What Are Perfect Duologies That Should Have Never Had a Third Film?

[Slimybug]

The Godfather
The Terminator
Halloween (original and 2018 sequel)

All of these told pretty killer stories that needed no third chapter. In the case of Terminator, they tried again and again, then even James Cameron came in and finally tried himself, and it didn't work. I honestly don't think there is an idea for a third Terminator film out there in the ether that works. It's just...Well, a perfect duology.

Anyone else?

[Mister Mets]

There are some third chapters of trilogies that weren't good but could've been (Spider-Man 3, X-Men 3) so I'm not counting those.

I think a Godfather Part III based on a mob war between Michael and Tom could've worked, although Coda wasn't a terrible movie. It just wasn't on the level of the first two.
I do agree that the narratives of Terminator Part II or the 2018 Halloween don't leave anywhere else for the series to go. In Terminator Part II, they keep the apocalypse from happening, so anything new changes that. In the Halloween sequel, a psychopath in his early 60s could work for one film.

The Last Jedi probably left too many loose ends for one movie to resolve everything, so that's more of a case where they should've split the conclusion to two films, rather than having a trilogy of trilogies.

[Frobisher]

Bill & Ted

[The Gold Stream]

back to the future 3 was pretty weak i guess

[Slimybug]

In the Halloween sequel, a psychopath in his early 60s could work for one film.

Right. The original film is just him stalking teenagers. The moment anyone with a gun shows up, it's over. The 2018 film was already stretching it given that she was meeting him at the door with a gun. But it wouldn't have been much of a movie if she'd just been able to blow him away. Still, anything past the first film, with the exception of the 2018 film, can only work if he's supernatural and invulnerable, which all the sequels did up to then. David Gordon Green did away with that for the 2018 film, only to go back to it in Halloween Kills.
The opening scene of him mopping the floor with six equipped firemen just took a really weird hop from the "first two" films.

But besides those logisitics, it's just a perfect one-two punch pair of stories. In the first film, it's about the tension as he hunts her. In the second film, they're hunting each other. Ever since he chose her as his victim, their fates have been intertwined, and neither will have any peace until the other is dead. This comes across perfectly in the "Prison Montage." Listen to that track on the soundtrack. It actually makes you feel bad for Michael. *Chef's kiss* Three generations of Strode women fight off the Shape that has haunted their family for decades, and it's over. All this was done away with in Halloween Kills, with Green specifically stating that Michael wasn't even targeting Laurie again the second time around. What a laugh. And I won't even get into that ending.

Terminator and Terminator 2 also have a perfect one-two punch of stories. There's always a terminator and a protector. The first film is a terminator and a human protector. The second film is a reprogrammed terminator as protector against a more advanced terminator. Perfect duology. Any attempt at a third chapter just ends up being "Terminator 2 2," with another good Arnold against another liquid metal terminator.

Godfather is about a man falling to evil, becoming a gangster. The second film is about him falling even harder, becoming evil even from the point of view of the other gangsters! Again, no real third chapter there.

Anyway, that's my justification for my three choices.

[j9ac9k]

My first thought was Terminator because the end of T2 felt like an ending - even though it was ambiguous, that was the point. The future was no longer set - it could be anything. Having the war actually play out was the easy thing to do, and it's easy to see why the studio would want to, but it hurt the overall story.

I don't think Godfather III was a bad idea. I think we needed to see Michael pay the price for his choices to close out his story. It just turned out to not be a good movie.

[Slimybug]

I don't think Godfather III was a bad idea. I think we needed to see Michael pay the price for his choices to close out his story. It just turned out to not be a good movie.

I think we see that at the end of Godfather II. As we see Michael sit alone at the dinner table in the old days, because he wasn't the same for his family, then sitting, right after, seeing him sitting alone at that park bench, contemplating his life choices. Those few moments tell us everything we need to know: He's alone and always will be, because of what he's done. Coppola has talked about how he really intended that to be shown and clear in #2, despite later taking 3 hours to spell it out for us in #3.

[Username taken]

Terminator and Terminator 2.

[Mister Mets]

Alien 3's beginning seems to have been a major mistake, reversing the accomplishments of Aliens. I wonder if it could've worked, or if Ellen Ripley's arc was exhausted. In the first film, she struggled to survive. In the second film, she found something she was willing to die for.

