132 - Lord of the Rings
123 - Matrix
Right, I realized after posting that there is another entirely reasonable way to describe orderings… namely naming the three movies “1, 2, 3”, and then ordering them based on quality… and, to make things more confusing, for “123” and “321”, that results in the same string that my method does. But the method I was using in the OP is to have your little string of numbers be in chronological order, with the number indicating the films quality ranking. So read “132” as “the first one released was the best, then 3rd best, than 2nd best”.
I tend to agree that Lord of the Rings is probably 132. But Toy Story is a tough case. I would personally say that it’s either 312 or 213, but the rottenTomatoes rankings for the 3 films are 100, 100, 99, and the IMDB ratings are 8.3, 7.9, 8.4, and while I think Toy Story 3 was a fantastic movie, I’m not sure I’ve ever actually heard someone claim it’s the best of the three.
In any case, another 132 is Back to the Future.
The original Mad Max trilogy does seem to be 213, based on both RT and IMDB.
I think the recent Ocean’s 11 trilogy is pretty clearly 132.
I still don’t think we have an unambiguous 231… (remember, that’s a trilogy that starts OK, then gets worse, then ends with its strongest one…)
21…3…4 Aliens
Just so I’m not confused and/or confusing others, I mean Aliens was best, then Alien, then a long way down Alien3 then off the charts stupid Alien resurrection.
By IMDB ratings, Lord of the Rings would be 312 (FotR: 8.8, TT: 8.7, RotK: 8.9)
And there was only one Matrix movie. 
Absolutely and I’d also like to add that I thought Last Crusade was better than Raiders of the Lost Ark.
I’d say:
Lord of the Rings: 231
Indiana Jones: 312
Star Wars: 231
Mad Max: 321
Godfather: 213
Matrix: 123
Back to the Future: 312
Nolan’s Batman: 213
Yes, I liked Thunderdome better than Mad Max 2. 4 is the best in the series, though. Indiana Jones 4 was better than Temple of Doom(yes, I said it), but is worse than the other two.
My Lord of the Rings movies are for the extended. Two Towers is really the best film in its extended version. If we go by theatrical, it goes 132. Fellowship was amazing in its theatrical, but the other two surpassed it in extended format.
Some other trilogies not yet mentioned:
Silence of the Lambs, Hannibal, Red Dragon
Night of the Living Dead, Dawn of the Dead, Day of the Dead
El Mariachi, Desperado, Once Upon A Time In Mexico
Blade, Blade 2, Blade: Trinity
Austin Powers
Naked Gun
Spider-Man 1,2,3 (Tobey Maguire)
Pirates of the Caribbean
Evil Dead
What about the Dollars Trilogy? That’s either 2-3-1 or 3-2-1. Either way, The Good, The Bad and the Ugly was the best of the three.
Not a trilogy, but Robert Downey Jr’s first three top-billed outings as Iron Man – you know, IRON MAN, and IRON MAN 2, and THE AVENGERS – also go 2-3-1.
Godfather is 21…3
So’s the Matrix, now that I think about it. I really liked a lot of the new ideas they had for 2 (orgies aside), never thought the first was all that special beyond the effects, which the 2nd one at least matched if not surpassed, but the 3rd one just pulled down its pants and shit right down the throat of everything that the 2nd one seemed to be setting up.
That’s my opinion anyway.
*Hmm… reading through the thread the numbers thing seems to be really confusing and the more explanations people try to make the more mixed up it gets.
Just to be clear, in my post I am saying the 2nd movie in these series is best, the 1st movie is a close second, and the 3rd movie is of considerably less quality and therefore in last place.*
The Bourne Ultimatum earned at least one critical review mentioning its jarring use of rapid shifting between camera angles, so that the average length of all the film sequences used is on the order of milliseconds. I found it almost nauseating to watch for this reason. Narratively the third film doesn’t do much for the story arc, serving only to flesh out a gap left in the closing minutes of the second film. So despite what the IMDB consensus is, I’d put Ultimatum in third place, consistent with either the ranking 213 (for me that’s the mere exposure effect at work, since I’ve seen The Bourne Supremacy at least twice as many times as The Bourne Identity) or the ranking 123.
Silence of the Lambs, Hannibal, Red Dragon - 132
El Mariachi, Desperado, Once Upon A Time In Mexico - 213
Blade, Blade 2, Blade: Trinity - 213
Austin Powers - 132
Spider-Man 1,2,3 - 213
Pirates of the Caribbean* - 213
*There are actually four of these, with more on the way.
I gave up after Hannibal, was Red Dragon actually worth it?
Oh yeah, in fact if you see Silence of the Lambs and Red Dragon and you NEVER see Hannibal you’d be a lucky fellow.
Definitely worth it. It was a huge surprise, but it’s actually a really good movie. It’s directed by Brett Ratner, too, which makes it an even larger surprise since he’s a hack.
I finally got a 231.
Kieslowski’s the Three Colors Trilogy. Starts strong with Blue, then moves to White, which is considered the worst, but finishing up with Red, which is widely considered the best of the three.
Maybe somewhat obscure, but it definitely is a true trilogy and actually works. I just can’t believe it took me this long to think of it, since it’s some of my favorite movies.
Star Trek (original cast) movies: 5.1.3.2.6.4
That is the wierdest preference pattern I’ve ever seen. You rank Temple as the best of the first three (which by itself was already in the running for strangest preference) then say that you prefer 4 to your #1 ranked movie, but think it worse than the two movies you just ranked third and second.
Maybe I’ve done a bit too much game theory, but preference patterns like yours are part of what makes it hard to design fair elections.
Is that your worst-to-best or best-to-worst ordering?
My own best-to-worst order for the first three would be 2-3-1, matching the request of the OP.
For all six, it’d be 2-4-6-3-1-5
The OP mentions best-to-worst and worst-to-best order exactly nowhere, I’m not sure where you’re getting that from.
I was tempted not to forgive you for ranking ST5 as your #1 movie, but I think we should just assume that anyone who doesn’t have a 6 in the fifth position of this question didn’t understand the OP’s nomenclature. (Pay special attention to his second-to-last sentence.)
Personally, I think the 5th best movie was released first, then the (1st) best, 4th best, 2nd best, 6th ‘best’, then finally 3rd best, so in the language of the OP:
5-1-4-2-6-3