Alien and 14 Other Movie Franchises They Should Have Stopped Making Decades Ago

A movie becomes a franchise when it hits big, and then when the sequel hits even bigger. At that point, the movie studios will start churning one sequel out after another — all of them terrible — ultimately serving as an object lesson in the law of diminishing returns.

Here’s our list of long-lived movie franchises that started strong but really should have stopped after the first or second movie. Instead, they kept going… and going… and going. Sometimes, more is less.

1. ‘Jaws’ (1975)

The original “Jaws” is an absolute classic. After that, things went rapidly downhill, culminating in the risible “Jaws: The Revenge.” When that abomination came out, the franchise had clearly jumped the shark. Critic Roger Ebert asked, “Wasn’t there someone in charge of assuring that the film was at least a passable thriller, however bad?”

2. ‘The Matrix’ (1999)

“The Matrix” was a groundbreaking film that people still watch today, and it still red-pills every viewer who sees it for the first time. But those sequels? Ugh. They got progressively more and more incoherent, and 18 years later, they made “The Matrix Resurrections,” which nobody asked for. Kevin Maher of the U.K.’s The Times called it “truly horrible,” and that was just the headline.

3. ‘The Terminator’ (1984)

“The Terminator” and “Terminator 2: Judgment Day” are groundbreaking and influential films that haven’t aged a day. Four more movies followed, each more intellectually bankrupt than the last, culminating in 2019’s “Terminator: Dark Fate,” which died a gruesome and horrible death at the box office. Joe Morgenstern of the Wall Street Journal called it “worse than death.”

4. ‘Rocky’ (1976)

The original “Rocky” was a serious movie about an underdog story that resonated with audiences so much that it won the Oscar for Best Picture. It was followed by a string of terrible sequels that achieved high levels of senseless idiocy, and people eventually stopped going to see them. The series has since morphed into the “Creed” movie franchise, so at least they changed the name and the protagonist.

5. ‘Pirates of the Caribbean’ (2003)

The first ”’Pirates of the Caribbean” movie was an epic adventure, and even the first sequel had some entertaining moments. The fifth one, “’Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales,” was a joyless exercise in going through the motions to collect a check. There’s nothing wrong with collecting checks, but rewarding repetitive garbage is something a society should just reject.

6. ‘Die Hard’ (1988)

“Die Hard” is an action classic, and the second movie was a passable follow-up. Even the third one, “Die Hard With a Vengeance,” was good fun during the first hour. But by the time Bruce Willis was in Russia for “A Good Day to Die Hard,” it was clear that the franchise was out of ideas, other than having Willis yell “yippie-ki-yay” after every explosion. In the Chicago Sun-Times, Richard Roeper wrote, “We feel as if we’re watching Bruce Willis in a Bruce Willis movie in which Bruce Willis can survive anything while taking out the villains, video-game style.”

7. ‘Halloween’ (1978)

Michael Myers is one of the most iconic villains in the horror genre thanks to the directorial brilliance of John Carpenter. The first movie is close to perfect, but the countless sequels, side missions, and retcons were not directed by him, and it shows. “Halloween Ends” was the last movie in the franchise, and in the Chicago Sun-Times, Richard Roeper wrote that the “so-called finale of the Michael Myers saga is just stabbing, metaphors, stabbing, soap opera, stabbing, marching band bullies, stabbing and more stabbing.” This time, let’s hope the franchise doesn’t pull a Michael Myers and keep getting up every time we think he’s dead.

8. ‘Rambo’ (1982)

“First Blood” was a powerful and serious film that depicted the way Vietnam veterans were treated when they came back home, and it took the PTSD that servicemen suffered as a primary topic. The second movie, “Rambo: First Blood Part II,” was massively popular, but it took the well-developed main character and turned him into a one-note mass murderer. The sequels continued in that very uninteresting vein. And let’s hope they meant it when they titled the 2019 entry “Rambo: Last Blood,” because enough already. In the Hollywood Reporter, Frank Scheck said, “The character deserves better, and so does the audience.”

9. ‘Alien’ (1979)

Ridley Scott’s “Alien” was a masterful mixture of science fiction and horror. The James Cameron-directed “Aliens” did the impossible and was as good as the original. Attempts to keep the franchise going since then have ranged from boring to pointless. However, 2024’s “Alien: Romulus,” did very well at the box office this summer, so we can probably expect more sequels.

10. ‘A Nightmare on Elm Street’ (1984)

The original “A Nightmare on Elm Street” was a clever horror movie based on a simple premise — don’t fall asleep, or else the horribly charred Freddy Krueger will kill you in your dreams. The second movie was kind of interesting for its unexpected gay subtext, and the third one was watchable. Everything afterward was very predictable, as most slasher films tend to be. The last entry was the 2010 remake, and since then the franchise has gone quiet. Don’t wake it up.

11. ‘Saw’ (2004)

The first “Saw” was clever, gruesome, and posed an intriguing question to viewers — if your loved ones were in danger, would you saw off your own foot? They really and truly could have gone out on top with that movie as a standalone entity, but instead, they made nine sequels. “Saw XI” is slated for release in 2025.

12. ‘Police Academy’ (1984)

The first “Police Academy” was stupid fun, and it made enough money to inspire a bunch of sequels in rapid succession, none of which were remotely funny. The last movie in the franchise was 1994’s “Police Academy: Mission to Moscow,” and since 30 years have gone by, it’s tempting to assume the movie studio got the hint and moved on. But as we all know perfectly well, a decades-old franchise can rise from the dead at any moment, and we should all be wary of some hypothetical reboot in 2051 starring Adam Driver and Lady Gaga.

13. ‘The Fast and the Furious’ (2001)

Did we even need the first movie in this franchise? “The Fast and the Furious” was a passable street-racing movie that was memorable for as many as ten minutes after the movie ended, but everything since has been as stupid as a bag of hammers. People keep going to see the movies anyway, but wow, how many of these movies do you people need?

14. ‘Jurassic Park’ (1993)

The original “Jurassic Park” was utterly groundbreaking, so much so that people sat by in amazement as it inspired crappy sequels, both of which seemed to have one-page scripts that simply said “Dinosaurs.” The franchise was rebooted with “Jurassic World” in 2015, and the movies since then have been absolutely story-free and utterly predictable.

15. ‘The Exorcist’ (1973)

The original “Exorcist” is a horror classic and remains one of the most terrifying movies ever made. The 1977 sequel, “Exorcist II: The Heretic,” is considered one of the worst movies ever made, a title it lives up to. 1990’s “The Exorcist III” was not terrible, but it wasn’t enough to make us forgive the entire city of Hollywood for making us watch the second movie. There were prequels, and another movie in 2023, “The Exorcist: Believer,” about which Stephanie Zacharek wrote in TIME, “I’ve already forgotten it.”