Is the King of the Monsters also the king of the box office? 4 billion dollars for Lucasfilm;
was it worth it? Was Wolverine strong enough to support the entire X-Men movie franchise
on his furry back? These movies brought back long dormant franchises to a planet near you.
"Star Trek" is one of the most influential and long-running media franchises of all time.
It's easy to forget that the original "Star Trek" television series was unceremoniously canceled
after its third season in 1969. "Star Trek" gained cultural momentum in reruns
during the 1970s, though, leading to a brief revival as an animated series and
a planned return to live-action television called "Star Trek:
Phase II." After the box success of "Star Wars" in 1977, Paramount changed course and relaunched
"Star Trek" on the big screen, resulting in 1979's "Star Trek: The Motion Picture."
"The Motion Picture" was a financial success but a critical failure whose plodding pace earned it the
fan nickname "The Slow-Motion Picture." Paramount was willing to try making another "Star Trek"
film, but only if it could be done on a much smaller budget. But despite being made on the
cheap by unproven director Nicholas Meyer, "Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan" made an immediate
cultural impact, becoming a legitimate mainstream hit and winning back eight times its budget.
"The Wrath of Khan" launched a new, prosperous era in which "Star Trek"
thrived both on the big screen and back on television for another two decades.
"KHAAAAAAAN!"
Following the success of "Wrath of Khan," "Star Trek" became a
pop culture brand that was everywhere, spanning movies,
television, and beyond. The original cast continued to star in feature films throughout
the '80s before hanging it up in "Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country" in 1991.
Meanwhile, "Trek" was undergoing a renaissance on television, with a string of TV spin-offs
that ran for 18 consecutive years and a cumulative 624 episodes. "Star Trek:
The Next Generation" was a big enough hit to warrant its own leap to the big screen, which kept
the film series alive until the critical and box office failure of "Star Trek: Nemesis" in 2002.
When "Trek's" television run likewise came to an end with the cancellation of "Star Trek:
Enterprise" in 2005, the franchise went into stasis for the first time since the mid-1970s.
Paramount wouldn't let "Trek" rest for too long. In 2007, J.J. Abrams was officially attached to
direct a new part-sequel, part-prequel, part-reboot simply titled "Star Trek."
This radical reimagining of the original source material reignited mainstream
interest in the franchise, making it one of the highest-grossing films of 2009.
Since then, "Trek" has had two more feature film sequels and yet another television revival,
with producer Alex Kurtzman now at the helm of the franchise's five new streaming series.
Beginning with its first installment in 2000, the "X-Men" franchise was at the forefront of
the superhero movie boom. Each chapter of the original "X-Men" trilogy outgrossed the last,
raking in a cumulative billion dollars in worldwide box office receipts.
With the original cast's story concluded, 20th Century Fox sought to expand the
franchise with a variety of new spin-offs, beginning with "X-Men Origins: Wolverine"
in 2009. "Wolverine" introduced the characters of Gambit and Deadpool to the big screen,
and they were each eyed for their own spin-offs. Additionally, two more prequels were planned,
one centered around Magneto and another on Charles Xavier's original class of X-Men.
But after the messy release and critical failure of "X-Men Origins: Wolverine," 20th Century Fox
put the rest of their "X-Men" slate on hold, focusing instead on a single project: the prequel
film "X-Men: First Class," which featured an entirely new cast and a period setting.
"First Class" didn't immediately reverse the franchise's box office fortunes, earning about
$10 million less than "X-Men Origins: Wolverine" on a similar budget, but it was better received
by fans and critics, putting the franchise back in the right direction. Its immediate sequel,
"X-Men: Days of Future Past," combined the new and original X-Men film casts and became
a massive box office hit. Incidentally, "Days of Future Past" also erased the poorly received
"Last Stand" and "Origins" from continuity by way of time travel. Neat trick, huh?
