# What is the WORST immediate sequel to a great film? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Tags:** movies\ **Created:** [May 11, 2025, 7:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-worst-immediate-sequel-to-a-great-film/1018246 "2025-05-11T07:15:33Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 10
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2025, 5:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-worst-immediate-sequel-to-a-great-film/1018246/181 "2025-05-15T17:56:50Z")
_Beneath the Planet of the Apes_ has already been mentioned, but another sequel came out about the same time. Time magazine’s review of both was entitled _Beneath and Beyond_. That’s because the other sequel was **Beyond the Valley of the Dolls** , a sequel to the 1967 motion picture version of Jacqueline Susann’s **Valley of the Dolls**. Neither the book nor the movie was a “classic”, but the sequel was even worse, from all accounts. (I’ve never seen it). It was directed by Russ Meyer, better known these days for employing women who had “blown themselves up to poster size”. The film was originally intended as a straight sequel but quickly devolved into parody. It was panned by critics. But, as often happens, it persisted and became a Cult Classic. Oh, yeah, and its screenplay was written by critic Roger Ebert. It stars probably no one you ever heard of, although Edy Williams, who appeared in Playboy and other mags, has a role. Pam Grier apparently has a bit part. And it was the last film of Coleman Francis, whose three most famous movies were the subjects of MST3K outings. And Trina Parks (“Thumper” in the Bond film _Diamonds are Forever_ has a bit part.) ---
**Author:** ![hogarth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hogarth/32/1773_2.png) [@hogarth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hogarth)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2025, 6:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-worst-immediate-sequel-to-a-great-film/1018246/182 "2025-05-15T18:02:36Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > That’s because the other sequel was **Beyond the Valley of the Dolls** , a sequel to the 1967 motion picture version of Jacqueline Susann’s **Valley of the Dolls**. Neither the book nor the movie was a “classic”, but the sequel was even worse, from all accounts. (I’ve never seen it). I haven’t seen **Valley of the Dolls** , but I found the Meyer/Ebert movie to be enjoyable cheese (and cheesecake). ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2025, 6:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-worst-immediate-sequel-to-a-great-film/1018246/183 "2025-05-15T18:06:09Z")
Beyond the title it is definitely not a sequel. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2025, 6:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-worst-immediate-sequel-to-a-great-film/1018246/184 "2025-05-15T18:11:17Z")
Neither are a lot of supposed “sequels”, like **Prom Night 2** > **[Hello Mary Lou: Prom Night II](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hello_Mary_Lou:_Prom_Night_II)** > > Hello Mary Lou: Prom Night II is a 1987 Canadian supernatural slasher film directed by Bruce Pittman, written by Ron Oliver, and starring Michael Ironside, Wendy Lyon, Louis Ferreira, and Lisa Schrage. It follows Vicki Carpenter, a high school student who becomes possessed by Mary Lou Maloney, a student who died at her high school prom in 1957. A sequel to the slasher film Prom Night (1980), it was originally intended to be a standalone film titled The Haunting of Hamilton High, but was retitl ..or most the **Howlling** series ---
**Author:** ![Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/elmer_j.fudd/32/1211_2.png) [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elmer_J.Fudd)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2025, 6:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-worst-immediate-sequel-to-a-great-film/1018246/185 "2025-05-15T18:44:51Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > Oh, yeah, and its screenplay was written by critic Roger Ebert. Beyond the Ebert connection, the only other thing interesting about that film is The Strawberry Alarm Clock. ---
**Author:** ![ParallelLines](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/parallellines/32/3575_2.png) [@ParallelLines](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ParallelLines)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2025, 8:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-worst-immediate-sequel-to-a-great-film/1018246/186 "2025-05-15T20:38:22Z")
> [@f.coli](#): > > 100% agreement from me, but I enjoy the Rifftrax commentary when I watch it. It’s a holiday tradition for me (and no one else). Incorrect! It’s a tradition for myself and my friends as well. Albeit also the Rifftrax version (“What are you, tobacco?!?!”) and in a very well lubricated state. And even then, it’s _terrible_ but traditions are what they are. By the way, the person who started this tradition in my group of friends received the Star Wars: The Life Day Cookbook from us as a “gift”, and it makes great fun of Bantha Surprise, which is readable in the Amazon preview pages. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2025, 9:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-worst-immediate-sequel-to-a-great-film/1018246/187 "2025-05-15T21:06:19Z")
> [@CallieGirl](#): > > I didn’t “get” the original “2001” either. I tried, I swear. But I just didn’t. Great filmmaking but I didnt get it either. > [@CalMeacham](#): > > Oh, yeah, and its screenplay was written by critic Roger Ebert. I wonder if he gave it a good review? ---
