Top 10 Worst Movie Sequels

Let's be honest, the majority of sequels are never as good as the originals. They all like to make as much money as possible by relying on previous installments to carry them, never finding the defining features that made the original work. Here are those infamous attempts where the subsequent film never even got close to the quality of the original.

Honorable Mentions:
The Godfather Part III - Don't get me wrong, this was a good film for the most part. However when compared with the other two films in the franchise this was a major disappointment.
The Lost World: Jurassic Park - One of the greatest fantasy adventure films of all time was reduced to generic action nonsense with this thoughtless sequel.
Grease 2 - To be honest I hated the original as well. I just couldn't miss the opportunity to call this a shit sequel.


#10 Home Alone 4 (2002) (2/10)

The fourth installment in the 'Home Alone' franchise promised to be bigger and badder than the originals. What a huge fucking lie that was. There was good news however, as the central character of Kevin McCallister returns. Well, not really; the role is actually played by a new actor that looks completely different to the lovable pest in the original. I'm not going to spoil things for you, but let's just say that this new actor was so successful in this role that he doesn't even have a Wikipedia page. I just can't imagine what the casting crew were thinking when they thought that hiring a kid who's nothing like the original character was a good idea. Actually they probably didn't care. They had dollar signs in their eyes and were too lazy to do anything about it. Their laziness results in the new kid being about as bland as a character can get, becoming an irritating little pissweasel that deserves to be beaten into a bloody pulp by two of the worst villains in film history.

The plot doesn't make any sense either, and like the characters is also incredibly bland. Clearly this is a younger Kevin McCallister from his heydays, yet the film's villains actually remember him from the events of previous films. Of course nobody really cares about these major flaws when you have the cringey level of awfulness in the comedy this film reluctantly provides, which let's be honest should be what a 'Home Alone' film is all about. Unfortunately the purposely shitty nostalgic slapstick in this new film was just dreadful, which is all this film managed to provide as well.


#9 Indiana Jones & The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (2008) (5/10)

No I'm not going to be one of those stereotypical keyboard warriors that feels the need to slag this film off because everyone else does. This is a film that's actually not that awful, and there's some decent little sequences and lines from Harrison Ford, who as I always like to mention is a living legend, and his mere presence in any film is always a boost. This is however a dreadful sequel considering how good the first three films in the franchise were. If you thought the casting of 'Home Alone 4' was bad then you need to meet the people that cast Shia LaBeouf in the supporting role for Indiana Jones himself. I mean Harrison Ford does his best to carry the guy along, which he always does because he's a living legend in case I hadn't mentioned it, but are we seriously meant to believe that Shia is the next Indiana Jones? If that's the case then this film can fuck right off.

The rest of the cast aren't that interesting either, aside of course from the living legend Harrison Ford. It really is true that Harrison Ford carries this whole fucking film, and even he's bogged down by this emotional nonsense that has absolutely no place in a fantasy adventure of this caliber. That's not the worst thing though. The real sin of this film is taking the 'Indiana Jones' franchise away from everything that made it great. There's no sense of grand adventure here, and the climax ends up resorting in serious big budget effects rather than giving the audience a sense of genuine wonder. Yes, 'Indian Jones' has always been incredibly silly, but here they overstepped the mark. Aliens and computer generated images have no place in a franchise like this, especially when the rest of the film is so ordinary and plain. The originals were a series that were a product of their time, and this sequel was proof that some series should just be left in the generation in which they were created.

#8 Star Trek V: The Final Frontier (1989) (2/10)

In all honesty I've never been a fan of 'Star Trek', and this film sums up why I hate the franchise in a nutshell. Even the usually stellar aspects about 'Star Trek' films are missing here. It looks shit, the action sequences are even shitter, the characters aren't very interesting, and the plot is god awful and focuses on religion more than anything else. You can tell the script for this film was continuously rewritten because it's absolutely diabolical. The directing however is even worse, which doesn't say much about William Shatner's skills as a director, and also highlights the terrible quality of the material on display. There weren't enough rewrites in my opinion, because the final product is still absolute shit.

Some of the sequences in this film are so stupid you wonder how this pile of shit ever got released. Why the hell they made Uhura dance erotically for aliens is anyone's guess. I mean what the actual fuck is that all about? Was William Shatner aware that just his mere presence was enough for nerds everywhere to ejaculate profusely? You just don't need that needlessly smutty scene that perfectly sums up the thoughtless direction behind this film. This whole film reeks of the egomaniacal ignorance of William Shatner. He still hasn't properly apologised for this mess, rather blaming others for a film that he himself directed. Unfortunately for Shatner I'm a disinterested blogger, so he can go fuck himself for releasing this pile of steaming crap.