Home Alone 3 may be an example of a film that shouldn't be done. They recognized Macaulay Culkin had aged too much and it would stretch credibility to have his character run into the burglars a third time (the second was a stretch, which may be why sequels already start at a disadvantage.) But repeating the premise with a new cast and first-time director didn't work, and didn't seem like it really could work. A kid by himself versus burglars for an hour and a half is unlikely to work a third time.

back to the future 3 was pretty weak i guess

I'm not a big fan of it either, but I think it's something that could've been a good film.

[Sutekh]

Alien 3's beginning seems to have been a major mistake, reversing the accomplishments of Aliens. I wonder if it could've worked, or if Ellen Ripley's arc was exhausted. In the first film, she struggled to survive. In the second film, she found something she was willing to die for.

Aliens really felt like a quantum leap from Alien, so it totally worked, but having raised the bar so high, they couldn't possibly make an Alien 3 without something really big, like an Alien infestation on Earth, changing genre once again to sort of zombie/survival/post-apocalypse (just as the 1st and 2nd movies kind of changed genres, rather than tread the same ground).

That was the big success of Aliens, IMO, that it straight-up jumped lanes and told a totally different genre of movie from the first Alien. It wasn't like a typical horror franchise, telling the same basic story with a different cast of victims and maybe a different background location.

[AnakinFlair]

Alien 3's beginning seems to have been a major mistake, reversing the accomplishments of Aliens. I wonder if it could've worked, or if Ellen Ripley's arc was exhausted. In the first film, she struggled to survive. In the second film, she found something she was willing to die for.

Home Alone 3 may be an example of a film that shouldn't be done. They recognized Macaulay Culkin had aged too much and it would stretch credibility to have his character run into the burglars a third time (the second was a stretch, which may be why sequels already start at a disadvantage.) But repeating the premise with a new cast and first-time director didn't work, and didn't seem like it really could work. A kid by himself versus burglars for an hour and a half is unlikely to work a third time.

I'm not a big fan of it either, but I think it's something that could've been a good film.

I actually liked Back to the Future Part 3 more than Part 2

[Captain Craig]

back to the future 3 was pretty weak i guess

I actually liked Back to the Future Part 3 more than Part 2

Same, and I don't dislike BttF pt.2, it's just so much rehash. Future pt.3 with the whole new setting and threads to pull on is a lot of fun.

I'm inclined to agree about Alien/Aliens with the way Alien 3 just cuts the prior films ending out from under it unfairly.
However, as good as T1/T2 are the reason T3 works, for me, is the bold decision to push the narrative that we know has to happen and ultimately have Judgement Day. Despite the heroes best efforts.

I've not seen Bill/Ted 3 yet.

Numerous franchises we could list got better after/with the third installment: Friday the 13th, Die Hard, Lethal Weapon, Nightmare/Elm Street just to name some.

[ChrisIII]

back to the future 3 was pretty weak i guess

BTTF 2 isn't self contained though, so it would not have worked with just itself and the first. 2 and 3 were made at the same time, although at one point (Script stage) part of III was considered for the second act of 2 but it was too much movie so they split it in two.


Aliens, with the deleted scenes in the special edition, although they kind of ruin the tension of the Colonist's fates, kind of show us how both Newt and Ripley were pretty much looking for a surrogate family (Newt's family were the first victims; Ripley lost her daughter to old age in the time skip). Makes Alien 3 even worse . Too bad we didn't get the proposed Alien 5, although that might've just been like Dark Fate, yeah it's a sequel that ignores the bad ones but it's possible it still would've made it's own mistakes.


Funny thing is the Dark Horse comics for Aliens, because of the long wait for III just decided to go ahead and do their own sequel with Newt, Hicks, eventually Ripley, and an Earth invasion. However they became overridden when 3 came out, so they tried renaming the characters for reprints and the eventual novel adaptations. There's also of course the popular 'alternate' Alien 3 treatment (Focusing mainly on Hicks) which also got a comic adaptation a few years ago.

[Slimybug]

Funny thing is the Dark Horse comics for Aliens, because of the long wait for III just decided to go ahead and do their own sequel with Newt, Hicks, eventually Ripley, and an Earth invasion. However they became overridden when 3 came out, so they tried renaming the characters for reprints and the eventual novel adaptations. There's also of course the popular 'alternate' Alien 3 treatment (Focusing mainly on Hicks) which also got a comic adaptation a few years ago.

Really?? Do you know the names of any of those comics? Did they end up making the novel adaptations?

[ChrisIII]

It's Aliens book one/Outbreak/Earth Hive, Book Two/Nightmare Asylum, and Book III/Female War. Novels were made in the 90s by Steve Perry.