**Author:** ![Mahaloth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mahaloth/32/1079_2.png) [@Mahaloth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mahaloth)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2025, 10:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-worst-immediate-sequel-to-a-great-film/1018246/188 "2025-05-15T22:45:47Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > I wonder if he gave it a good review? > [@](#): > > Ebert said that Beyond the Valley of the Dolls seemed “ **like a movie that got made by accident when the lunatics took over the asylum** ”. Ebert says Meyer "directed his actors with a poker face, solemnly discussing the motivations behind each scene. ---
**Author:** ![Mahaloth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mahaloth/32/1079_2.png) [@Mahaloth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mahaloth)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2025, 10:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-worst-immediate-sequel-to-a-great-film/1018246/189 "2025-05-15T22:47:29Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > I wonder if he gave it a good review? On the other hand…Gene Siskel: > [@](#): > > The film was critically panned upon release. Ebert’s future TV co-host [Gene Siskel](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gene_Siskel) gave the film zero stars out of four, writing in the _[Chicago Tribune](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicago_Tribune)_ that the film “unfolds with all of the humor and excitement of a padded bra … Boredom aplenty is provided by a screenplay which for some reason has been turned over to a screenwriting neophyte”.[[37]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beyond_the_Valley_of_the_Dolls#cite_note-Siskel-38) He later put it on his list of the 20 worst films of the year.[[38]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beyond_the_Valley_of_the_Dolls#cite_note-39) ---
**Author:** ![mbh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a6a055/32.png) [@mbh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mbh)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2025, 11:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-worst-immediate-sequel-to-a-great-film/1018246/190 "2025-05-15T23:07:55Z")
The thing I remember about **Beyond the Valley of the Dolls** was that the script had a lot of teenage slang, spoken by characters who were definitely not teenagers. I often got the impression that the actors would have been far more comfortable with iambic pentameter, than with the lines they were given. ---
**Author:** ![f.coli](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/eada6e/32.png) [@f.coli](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/f.coli)\ **Post date:** [May 16, 2025, 4:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-worst-immediate-sequel-to-a-great-film/1018246/191 "2025-05-16T16:13:32Z")
I’m not surprised that others honor(?) the tradition, and I should have said no one else _in my family._ ---
**Author:** ![Hermione1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/d07c76/32.png) [@Hermione1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hermione1)\ **Post date:** [May 19, 2025, 2:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-worst-immediate-sequel-to-a-great-film/1018246/192 "2025-05-19T14:43:01Z")
The YouTuber Diva (aka Christi Esterle, past Jeopardy winner) has done [a riff of it](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cpvD8Eo8ixw) as well as part of her Musical Hell TV series. (She’s retired from the Musical Hell part, but still does the other sub-series, such as At The Source, which compares musicals to their source material, Know The Score, which discusses musical theater and films in general, and Musical Hell TV, which riffs bad musicals.) I’ll pay her the compliment of saying her riff of the SWHS is as good as the Rifftrax one–maybe better. (I like her comment on the brief All In The Family commercial–paraphrased: “Ah, the days when TV could show a right-wing bigot forced to confront his ingrained prejudices.” ---
**Author:** ![Hermione1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/d07c76/32.png) [@Hermione1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hermione1)\ **Post date:** [May 19, 2025, 2:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-worst-immediate-sequel-to-a-great-film/1018246/193 "2025-05-19T14:44:46Z")
I think Richard O’Brien has said something to the effect that Shock Treatment’s not a sequel, or a prequel, but an “equal.” I interpret it as meaning this is an AU of the Rocky Horror universe…an alternate timeline where Brad and Janet never got stuck in Frank-N-Furter’s castle. ---
**Author:** ![Hermione1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/d07c76/32.png) [@Hermione1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hermione1)\ **Post date:** [May 19, 2025, 3:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-worst-immediate-sequel-to-a-great-film/1018246/194 "2025-05-19T15:33:46Z")
As for my own candidate… Maybe 2005’s The Legend of Zorro wasn’t the WORST immediate sequel (if, indeed, eight years after The Mask of Zorro counts as “immediate”). But it was a drop-off. Mainly, because the main engine driving the plot was rather unbelievable as well as historically inaccurate. I mean, there’s “suspension of disbelief” and there’s “instant divorce in a heavily Catholic region in the nineteenth century.” My tendency to script-doctor kicks in with this one…the movie would have been better, perhaps even lived up to the original, if they’d pulled a Vertigo and had the Pinkerton agents blackmail Elena into faking her death and impersonating someone else. That would have afforded us some drama as a grieving Alejandro struggles to hold on for his young son’s sake, and, after seeing this new woman in town who so resembles Elena, fears he is going mad from grief in believing it’s really her. And it would have given us a