#7 Spiderman 3 (2007) (3/10)

You may be aware that I'm not a fan of comic book films, and if not well now you know. I did however enjoy 'Spiderman 2', and so naturally I was looking forward to a sequel that would surely be as exhilarating as the second. Unfortunately this sequel ended up being one of the worst superhero film I've ever had the displeasure of watching. Peter Parker, whose never been the best comic book character, is the absolute worst here. He's the least charismatic hero ever, and is just irritatingly bland in every scene. How is he the one that has to take down fifteen million villains? The villains incidentally are all identical in the respect that they all follow the same trait of having absolutely no depth and are just used as a shock factor rather than any actual merit. Maybe they should of stuck with the single well written villain like a good film would.

Yeah okay, this film still looks as good as the originals, but there's no substance. It's actually quite repetitive and boring, which for a superhero film is quite an impressive non-achievement. And I still don't understand how you can have three villains and still expect a decent story to present itself to the audience. Not surprisingly too many villains makes the plot become a convoluted mess, which isn't helped by this film never deciding whether it wants to be a superhero flick or a romantic comedy. The finished product shows us that this version of 'Spiderman' doesn't do either of those things at all well, which isn't surprising from a film that has all the hallmarks of a small kid in a sweet shop. At one time 'Spiderman' was becoming the next cool superhero. Not after this film was released.


#6 The Hangover Part 3 (2013) (2/10)

I never enjoyed the second Hangover film, but the third was worse on a whole new level. 'Annoying' would be the perfect word to describe this film. It certainly isn't funny, just disturbing how any of the scenes can pass as comedy. People often criticise comedy sequels, and here we have the perfect example of a franchise that's more than overstayed its welcome and completely run out of ideas. The jokes in this one were replaced by basic shock factor, albeit shocking scenes that weren't very exciting.

The plot is equally stupid. For starters there isn't even a hangover. The plot just tries to use former glories to promote a sub-standard film that desperately tries to be bigger and better than the previous two, but forgets that comedy should be the crucial element in a comedy film. Pulling off a comedy sequel is no easy task, but I have no time for lazy sequels that just want to act as a cash cow instead of becoming inspiring and professional standalone pictures. I do respect the people involved for trying to veer away from the previous 'hangover' premise of the first two films, even though that was the most interesting part and a big talking point for the audience, but you just can't replace that empty void with just a plain plot with little laughs along the way. Surprisingly despite this film's success there hasn't been a fourth in the franchise.


#5 Blues Brothers 2000 (1998) (3/10)

'Blues Brothers 2000'. A film that doesn't contain the original Blues Brothers, and was released in 1998. That doesn't sound like a recipe for disaster does it? To be fair to the film the music isn't all that bad, it's just that the comedy and action parts ruin this one; which is really everything else this film offers. This sequel is so totally different from the original that I'm not even sure we can count this as a sequel. The cast is so different from the original it blows my mind they thought of rehashing the whole idea of the first film. Dan Aykroyd returns; that's it. The rest is a cast of wannabes trying to fill the shoes of roles they never had a hope of emulating. Especially that fucking kid, who should never be anywhere near a mature comedy film like the 'Blues Brothers'. I don't know who he is or how they fucking found him, but in all honesty I don't give a shit. Why the fuck would anyone try and shove a child into a mature comedy?

Once you've stopped getting angry at the hopeless cast you have a plot that doesn't even try to uncover new ground to enjoy. It's same old, same old, and that's just laziness that shouldn't be allowed in a film that attempts to revitalise a cult classic. There's no passion, no energy in this one. You get the sense the actors here want to line their pockets because they've got nothing better to do. That attitude certainly isn't funny to me, but then neither is the film. Hell, it's not even amusing. This is a limp wristed imitation of a classic that should never have been released. John Beluschi, who was one of the stars of the original, must be turning in his grave.


#4 Jaws: The Revenge (1987) (2/10)

The final straw in a franchise so legendary it's shameful to watch it stoop to such lows. If you're wondering why this guaranteed moneymaker of a series hasn't been rebooted since then I suggest you give this a watch. You can actually physically see the series go down the drain when we discover that sharks somehow have a psychic connection to relatives of their food, and can therefore trace members of their victim's family to further terrorise. No really, that is the plot. What makes it even more stupid is that it's sometimes told in flashbacks where the character in question wasn't even present. How they ever convinced seasoned veterans like Michael Caine to climb aboard this disaster is a mystery to me. Surely Caine must have realised sometime through production that he had been given an uninteresting script, with shit costars, and a development that went through absolute hell.

