It sometimes comes as a bit of a surprise to discover that certain movies have their
own sequels or prequels — but finding out they're part of a whole trilogy can be downright
astounding.
From underrated classics to straight-to-video monstrosities, these are a few of those movies.
The XXX series is all about explosions, fights, and tacky one-liners.
"Welcome to the Xander Zone!"
The first movie cashed in on Vin Diesel's Fast and Furious street cred, giving him the
title role as one-note badass Xander "XXX" Cage.
And although there's plenty on offer here for action fans, the prefab script kinda lets
the rest of the movie down.
XXX: State of the Union's switch from Diesel to Ice Cube might have seemed ill-advised,
but Cube's charisma and sense of wonder as criminal mastermind-turned-secret agent Darius
Stone basically carries this absurd example of popcorn cinema.
And sure, the talents of Sam Jackson and Willem Dafoe are pretty much wasted — but so what?
Nobody is going to see a movie called XXX: State of the Union for dramatic nuance.
Diesel then returned to the franchise for the belated third installment, 2017's XXX:
Return of Xander Cage, and the results were… well, they were more or less exactly what
you'd expect.
Directed by Park Chan-wook, Oldboy first stole the spotlight when it won the Grand Prix at
Cannes, introducing a whole lot of people to Korean cinema and stunning audiences around
the world.
It also set the gold standard for hallway fights, and featured the octopus-eating scene
of all octopus-eating scenes.
The movie also inspired a sadly inferior sequel that just couldn't compare to the epic tragedy
of the original film.
Still, if you want to explore the twisted mind of Park Chan-wook even further, then
you're in luck, because Oldboy is actually the second installment in the director's so-called
"vengeance trilogy."
This loosely thematic saga began in 2002 with Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance, the story of a
man seeking revenge for the death of his daughter.
Then Oldboy was released in 2003, the story of a man who sets out to bring down the people
who imprisoned him for 15 years.
Park finished his trilogy with Lady Vengeance, the story of a woman who hunts down the man
who committed the crime for which she was framed.
Obviously, the trilogy revolves largely around the concept of vengeance, and most notably
the idea that getting even with your enemies never really solves your problems.
In Park's world, revenge is a messy, bloody, and murky business, and even if the protagonists
succeed in finding vengeance, they're never much better off at the end of these movies.
[screaming, breaking down and singing]
And while each film explores this in slightly different ways, the vengeance trilogy is still
a must-watch series for fans of Korean movies, gore-soaked cinema, and stories that aspire
to the bloody heights of Shakespeare.
Coming off the back of his starring role in Sons of Anarchy, Taylor Sheridan decided to
write Sicario, a brutal screenplay about America's war on drugs and the nightmarish violence
along the U.S.-Mexican border.
Eventually, the script picked up an incredible cast as well as the nigh on unbeatable pairing
of director Denis Villeneuve and cinematographer Roger Deakins.
Inevitably, when Sicario hit theaters in 2015, the critics were floored.
Sheridan's next project was the equally impressive Hell or High Water, a modern-day Western that
follows two West Texas brothers as they rob banks in one economically desolate town after
another.
The script earned Sheridan an Oscar nomination, as well as one for Jeff Bridges for his turn
as a surly Texas Ranger.
A year later, Sheridan made his directorial debut with Wind River, a movie set in the
snowy wilderness of Wyoming, where a hunter and an FBI agent attempt to solve the murder
of a Native American woman.
While there aren't any individual characters linking these films together, Sheridan has
described his films as a "frontier trilogy."
Talking with the Associated Press, Sheridan said:
"[These movies are] an exploration of the modern American frontier and how much has
changed, and how much hasn't changed, and the consequences of assimilation that still
reverberate today."
To that end, Sheridan's frontier trilogy is very much an examination of the secret struggles
and brutal realities of living in the rural U.S.; a series about the forgotten people
of North America and their desperate fight for survival.