1968's "Planet of the Apes" is one of the sci-fi genre's best films, as well as the launchpad of
its first long-running sci-fi film franchises. The original "Planet of the Apes" spawned four
direct sequels in rapid succession between 1970 and 1973. And when the series fizzled out on film,
the franchise moved to television — first as a live-action series, then in animation — but both
efforts were short-lived. With the cartoon's cancelation in 1975,
"Planet of the Apes" disappeared from both film and television for a quarter-century.
A big-budget, Tim Burton-helmed reimagining of "Planet of the Apes" was released in 2001,
which turned a profit but was such a critical disaster that the franchise was immediately put
back on the shelf. The next reboot attempt came a decade later with 2011's prequel "Rise of the
Planet of the Apes." It gave new life to the franchise, replacing the previous generations'
make-up effects with remarkably expressive CGI apes performed via motion capture by the likes
of Andy Serkis. "Rise" spawned a successful new "Apes" trilogy whose middle chapter,
"Dawn of the Planet of the Apes," was a critical darling as well as a smash hit.
Unsurprisingly, another reboot of the franchise is already in the works.
"Get your stinking paws off me, you damn dirty ape!”
Ridley Scott's 1979 sci-fi/horror mashup "Alien" is a classic in both genres,
so it's remarkable that anyone was able to create even one sequel of comparable quality
in the first place. James Cameron's 1986 follow-up "Aliens" triumphed by
continuing the journey of original film protagonist Ellen Ripley with
a totally different approach and tone, but this trick proved difficult to repeat.
1992's "Alien 3" distanced itself from the action-oriented tone of "Aliens" and was
poorly received, while 1997's "Alien: Resurrection" seemed to overcorrect,
becoming a bizarre comic book-y affair that grossed poorly in North America. The brand
was kept alive for a time by crossing over with the similarly struggling "Predator" franchise,
but the "Alien vs. Predator" film series likewise fell apart after two entries.
It would take Ridley Scott himself to lend credibility back to the universe that he
helped create. His 2012 film "Prometheus" is set in the same universe as "Alien," but follows
another set of characters on a journey that's only tangentially connected to the events of
the original film. More importantly, it shares "Alien's" moody, unsettling tone and gruesome
body horror, and added even loftier philosophical and ontological themes.
While reviews were mixed, "Prometheus" became the highest-grossing film in the franchise,
leading to sequel "Alien: Covenant," which also serves as a more direct
prequel to the original film. With interest in "Alien" fully revitalized,
an additional film and a spin-off television series are forthcoming.
Godzilla is one of cinema's most prolific and iconic monsters, having starred in 36
films since 1954. His longevity as a movie icon has been assured by his occasionally going into
hibernation, as he did in 1975, 1995, and finally in 2004. On the occasion of the original film's
50th anniversary, Japanese studio Toho released "Godzilla: Final Wars," which brought an
end to the "Millennium era" of Godzilla movies and put the famous kaiju to rest for the third time.
A decade later, Gareth Edwards' 2014 American "Godzilla" was a critical and box office success.
Not only did the 2014 "Godzilla" lead to the expansion of Legendary's "Monsterverse," (crossing
Godzilla over with King Kong for the first time in half a century), but also prompted Toho to
revive Godzilla in Japan. "Godzilla Resurgence" was not only a hit at the Japanese box office
in 2016 but also the recipient of the Japan Academy Film Prize for Picture of the Year.
The original 1979 "Mad Max" is a small miracle of filmmaking. The debut feature
from writer/director George Miller was produced for less than half a million dollars and became
such a hit that it held the world record for the most profitable film in terms of cost vs. gross,
until it was toppled by "The Blair Witch Project" in 1999. Its two sequels, "Mad Max
2" (aka "The Road Warrior") and "Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome" were increasingly expensive and
outlandish, but also won increasing financial returns. "Beyond Thunderdome" was a hit,
but was considered a slight step down in quality from its predecessors.
