h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I'm thinking about doing an entry on Movie Sequels (or spinoffs, prequels etc.) that actually manage to match or even surpass the original, or are so bad that you can't watch the original without your enjoyment being spoiled by the knowledge that your favourite characters and so on are going to be in the worst film ever. Perhaps we could also do a list of the sequels we would most like to see made...

Any help towards this end would be highly appreciated!

Some Examples (to get you started):
As good as / better than [ ]
-Toy Story II
-The Empire Strikes Back
-Aliens
-The even-numbered Star Trek sequels
-Mad Max II
etc. etc. etc.

Worse than (they could have been so much better!) [ ]
-Escape from LA
-Jurassic Park II The Lost World (contentious one, that)
-The odd-numbered Star Trek sequels
-Die Hard II
-Ep. One The Phantom Menace (deeply contentious, I know; I DID like the film, but three things spoiled it for me - Jar Jar Binks, the virgin birth business, and the midichlorians. The Force is a virus, huh? Anakin Skywalker is some kind of 'space Messiah', eh? Hmmmm.)

OMG you forgot the best ever sequel godfather part 2

good point.

I'd have to agree with the "Godfather II" recommendation - a great movie - but "Godfather III" would have to go on the unwatchable list. "The Sicilian" is also, arguably, a Godfather sequel, and was horrible.
"The Color Of Money" was a great sequel to "The Hustler."
"Indiana Jones And The Last Crusade" was a good sequel (unless you're excluding serials, like this and the "Batman" movies). I'm sure there were some bad Indiana Jones movies between the first and the last, but I don't recall their names.
"Fierce Creatures" was sort of a sequel to "A Fish Called Wanda", and was not a good movie.
Every "Jaws" movie after the original was terrible.
Hope this helps...

the one film betreen lost ark and last crusade was the temple of doom and personaly i like that better than crusade

It does indeed help.

Hmm. I'm not sure whether to include serialised sequels and so forth. The trouble is that you start getting into territory that is pretty difficult, if only because it's impossible to say where to draw the line. Obviously, if the films are self-referential (e.g. Indy) or show definite narrative continuity (e.g. Star Wars), then it's much more straightforward to compare btw. the films.

Some movie serials/franchises that are probably best to avoid are things like Bond, Basil Rathbone as Sherlock Holmes, Hammer Dracula etc, Charlie Chan etc etc... (I include Bond on this list because this forum could just become people ranting about their favourite, and me disagreeing and going for From Russia With Love).

I do want to cast the Joel Schumacher Batman films into the darkest pit of hell, though. [e.g. 'You're not sending *me* to der cooler!' Excruciating. ]

Back to the Future II and III are both good. Also, I prefer 'Last Crusade' to 'Temple of Doom', where Indiana Jones films are concerned. I also enjoy 'For a Few Dollars More' and 'The Good, The Bad and The Ugly' as much as 'A Fistful of Dollars'. This is more a series than sequels, but I'm including them anyway. And both the 'French Connection' films are good.

As far as bad sequels go, Highlander 2 should never have been made. It made a nonsense of the whole premise. I can't judge the latest Flintstones film, but I just don't want to see it. Aliens is as good as Alien, but Alien III is dreadful. And, if we're on about Batman films, I never did like 'Batman Returns'.

That's all I can think of, for now. I'll let you know if any more occur to me.

Here, here! Highlander II, definitely must make the "unwatchable" list - a shame too, since the original was rather good.

i forgot all about the alien movies what about alien reserection? didn't even hold up to alienIII imho oh yea there anothe highlander coming out soon too so well see how that one does maybe we wanna expand this to books gone movie cus i got some good gripes there :P

If you want to have a go at films adapted from books, wander over to the 'Asimov' thread. It's either under 'Ask h2g2' or under 'Miscellaneous Chat'. I've laid into adaptations a bit myself, and don't want to repeat myself.

Ok, the list I have....

Evil dead... Bad. Evil dead 2 and Army of darkness. Good
Any police academy movie... Bad
Mad max 1 & 2 Good, Thunderdome... Bad
Alien 3.. bad



And.... Let's make it interesting. MOVIES THAT SHOULD HAVE HAD SEQUELS....

Dune, real Genius, Dracula,


Movies that should have never been made...
Ice pirates, flintstones,


Books that should be made into a movie

H2G2 (all)

My 'Best' films:

2001 - A Space Oddysey and 2010 - Oddysey 2

Agree on Dune 2 as well - It should definitely be made.
'G'

Is no one going to mention Terminator 2?
That was a great sequel because it refered to the original and drew off it without arseing it up and whilst using newer technology which had become available in the interim.