Thanks to Guillermo del Toro's love for all things weird and wonderful, the world has
been gifted with some truly incredible films, such as Pan's Labyrinth and The Shape of Water.
But before del Toro was known as the monster maestro, he struggled with a little creature
feature called Mimic.
Del Toro had a very specific creative vision for the movie, but the studio wanted something
different, and the resulting film is… well, let's just say it's not one of the director's
best.
Still, it has its moments, and the premise — which involves giant cockroaches impersonating
human beings — is at least pretty cool.
While Mimic was anything but a box office success, it must have had that certain something,
because somebody at Dimension Films then decided it had franchise potential.
Mimic 2 was released direct to DVD in 2001, and played out like an ickier version of Beauty
and the Beast.
The sequel followed an entomologist from the first film who's being stalked by a jealous,
humanoid insect that wants her for, uh, romantic purposes.
Interestingly, the 2003 straight-to-video follow-up, Mimic 3: Sentinel, borrows the
plot from Rear Window by trapping its voyeuristic hero inside an apartment, watching the world
through his camera.
His spying soon turns into sleuthing, however, when he realizes there's something strange
happening across the street...
something that might just involve some very hungry bugs.
Incredibly, this unlikely trilogy capper actually did pretty well with the few critics who saw
it.
But then again, who wouldn't want to watch an Alfred Hitchcock movie with killer cockroaches?
It's a scientific fact that sharks are the scariest animals on the planet, so it should
come as no surprise that Open Water thrilled audiences at Sundance — and subsequently
scared up $54 million against a $500,000 production budget.
This aquatic indie was directed by husband and wife filmmakers Chris Kentis and Laura
Lau, and followed an unlucky couple who become stranded in the Great Barrier Reef, desperately
trying to avoid becoming sushi for the sharks.
With such an impressive showing at the box office, it was only a matter of time before
a sequel came swimming along — but what's weird about Open Water 2: Adrift is that there's
not a single shark in sight.
That's right.
No sharks.
Originally titled just Adrift, the movie wasn't supposed to have anything to do with the movie
by Kentis and Lau, but some executive came along and stuck the name Open Water on it.
The sequel follows a bunch of genuine idiots who jump off their yacht to go swimming, only
to find they've forgotten to lower the ladder first.
Stranded in the ocean, our forgetful heroes then have to desperately try to get back on
board.
Then came Open Water 3: Cage Dive, released straight to video by Lionsgate.
It focuses on a group of Americans who go — you guessed it — go cage diving off
the coast of Australia.
This time, the sharks actually show up, and soon enough these scuba divers are little
more than fish food.
Still, although they at least got that part right, it goes without saying that Open Water
3 isn't exactly a masterpiece.
Source Code director Duncan Jones spent 15 years working on his passion project, a sci-fi
noir called Mute.
Despite a myriad of personal and professional problems that slowed him down, Jones soldiered
on and finally finished the movie, which was released in 2018.
Mute follows a silent bartender in the near future who embarks on a blood-soaked quest
to find his missing girlfriend.
Based on the trailer, you'd never guess this was the second installment of a trilogy.
According to Jones, however, Mute takes place in the same universe as Moon, his critically
acclaimed space drama about a lonely astronaut on an isolated moon base.
Jones calls his cinematic world "the Moon-iverse," and once promised a third film would eventually
come along to complete the trilogy.
In 2020, however, Jones revealed that he was having trouble funding part three, and decided
to make it a graphic novel instead, with the hopes that it may eventually become a movie
in the future.
Madi : Once Upon a Time in the Future is the story of two mercenary sisters on the run
and was fully-funded through a Kickstarter campaign.
Only time will tell if it gets the cinematic treatment.
A true classic of the 1980s, The Lost Boys is basically The Goonies meets Dracula.
Directed by Joel Schumacher, the film follows two brothers who move to the city of Santa
Carla, otherwise known as the murder capital of the world.