After directing three "Mad Max" films in six years, Miller was certain that
he was finished with the series in 1985. But inspiration for "Fury Road" struck hard in 1998,
leading to a torturously long development process. The film was almost made in 2003,
then again in 2010, before cameras finally began rolling in 2012. By the time "Mad Max:
Fury Road" hit theaters in 2015, the series had been dormant for 30 years.
The wait was worth it — "Fury Road" was an unqualified critical and commercial success that
earned 10 Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture. Audiences clamored for more,
and a franchise was reborn. Two more "Mad Max" films are currently in development, one featuring
series lead Max and one expanding on the origins of the breakout character of “Fury Road”- Furiosa.
There should probably never have been a sequel to "Jurassic Park" in the first place — the
moral of the original film is that a theme park full of sharp-toothed, ravenous, prehistoric
monsters is a bad idea that should never be tried again. But try they have, over and over again.
After the 1993 original came the underwhelming 1997 sequel "The Lost World: Jurassic Park."
If Steven Spielberg himself couldn't make a successful sequel to his own classic,
what hope could anyone else have? 2001's "Jurassic Park III" was even less successful,
but plans for a "Jurassic Park IV" continued to roll on nevertheless
with a decade-long marathon of rejected scripts.
Finally, in 2015, Universal and director Colin Trevorrow released their long-awaited, big-budget
attempt to clone their cash cow, "Jurassic World." Sporting an entirely new set of characters but
deeply rooted in nostalgia for the original, "Jurassic World" was a colossal box office hit,
raking in over $1.6 billion worldwide and spawning a pair of sequels of its own.
Like their genetically reconstituted stars, the "Jurassic World" films really shouldn't exist,
but there's no denying that the franchise is alive and well.
From the moment Disney purchased Lucasfilm for $4 billion in 2012,
it was a sure thing that "Star Wars" would be coming back to the big screen,
and nearly as certain that their first movie out of the gate would be a smash hit.
Just as in the case of 1999's "The Phantom Menace," anticipation and speculation alone
would have brought filmgoers out in droves to see if the old "Star Wars" magic had come back,
no matter how disappointed they may have been in George Lucas' prequel trilogy a decade earlier.
What's remarkable about "Star Wars: Episode VII — The Force Awakens," though, is the sheer magnitude
of its success. It grossed over $936 million in the U.S. alone and over $2 billion worldwide. It
also got the warmest reception from critics of any "Star Wars" film since "The Empire Strikes Back."
Fans may have mixed feelings as to the overall quality of the post-buyout "Star Wars" brand,
but "The Force Awakens" announced loud and clear that "Star Wars" was back in a big way.
It's unlikely to be retired again any time soon.
The Marvel Cinematic Universe, the most financially successful film franchise of all time,
is essentially one big franchise made of many smaller ones. Almost every one of the 23 films
in its ambitious "Infinity Saga" won its opening weekend, turned a profit, and spawned a sequel.
Sure, all the movies were hits, but answer us this question — after "Thor:
The Dark World," was anybody out there really clamoring for more solo Thor movies?
"The Dark World" has the lowest Rotten Tomatoes score in the "Infinity Saga," and the first "Thor"
doesn't score much higher. With Chris Hemsworth's original Marvel contract expiring with "Avengers:
Endgame," who's to say there'd have been enough heat behind the character to renew any further?
Director Taika Waititi, that's who! Waititi took this ailing corner of the MCU for a hard
left turn with "Thor: Ragnarok," giving it a new sense of humor and a new cast
of supporting characters. "Ragnarok" outgrossed "The Dark World" globally by over $200 million,
and rests near the top of many lists ranking the MCU's best films. Its success prompted rewrites of
"Avengers: Infinity War," and the more comedic version of the character is set to return for
another "Thor" film with Waititi at the helm. Hemsworth hopes to continue to play Thor for
years to come, something that almost certainly wouldn't have happened if not for "Ragnarok."
"I thought you were gone forever! I'm glad to see you back!"
"You're ruining my disguise!"
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