Do sequels ever make your head feel like the above? They hold a dubious place in the realm of Hollywood; they are often profitable, easy to make because they are based on an established story/cast/concept and they are usually done on the cheap. However, audiences have learned over the years to be wary of sequels because they, more often than not, fail to live up to the enjoyable qualities of the initial film they are based on. A film can usually achieve a trilogy and still retain a large portion of its audience but by the 4th film the studios begin to use deceptive titles to hide the sequential nature of the film. Here are a list of 10 films that tried VERY hard to get us to not realize they weren’t just another needless sequel.
Keeping with the theme of this article, here are the films in no particular order:
Rambo: First Blood Part 2 (or First Blood 2)
This is a case of a movie franchise who’s main character eclipsed the entire story in such a way that they had to rename the series after him. Crowbarring John Rambo’s name before the actual title worked so well that any semblance of First Blood failed to appear in future films (Rambo III). Sylvester Stallone made matters more confusing when he reinvigorated the franchise with the 2008 film simply titled Rambo.
Saw 3D (or Saw 7)
Look, you get one chance to name a sequel part 3D and that is with the THIRD film. Friday The 13th 3D is the third film, Jaws 3D is the third film, seeing a trend? Saw missed the boat on this and has instead given their 7th film a very confusing title. They’re also claiming this is the last one but if Freddy’s Dead and Jason Goes To Hell have taught me anything, I know this won’t be the case.
Leprechaun: Back 2 Tha Hood (or Leprechaun 6)
I suppose it is a bit dubious to expect any sort of coherency from the Leprechaun series but, like many slasher series do, they decided to eliminate numerals from their titles after the 3rd film. Fair enough but after the mild rental success of the 5th film, Leprechaun in the Hood, the folks who titled the follow up seem confused as to which number this film is in the series. I suppose the goal was to treat the film as a direct sequel to its predecessor (thus the inclusion of the number 2 in the title) or were they just trying to make the title as hip as possible (as with the use of ‘tha’ instead of ‘the’). Either way, the film is complete garbage and isn’t as campy or fun as the Leprechaun’s first trip to tha hood!
Halloween: H20 (or Halloween 7)
Long before Batman Begins ushered in a new wave of terminology for eschewing the dreaded “remake” label there was this “reboot” of the Halloween franchise. Despite being the 7th film in the popular slasher series, H20 (which stands for “20 Years Later” not designating it the 20th film), smartly does away with a lot of the baggage afforded by the previous sequels (Halloween 3 doesn’t even include the infamous Michael Myers – how’s that for sequel continuity!). Star of the original film, Jamie Lee Curtis reprises her role and the film essentially catches up with her character 20 years after the events of the 2nd film (and the last to feature Curtis). Whether it was the title or the return of Curtis, the film became the highest grossing film in the entire franchise and spawned another successful sequel before Rob Zombie ‘reimagined’ the series with a pair of poorly reviewed films.
The Omen: 666 (or The Omen 5)
Brilliant marketing strategy held back by one fatal flaw; this is only the 5th film! Nitpicking, I know, especially since this is more of a remake than a sequel but it would have had the full 666 effect if it had actually been the 6th film in the series! It’s also a bit bizarre that they would even risk misconstruing this film as a sequel in the fervor of the remake craze by affixing it with the 666 subtitle despite how alluring it was as a marketing strategy.
Fast and Furious (or The Fast and the Furious 4)
The fourth film in this high octane action series was just too cool for numbers. Heck, it was even too cool to retain the word “the” in the title. Vin Diesel left this series after the first film in hopes of becoming a giant action star (and he was for a while but Paul Walker at least stuck around for the first sequel. After a 3rd sequel without either star (instead we got Lil Bow Bow), the film needed its original stars back (and, quite frankly, they needed the series just as bad). The title, however, is just flat out rediculous! At least 2 Fast, 2 Furious had the number 2 in the title but this film basically just gives itself the same title as the original as if the audience isn’t even supposed to know the original film exists! Audiences did, however, flock to see this film in theaters and it managed to outgross the original film.
Alien³ (or Alien 3)
The 90’s were the heyday of edgy sequel titles and Alien³ is one of the crown jewels of Gen X titling. I suppose after a sequel title like Aliens (simply a pluralized title of Alien), adding a number into the scenario was a tad difficult. Surely they couldn’t call it Alienses (a title that SNL spoofed around the release of Aliens) but adding the mathematical symbol for cubed is just baffling. It serves no purpose other than it looking cool (or it did at the time) and when it came time to make a fourth film the series opted for a numberless title in Alien Resurrection.
Amityville 1992: It’s About Time (or Amityville Horror 6)
The fact that there are so many Amityville Horror film is a testament to the strength of the direct-to-video horror market in the 80’s and 90’s. The producers of the 6th installment were helpful enough to put the year the film was released in the title to help the droves of fans at Blockbuster weed through all the other Amityville films to find the most current one! Whatever their reason was for this bizarre title, the use of the year didn’t stick as 1993’s Amityville: A New Generation didn’t stick with that format.
The Final Destination (or Final Destination 4)
As with Fast and Furious, this film essentially copies the title of it’s original film. It could have entered Saw 3D territory, however, as the original title was Final Destination 3D. To make matters worse is that there is already a 5th film in development, making this title even more ridiculous.
Jason X (or Friday the 13th part 10)
Okay, this film gets credit for the fact that X is, in fact, the roman numeral for 10 but I have to wonder if the filmmakers even knew that when they gave it this hip title? It doesn’t help that the Friday the 13th series has actually dropped numerals from its title TWICE with Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter (part 4) and Jason Goes To Hell (part 9) and rebranded the series with Jason’s name getting top billing the the latter two films. So, is Jason X a misleading title? Not entirely but it surely is an awful film!
Have we missed anything? What sequel titles get on your nerves or do you think we’re being too hard on any of these titles?