Even the shark is terribly made. This once terrifying villain has been reduced to an ugly prop that roars. As a zoology student not only am I offended by this depiction of a supposedly realistic shark, but I'm also qualified to tell you that roaring sharks are just ridiculous. The original shark actually put fear into the hearts of moviegoers everywhere and made them stay out of the water for an eternity, but this shark, the subject of the film, looks worse than the original and feels about as living as a zombie. This once iconic character is now kept as the least mysterious monster in cinema history, essentially becoming an aggressive tumor that can't help but repetitively ruin scenes, always appearing with the same opened mouthed expression that I suppose is fitting for a shark realising he's appearing in crap like this. This shark is not scary in any way, it's just sometimes there in the film for absolutely no reason. It must be a miracle for this shark when it's finally put out of its misery, being stabbed in a scene that resembles a cocktail stick attacking a sausage more than an epic death. A fitting end to an equally terrible film that was so shit that it's managed to get a 0% rating on Rotten Tomatoes.


#3 Superman IV: The Quest For Peace (1987) (2/10)

Remember when cheesy campness was good in a superhero film? Well this film decides there wasn't enough cheesy campness in the original 'Superman' films and takes it upon itself to ruin the legacy of possibly the most iconic superhero of all time. I'm not sure if there was a plot lying around somewhere in this film, but I sure as hell couldn't find one. The resulting mess is just a generic snoozefest, which isn't very impressive in a superhero film with quite possibly the ultimate superhero for an action packed laugh. The only laughs in this film are overshadowed by horror or sheer disbelief as superman saves the Statue of Liberty in possibly the worst looking scene of all time, and then saves and rebuilds The Great Wall of China from the horrors of a villain named 'Nuclear Man'.

'Nuclear Man' is actually so pathetic it's hilarious. Firstly he's called 'Nuclear Man', which already sounds like the shittest supervillain of all time, and that's even before you find out he's solar powered. He doesn't look any better than he sounds either, rather resembling something you would find in a back alley San Francisco club. And to top it all off he doesn't even talk. He's the most pathetic character of all time that we as the audience have to try and believe is the biggest threat to mankind. 'Nuclear Man' is if you haven't realised the worst social commentary for nuclear warfare ever created, and this film manages to butcher such a serious theme at such an unstable time. Turns out 1987 was just a terrible year for movie sequels. Saying this is worse than 'Jaws: The Revenge' is all you need to know.


#2 Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace (1999) (5/10)

I'm one of those people that tries to defend this film from the barrage of hate it so frequently gets, but there's no denying that this was a dreadful sequel in one of the most beloved franchises in cinema history. The only thing 'The Phantom Menace' does better than the originals is look really nice, which is a shame considering this is a beautiful film that actually has some great action sequences and a fucking cool villain, but unfortunately no soul or depth that are crucial for a great space opera. But creator George Lucas knew this. He redefined the rules of sci-fi with the original trilogy, so there's no excuse for this film going so horribly wrong.

Everything fans loved about the original 'Star Wars' films was ripped to shreds by multiple dreary sequences, uninteresting characters and settings, and a less than spectacular plot. How can you possibly justify having such hateful characters as Jar Jar Binks and a young Darth Vader in such a prestigious series? And yes there was a spoiler there, but do you honestly still need one for the Darth Vader plot point? A crucial plot point may I add that was almost completely ruined by this film alone. It's an insult that when you have a universe as rich as the 'Star Wars galaxy' you make a film as mundane as this. The original trilogies had 'The Death Star' blowing up twice, but all we got with this revamped version was some trade disputes between parties that weren't at all interesting. And that's the problem with this film. There's no ambition, so sense of grand adventure, no sense that we're witnessing galaxy changing events unfold. To surmise this was a sequel that forgot what made the originals great.


#1 Batman & Robin (1997) (0/10)

Has anything positive ever been said about this pile of shit? In all honesty if I have to go through everything wrong with this film you'll be reading this article for years. I guess I have to start with the huge issue of characters. It's almost a competition which is the worst character in this film, because all of them are so fucking awful it's not even funny. My choices are the two pictured above. That's Poison Ivy and Bane, who have no chemistry, walk about the set like two planks of wood, and have zero character development. In truth there's not a single thing noteworthy about any characters in this horror show. It doesn't help that the two central villains working together want to freeze the planet so Poison Ivy can grow flowers on it. How does that make any sense?

Even Batman himself suffers from the same flaws. George Clooney is a dreadful lead here, and even the hilariously bad puns of Arnold Schwarzenegger can't save this stinker of a performance. The fact that these performances almost killed such a beloved character speaks volume about how bad this film really is. And it doesn't stop there. The shitty awfulness just keeps going and going, torturing your insides. Shit scene after shit scene just keeps on appearing. I was so tortured by this abomination that I'm now experiencing PTSD just writing about it. Director Joel Schumacher did eventually apologise for this film, but that's not good enough. Simply apologising for an easily preventable atrocity that almost ruined a historic franchise just rubs salt in the wound in my eyes.