I’ll nominate the Trancers films. Last I saw, they were literally up to number eight or nine in the direct-to-video market. If you had told me that Point Break was going to become a five or six-part home video franchise, I’d have been less surprised than if you told me about Trancers.
What’s your vote? Critters? Universal Soldier? Trois?
It surprises me that so much mileage has been gotten out of the Puppet Master series.
TREMORS, a movie that I didn’t expect to like but loved (mainly for Michael Gross/Reba McEntyre’s survivalist nuts), spawned a sequel that premiered theatrically (sans Bacon or Reba) and then some straight to video sequels and a syndicated TV series. I think Michael Gross appeared in all of them.
Eddie & The Cruisers (starring the great looking and really talentless Michael Pare) was, iirc, the first movie flop to become a big hit on video, so much so that a video sequel was released.
The Addams Family was a huge box office hit, Addams Family Values a hit but not nearly as big, and then when Raul Julia died and Anjelica Huston wasn’t interested the series continued with a couple of video movies. The biggest budget one starred Tim Curry and Darryl Hannah as Gomez & Morticia. The only common cast members were Carel Struycken as Lurch and (magician) Christopher Hart('s) hand as Thing. Later they went to a really low budget series of videos with no-name actors, though John Astin appeared as an Addams ancestor in one.
There was a direct to video series of Captain Kangaroo tapes with- BURN IN HELL HERETICS!= a non Bob Keeshan Kangaroo. Since said time producers and stars have lost their immortal souls.
That seems unusal content for a Captain Kangaroo video.
I’m picturing the Captain being showered with flaming ping pong balls…
The Land Before Time simply will not stop. I think I remember seeing the first one in the theater, though I could be wrong about that since I would have been about 4 or 5 at the time, but now they are on number 12 or something.
Hard to believe that a ten-page short story could not only spawn a feature-length movie, but also six sequels.
All of which I’ve seen. Yes, I’m that pathetic.
I saw the first one in the theater too, and then I caught the first sequel on TV, slightly surprised that it got made at all. Then, I suddenly spotted number ten at the video store. Damn. I’d almost like to rent them all just to see what the hell they’re about.
If you’ve seen one of them, you already know the answer.
I believe the next one is titled The Land Before A Couple Of Saturdays Ago.
What, they quest to a new place each installment?
Honestly, I don’t know - I’ve only seen a few, but the point is they all seem so bland and samey, I can’t remember what happened in which.
I can’t believe how many “sequels” they got out of The Howling.
Actually, what I can’t believe is that they got away with calling them sequels when none of them actualy were, except the first one. The original was worth watching for the effects, the cameos, and the cheesy in-jokes. The second was worth watching for Sybil Danning’s boobs (don’t watch it on TV – they can’t show them, so the film has no point). There are a couple of interesting ideas in the others, but not enough to justify a movie (Marsupial werewolves!)
That is a courageous bit of casting! How’d she do?
I did not expect Poison Ivy to be made in sequels and I will admit I was a little surprised to see Roadhouse get a sequel
The Addams Family and Captain Kangaroo also had new TV series at one point in time. Speaking of which, The Land Before Time is now also a TV show. Why didn’t they just do that in the first place?
The fact that Fox has done Sandlot DTV sequels is amazing, but the king of unusual DTV films (other than Disney, of course, who has announced- thankfully- that they are stopping the process) has to be Universal. Besides the countless Land Before Times, they’ve given us three Beethovens, two Bring It Ons, two American Pies, and rumor had it they were going to do a Back to the Future IV. If Universal’s direct-to-video franchising keeps up at this pace, maybe they really will make that movie Peter Jackson joked about where King Kong’s son fights Nazis.
Land Before Time, eh? This is a good opportunity to pimp one of my current favorite webcomics by way of example – A New Captcha Approach.
Universal has been doing this for decades. Dracula, Frankenstein, Wolf-Man, etc.
Go to imdb.com and do a search on Lon Chaney or John Carradine.
Yes, but were there VCRs back then?