It's no surprise when filmgoers complain about the complete lack of creativity coming from
the movie industry.
Still, if there's one thing even worse than a lack of creativity, it's too much creativity,
and Hollywood's history of insane abandoned sequel ideas proves it.
Since we're talking about planned sequels, beware of spoilers for films you haven't seen
yet.
You'd think a franchise with 200 million years of backstory would have no problem coming
up with plots.
Nevertheless, the Jurassic Park franchise has been hyper-focused on bioengineered super-dinos.
The big bad in Jurassic World was the Indominus Rex, basically a T-Rex with various other
dinosaur DNA, while Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom featured the Indo-Raptor, a raptor
crossed with Indominus Rex DNA.
Believe it or not, it could have been a lot weirder.
2001's Jurassic Park III featured a low point in the whole franchise with a dream sequence
that included a talking raptor:
"Alan"
Despite that, the producers wanted to double down with Human-Dino hybrids for a sequel.
Yes, Jurassic Park turns into the Island of Dr. Moreau.
Back In 2005, the proposed story for the fourth film was a secret genetics lab that crossbred
humans with dinosaurs, creating hybrids capable of solving complex problems and firing automatic
weapons… and probably inspiring a lot of toys too.
The idea got far enough along that a script was written and concept art was developed.
Thankfully, the human-dino hybrids idea went extinct, but don't get too cozy.
After all, to quote Dr. Ian Malcolm:
"Life, uh, finds a way."
Longtime Ghostbusters buffs might already know that a potential third entry in the franchise
would have found the blue-collar gang taking a trip down to the underworld to visit Satan's
homestead.
The name of this film was going to be Ghostbusters 3: Hellbent, though its version of Hell would
not feature your standard lake of fire and molten brimstone.
The idea was that Hell was actually an alternate version of Manhattan — called ManHELLton
— where the crew would even meet up with the devil himself, a Donald Trump-like character
named Mr. Siffler.
While the "Ghostbusters in Hell" pitch is well-known, what's less well-known is that
the idea actually goes back much further, to the first film.
In early drafts of the story, the Ghostbusters made it to the gates of Hell, which were even
designed by concept artist and comic book legend Bernie Wrightson.
He elaborated on the experience in a 2016 Kickstarter video:
"I did a lot of drawings of those, which I don't know if they were filmed, but they never
made it to the final movie."
The original pitch for a third Indy film, before Indiana Jones and The Last Crusade
was finalized, was as crazy as its title — Indiana Jones and the Monkey King.
The story was conceived by three of the greatest blockbuster minds ever: Steven Spielberg,
George Lucas, and Home Alone director Chris Columbus.
Columbus was hired to pen the script, which begins with Indy fighting a ghost in Scotland.
Indy and friends are seeking the mythical city of the Monkey King, whose enchanted orchard
contains fruit that will grant eternal life.
In typical Indy movie fashion, he must fight Nazis along the way.
In not-so-typical fashion, the Nazis have machine gun arms and Indy's saved by tank-driving
gorillas.
Indy even rides a rhinoceros.
It's pretty intense.
Despite everything he's survived before, in this film, Indiana Jones actually dies…
temporarily.
Because he's pure of heart, Indy's brought back to life by the magical fruit of the Monkey
King.
Considering how insane the entire project sounds, we might have to consider ourselves
lucky that we got Indiana Jones and the Crystal Skull instead.
Well, maybe not.
Will Smith's star power carried I Am Legend to become the biggest hit of the 2007 holiday
season.
Nothing says holly jolly family fun like the last man on earth battling an undead army.
Given that the film made bank, Warner Bros. naturally wanted a sequel with Smith starring.
There was one problem: Will Smith's character dies at the end of the film.
Not to be deterred by a little thing like the main character being dead, WB proceeded
onward.
The first solution was to make a prequel.
Because I Am Legend was about the human population being wiped out due to a zombie infection,
the prequel would find Smith's lone survivor Dr. Neville just before the world ended.
Another option was floated for a sequel that would have found Smith's character returning
as a clone.
Fortunately, I Am Legend 2 never got past the planning stage, so the original remains
a legend.
Despite the huge success of 1977's Close Encounters of the Third Kind, director Steven Spielberg
refused to make a sequel.
He offered up an alternative, though: a movie that mixed the horror of Jaws with the extraterrestrials
of Close Encounters.
The film was ultimately abandoned, though elements of it remained in E.T. the Extraterrestrial,
which presents a much kinder, gentler alien.
The film was a similarly huge success, and Universal wanted a sequel.
Surprisingly, Spielberg was on board for this one.
He and E.T. screenwriter Melissa Mathison penned a treatment that had that lovable little
guy E.T. being part of a warring alien race whose evil albino members have imprisoned
other alien races from across the galaxy for food.
Yes, that's exactly what Spielberg planned for E.T. II: Nocturnal Fears.
Now, E.T. isn't all sunshine, unicorns and rainbows — it's actually a compelling examination
of the effect of divorce on a family — but still, carnivorous mutant E.T.'s?
That sounds like a completely different franchise.
"We better get back cause it'll get dark soon.
They mostly come at night.
Mostly."
David Fincher's dark, serial killer film Se7en wowed audiences and critics alike; unsurprisingly,
the studio wanted a sequel.