Well, I don't know if it counts as a sequel... it's more of a remake.

The new version of Psycho is TERRIBLE! AWFUL! TAKE IT AWAY!!!!!!

Hey, and the sequel was pretty bad... BUT NOT AS BAD AS THE RE-MAKE!

Now look. I've come up in a rash just thinking about it.

I can't think of anything that fits N7's categories and hasn't been mentioned, but I do have theory about two movies of which one could have been the sequel to the other:
"High Fidelity" could have been a sequel of "Say Anything" if Diane Court had dumped Lloyd Dobbler for an Oxford-type three months after they moved to England together. John Cusack's character in H.F. is basically a more complex version of Lloyd when he drives around in the rain and talks into a taperecorder to Corey. "The rain on my car is a baptism, the new me, Power Lloyd, my assault on the world begins now."

Perhaps it's a stretch, but it's my theory and I'm sticking to it!

IMHO, the problem with 2001 - A Space Odyssey was that I had to read the book before I could understand what it was all about. It's not that it was a poor adaptation of a book. The film was inspired by a short story by Arthur C. Clarke (The Sentinel, if you're interested), and the book was written as the film was being made. Having read the book, I've since seen the film and been able to understand it, but a film shouldn't need a commentary of any kind.

As for Dune 2, the original was terrible. They tried to cram a very long book into 2 hours, and in doing so made a complete pig's ear of the story - and that's being polite. Before they do Dune 2, I'd like them to do Dune and get it right! This would probably take a mini-series - 4-6 episodes of 1 hour each (including credits, but excluding time for commercials). You'd need at least a couple more mini-series for the sequels to the original 'Dune' story, if you wanted to get the story right.

The big problem with Dune is that the first cut ran 4:30 (roughly) and the studio had kittens; they woulnd't trust the audience to determine if the film was just right at that length, so the demanded half the story cut away and got the film down to a manageable (and incoherent - I'd just re-read the book when I saw the film and couldn't follow the film) 2:20.
Apparently there is now a director's cut available on DVD.....

As long as they stop with the first three books, they might have something there....a telly series would definitely be a better idea, especially if it's HDTV or something.....

The trouble with 2001 is that Kubrick assumes that people will think about every single frame as much as he does; I certainly don't, and I expect more from a film than most people I know. Personal note: Peter Hyams should never be allowed to write or direct anything again. (He directed, co-wrote(with ACC), photographed, produced and edited 2010....and STILL couldn't inject any character into any human except HAL.)

Tacky sequels: Ghidra, Mothra, Rhodan.; originals that oughtn't to have been made: Godzilla in New York, Millennium (from John Varley's "Air Raid"), Species and More Species, ....that's all I can think of right now.

Fruitbat

To be honest, I'm not sure the longer length Dune would have been any better than the short one. There are too many things that just screw the story. The way Paul Atreides trains the Fremen, for example (leaving aside the fact that Paul is meant to be 15 and no way does Kyle Maclachlan pass for that), Paul's 'trial' with the sandworm and the way it suddenly rains at the end. Few of the characters looked the way they are described in the book, either. I could cope with that, normally, but when they make the Mentats a race rather than a group of specially trained men ...

IMHO, Dune is probably best left alone as it is, a real curate's egg of a film (i.e. good in places). The books in the Dune series beyond the first were okay, but I think they were all inferior to the first; how they'd turn out I shudder to think.

The original Dune, as a novel, is itself probably the last sf title any sensible person would consider making a film of, not because it doesn't merit it, but because the rambling scale, the extremely large amounts of internalised monologue and the massive textual richness of the galaxy in 10191 is just TOO much for a film to be commercially viable. I mean, if the forthcoming Harry Potter film has its title changed from '...Philosopher's Stone' to '...Sorcerer's Stone' just because some studio suit is concerned that the lowest common denominator wouldn't get it (or even worse, think that it was all about dull stuff like Plato etc), then, hey, what chance would a 100% faithful adaptation of Dune have?

Good subject how about the pink panther films some of which are great but shot in the dark and inspector clouseau wer terrible films rockets galore was watchable but not as good as whisky as for the rocky films they went down hill faster that a ski champion.
some films that come in series are mixed like the road to films most of which are good but not that much diffrent from the others planet of the apes was a good series of films dracula and wolf man films have had many series as have frankenstien most of them should never have been made both the fly films had sequels that were rubbish curse of the fly should be burned no it should be shown to all movie directers as a warning to how bad a film could be if they don't do a good job (by the way have you noticed that most of the films that i have mentioned are quite old i don't know why but i think it could be that most of the newer films have been done).