If you look at the schedule for this year's blockbuster movies, you will see that there are many threequels on their way to cinemas. There's Ocean's Eleven 3. Spider-man 3. Pirates of the Caribbean 3. Bourne 3. Shrek 3. Rush Hour 3. Your gut reflex is to get excited. After all, threequels are only made when the first two movies in a series have been wildly successful, and chances are that you will have loved the first two movies in the series (or at least the first one). However, your second reflex is probably to say something along the lines of: "Wait, the second one also sucked, so why should I be interested in number three?" Still, it's too easy to just dismiss threequels like that, or at least until we've done some research into the subject. Are threequels a blessing for fans, or just a way to make more money?
Is 3 really the magic number?
For this little bit of research, I looked at the IMDB scores for some of the most famous movie trilogies ever made, added up those scores and looked whether or not it's true that it's always the first movie in a trilogy that's the best, or if threequels get a bad rap.
American Pie (6.8 / 6.2 / 6.2)
The first movie was a lot of fun, a fresh piece of high school comedy with some great scenes and cool characters, but the additional sequels missed the sparkle of the first movie. I'll admit I still enjoyed two and three quite a bit, but it was already losing it's charm before the credits roled on sequel numero uno.
Back to the Future (8.1 / 7.1 / 6.8)
I absolutely love the first movie in this trilogy, and so do many other people on the IMDB, who have propelled this movie to a high position in the top 250. The other two movies in the trilogy aren't that much worse, it's just that the second one was overcomplicating things, while the third was basically a retread of the first one, just in a different setting. Still, it's almost impossible for me to watch the first one without popping in movie 2 and 3 as well.
Star Wars (8.8 / 8.8 / 8.2)
An amazing trilogy, that, when viewed back to back to back, is almost like one long movie. Not a lot of loss of quality here, though many people see the second one as the best, and, here we go, as the least of the three.
Indiana Jones (8.7 / 7.2 / 8.1)
In many trilogies, it's the second movie that is considered the worst, and the Indiana Jones trilogy is no exception. While the first and third ones are considered classics, the second one just doesn't feel as epic and wonderful, and seems made more to cash in on the unexpected succes of the original than movie number three.
Police Academy (5.9 / 4.6 / 4.1)
I know that you can hardly consider these movies to be classics, but as a kid I really loved the first movie. And even though my standards weren't that high back then, I could also see that after movie three, things were probably never going to be turned around for the better anymore.
Rambo (6.9 / 5.2 / 4.2)
A clear case of a trilogy where things fell apart after the first movie. Let's hope part four will do a Rocky Balboa and surprise us.
Rocky (7.8 / 6.4 / 5.8)
Even though the quality of the movies decreased rapidly, they were still immensely popular at the time they came out. And Stallone did the unthinkable and made a sixth movie in this series that came close to the quality of the first one.
Taxi (1: 6.6 / 6.1 / 5.2)
I enjoy these French action movies a lot, but I have to admit that, thinking back of them, I cannot remember what exactly happened in which of the three parts!
Lethal Weapon (7.4 / 6.9 / 6.3)
We still kept anticipating the latest installments in this series, even though we knew the last part had been significantly worse than the part before it.
Jurassic Park (7.5 / 5.6 / 5.6)
The first one was great, the second one a snoozer, but the third one was quite exciting again, though you don't see that reflected in the scores on the IMDB. Guess I'm one of the few people who liked the third one then.
The Godfather (9.1 / 9.0 / 7.4)
Though many people consider the third movie underrated, it cannot hold a candle to the first two movies.
Porky's (5.5 / 4.0 / 3.6)
The first movie was funny in a subversive way, but I recently saw the second movie for the first time and was shocked at how horrible it was. I think I'll pass on number three then...
X-Men (7.3 / 7.9 / 7.1)
One of the few times when part two improved on part one, but part three was slightly inferior to both, which can have something to do with the change in directors.
Jaws (8.3 / 5.5 / 3.3)
It might not seem fair to include this one, since the drop-off is so dramatic, but it's the studio's fault for releasing such attrocities.
Terminator (7.9 / 8.3 / 6.8)
So far, sequels are faring a lot better than threequels, although I personally really enjoyed all parts in this trilogy.
Beverly Hills Cop (7.2 / 5.8 / 4.7)
Another case of an eighties movie getting some boring sequels that failed to excite the fans of the original movie.
The Fast and the Furious (5.6 / 5.0 / 5.3)
I'm shocked at the low grade the original is getting, not so shocked at the even lower grades of parts two and three.
Scream (7.0 / 5.8 / 5.3)
The Scream-movies didn't fare much better than the horror movies they winked at. A great first movie, a rapid decline in quality with the sequels.
Robocop (7.3 / 4.9 / 3.1)
That's what you get when you let the sequels get made by people who didn't understand the original movie.
So there you have it. Judging from these twenty instances when a movie series went to movie number three (or further), threequels really are a lot worse than the originals. There isn't a single threequel that bests the original movie, with only a few threequels scoring higher than it's preceding sequels. The final score? Originals: 7.36, sequels 6.02, threequels 5.36. In other words, I wouldn't hold my breath to be as excited about all those threequels as you were about the originals, or even the sequels. Of course, this does not mean the movies cannot at least be enjoyable, but it might be better to check out some of the more original movies coming out this year instead (not that there are many of those, but that's a whole different story!).
What about The Matrix?
Posted by: Don M | February 20, 2007 at 04:40 PM
Ranking with Star Wars, where the 2nd movie is the strongest (I haven't checked whether IMDb agrees):
Mad Max / Road Warrior / Beyond Thunderdome
El Mariachi / Desperado / Once upon a Time in Mexico
And a special case, where each sequel gets better (and yes, I know they're not precisely sequels):
A Fistful of Dollars / For a Few Dollars More / The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly
But these are rare indeed. The normal case is for the first sequel to suck miserably, and the next to go either way but still not measure up to the original.
Posted by: Alan S. | February 20, 2007 at 10:46 PM
Yeah, I guess I did miss a few sequels that were worthwile actually. The second Mad Max was a lot of fun, and I also loved Desperado. Great choice by the way for your last trilogy! Three excellent movies, and at least a trilogy in style and feel.
Oh and the Matrix trilogy... I guess I forgot those movies because I tried too hard to forget I ever saw the sequels ;)
Posted by: ScribbleKing | February 20, 2007 at 10:55 PM