What's in a name? Worst sequel titles ever
Posted Thursday, June 6, 2013 at 12:32 PM Central
Last updated Thursday, June 6, 2013 at 1:10 PM Central
by John Couture
Ever since Breakin' 2: Electric Boogaloo, we have come to ridicule, shame and outright mock those in Hollywood who are in charge of coming up with sequel titles. It's now perfectly accepted to add "Electric Boogaloo" to any sequel title in a surefire way to denote derision of the film or title choice.
Case in point: 22 Jump Street: Electric Boogaloo.
That's not a typo. In fact, I suppose you can thank Sony Pictures for this little diatribe I'm about to unleash. That's right, they have decided (in their infinite wisdom of course) to rename 21 Jump Street 2 (which was weak in its own right) to 22 Jump Street.
Seriously, I wish I were making this up. So, either they moved the undercover cop headquarters across the street or they are implying that they plan to go back and make "1 Jump Street," "2 Jump Street," and so on.
Well, if there's anything I can't stand more than 20 prequels to 21 Jump Street, it's completely robbing the source material of its remaining dignity by brazenly changing its name like it's no big deal. If Johnny Depp were dead, he'd be spinning in his grave over such nonsense. Instead, he's alive and will most likely make another cameo appearance in the sequel.
Sigh.
But as these things tend to do, it gave me inspiration. Arise*, brilliant idea! Let's compile a list of the worst sequel titles ever.
Here are a few to get us started, but please send us your worst.
2 Fast 2 Furious
This pretty much goes for any sequel that tries to use text speak or numbers to replace words (see the asterisk below). Everyone already knows how I feel about the Fast & Furious movies, but this is a special sort of evil. And it's not limited to this first sequel. The whole series is rife with bad title selections. What is Fast & Furious? Oh, it's the fourth movie in the franchise? Where did the "the"s go? And what about the "Furious" in Fast Five?
Blues Brothers 2000
This sequel to the iconic The Blues Brothers was released in 1998, so I'm still trying to figure out where the 2000 came from? Why not go with the hip term of the times, Blues Brothers Y2K? At least that title has a simple 2 in it and conveys both a sequel and a new set of Blues Brothers for a new century/millennium.
Leonard Part 6
This film is not a sequel, nor did it give rise to one and yet, it is still called "Part 6." They explain in the opening that parts one through five were locked up for "national security" purposes. It's too bad they couldn't have also locked up this stinker.
Live Free or Die Hard
The original title is iconic, Die Hard, but it seems that each sequel is vying to outdo the previous one for ridiculousness. In fact, we could probably run a poll asking for the worst sequel name just from Die Hard sequels. Die Hard 2: Die Harder, Die Hard with a Vengeance or A Good Day to Die Hard could easily make this list.
Alvin & The Chipmunks: The Squeakquel
There's a special place in Hell for whoever created this monstrosity of a title. I'd feel bad for Jason Lee, but he actually came back for the third film Alvin & the Chipmunks: Chipwrecked which is its own special breed of disgusting.
Halloween: H20
Sometimes terrible sequel titles are simply a product of overzealous marketing types and a poor choice in font. Such is the case for Halloween: H20. Is it H20, as in twenty years since the original, or H2O, as in water? Well, water makes no sense and the release date seems to work out for twenty, but everyone still pronounces it "H-2-Oh."
Leprechaun: Back 2 Tha Hood
Not only does this sequel break the number substitution rule above, but it's not even the second film in the franchise. By my count, this is the seventh film in Warwick Davis' third most famous franchise. Of course, the original did introduce us to Jennifer Aniston, so there's that.
Well, that should help to get the ball rolling. What do you think? Continue the conversation in the comments section below.
* This speaks volumes to the level of grammar nerds that Tim and I are. We can both accept the concept of a Snake Woman, but we cringe at the use of a verb as a noun.