Top Ten - Most Unique Sequels (Part Two)

And now...part two of the most unique sequels of all time!

5. Gremlins 2: The New Batch

On the surface this looks like another madcap journey into insane Gremlins action. Billy finds Gizmo, Giz gets wet, mogwais eat food after midnight, and wreak havoc in a media mogul's skyscraper. But, Joe Dante doesn't seem interested in making just another sequel. Instead, he uses the plot merely as a framework for a constant barrage of jokes, taking the dark humour of Gremlins 1 and amplifying it to bizarre heights. Of course, simply adding humour to a sequel doesn't make it unique. What makes Gremlins 2 unique is that the humour is so deconstructive, ridiculing sequels and film structure entirely. It may be the first postmodern sequel to a film that wasn't originally a spoof. Not only are there countless movie parodies (ranging from Rambo to Busby Berkeley musicals), but the film takes fun potshots at its predecessor. Leonard Maltin shows up as a film critic who lambastes Gremlins before being killed, and Phoebe Cates is allowed to mock her critically reviled Christmas speech from the first movie with a ridiculous story about Lincoln's birthday. Then halfway through, during a tense moment, the film reel burns up, halting the movie so that the Gremlins can make finger puppets on a white screen. In order to get the story up and running again, it's up to Hulk Hogan to scare the Gremlins into restarting the projector. Dante clearly realizes that Gremlins 2, by it's very nature, would be identical to the first one if played straight. By deciding to throw in everything including the kitchen sink, Dante hilariously sabotages the film franchise and makes a true live action cartoon.

4. Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back

Jay and Silent Bob popped up in each of Kevin Smith's films before Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back. In Clerks, Mallrats, Chasing Amy, and Dogma they had a small storyline that existed beneath the main plot. When Kevin Smith finally let them helm their own movie, he decided to make it the culmination of every film he had ever made, a sequel to all of his previous films. This could create a couple of problems, especially since guys like Jason Lee played a lead character in both Mallrats and Chasing Amy. Keeping true to the idea that this would be an official sequel to all previous films, Smith has Jason Lee show up to play both characters. Then upping the postmodern tactics employed by Gremlins 2, he ends the film in a Hollywood studio...mixing real actors playing themselves (Ben Affleck and Matt Damon), with actors playing characters (Will Ferrel as a wildlife Marshall). It's all sooo complicated, but tons of fun if you have followed Kevin Smith's previous films. (I imagine it would be fairly nonsensical for first time viewers). By the end, it actually feels like a fitting conclusion to Smith's Jay and Silent Bob series...a sequel to four separate movies.

3. Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein

Universal Studios had a pretty awesome collection of horror movie icons with Frankenstein's Monster, Dracula, and the Wolfman. In order to spice up some of the previous sequels, they decided to pit different monsters against one another in the films, so a film like House of Frankenstein found a way to incorporate all three villains into one movie. That in itself is enough to get on this list, but then someone at Universal had an insane idea - take their top comedians, Bud Abbott and Lou Costello, and throw them into a monster movie with all three horror icons. What could have been a disaster ends up being one of the most innovative, and funniest horror comedy sequels of all time. The genius of it all is that it never forgets that it is a real sequel to these scary horror flicks, and the villains are all played one hundred percent straight. They haven't changed from one movie to the next. The humour comes from Abbott and Costello being terrified by the fact that they are being constantly attacked by these nightmarish creatures. Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein is on this list for successfully cross breeding two seemingly opposing genres, incorporating three movie franchises into one (four if you consider the Abbott and Costello comedies a franchise), and managing to actually be a fantastic movie.

2. New Nightmare

The Elm Street franchise took a quick nosedive into the ridiculous. Wes Craven's Nightmare on Elm Street was a genuinely scary low budget horror flick with a frightening concept (a serial killer slashing his victims in their dreams), but the sequels turned Freddy Krueger, a child molester nonetheless, into some kind of comic anti-hero. Classy! After the pathetic Freddy's Dead (in which Freddy is killed off in 3D), Wes Craven must have felt like his scary concept had been butchered. So, what to do? Well....why not make a sequel that exists in the real world, where the cast and crew of the Nightmare on Elm Street flicks all play themselves. Heather Langenkamp (who played Nancy in parts one and two) plays herself, as does Robert Englund, John Saxon, and even Wes Craven. Instead of following any of the previous plots, New Nightmare decides to be a sequel to the entire franchise. The story, which sounds less ridiculous in the movie, has to do with the fact that by ending the Nightmare franchise, the evil of Freddy Krueger escaped into the real world. To harness it, Wes has to make a new Nightmare movie, but Freddy has decided to terrorize Heather's family, and possess her son, before that can happen. Reality and Fiction become intertwined as Heather's life starts to transform into the first Nightmare on Elm Street movie. As complicated as it sounds, the important fact is New Nightmare is the scariest and most creative film in the entire series, surpassing (in my opinion) the first one. While most producers these days decide to reboot franchises to add new life (Batman, James Bond), Craven did it through innovation, and a story that doesn't discredit the previous six movies.

1. Escape From the Planet of the Apes (spoilers for the Planet of the Apes series)

The writers of this third Planet of the Apes movie really had to work for their money, trying to find a way around one of the biggest plot problems ever created. How do you make a sequel to a movie called Planet of the Apes when the entire planet blew up at the end of the last movie? Ingeniously, they decided that the heroic ape couple of Cornelius, and Dr. Zira (along with "who the Hell is that" Dr. Milo), upon trying to escape the planet were caught in a time vortex, amusingly created by the nuclear explosion, that sent them back in time to Earth circa 1971. It's good cause it's cost effective, but also because, in my recollection it's the first sequel that is simultaneously a sequel to the second movie, and a prequel to the first. That's right - A prequel/sequel!! As Escape From the Planet of the Apes takes shape it tells the story of Cornelius and Zira becoming celebrities in modern America. But soon, they are seen by paranoid government officials as being a threat to mankind (probably because apes end up taking over the world and enslave humanity), so they are hunted down. Before the tragic ending, they manage to save their only child and subsequently put into motion a series of events (covered in the fourth and fifth movies) that will lead to the very same events from the first movie. It's the first curve in the Planet of the Apes vicious circle.

In my opinion these are the ten most unique sequels I've ever seen; movies fighting against the status quo. If anyone knows of any others please share below.