5 Movie Franchises That Got Better Over Time (And 5 That Got A Whole Lot Worse)

Prior to the release of Ghost Protocol in 2011, it looked for a while as if the Mission: Impossible franchise was struggling to keep its head above water. After all, we'd only seen two unspectacular new adventures for Ethan Hunt in the previous decade, with the second installment scoring the worst reviews and the third taking home the least at the box office.

However, after a stunning reinvention, Mission: Impossible might very well be the single best franchise that modern Hollywood has to offer. If Brad Bird set the bar with Ghost Protocol, Christopher McQuarrie raised it higher than anyone thought possible, with Tom Cruise literally risking his own life in order to deliver the sort of jaw-dropping entertainment that you won't see anywhere else on the big screen.

With the A-list leading man and creative driving force performing the kind of stunts that many seasoned professionals would balk at under the increasingly assured direction of a filmmaker that quickly established themselves as one of the action genre's leading lights, Mission: Impossible is now bigger and better than ever than ever before, with expectations now sky-high for the upcoming back-to-back sequels.