hell of a scene when Alejandro, after finding out the truth, confronts the Pinkerton agents who are behind the scheme… “Why Elena? Any other woman would have served your purpose just as well. Some Don’s patriotic daughter, or some widow, or, hell, you could have trained a whore from the brothel to impersonate an aristocrat. Instead, you settle on a devoted wife and mother and blackmail her with her husband’s safety. You force her to fake her death with no guarantee she could go back to her old life afterwards…or even that she’d survive this at all. You put her through hell. You put me through hell. You put HER EIGHT-YEAR-OLD SON THROUGH HELL!!! If there’s a shred of humanity left in either of you, you will tell me why you did this!” One of the agents replies, “Because no other woman–no Don’s daughter or widow or whore–had the inside information on your society that your wife already did. And it would have taken time to train another operative–time we didn’t have. By the time we would have had any other operative ready, it may well have been too late for this country.” “Congratulations,” Alejandro sneers. “You thought of everything.” The agent glowers. “It’s easy for you to judge us, isn’t it, Don de la Vega? You charge in on your stallion and wave your sword and the public hails you as a hero. As they should. You do, after all, save lives. Our work saves lives too…but no one hails us as heroes. We work in the shadows because we have to…because we have to make the dirty decisions that the public doesn’t know about and doesn’t want to know about because they don’t want to believe these decisions are necessary. The kind of decisions where we may have to allow five innocent people to die so that five _thousand_ innocent people can live. That’s the truth of our work. That’s what we have to do and will continue to do. But don’t think for a minute, if I do have to let five innocent people die, that I am not haunted by those five every day of my life. Whether the good I try to do outweighs any evil I have to allow…I’ll find that out on my day of judgment.” ---
**Author:** ![ShadowFacts](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/shadowfacts/32/2934_2.png) [@ShadowFacts](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ShadowFacts)\ **Post date:** [May 19, 2025, 3:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-worst-immediate-sequel-to-a-great-film/1018246/195 "2025-05-19T15:51:34Z")
> [@Mahaloth](#): > > “unfolds with all of the humor and excitement of a padded bra” Whaaaaaaaat? 🤮 (Note that this comment is from Gene Siskel, not Mahaloth, who was just quoting). ---
**Author:** ![f.coli](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/eada6e/32.png) [@f.coli](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/f.coli)\ **Post date:** [May 19, 2025, 4:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-worst-immediate-sequel-to-a-great-film/1018246/196 "2025-05-19T16:45:31Z")
Thanks for the recommendation. I will try to watch it in the next few days. The channel looks interesting. ---
**Author:** ![Hermione1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/d07c76/32.png) [@Hermione1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hermione1)\ **Post date:** [May 19, 2025, 4:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-worst-immediate-sequel-to-a-great-film/1018246/197 "2025-05-19T16:47:58Z")
Hope you like! ---
**Author:** ![Tzigone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/839c29/32.png) [@Tzigone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tzigone)\ **Post date:** [May 19, 2025, 4:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-worst-immediate-sequel-to-a-great-film/1018246/198 "2025-05-19T16:53:14Z")
> [@Hermione1](#): > > Maybe 2005’s The Legend of Zorro wasn’t the WORST immediate sequel (if, indeed, eight years after The Mask of Zorro counts as “immediate”). But it was a drop-off. Mainly, because the main engine driving the plot was rather unbelievable as well as historically inaccurate. I mean, there’s “suspension of disbelief” and there’s “instant divorce in a heavily Catholic region in the nineteenth century.” I have seen the movie - or at least part of the movie. I don’t remember if I finished it. I have mercifully forgotten all but two terrible scenes (and one of those I recall from the trailer, not the movie). But I seem to remember from an internet post panning the movie that the CSA/Confederate army exists in 1850. ---
**Author:** ![simster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/simster/32/1047_2.png) [@simster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/simster)\ **Post date:** [May 19, 2025, 6:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-worst-immediate-sequel-to-a-great-film/1018246/199 "2025-05-19T18:03:09Z")
I think this is an example where waiting too long to do a sequel will always guarantee a bad sequel - even more so if what you are a sequel to has any kind of following at all- See - Star Wars prequels and sequels as another fine example. ---
**Author:** ![N9IWP](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/n9iwp/32/3154_2.png) [@N9IWP](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/N9IWP)\ **Post date:** [May 19, 2025, 6:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-worst-immediate-sequel-to-a-great-film/1018246/200 "2025-05-19T18:20:38Z")
**2010** came out in 1984 - **2001** came out in 1968 (almost double the time difference based in title) While not a cinematic masterpiece, **2010** was IMHO pretty good. Brian I don’t know what you folks are talking about there was only one **Highlander** movie 😉 [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-worst-immediate-sequel-to-a-great-film/1018246.md?page=9) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-worst-immediate-sequel-to-a-great-film/1018246.md?page=11)