Naturally, they have a difficult time settling into their new home, especially since they're
welcomed to the neighborhood by a gang of motorcycle-riding vampires — including a
fanged-up Kiefer Sutherland and an undead Bill on a wholly different kind of adventure.
"Excellent!"
Despite finding considerable success at the box office, The Lost Boys laid dormant for
over 20 years.
For a brief moment, there was talk of a sequel titled The Lost Girls, but unfortunately that
idea never came to pass.
Instead, in 2008, we got the Lost Boys: The Tribe, a movie that basically rehashed the
plot of the first film.
It's all very familiar: New kids move into town, face an evil vampire, and when things
start getting freaky, they turn to a vampire hunter played by Corey Feldman.
Of course, with such a stunningly unoriginal plot, it should come as no surprise to find
that The Tribe has an impressive zero percent rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
While the Lost Boys: The Thirst has the same awful rating, it at least tries a little harder
in the plot department.
Released in 2010, the third movie in the trilogy follows Feldman as aged vampire slayer Edgar
Frog, who sets out to stop a group of vampires from using a demonic drug to transform partygoers
into undead monsters.
Of course, the third entry can't hold a crucifix to the original film, even with a more interesting
premise — so maybe it's time for Warner Bros. to stake this saga in the heart.
Written by Quentin Tarantino and directed by Robert Rodriguez, From Dusk till Dawn is
a bona fide cult classic.
Released in 1996, the movie stars Tarantino and George Clooney as criminal brothers who
escape to Mexico after robbing and killing several people.
They plan to spend the night hiding out at a strip club before meeting their contact
at dawn, but what they don't know is that the bar is staffed entirely by vampires.
Soon enough, all hell breaks loose in a full-blown orgy of blood and violence.
As well regarded as From Dusk till Dawn is, however, nobody seems to remember its two
sequels.
For one thing, From Dusk till Dawn boasts an amazing cast of '90s stars, but of its
many lead actors, only Danny Trejo returned for 1999's From Dusk till Dawn 2: Texas Blood
Money.
Instead of Clooney and Tarantino, the movie stars Robert Patrick and Duane Whitaker.
It also suffers for lacking the talents of Tarantino and Rodriguez behind the camera,
and, unsurprisingly, ended up being released directly to video.
From Dusk till Dawn 3: The Hangman's Daughter, which got a direct to video release in 2000,
is actually a prequel set in the early 1900s.
It features even less star power than the second one, but hey, at least Danny Trejo
is still there.
That guy really needs to learn how to say no to people.
2017's Call Me By Your Name was a huge success as far as independent movies go, gaining heaps
of critical acclaim and four Oscar nominations, one of which it won.
This wistful, romantic love story starred Armie Hammer and Timothée Chalamet in a whirlwind
summertime romance between two men with something of an age difference.
"I would kiss you if I could."
Still, despite attracting a little controversy in that regard, Call Me By Your Name was a
resounding triumph for director Luca Guadagnino.
But what you might not know is that it's actually the third installment in a trilogy.
Guadagnino has often expressed his interest in the desire that human beings feel for one
another, and he spent the better part of a decade crafting a trilogy of narratively unrelated
films revolving around that theme.
The first was I Am Love in 2009, which starred Tilda Swinton as the wife of a wealthy industrialist
who has a passionate affair with a chef.
Then, in 2015, came A Bigger Splash, which also starred Swinton, this time as a rock
star torn between past and present lovers, even as her current boyfriend is tempted by
a younger woman.
Call Me By Your Name is the only film in Guardagnino's Desire Trilogy not to feature Swinton, but
it shares thematic elements and picturesque Italian settings with those first two installments.
Whether that third movie marks the end of Guadagnino's dalliances with desire, however,
is yet to be seen.
William Friedkin's 1971 movie The French Connection is an absolute classic.
The gritty story of New York detective Popeye Doyle and his attempt to thwart a heroin-smuggling
operation, Friedkin's picture influenced crime cinema for decades to come and is still considered
a must-see for cinephiles today.
