Movie studios are all about minimizing risk when it comes to commercial filmmaking. One of the best ways to do so is by taking an already successful movie and pumping out its sequels for as long as fans are willing to fork over the cash. This is the strategy that has made the MCU,Fast & Furiousmovies, and similar big-budget franchises the cornerstones of Hollywood pop culture in the last two decades.
The process of making sequels is never entirely cut and dried. Sometimes the makers are following an existing blueprint for a multi-movie story arc, like with theHarry Pottersaga. Other times the sequels are pretty much freshly made up as you go along with each new successful entry in the franchise. Let us take a look at some sequels from the latter category which you can watch and enjoy even if you have not seen the previous installment(s) in the series.
The originalMad Maxmovies turned Mel Gibson into a star and gave Hollywood one of the best action directors of all time in filmmaker George Miller. But the franchise reached its peak in the ’80s. This led to a lot of raised eyebrows when Miller announced that he would be making a newMad Maxmovie three decades later with a new cast of main characters and an entirely new setting.
Many wondered if the new movie would still be relevant for modern audiences who have only a passing familiarity with the original Mel Gibson films. The answer turned out to be a resounding Yes! withMad Max: Fury Road. Tom Hardy more than lives up to the role of the new Max, while Charlize Theron asImperator Furiosa walks away with all the gloryin a film that not only outdoes every previousMad Maxmovie, but is quite simply one of the greatest action films ever made.
9Godzilla vs. Kong
The 2010s was the time when every Hollywood producer was trying tojump onto the cinematic universebandwagon with their studio-owned IPs. Legendary made a daring decision to launch a modern giant monster franchise that would combine the western popularity of King Kong with the Eastern iconic status of Godzilla. The series began with standalone films introducing each mighty monster in modern settings.
Unfortunately, the studio was unable to land upon a unifying theme or tone for the movies. This makes each entry in the Monsterverse feel like a separate movie. This also applies to the much anticipatedGodzilla vs. Kong, the fourth movie in the series. The action starts off briskly. There is little need for much backstory for the two main characters, and many elements from previous movies are contradicted or straight-up ignored to focus on giving audiences a rousing spectacle film that uses plot as an excuse to create a series of giant monster action set pieces.
TheX-Menmovies under Fox studios have a chequered history. But one thing the franchise got exactly right was casting Hugh Jackman as Wolverine. A breakout star from the start, Wolverine quickly spun off into his own solo live-action adventures while also continuing to be a part ofX-Menmovies across various timelines and story arcs. All of this culminates withLogan, Wolverine’s final appearance in the franchise.
The movie takes place in the same reality as the previousX-Menmovies, but is set decades in the future. The only original characters that remain are Wolverine and a greatly enfeebled version of Professor X who is a shell of his former self. Despite some references to other X-Men and the events of past movies,Loganessentially works as a standaloneWolverinemovie that bids a fitting goodbye to the character. At leastuntil Deadpool came calling.
722 Jump Street
Few people knew what to expect when it was announced that there was going to be a remake/sequel to the21 Jump Streettv series as a movie starring Jonah Hill and Channing Tatum. But the film turned out to be a welcome surprise, being remembered as one of the best comedies of the past two decades, which helped Hill establish himself as a leading man, and gave Tatum the chance to prove he has some serious comedic chops.
Naturally a sequel soon followed with22 Jump Street. While a direct sequel to the original, it has little in the way of connective tissue aside from starring a few of the same main characters, whose backstory is quickly explained to the audience at the start of the film through a handy recap montage. After that the movie pretty much does its own thing, adding even more humor and wacky antics into the mix to create another hilarious viewing experience.
6Angels and Demons
The “hunting for a secret treasure” type of movies have long been a popular staple of commercial fiction. Novelist Dan Brown put a modern spin on the genre with his series of books starring Robert Langdon, a Harvard professor who always finds himself at the center of a deep conspiracy involving secret societies, ancient treasure maps, and world-ending threats.
