There’s nothing quite as uniquely irritating as a great franchise with only two installments. Our love of trilogies is a perfectly human and understandable one – three as a magic number has been hammered into our collective subconscious since the days of the Old Testament. So when we see a great franchise like Ghostbusters or Gremlins one installment shy of a trilogy, we (”we,” in this case, means “us movie nerds here at Filmwad”) get just a little bit irked. So, without further ado, here are five great franchises that need their second sequels.

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Ghostbusters 3
 

Why it should happen:

Rumors were abound of a third Ghostbustersflick in the mid-90’s, a few years after the release of Ghostbusters 2. Ostensibly, the plot would revolve around the old Ghostbusting gang passing the torch to a newer, younger team of Ghostbusters (who would have ostensibly been played by the leading young comedic actors of the time).  The project was originally canned, and banished to development hell.

A few years later (we’re talking early 2000’s), Dan Aykroyd finished his script for Ghostbusters 3: Hellbent, which would have taken the Ghostbusters to – stay with me – a version of Hell that exists parallel to Earth. According to Aykroyd, Hell exists on top of New York:

“Downtown, Folley Square - where the cops are, they’re all blue minotaurs. Central Park is this huge deep mine, green demons there, surrounded by black onyx thousand foot high apartment buildings with classic red devils. Very wealthy. And we go visit a Donald Trump like character - Mr. Siffler. Lou Siffler, Lucifer.”

While Aykroyd’s setup doesn’t exactly sound brilliant, any reunion of the Ghostbusters would be a cause for rejoicing: Aykroyd, Ramis, Murray, and Reitman remain the only team to have efficiently tackled the sci-fi/horror/comedy genre in a mainstream film, and to do it efficiently twice in a row (Men in Black was decent, but its sequel isn’t even useful as a drink coaster).  

Why it won’t:

Bill Murray doesn’t wanna. The new king of indie film has agreed to do a voice-over should the film be done entirely in CG, but, at his age, he doesn’t really want to actually get on set and film another flick.

However, a CGI Ghostbusters sequel isn’t necessarily an impossibility: earlier in the year, Aykroyd said that Ghostbusters 3 was indeed “alive.” Whether this ends up being true or not remains to be seen.

28 Months Later

Why it should happen:

28 Days Later and 28 Weeks Later may be two of the best zombie movies of the last ten years, Shaun of the Dead notwithstanding. Despite the fact that their “zombies” were actually rage-infected humans, the films commanded the same levels of fear, claustrophobia, and sociopolitical commentary as found in the best of George Romero.

28 Days Later handled intimate character relationships and human drama but remained generally confined to a small scale; 28 Weeks Later felt terrifying and epic, but skimped on anything even remotely resembling human drama. With Boyle returning to the director’s chair for a third installment, might he possibly learn from the mistakes of the two previous films and create the ultimate installment of his zombie trilogy?

Given the fact that the end of 28 Weeks Later leaves the story open for a truly epic sequel, a third installment is damn near necessary at this point.

Why it won’t:

28 Weeks Later didn’t really do that well at the box office – at least, not well enough to warrant the huge budget than 28 Months Later would demand, should it be the epic it deserves to be.

Danny Boyle has expressed interest in directing a third film and Fox has said they’d finanance a sequel if Weeks’ DVD sales reach a certain number, but it’s up in the air at this point. To be honest, if there’s one sequel on this list that you should expect to eventually appear in someform or another, it’s probably 28 Months Later.

 

Predator 3

Why it should happen:

Because Alien vs Predatorwas a piece of shit, for one. And because we need to see the age-old battle of man versus Predator once again, in a different locale.

Wondering about what a third Predator film might consist of is fun all on its own: what actor has the gravitas and ass-kicking ability to believably take on a Predator without the whole affair seeming hokey (don’t say Vin Diesel or the Rock)? Where would it take place – on a warzone in Iraq, perhaps? Every other damn film coming out in the next two years indirectly references or takes place in Iraq, so why not go the whole kitten-caboodle and have aPredator picking off Marines and Insurgents in the Middle East?

Too soon? Yeah, probably.

Either way, a third Predator flick has the potential to rekindle the gory, balls-out horror/action genre whose hardcore earnestness has been missing from damn near every action flick of the last ten to fifteen years.

Why it won’t:

Even ignoring the lack of great action heroes to fight a Predator or the difficulty in choosing a new locale, Predator 3 has its cards stacked against it.

Firstly, Fox likely considers Aliens vs Predator the next step in the Predator franchise, for good or for worse – a sequel is already in the works, so Fox will probably onlyfeature the Predator if he’s fighting a Xenomorph. For the next decade or so, at least.

Secondly, even if Fox somehow did decide to produce a third Predator flick, it’d probably function in much the same way Alien vs Predator did – in other words, it’d be a PG-13 mess not worthy of the Predator name.  No matter how you slice it, it’s nearly certain we won’t get a TRUE Predator movie anytime within the next decade.

Escape From Something That Isn’t New York or Los Angeles

Why it should happen:

Because, while Escape From LA may be one of the worst movies I’ve ever seen (in addition to serving as nothing more than a slightly-different remake of the first film, it includes two things Snake Plissken should never, ever do: surf and play basketball), Escape from New York may be one of the best. Snake Plissken is one of the coolest antiheroes in the history of cinema, and just one fun go-around isn’t enough.

Unlike other belated sequels (Ghostbusters 3), the age of the main actor would benefit the direction of the series. When Snake Plissken gets into his ‘50s, how does he change as a character, if at all? How does he compensate for the fact that he’s probably not as strong as he used to be? Death Proof showed us that Kurt Russell is still a hell of an actor, assuming he’s given the right role. Why not reunite him with his single greatest character, for one final flick? If Indiana Jones can do it, why can’t Snake?

Why it won’t:

Since they’re remaking Escape from New York with Gerard Butler, it’s probably a fair bet that the studios consider the original franchise a thing of the past, not worth revisiting unless given a wholly unnecessary facelift.

We’ll technically get another installment of the Escape series by way of this remake, but minus everything that made the damn series awesome in the first place: no Kurt Russell, no John Carpenter, and no awesome synthesizer music. I’ll pass.

 

Gremlins 3

Why it should happen:

As mentioned above in reference to the Ghostbusters, there aren’t enough great mainstream horror-comedies anymore. Gremlins is one of those rare films that is scary and hilarious, yet technically family-friendly, and its sequel, Gremlins 2: The New Batch was basically a hysterical parody of the film that preceded it.

A new Gremlins movie could either go back to its roots and make the creatures dark and scary again, or it could continue in the vein of The New Batch and emphasis the comedy over the horror. Either way, both Gremlins films were entertaining as all hell, and evoke a fun b-movie quality (both films could just as easily be called “Attack of the Gremlins”) sorely missing from today’s horror cinema

Why it won’t:

Because these kids today have no idea as to what the hell Gremlins is. If Gremlins ever did come back, it’d probably be in the form of a horrendous remake starring someone like Jamie Kennedy, or (best case scenario) Jack Black.

The family-friendly horror film doesn’t even exist anymore: modern American horror consists of either rip off moody, Japanese neo-classics or generally inferior remakes of older titles. Were Gremlins to be remade today, it would either be too dark for most uber-PC families, or it’d be homogenized to the point where kids, and no one else, would be able to derive some enjoyment out of it.

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