20 Film Franchises That Were Cancelled After One Movie

20. John Carter

In Edgar Rice Burroughs' Barsoom series, a Civil War vet named John Carter gets transported to Mars, where he becomes an instrumental figure in a planetary war. Since the 1930s, Walt Disney himself tried to adapt the first Barsoom book, A Princess of Mars, into a feature. It may have taken decades but in 2012, the first film adaptation of the series, John Carter, finally hit theatres.

Director Andrew Stanton saw John Carter as the first of a trilogy and intended to adapt the sequel, God of Mars, if the first film was a success. The follow-up would've had Carter battling the Plant Men, have an epic sky battle with thousands of airships, and journey to Martian Heaven.

Despite failing badly at the box office, the cast and director still pushed to continue on with the second and third film. But when rights for the Barsoom novels returned to the Burroughs estate in 2014, the trilogy was toast.