Naturally Hollywood took a stab at adapting Brown’s novels, starting with breakout bestsellerThe Da Vinci Code, starring Tom Hanks as Langdon. The success of the movie ensured two sequels,Angels and DemonsandInferno. While all three movies feature Langdon in the lead, their plots and supporting cast bear little relation to each other, and each movie in the trilogy can be viewed as a standalone feature.
M. Night Shyamalan is one of Hollywood’s last few auteurs who resolutelycontinues making the movies he wantsto make rather than chasing the box-office or tentpole projects. In 2016 Shyamalan madeSplit, a gripping psychological thriller about a serial killer known as the Horde with multiple split personality disorder.
The movie manages to work perfectly well as a standalone feature. It is only near the very end that a minor scene at a diner reveals thatSplitis actually a sequel to Shyamalan’s 2000 superhero movieUnbreakable. The success ofSplitensured a second sequel toUnbreakablewould also get made, 2019’sGlass, which brings together the main characters from the previous two movies for a final showdown.
4Avatar 2: The Way of Water
No one knew quite what to expect when filmmaker James Cameron revealed that he would be making multiple sequels toAvatar. The movie had such a huge production budget, and its climax wrapped up the story so definitively, that it did not seem that there was much left to say in the sequel, and neither did it seem likely that audiences would flock to the theaters in gigantic numbers a second time to ensure the sequel recovers its production cost.
Of course, you’re able to never bet against James Cameron.Avatar 2: The Way of Wateris not a direct sequel so much as a fresh chapter in the story of the alien planet Pandora. It reintroduces the two main characters from the original movie decades later as parents, and the sequel is really a story about their children and the battle to take back Pandora from the human invaders in a new setting.
3Mission: Impossible III
It has become something of a running joke that theMission: Impossiblefranchise essentially features movies that recycle the same plot over and over again, as an excuse to set up action set pieces starring Tom Cruise in death-defying situations. While there is some merit to this idea, theMission: Impossiblemovies can be broken up into two distinct phases, consisting of the first two movies and the rest of the series.
After the mixed reaction toMission: Impossible 2, the makers decided to make some drastic changes in the style and presentation of the series. InMission: Impossible III, the main character Ethan Hunt gets reintroduced as an older statesman of the American spy network who has retired from work and is engaged to be married. The themes of Ethan getting older, his relationship with his fiancé, and his ethical doubts about the agency he works for continue to get explored in later movies in the franchise.
2The Suicide Squad
The DCEU had been in a tight spot for many years when filmmaker James Gunn was brought on board to helm a film in the franchise.From an array of options, Gunn choose to makea live-actionSuicide Squadmovie. The only problem was such a movie had already been made by David Ayer a few years prior, which had not been received well by critics or fans.
This did not bother Gunn, who stuck to his original choice for a DCEU project. The result was 2021’sThe Suicide Squad, which operates as a very loose sequel to Ayer’s film. Many of the main characters are the same, as is the basic premise of the two movies. But Gunn manages to make the sequel feel like an entirely different film, filled with lots of bawdy humor, characters you actually care about, and a memorable main villain.
110 Cloverfield Lane
2008’sCloverfieldwas the kind of breakout indie hit that Hollywood rarely sees anymore. Making able use of the “found-footage horror” trend popular at the time in the setting of a monster movie, the film garnered rave reviews from critics and general audiences. Naturally, the studio wanted to make sequels toCloverfield, but the problem was there was no plan in place to take the story forward by the writers of the original film.
To get around this, the producers took an original script for an unrelated story and decided toturn it into a sequel toCloverfield. That is how the world got10 Cloverfield Lane, a movie that carries only the barest of hints that it is connected toCloverfieldbeyond the name itself. Fortunately,10 Cloverfield Lanemanages to stand on its own as an engrossing thriller about a trio living in an underground bunker following a massive attack that has left Earth uninhabitable.
