10 Planned Comic Book Movie Sequels (And What Happened)

The messy stories of how comic books' greatest franchises met their silver screen ends.

spider man 4 poster
Sony Pictures

You might be forgiven for thinking there are too many superhero films being made right now. The Marvel Cinematic Universe and the less-successful-but-still-trucking-along DC Extended Universe are keeping the market saturated so that audiences have always got something new to look forward to.

But this wasn’t always the case - the superhero zeitgeist only really began with The Avengers, and before that, superhero films were a risky prospect that led to a lot of cancellations of beloved franchises.

If things had been different, we could have had far more sequels, for better or worse, with some even getting into the planning stages before they were cancelled...

10. Green Lantern 2

spider man 4 poster
Warner Bros.

The Planned Sequel

Green Lantern 2 was intended to feature the legendary Lantern villain Sinestro and the Yellow power rings. In the original film, Sinestro suggested the forging of the yellow ring from Parallax's essence of fear, but protagonist Hal Jordan argued it would corrupt the wearer.

This is exactly what happened in the end-credits scene, where Sinestro puts on the ring. The film was meant to be the second of a trilogy that would begin a new DC franchise akin to the MCU, but the plans didn't last for long.

What Happened?

The original film was sadly cursed with setbacks and delays in pre-production, and various directors, including Quentin Tarantino, were picked up and dropped before it started filming; the film was doomed to fail.

The high expectations for the original’s box office led Warner Bros. to scrap the planned sequel after barely making back its budget, and the slating it got from critics dashed any hopes for the story to continue. However, in 2015 DC announced a new Green Lantern film called Green Lantern Corps, which is set to debut in 2020!

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Ben Trangmar hasn't written a bio just yet, but if they had... it would appear here.