Now, as a film lover I have unsurprisingly seen many many movies. But nothing perplexes me more than the idea of a sequel. For the longest time I really couldn't wrap my head around the thinking, because why make more of something that people liked If your not going to put the same amount of effort in? And why would you bother with that pesky habit that sequels have of being unwatchable? Let's face the facts here, when was the last time you saw a sequel and thought that it was superior to the original. I am willing to bet that hardly ever happens. (With the obvious exception of White Noise 2, which was much better than its predecessor. But when the first movie was the very epitome of mindless crap, which might as well of been made through smearing shit on a film reel and mailing it to cinemas worldwide... the second can ONLY be an improvement. Which incidentally is the reason I feel Open Water 2 is just around the corner.)
Before I start, I feel as though I should mention that there is one kind of sequel that is the exception to this rule of "Sucky Sequels" and sometimes can even be better than its first. And that is the middle part of a trilogy. The second Spider-man, The Empire Strikes Back and Pirates of the Caribbean 2 were all shinning examples of this. Of course having a sequel that isn't an insult to the film industry does come with its price. Yes, if you achieve this the movie god will even things out by making sure you create a third part that will more than likely resemble something heinous, that will no doubt have audiences everywhere loosing their lunch over the cinematic filth you have infected the world with... or Pirates of the Caribbean 3.
Anyway the fact is that more often than not sequels are poor. This is a widely accepted rule (a very similar rule exists for Michael Bay films). So the part that confuses me is that despite this fact, the studios keep pumping out sequel after sequel like there simply aren't any original ideas left (Which I can assure you is NOT the case). I mean, look at the list of last year's summer releases for example. We had, Spider-man 3, Shrek 3, Pirates 3, Bourne 3, Nightwatch 2, Ocean's 13, Hostel 2, Fantastic 4 2, Bruce Almighty 2, Die Hard 4, Resident Evil 3, Harry Potter 5 and the ever disastrous Rush Hour 3. Oh and Transformers, which won't be gracing us with a sequel until NEXT year.
For a while I though the reason sequels sucked was deeply connected to the lack of story left to tell after the first. This is because movies are generally made and designed to be standalones to cover the unfortunate event of not getting a sequel (although this particular fate is becoming very rare). They are usually a single story that begins and ends within its 2 hour time frame making it very difficult to beat any more story out of the dead horse that is your movie. As history has taught us beating a dead horse mostly produces nothing more than a twitch of a story, the one thread you didn't tie up in the first that you couldn't possibly fill 2 hours of screen time with unless you are stupid enough to think you can tell the same basic story again but with a different, almost identical, central character who will mysteriously be portrayed by a much cheaper actor than the first time. (See: Triple X: 2)
But of course this can't be the reason why sequels leave me dead inside. Because the studios are so determined to flood the world with 7 movies for each single idea, that alot of big movies get signed for multi-movie deals before they even make the first, leaving no excuses for poor storytelling. They should have plenty of chance to develop and could purposely leave alot of story to tell. And on top of that many modern day movies are based on already existing products with ongoing storys, such as books, TV shows, comics or old movies they are remaking. So the above theory of lack of story can't possibly explain the percentage of sequels that I would rather eat frame by frame with a side order of cod-liver oil than watch.
So, is it the budget? Do sequels have lower quality due to a lack of money and therefore a lack of talent involved in the production? Well, let me nip this one in the bud in a more quick and concise way. No. That is NOT the problem. A high percentage of these sequels have similar or higher budgets than the originals. Unless of course you referring to the dreaded straight to DVD sequel, a technique invented by Disney and whored out by the American Pie franchise which I believe is on its 23rd sequel. Maybe the repetitiveness of the central characters and themes are what cause the huge loss of quality? No, no and nope. TV series and comic books rehash the same themes and characters all the time are very popular and never seem to drop in quality (Well, not never, but mostly). This is the same for other forms of ongoing series. So this can't be the explanation I was looking for.
