker that really made the film excel, earning a superhero film its first ever acting Oscar, as Ledger was posthumously awarded the Best Supporting Actor Academy Award.
The Dark Knight changed the blockbuster landscape forever, and we can see the ripples in forthcoming superhero pics like Iron Man 3, which appears to have a far more downcast tone than the previous films. If the grosses of The Dark Knight and The Dark Knight Rises proved anything, it’s that audiences love a little bit of misery alongside their explosions.
Terminator II: Judgement Day
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And yet, not even Christopher Nolan’s indefatigable directorial prowess could take the #1 spot away from what is without question the best movie sequel of all time. James Cameron’s The Terminator was a thrilling low-budget action thriller that engaged with the notion of time travel in an arresting manner, and told a story that was practically begging for a sequel.
Boy, did James Cameron deliver or what? Terminator 2 ups the ante in every way possible – there are two machines instead one, specifically – thanks to an increased budget, allowing for state-of-the-art visual effects which bring the antagonist of the picture, Robert Patrick’s T-1000, to life in ways previously thought unimaginable.
The action crackles, but what really makes the film work is the character development; Cameron is confident enough to take lengthy downtime to flesh Sarah Connor out especially, and the potentially snoozy scenes in Albuquerque are actually some of the best in the entire film.
Terminator 2 didn’t just up the game; it set a bar for action movies that still hasn’t been topped today.
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Felix Sanchez, chairman and co-founder of National Hispanic Foundation for the Arts, told Fox News Latino it was a grave injustice not just to Ontiveros, but to Latinos as well.
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