We love movies and every year hundreds of movies come out. Some of these movies are good, some of them are bad and some are downright horrible. For some reason it seems that some of the worst movies made are sequels to other movies. Maybe it’s because the movie doesn’t change things enough the second time around, or maybe it’s because it tries too hard to change things that worked. Whatever the reason, sequels (or prequels) are seldom as good as the movie before them and often leave everyone wondering why they were even made to begin with.
10. Predator vs. Aliens: Requiem
You know a sequel is likely going to suck when the first movie in the series was horrible. Predator vs. Alien was an attempt to combine two of the biggest, baddest intergalactic monsters in cinema history together on the same screen and it didn’t work well the first time. For some reason people seemed to think that screwing a movie up once wasn’t enough and they made a second installment of this subpar movie that turned out even worse. Note to Hollywood: If the first movies sucked the second one is likely going to be even worse.
9. Dumb and Dumberer: When Harry met Lloyd
This particular movie honestly should have never been made. Dumb and Dumber was a brilliant movie and it owed that brilliance to the chemistry between Jim Carry and Jeff Daniels. When they decided to do the second movie they didn’t get Carry or Daniels back and this was destined to be a flop because there was no way two different actors could pull of the characters of Harry and Lloyd. Even had they gotten Carry and Daniels back to play their roles again there is no promise this move would have been much better. Sometimes a sequel is just a bad idea.
8. Poltergeist II
Poltergeist II makes it on this list because it is so indicative of the horror genre in general. It seems like every time a truly unique spin on horror comes along, the powers-that-be beat that concept to death. It doesn’t matter if it is Freddy Kruger or a little girl that can talk to ghosts, Hollywood loves to keep handing us the same stuff it did in the last movie. Poltergeist II was really the same movie as the first with a few more special effects thrown in. True, some people like the rehashed movie but honestly telling the story once was enough.
7. The Crow II
The Crow II: City of Angels was the follow up to the phenomenal movie The Crow. City of Angels actually did a couple things right such as capturing the feeling of the first film but it did so much more wrong. This movie is on this list because it was almost a good movie. It’s hard to pinpoint one thing or another as the reason this movie wasn’t what it could have been, but overall it was a frustrating experience because viewers could tell that this movie could have been just as good as the first, but it just wasn’t.
6. Halloween III
We already discussed the horror genre’s tendency to rehash the same movie over and over again, but Halloween III deserves to be on this list because it had absolutely nothing to do with any of the other movies in the franchise. This monstrosity simply stole the title of a successful movie franchise and then proceeded to make a really bad movie. This movie sucked in every way a movie can suck. It was a bad story, it was really bad acting, and the special effects were complete crap. You might be tempted to put yourself through this hell, but trust me, it really was that bad.
5. Grease 2
There are some movies that no matter how hard they try, they will never be able to duplicate the original, and Grease 2 was one of those movies. Grease 2 was essentially High School musical with a bad attitude and completely failed to deliver anything remotely close to the original. This movie took an icon and ran it through the mud with a lame script, horrendous acting, and musical numbers that were obviously lip synced.
4. Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 (1986)
The original Texas Chainsaw Massacre has been a cult hit for decades because it was a very well told story with some pretty decent acting as well. The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 basically took everything that was good about the first movie, threw it out the window then handed audiences a pile of junk and told them to enjoy it anyway. This move made almost no sense and made no real effort in either acting or special effects. While the horror genre can spawn good sequels by simply rehashing what has been done before, this movie didn’t even do that.
3. Conan the Destroyer
Conan the Destroyer is the result of Hollywood execs thinking that making an adult movie into something with wider appeal can actually work. The success of the original Conan was a direct result of its gritty feel and dark themes, when you take those out and replace it with slap stick comedy, the result is bound to disappoint audiences, and Conan the Destroyer did just that. The only redeeming quality about this movie was… well there isn’t one.
2. Blair Witch Project 2: Book of Shadows
The Blair Witch Project was one of the biggest surprises in cinema history. It took a very simple concept and used it to tell a story that managed to scare almost everyone who saw it. The problem with the original movie was that there was no way a sequel could be done the same way, it just wasn’t going to work. The Blair Witch Project 2 got that part right but failed on every other front imaginable. Yes, it did have to steer clear of some of what the first movie did, but this movie completely ignored the things it could have used from the first. Instead of exploring the history of the Blair Witch and maybe using another spin on the documentary style of telling the story, the writer and director handed us a poorly done horror film with some gratuitous nudity. This movie sucked so bad that you almost got sick watching it but unlike the first, it had nothing to do with the funky camera angles.
1. Star Wars episodes 1-3
All three of these movies actually deserve their own spot on the list but it would just be the same criticism over and over again. Somehow George Lucas managed to completely forget everything that made the first three Star Wars films so good. The story was about as compelling as a swarm of gnats, the characters were one dimensional and hard to relate to, and the special effects were so over done that you couldn’t really tell what was actually happening half the time. The reason these movies deserve the top spot on this list is more than the fact they were bad. These movies should have been three of the best movies ever made, they could have been had Lucas stayed true to the things that made the first three Star Wars movies the works of art that they were. Seriously, George, what happened to you?