20 Movie Franchises That Carried On For Way Too Long

7. Transformers

The Movies: Transformers (2007), Revenge of the Fallen (2009), Dark of the Moon (2011), Age of Extinction (2014) Is it fair to say a franchise has overstayed its welcome when the series is one of the most lucrative in history, with box office grosses of well over $2.5bn, Dark of the Moon currently sitting pretty as the sixth-biggest movie of all-time and this year's Age of Extinction all-but-guaranteed to be one of the year's biggest hits? I think so. Transformers was released in July 2007 and while not a great movie, it is easily the most satisfying entry in the franchise. A solid origin story, the seamless mixture of practical and visual effects saw Michael Bay unleash several huge action set-pieces. Of course, characterization and dialogue were overlooked, but that's not why anyone went to see this movie. All in all, it was a promising start for the franchise. And then came Revenge of the Fallen... An overlong, overly-complicated, almost unbearable assault on the senses, all of the charm of the original was buried under an avalanche of incomprehensible set-pieces and questionable humor. Ignoring the awful comedy of Sam Witwicky's parents, we also had the borderline-racist Autobot duo of Skids and Mudflap and of course...giant robot balls. Oh, ha ha. Was it really worth letting John Turtorro becoming one of the only actors to ever be filmed on the pyramids for that? Dark of the Moon was a little better, but not by much. Again, at almost 160 minutes the movie was far too long and the lowbrow humor remained. On the plus side, Michael Bay actually toned down his visual style (a little) to complement the films addition of 3D which hugely benefits the impressive action. Despite the director claiming this was the end of his involvement with the franchise, a fourth movie was soon announced. Age of Extinction will again be in 3D, and feature an all-new cast in the same universe. It's strange for a director to reboot his own franchise, but maybe it's for the best. Armed with a lower budget (a paltry $165m) and a point to prove after publicly criticizing the last two movies, Michael Bay will be out to prove his critics wrong. I'm just expecting more of the same.