20 Highest-Grossing Movie Franchises Ranked Worst To Best

Worldwide box office: $3.35 billion.

Between 2008 and 2012, the Twilight Saga was all the rage, either leaving audiences swooning over Robert Pattinson's moody vampire Edward Cullen, or throwing its biggest critics into a frenzy with its narrative inconsistency, dire action sequences, and cynical approach to romance.

It's hard to deny that the five-movie series, based on Stephanie Meyer's bestselling book series of the same name, was incredibly popular, and struck a chord with a large group of typically younger viewers, but even so it's hard to overlook the series' most glaring flaws when considering it as a whole.

Though the first film - meme-able as it may be - carried some emotional weight in its core story, the sequels became increasingly melodramatic and joyless to the point of alienation. The villains were hammy and unthreatening, the infamous love triangle became tepid and forced, and the dialogue slipped almost into parody.

It's easy to see the appeal, particularly for teenage audiences and fans of the novels, but strictly as a movie series Twilight just had too many flaws to make itself work.