10 Movie Franchises That Should Have Stopped At One Film

7. Alien

Liam Neeson Taken 2
20th Century Fox

When Alien appeared in 1979, it was unlike any horror movie that had preceded it. The mixture of scares and sci-fi was an instant winner, and the stomach-bursting scene is one of the greatest moments in movie effects. The tension was constantly cranked to the max as the crew were picked off one by one, and Sigourney Weaver upended the traditional female in distress motif to become the ass-kicker in chief.

Surprisingly, it took seven years for a sequel to appear, and when Aliens was released in 1986, it was a cut above the usual quick cash in. Perhaps the lengthy gap between the two was a factor. Whatever, the magic wasn't able to be worked for the third entry, which saw the slow, steady descent into mundanity that the Alien franchise shared with every other over-stretched idea.

The box-office success of the movies led to prequels, sequels, spin-offs, comics, games and a cancelled plan for a TV series. There can be very few who would rate any of the sequels beyond Aliens as anything more than a way to spend a couple of hours at the movies - the stories are unmemorable and the thrills are in short supply. Sound familiar?

Contributor

Lifelong music obsessive, regular contributor to US guitar magazines, sometime radio presenter, singer/guitarist in Star Studded Sham, true believer in the power of rock'n'roll and an amp turned up to 11, about to publish first novel, The Bulletproof Truth.