8 Movie Franchises That Continued Long After Their “Final” Chapter

While Spielberg and Lucas originally considered making five Indiana Jones movies, they decided to stop with the third entry instead. Spielberg felt Temple Of Doom was much too dark and horrible, so he wanted to get back to the light-hearted tone of Raiders with The Last Crusade.

Bringing along Sean Connery to play Indy’s father was a stroke of meta genius, and The Last Crusade – which ended with Indiana and friends riding off into the sunset – felt like the right time to stop. Of course, George Lucas isn’t one to let potential money just sit there, so he produced The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles TV show afterwards.

When Ford reprised Indy for a cameo in one of the episodes it spurred Lucas to create another movie, which after years of development hell became *shudders* Kingdom Of The Crystal Skull. While it was a huge hit it was also critically reviled, and fans of the series prefer to ignore it.

Hopefully, the fifth movie, which is due in 2019, will close the series on a strong note.

Can you think of any other franchises that kept going well beyond the "final" instalment? Name and shame them in the comments below.