sequels | the m0vie blog

Requiem for The Wolverine: Why Darren Aaronofsky was the Perfect Choice to Direct The Wolverine…

Posted on June 17, 2011 by Darren

I was actually really anticipating what Darren Aronofsky could bring to The Wolverine, the sequel to the rather lackluster X-Men Origins: Wolverine. So I was actually genuinely disappointed when it was announced – rumoured to be for the inevitable creative reasons – that Aronofsky would not be directing the film after all. While it’s great that this affords Aronofsky complete creative freedom on the next film he works on, and while I certainly don’t want a film that has been subject to Fox’s executive meddling, I can’t help but regret what might have been.

Blades of glory?

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Filed under: Movies | Tagged: brett ratner, bryan singer, chris claremont, Christopher Nolan, Clint Eastwood, Darren Aronofsky, films, Fox, hugh jackman, Movies, sequels, The Wolverine, x-men, X-Men Origins: Wolverine | 6 Comments »

Non-Review Review: X-Men – First Class

Posted on May 30, 2011 by Darren

X-Men: First Class is easily the best thing to emerge from Bryan Singer’s X-Men movie franchise since X-Men II, all those years ago. Jane Goldman’s smart script and Matthew Vaughn’s confident direction help inject life back into the franchise that stirred up this current superhero blockbuster fad, providing one of the finest examples of the subgenre. Although the movie does occasionally veer a little bit too close to (and, once or twice, right into) camp, it’s also a clever, brave, bold and exciting action adventure, which provides the best characterisation of the series to date.

We've got it covered...

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: aleternate history, Beast (comics), blockbuster, bryan singer, charles xavier, civil rights, Cuban Missile Crisis, film, first class, hellfire club, history, ian mckellen, james mcavoy, Jane Goldman, Jean Grey, kennedy, kevin bacon, kick-ass, magneto, marvel, matthew vaughn, Michael Fassbender, Movie, non-review review, prequel, president kennedy, Professor X, review, sequels, sixties, trilogy, x-men, X-Men (film), X-Men: First Class | 15 Comments »

Too Much of a Good Thing: Why Inception Might Be Best Left as One of a Kind…

Posted on November 3, 2010 by Darren

Apparently Warner Brothers want a sequel to Inception. That’s a long way from the earlier rumour that Inception was a “gift” to Nolan, almost a sort of bribe in order to keep him on board for Batman 3 (or, as it shall henceforth be known, The Dark Knight Rises), and one that the studio was never really 100% certain about. While I’m delighted the movie turned out to be successful enough to warrant a sequel, I can’t help but hope that it is never produced or released.

This announcement knocked me for a loop...

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Filed under: Movies | Tagged: batman begins, blade runner, Christopher Nolan, dark knight, Inception, inception sequel, Matrix, sequels, terry gilliam, Warner Bros | 4 Comments »

Counting Your Chickens… Green Lighting Sequels Before the Original is Released

Posted on July 7, 2010 by Darren

I would have thought that the mess that was caused by The Matrix Revolutions and The Matrix Reloaded would have killed the notion of greenlighting several films at once – those two movies, following up to the science-fiction phenomenon which was The Matrix, represented a jumble of ideas from the film makers, without the counterbalance or mass appeal which defined the original. The Wachowski Brothers, allowed free reign, proceeded to produce two extremely dense discourses on abstract philosophy lacking in any real heart and populated with awkwardly assembled set pieces and grand-sounding ideas. I would have assumed that the poor reception and somewhat negative impact the two films have had on their iconic predecessor would have dissuaded studios from allowing such free reign again. However, it seems that the trend might be coming back into vogue – with rumours of a green-lit Green Lantern 2 before the original is released and not one but two Mad Max reimaginings on the way.

Join me, Luke, I have a six picture deal...

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Filed under: Movies | Tagged: blockbusters, economics, films, green lantern, green lantern 2, green light, green-lit, mad max, mad max: furiosa, mad max: fury road, Movies, sequels | 5 Comments »

Non-Review Review: Alien³

Posted on July 5, 2010 by Darren

Alien³ is generally regarded as an inferior Alien film, and the start of a slippery slope that would lead us through Alien: Resurrection into Aliens vs. Predator and even Aliens vs. Predator: Requiem. It’s also regarded as something of a hiccup in the career of David Fincher, and an example of how meddling from greedy corporate executives can potential derail the rise of a young talent. That’s a lot of pressure for a single film to carry – particularly one which has enough trouble standing on its own two feet. However, I am quite fond of this particular incarnation of the franchise. Not enough to call it a “classic” or even “great”, but enough to argue that it was a relatively brave and ultimately valid experiment for the franchise – much more so, arguably, than the fourth film.

