This isn’t a poll about sequels in general. Movies like Highlander 2 and…well, Highlander 5 have pretty much made talking about bad sequels redundant. We know there are a ton.
Instead, I want to focus on four sequels I hear about regularly. By hear about them regularly, I mean that I often hear about how disappointing and bad they were compare to what was expected. In all of these(except Matix 3), some serious time passed between the previous movie in the series.
Cool…I’m first…
I picked Indiana Jones because the fact that the aliens were real and actually aliens took away from what the series was…about archeology and fact based supernaturality (Bible stuff) and not just aliens.
It was a toss-up between Crystal Skull and Phantom Menace. Godfather 3 only suffers in comparison with the first two. By itself it’s an OK gangster movie. The matrix sequels had good action sequences. The fight for Zion was kind of cool if you didn’t stop to ask why the didn’t fully armor their mechas.
I went with Phantom menace because man did I hate that movie. It wasn’t Jar-Jar that was the problem for me, it was Annakin. What a horrible child actor Jake Lloyd was. Darth Vader as a whiny petulant mary-sue was painful to watch. The last Indy movie was merely bad, a poorly written lazy money-making machine.
It’s an unbelievably boring and horrible movie. After that, I’d go with The Matrix Revolutions, a movie that I almost fell asleep during(and I do NOT sleep during movies). After that, the Godfather III, which had its moments but was mostly badly directed.
I liked Indiana Jones 4. I agree it should have been a religious item, not an “inter-dimensional being” kind of item, but it was good aside from that and the monkeys.
Phantom Menace. Its the worst movie of the 4 just taken on its own merits and it was easily the one that had the most anticipation before it was released, and thus the biggest disappointment.
It also didn’t help that when watching it you knew that irregardless of how much it sucked, nothing was going to stop Lucas from making two more crummy sequels.
I haven’t seen Godfather 3, but of the other three, Phantom Menace is the worst for how far the rot spreads. Crystal Skull was merely bad, while Revolutions was bad and killed off everything that I liked from the first movie, but Phantom Menacecorrupted Darth Vader and the Jedi. Darth Vader is supposed to be awesome, not the millstone around a movie’s neck. And the shithole that is Tatooine shouldn’t be shoved into the limelight just to show the Jedi Council not doing their jobs.
The Star Wars, Matrix and Indiana Jones sequels were modestly entertaining as popcorn movies; I might watch them again if they were on TV. I found Godfather III to be quite boring, though, not nearly as engrossing as the first two.
The main bad thing about Godfather 3 is Sophia Coppola attempting to act, especially opposite Al Pacino. I swear in one scene he’s rolling his eyes at how awful her acting is.
Had a tough time making up my mind, but Indiana Jones was the largest disappointment for me.
Phantom Menace sucked the most because it was so anticipated and delivered so little. Also because it did the most canonical damage to the original franchise (they ruined the Force).
I didn’t think Crystal Skull was all that bad actually. I can accept aliens more easily than gods.
Haven’t seen Godfather 3 yet though from what I have read I doubt it’s an average film at worst.
My vote goes to Phantom Menace a truly terrible film and I say this as someone who liked the next two prequels quite a bit. Matrix Revolutions is not far behind; a really boring and confusing film. I thought Crystal Skull was mildly enjoyable for about three quarters of the way and quite a lot better than the awful Temple of Doom which deserves to be on this poll instead.
You have telepathic powers, you said exactly what I had in mind, in probably a better way than I would have. And yeah, fucking Annakin. But I’ll go for Indy, at least Phantom Menace could be mentally confined to the new trilogy, Indy couldnt. It was the same actor, same director, same creative team. And, apart from a few moments of inspiration (I liked the Atomic shot, could have been a reflection on how much Jones is out of touch, how we’ve moved from pulp to atomic adventures), it was constantly shitting on the legacy of one of the best characters ever created for movies.
Ooh tough. I couldn’t even make it through Crystal Skull, it was so bad and difficult to follow (wait, Sheea TheBeef comes out? And he’s his son or something?). But in the interest of accuracy, I said Phantom Menace. It’s main sins were poor acting and poor directing, which ties in with Indiana Jones.
The other two might be disappointing considering what they followed, but Godfather III was perfectly serviceable on its own. The third Matrix was a muddled mess, but considering it follows the also disappointing second film, it’s not so terrible. I am completely blanking on 95% of the plot of that film, though.
Phantom Menace, hands down. I recently had occasion to watch it again, and was impressed by the number of idiotic plot elements or characters, many of which were not only nonsensical in themselves but also made parts of the original series nonsensical.
Jar-Jar Binks.
A planet democratically electing a 14-year-old girl as Queen.
Jar-Jar Binks.
Having some of the major villains be a pseudo-Japanese Trade Federation. Yawn.
Jar-Jar Binks.
Having Anakin’s home world be Tatooine, making it be ridiculous place to be a hideout for Luke and Obi-Wan in the original series.
Jar-Jar Binks.
Having Anakin show not the slightest glimmer of the Vader-to-be.
Jar-Jar Binks.
Demystifying the force with midichlorians.
Jar-Jar Binks.
Having another major villian, Darth Maul, lack any characterization whatever.
Making Jar-Jar Binks a general during a critical battle.
Godfather III was not a bad movie in itself, it just wasn’t as good as the other two.
Matrix Revolutions was just confusing. I can’t remember enough about it to hate it.
As for the Crystal Skull, I actually thought having aliens was a good way to bring the series into the 1950s. In that era aliens had started to take on aspects of mythological deities a la Chariots of the Gods. The movie just wasn’t all that good.