Also unsurprisingly: the sequel would have been titled Ei8ht, with the number 8 replacing
the "g."
Unlike I Am Legend, which wanted to undo the ending of the previous film, Ei8ht was content
with leaving Brad Pitt's character in prison.
Don't assume this means the sequel wasn't going to be ridiculous — far from it.
In Ei8ht, Morgan Freeman's world-weary detective continues to hunt serial killers, but discovers
he has the ability to predict the future.
This concept got far enough along that a script was actually written.
You don't need to be see the future to know this would have been a very bad idea.
A sequel to Se7en isn't bad in theory, but giving Freeman supernatural abilities is ludicrous.
While the sequel never happened, the story actually did.
Much of the screenplay was repurposed for 2015's Solace, a movie about a psychic solving
crimes starring Colin Farrell and Anthony Hopkins.
Despite the talent attached, Solace bombed, so we don't have to worry about anyone trying
to make Nine.
To be fair, describing Forrest Gump's plot makes it sound kinda nuts.
Tom Hanks plays a man with a 75 IQ who experiences almost every momentous event in American history
between 1950 and 1981, from teaching Elvis to dance to calling the police during Watergate.
Still, it worked enough that it won Best Picture and got Tom Hanks his second Oscar for Best
Actor.
Even with that primer, Forrest Gump II sounds genuinely insane.
Where to begin?
Well, Forrest goes broke and plays for the New Orleans Saints.
He invents the formula for New Coke and also creates a power plant fueled by pig poo.
He crashes the Exxon Valdez, rides in the back of OJ's Bronco, and works for NASA.
There, he befriends an orangutan named Sue, who joins him in Operation Desert Storm.
While the first film managed to seamlessly weave this one man throughout American history,
the proposed sequel did so with all of the subtlety of Lt. Dan hosting a children's show.
The whole thing just sounds awkward.
"That's all I have to say about that."
Since coming home from Vietnam, John Rambo has battled Vietnamese forces, Soviet soldiers,
the Burmese army, and even some Americans.
With that lineup of victories, what enemy is left for the one-man army to take down?
Well, Rambo V was originally set to pit Sylvester Stallone's super-soldier against a half-man,
half-beast, pure killing machine.
Rambo V: The Savage Hunt would've seen Rambo sent to the Pacific Northwest to clean up
the mess after a top-secret government experiment creates an out-of-control monster.
Stallone clarified the movie's planned plot in 2009:
"It's not a Universal Soldier… it's not me fighting a super soldier… it's actually
a feral beast…
It's this amalgamation of fury and intelligence and pure, unadulterated rage.
[Rambo's] going against a feral beast that has absolute cunning and intelligence and
a will to survive that is only matched by Rambo's."
This might be the one sequel on this list that we almost wish did happen.
Alas, Rambo V: The Savage Hunt was abandoned in favor of the upcoming Rambo V, which will
see Stallone fighting the Mexican cartel instead.
Maybe, just maybe, it'll do well enough to make Rambo vs. Monster happen.
Fingers crossed!
A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away, George Lucas made plans for a Star Wars sequel
that wasn't part of his original vision.
Before the movie that would eventually be called A New Hope was released, Lucas gave
partial creative control of his space opera to writer Alan Dean Foster.
Foster was hired in 1976 to pen the novelization of Star Wars, as well as a second book which
Lucas could use for a potential follow-up.
That book was the first official Star Wars sequel, Star Wars: Splinter of the Mind's
Eye.
Lucas' only restriction was that the story could be filmed on a low budget so he could
reuse props and sets.
Splinter finds Luke, Leia, C-3PO, and R2-D2 stranded on a dark, foggy mining world which
contains a powerful crystal sought by the Empire.
Vader shows up only briefly for the grand finale fight, while Han and Chewie don't show
up at all, as Harrison Ford was only contracted for one Star Wars.
Splinter is a cool idea, but was basically Lucas' backup plan in case Star Wars only
did so-so.
Of course, it became the highest-grossing film of all time at that point, launching
arguably the most popular franchise in history and allowing Lucas to film his saga as he
had planned it from the start.
What is it with sequels to movies where the main character dies?
While Gladiator may not have aged well, Ridley Scott's 2000 swords-and-sandals epic took
home Best Picture and box office gold.
Russell Crowe also won Best Actor for his performance as Maximus Decimus Meridius, his
crowning moment in a career that has been spotty at times.
One of those spotty times was in the mid-to-late 2000s, after the biggest bomb of his and Ridley
Scott's respective careers, 2006's A Good Year.
Perhaps hoping to revive past glory, Crowe wanted to be in a Gladiator sequel, despite
Maximus dying at the end of the film.
The solution?
Just throw some Roman mythology on it.
Scott and Crowe hired Australian musician and screenwriter Nick Cave to come up with
a creative solution to bring back Maximus.
Cave's Gladiator 2 had Maximus melding with Roman gods to achieve immortality.
He is then reincarnated on Earth, where he defends the early Christians and goes on to
fight in various conflicts, including World War II and the Vietnam War, eventually rising
through the ranks of the modern-day Pentagon.
The film might not have been good, but it definitely sounds entertaining.
"Are you not entertained?
Are you not entertained?
Is this not why you are here?"
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