It’s an emotional reunion, to say the least…

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: alien, alien 3, alien franchise, alien trilogy, aliens, charles dance, charles durning, david fincher, films, Movies, non-review review, review, sequels, sigourney weaver, xenomorph | 4 Comments »

Are Spin-Offs the New Sequels?

Posted on June 10, 2010 by Darren

It seems that year-on-year, the cinemas are flooded with sequels to banal action movies. This year we have Iron Man 2, Shrek 4, Predators and Sex and the City 2, among others. It’s been that way for years. If you summer blockbuster isn’t an adaptation (of television show, novel, comic book, earlier film or even video game), chances are that it is a sequel (or a prequel). It makes shrewd business sense. Given the huge amount of money spent on these tentpoles ($150m for just the production budget, let alone other costs), so it feels somewhat safer to spend it on a known quantity. Franchises have built in fanbases, more merchandise, already had several DVD releases (which means more people are aware of it than casual cinema goers), which means a bigger audience, more awareness and more money. It can be quite exhausting, however, from a cinema goer prospective. However, Hollywood likes to innovate in its own insanely boring way. Much as they redefined cinema by bringing back a gimmick from the fifties, and turned the glut of sequels into prequels, it appears Hollywood has found a new way of generating money from established properties: the spin-off.

Think of the Gross, baby!

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Filed under: Movies | Tagged: aldous snow, business, films, franchises, get him to the greek, hollywood, les grossman, Movies, sequels, spin-offs, tropic thunder | 20 Comments »

Sequel Query: Hollywood’s Fascination With Sequels…

Posted on June 10, 2010 by Darren

Can you remember a year when the summer wasn’t dominated by sequels or spin-offs or reboots or prequels? If you can, most of them were probably adaptations. There’s been a lot of back-and-forth recently about the abundance of such films in the summer lineups, so I thought it might be worth a little exploration into the history of the sequel and of Hollywood blockbusters, and also worth considering the suggestion that has been mooted a lot recently: are movie-goers tiring of sequels?

: Even death couldn’t keep Spock out of the next Star Trek movie…

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Filed under: Movies | Tagged: audiences, films, hollywood, Inception, lowest common denominator, Movies, original films, originality, prequels, remakes, sequels, sex and the city 2, spin-offs, studios | 2 Comments »

Die Hard and the Rule of Escalating Threat…

Posted on February 25, 2010 by Darren

Bruce Willis has started talking about Die Hard 5 (maybe that should be Die Hard 5.0, but I digress), and has suggested that the next logical step for John McClane is to save the world. Think about it. In Die Hard, he saved a building full of people – not bad, you might say. In Die Harder, he saved an entire airport and the planes in the sky – impressive, you might agree. In Die Hard With A Vengeance, he saved New York from a mad bomber – maybe a little outside of his pay grade, you’ll possible argue. In Die Hard 4.0 (or Live Free and Die Hard), McClane pretty much single-handedly (because nerdy sidekicks don’t count) saved the United States of America. The remark that McClane is porbably going to save the world – while probably a bit of a joke on Willis’ part – got me thinking: is the rule of escalating threat necessarily a good thing?

More sequels, less hair...

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Filed under: Movies | Tagged: bruce willis, die hard, die hard 4.0, john mcclane, Movies, sequels, the first law of metafictional thermodynamics, the rule of escalating threat, threats | Leave a comment »

Sequels Separated by Decades…

Posted on July 23, 2009 by Darren

Flynn lives! Jeff Bridges’ career declines! The viral marketing campaign for the sequel to Tr0n kicks off this week at Comic Con and I’m skeptical – but not just because they haven’t decided to go with the logical title Tr1n. I’m mostly skeptical because it’s a sequel to a cult movie produced twenty years after the fact. How many sequels separated by decades have actually succeeded?

It was cutting edge for the time, I swear...

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Filed under: Movies | Tagged: avatar, chinatown, film series, films, flynn lives, franchises, godfather, indiana jones, james bond, jeff bridges, Movies, sequels, star wars, the godfather, tr0n, tr0n2, tron, tron 2, tron: legacy | 3 Comments »

Remake me Beautiful

Posted on May 29, 2009 by Darren

Whatever happened to originality? This is the first weekend since Wolverine kicked off the blockbuster movie season a month ago that there isn’t a sequel, prequel or reboot opening at the multiplexes in America. Despite the fact that Pixar’s Up and Sam Raimi’s Drag Me To Hell are reviewing very strongly, most box office folk seem to think that this will be a relatively quiet weekend at the old box office, which is a shame really when we’ve got two of the best reviewed movies of the year going head-to-head. Still, what happened to Hollywood’s originality?