10 Movie Sequels With The Most Shocking Drops In Quality

3. Exorcist II: The Heretic

Exorcist II: The Heretic
Warner Bros.

If you ask horror hounds what the worst sequel in horror movie history is, a good portion of those will immediately bring up Exorcist II: The Heretic.

Not only did The Heretic have the daunting task of following an iconic picture, it was also just absolute trash. It's one thing to not match the ridiculously high quality of your predecessor, yet it's something else entirely if a follow-up is awful on a multitude of levels.

Released in 1977 - four years after William Freidkin's The Exorcist - The Heretic picks things up with a 16-year-old Regan MacNeil, who's now in a psychiatric facility and purportedly has no memories of the events of the previous film. Along for the ride, there's Father Lamont, a priest troubled by his own exorcism experiences which left a woman dead, and who is now investigating the circumstances of Father Merrin's death during his encounter with the Pazuzu-possessed Regan.

There's brainwave monitoring, there's locusts, there's trippy visions, there's doppelgangers, there's some horrendous dialogue, and not even the presence of Richard Burton - who played Lamont - could save this from being an utter stinker.

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Once described as the Swiss Army Knife of WhatCulture, Andrew can usually be found writing, editing, or presenting on a wide range of topics. As a lifelong wrestling fan, horror obsessive, and comic book nerd, he's been covering those topics professionally as far back as 2010. In addition to his current WhatCulture role of Senior Content Producer and Presenter, Andrew previously spent nearly a decade as Online Editor and Lead Writer for the world's longest-running genre publication, Starburst Magazine, and his work has also been featured on BBC, TechRadar, Tom's Guide, WhatToWatch, Sportkskeeda, and various other outlets, in addition to being a Rotten Tomatoes-approved film critic. Between his main day job, his role as lead panel host of Wales Comic Con, and his gig as a pre-match host for Wrexham AFC games, Andrew has also carried out a hugely varied amount of interviews, from the likes of Robert Englund and Eli Roth to Kevin Smith and the Russo Brothers, to Kevin Conroy and Frank Miller, to Bret Hart and Sting, to Mickey Thomas, Joey Jones, Phil Parkinson, and Brian Flynn, to many, many more. Where his beloved Wrexham AFC is concerned, Andrew is a long-standing season ticket holder and an FSA Award-winner for his time co-hosting the Fearless in Devotion podcast.