But despite The French Connection's enduring popularity, hardly anybody has seen French
Connection II, and most people don't even know there was a third movie in the series,
too.
Gene Hackman returned as Popeye Doyle for French Connection II, with John Frankenheimer
taking over directorial duties.
It follows Popeye as he travels to France in pursuit of Alan Charnier, the drug smuggler
who escaped at the end of the first film.
Fernando Rey is the only other cast member besides Hackman to return for the sequel,
which also features a series of harrowing scenes of addiction and recovery as Doyle
is captured by Charnier and injected with heroin as an interrogation tactic.
By the time Charnier lets him go, Popeye Doyle is a full-blown addict, and must go cold turkey
in a French police station holding cell.
It's not exactly a barrel of laughs.
The third film to pick up the story is called Popeye Doyle, and stars Ed O'Neill as the
title character.
The movie was made for television, and seemed designed as the launching point for a television
show, but the spin-off series never really happened.
Still, even if it was more of a TV pilot, Popeye Doyle was clearly established as a
further story following the same character from the first two films — so it certainly
counts as the third installment in the trilogy.
One of the all-time great monster movies, The Creature from the Black Lagoon introduced
the world to the Gill-man, the scaliest member of the Universal Monsters roster.
And like his equally iconic cohorts, old Gilly inspired a franchise that would inspire both
fear and pity in this prehistoric fiend.
The whole concept of the Gill-man began when producer William Alland attended a dinner
party at Orson Welles' house.
There, he met a cinematographer who told the story of a reptilian monster that lived in
the Amazon and occasionally kidnapped native women.
This bizarre anecdote inspired a spark in Alland, who went on to make that famous first
film — which is about a troop of explorers who travel to South America and encounter
an amphibious beast with a thing for women in bathing suits.
The movie was released in 3-D, a revolutionary innovation at the time, and turned out to
be an immediate hit.
And before production had even finished, Universal was already setting up the next entry in a
new series.
The follow-up was titled Revenge of the Creature, and, in this film, the Gill-Man is captured,
put on display, and tortured by scientists.
Soon enough, however, he escapes, and our fishy friend decides to go looking for revenge.
Things then get super weird in the final film, The Creature Walks Among Us.
In this entry, the Gill-man is set on fire, and most of his scales are burned off.
Then, after undergoing surgery, the creature comes out looking incredibly human-like.
The rest of the film follows the Gill-man as he tries to adjust to the human world,
all the while dreaming of his home beneath the water.
It's… not great.
The 2010 sci-fi action film Skyline is less a piece of cinema and more a truly wild, over-the-top
thrill ride.
It stars Eric Balfour and Scottie Thompson as Jarrod and Elaine, a married couple with
a baby on the way, who attend a friend's birthday party — as aliens suddenly invade Los Angeles.
The film has a truly strange ending, too, in which Jarrod and Elaine are captured and
taken aboard an alien ship, where Jarrod's brain is extracted from his body and placed
into a biomechanical alien body… you know, for reasons.
But Jarrod's brain suddenly glows red instead of blue like the other alien drones, which
apparently means he has retained his memories and personality.
The movie ends with the alien Jarrod protecting his still-human wife and unborn child from
the other aliens.
Incredibly, things get even stranger in Beyond Skyline, a follow-up flick in which Elaine's
pregnancy is accelerated — as is the growth of the daughter to whom she gives birth.
Along the way, a resistance movement against the aliens begins to come together, including
other alien drones who manage to maintain their inner humanity, just as Jarrod did.
The third movie in the trilogy, Skylines, finds humanity and their half-human allies
finally managing to defeat the aliens ten years later, under the leadership of Jarrod
and Elaine's fully-grown 10-year-old daughter.
Director Liam O'Donnell helmed all three movies, so there does appear to be some kind of artistic
vision at work here… no matter how little sense it seems to make.
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