Movie franchise: the sequel

2006.01.06 — Entertainment | Movies | Movie Analysis | by Andrew Cole

This article is not a sequel. It's about sequels. I hope I don't write a follow-up article; I'm not sure what I would call it.

This being the 21st century, you're not really much of a filmmaker until you've made a film that is part of a franchise that will live on for decades, like the Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, and Police Academy movies. And even then, there's no guarantee that your work will be respected, like the Star Wars movies. There is a new trend among movie franchises, tho. In order to plan on additional films and still keep all the films together in alphabetic lists and computer searches, filmmakers are now resorting to punctuation, specifically: the colon.

There are several older schemes for naming sequels. The best known is just numbering each film: Jaw 1, Jaw 2, Jaws 3 (a.k.a. Jaws 3D), etc.

Unique titles

Before someone came up with the numbering thing—whenever that was*—you had to actually think of different titles for each movie, generally with something shared, like the name of the title character.

* The Godfather, Part II (1974) —Ed.

Most of the Andy Hardy movies had "Andy Hardy" in the name. The Thin Man movies all had "Thin Man" in the name, even tho the title originally referred to the skeletal victim. Likewise the Bulldog Drummond and Ma and Pa Kettle franchises.

The James Bond movies didn't bother to include "James Bond" in the title. They were actually completely different from one to the next. Of course, originally, the filmmakers told you the next movie's title at the end of each one: "James Bond will return in Goldfinger!" Then, when they were no longer sure what the next film would be called, they just put "James Bond will return!" as if we had any doubt.

Likewise, the Sherlock Holmes movies mostly took their titles from the tiles of the original stories, which were generally of the form "The Adventure of...."

Boring numerals

In the old days, sequels were named with the perfunctory numeral tacked on to the end: Rocky, Rocky II, Rocky III, Rocky IV.... Some used Arabic numerals (1, 2, 3..) and some used Roman numerals (I, II, III...), which is more traditional: World War II, for instance.

World War 2 wasn't a movie, and I never use Roman numerals for it anyway. —Ed.

I think you should read the Official War Naming Commission manual of style. —AC

The Friday the 13th movies added Part 2, Part 3, and so on, because Friday the 13th 2 doesn't make sense. And "Saturday the 14th" just isn't scary.

Unfortunately, the numbering thing is boring and uninformative (well, it does tell you what order they came in). Worse, audiences caught on that each film was just a rehash of the one before with a slightly different setup and with the better actors bowing out. At one time, it was common to say that sequels would 65% of the original's box office and that, therefore, they should have 65% of the budget. Rather than describing an immutable principle, this probably contributed to the problem of sequels more or less sucking.

Retroactive franchising

Sometimes, the original movie's title is tweaked to put it in line with later films and to create a connection. Star Wars is now called Star Wars Episode 4: A New Hope, which would have made no sense at all on its first release. Raiders of the Lost Ark is now regularly called Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark.

Colonizing... er... colonification

Today, franchises are thought out ahead of time, planned and scheduled. Actors sign multi-picture deals. And, most importantly, films get titles with a colon. The first film in the Lord of the Rings saga was Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, signaling clearly that there was more to come. Orlando Bloom and Johnny Depp signed on not merely to Pirates of the Caribbean but to Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl... and to a couple of others as well.

This has generated ridiculous titles like 2005's The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe.

Throw-backs

Spider-Man, Sahara (a Dirk Pitt adventure), and Harry Potter are throw-backs to older styles. Spidey is going to traditional numerical route, perhaps with a flourish later on (dare we suggest Spider-Man 4: Return of the Goblin?). The Dirk Pitt adventures will likely follow Clive Cussler's books in James Bond fashion (no repeated parts), just as the Harry Potter series follows JK Rowling's books in Indiana Jones fashion (the main character's name plus "and the" whatever.

Make no mistake tho. These franchises are just as carefully thought out and pre-planned as any film franchise today.

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