Friday Five: Most Satisfying Sequels/Prequels

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Welcome to the Friday Five! Each week we help you get to know our writers a little better with the help of a top 5 list! This week we build off of last weeks category by listing our Top 5 Most Satisfying Sequels/Prequels!

 

We watch a lot of movies, play a lot of games, and in the recent trend with the entertainment industry the majority of the games and movies we’ve been enjoying are sequels/prequels to other properties. While hipsters might complain that the industry lacks any originality and/or creativity, we have to disagree. There’s nothing wrong with building a deeper franchise and expanding on the mythology already created by an intellectual property, so long as it’s done well. (We’re looking at you Transformer 2.) A fairly large number of sequels/prequels are better then the original materials preceding them. We’re going to list a few of our favorites here.

 
 

Chris

Sequel and Prequels are hard to do right, if the original movie was great the film makers have to somehow replicate that film while keeping it new and interesting.

1. Indiana Jones and The Last Crusade – Temple of Doom was a great movie, it had the fun of Raiders, but took it much darker. But then The Last Crusade came out, and added Sean Connery to the mix and that was the end of it.
2. Star Wars The Empire Strikes Back – Nothing was settled in this movie, tons of shit happens and we’re left with a huge cliffhanger, well multiple cliffhangers actually. This is exactly what a middle sequel should be in a trilogy.
3. Batman Returns – The 1989 Batman by Tim Burton is a great movie. It’s nothing like the Nolan movies. Batman isn’t a crazy ninja assassin, he’s Michael Keaton but it’s still an awesome movie. And the Sequel gets even better, Batman Returns took classic Batman villains, a great story, a great cast, and one of the best directors in the business and made one hell of a sequel.
4. Uncharted 2: Among Thieves – A video game has a different set of standards when it comes to sequels and prequels. And usually by the time a sequel comes out people are like “Eh…been there done that” except when it’s CoD, even though they haven’t improved since 2003. Anyway Uncharted 2 took all the best parts of the original Uncharted and added some great new features. And the story was just as gripping as the first game. This is a game you play for the story not for the gameplay even though both are great.
5. Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan – I’m not really a fan of Star Trek. I like the new movie from a couple years back. But otherwise I would be fine without ever seeing another U.S.S. Enterprise. I’ve gotta say though having seen a good chunk of the movies throughout my life Wrath of Khan was probably the only one that really did shit right. It was emotional, and not just a reason to show off the better special effects of the late 70’s like the original film was. Even though it’s not a favorite movie, it’s still one of the best sequels I’ve seen.

 

 

Eric

Some sequels make us cringe. While others have us jumping out of our seats in excitement! I’m going to skip movies here and go for games. So, here’s a few sequels to games that I just couldn’t put down after I picked them up.

1. Uncharted 2: Among Thieves – Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune is one of the greatest games I have ever played! It has an awesome story, great characters, excellent humor, and the gameplay is top notch! How could it get any better? Uncharted 2 is how! All new globe spanning story, refined and tightened controls, more of those awesome characters, bigger set pieces, and and it was a technological wonder! It also helps that the games feel a lot like a modern day version of Indiana Jones. If you’ve missed out on this then do yourself a favor and check it out NOW! Uncharted 3: Drakes Deception was also a really great game, but U2 is by far the best in the series and one of the best game of all time.
2. Fallout 3 – In 2008 we were treated to the first sequential Fallout title in 10 years. There were 2 other Fallout spinoffs in this time frame, but neither of them were of the same caliber as Fallout 3. Set nearly 200 years after the nuclear war that devastated the world you emerge from Vault 101 to look for your father, who had recently escaped from the vault. From this point you’re free to forge your own path in the Capital Wastlands of Washington, D.C. There’s really too much to get into here, but Fallout 3 brought this old franchise into the next gen while still retaining its odd humor, and some updates to the older gameplay mechanics. I’ve been through it 3 times, and each time I’ve found new things to do that I completely overlooked in previous games.
3. Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim – This is in the same vain of Fallout 3, except the time difference is only 5 years as opposed to 10. ESIV: Oblivion was a really great game, with tons to do. It also looked beautiful. However, I could never go back to play that one after having played Skyrim. Skyrim improves upon Oblivion in every way imaginable. Better controls, epic story, new leveling system, and DRAGONS! Skyrim is one of my favorite games of 2011, and I highly recommend it.
4. Batman: Arkham City – Arkham Asylum was the first great Batman game. Ever. It was the first game that really gave you an idea of what it’s like to be the Dark Knight. The downsides were that Arkham Asylum was pretty small so there weren’t too many areas to explore, and the boss fights were underwhelming. Arkham City fixed that by giving you nearly all of Gotham to explore, and making boss fights more interesting. They also refined the combat to make Batman even more badass than ever. It’s difficult to explain how awesome the game is, you kinda have to experience it for yourself. Trust me, it’s totally worth it.
5. Assassin’s Creed II – I had a tough time trying to figure out if I wanted to include AC: Brotherhood or ACII on the list. While Brotherhood was awesome and expanded on a lot of the features of ACII and added the Assassin’s Brotherhood to fight by your side, I ultimately felt that ACII was a far superior game. There were more cities to explore, a deeper plot, the addition of the economy system, Leonardo DaVinci, and the big reveal at the end of the game was far more unexpected than in later games. It fixed everything bad about AC and forged its’ own path to make AC a well known franchise. The story was so epic, it had me and my friends discussing our theories up until the release of Brotherhood a year later.

 

Eric is not a boss. You can Email Eric or follow Eric on Twitter @EricSweeten or Facebook

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