Nine Franchise Sequels That Failed So Badly They Changed Hollywood Forever

Franchise sequels have been the mainstay of Hollywood for a long time, but for every Empire Strikes Back or Spider-Man 2 or Aliens, there are sequels that not only failed, but failed so badly the direction of the franchise was changed forever. In May of 2026, several original films outperformed legacy sequels like The Mandalorian and Grogu, which raises the possibility that we may be entering a new era of originality. With that in mind, I want to look at some of the franchise sequels that failed spectacularly: movies that never got another sequel, movies that had high expectations and disappointed, or movies that fans questioned the existence of in the first place. I will talk about the quality of these movies, but mostly the relationship between these movies and their franchises, and how those franchises were changed.

Spoilers for all of these movies, obviously.

Joker: Folie à Deux misunderstood Arthur Fleck and tanked its own franchise

Joker: Folie à Deux is the sequel to the highly debated Joker from 2019, a film that spawned discourse everywhere and won Joaquin Phoenix the Oscar for Best Actor while becoming the first R-rated movie to reach a billion dollars. The problem is that Joker was not designed to have a sequel. It ends conclusively, and fans did not really want one, since sequels can undermine the original film. That is exactly what happened. Even though Todd Phillips wrote and directed both films, the sequel completely misunderstood Arthur Fleck. The movie centers on Arthur's trial, with Harley Quinn entering the picture and pushing him to keep being the Joker, only for Arthur to admit by the end that there is no Joker at all, before he is killed, presumably by the real Joker.

As I see it, "it feels like Todd Phillips wanted to backtrack Arthur's character arc from the first movie that the whole Joker thing was just an act and not a product of the lengths marginalized people can actually go to." The five-year gap between the films did not help either, since pop culture can lose interest over that much time, and the project was met mostly with a shrug.

Joker: Folie à Deux scored 31% on Rotten Tomatoes with a matching 31% audience score, and a 5.2 on IMDb. It grossed just $207 million on a roughly $200 million budget, about 20% of what the first film made. Looking back now, the movie did not derail the future of DC much, since Arthur's death made a third film unlikely anyway. It landed awkwardly between the end of the DCEU in 2023 and the start of James Gunn's DCU with Superman in 2025, but since it was an Elseworlds story, Gunn had no reason to worry about it affecting DC's future. Its legacy is really just how badly it failed and how it tarnished the first film's reputation.

Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore ended Warner Bros' spin-off ambitions

The Secrets of Dumbledore was not a disaster on the level of Joker 2, but it was still a disappointment. The first Fantastic Beasts film grossed $816 million in 2016, and The Crimes of Grindelwald made a respectable $655 million in 2018. A four-year gap followed before the third film, partly due to COVID delaying releases, and momentum from the underwhelming second movie was already gone. The Johnny Depp situation, where Depp was fired from playing Grindelwald following the Amber Heard fallout, added more controversy to a franchise that was already struggling.

The Secrets of Dumbledore scored 46% on Rotten Tomatoes with an 83% audience score and a 6.2 on IMDb, grossing just $407 million, less than half of the first film. Most fans would probably argue it is actually better than The Crimes of Grindelwald, which means its failure is partly the fault of the film before it. J.K. Rowling had confirmed plans for fourth and fifth Fantastic Beasts films, but Warner Bros never greenlit them after this disappointment. I would argue that had this series succeeded, Warner Bros would not have pushed for the new Harry Potter reboot on HBO, since the studio now seems to want to avoid risk on Harry Potter spin-offs altogether and would rather just remake the original story.

The Marvels became the nail in the coffin for Captain Marvel

The Marvels is the sequel to 2019's Captain Marvel, and in a way also a sequel to the Disney+ shows WandaVision and Ms. Marvel, which likely hurt it more than anything. It scored 63% on Rotten Tomatoes with a 79% audience score and a 5.4 on IMDb, grossing just $206 million, less than 20% of Captain Marvel's total. I think this is one of the rare cases on this list where comparing to the first film is not entirely fair, since Captain Marvel's billion-dollar gross was driven mostly by hype for Avengers: Endgame rather than the character herself. I would actually argue The Marvels is the better film of the two, with a more entertaining supporting cast, but that clearly did not matter at the box office.

Part of the failure came down to the state of the MCU at the time, with no clear direction and general superhero fatigue. A reason not enough people mention is how many post-Endgame movies required watching Disney+ shows for context, and The Marvels was the last MCU film to lean on that so heavily before the studio corrected course and scaled back its show output. The clear legacy of this film is that Captain Marvel is not a box office draw, so we probably will not see much more of her beyond a likely appearance in one of the two upcoming Avengers films. I would be shocked if we ever got a Captain Marvel 3.

Alien: Covenant killed interest in Ridley Scott's prequel storyline

Treating Alien: Covenant as a sequel to Prometheus for this discussion, the 2012 film was a peculiar, divisive horror movie marketed as an Alien prequel that never actually featured a Xenomorph, yet it still grossed roughly $400 million, excellent for an R-rated film. It took five years for Covenant to arrive, picking up nearly an entirely new cast except for Michael Fassbender's David, and continuing the origin story of the Xenomorph. That is the storyline I dislike the most: "I don't care to see how the Xenomorphs were created, especially when it ties into other Aliens and weird black goos."

Beyond that, the film has weak characters who make poor decisions and get killed, which feels generic for the franchise, though I do like its chilling ending. Alien: Covenant scored 65% on Rotten Tomatoes with a 55% audience score and a 6.4 on IMDb, grossing $240 million, about 60% of what Prometheus made. Ridley Scott reportedly had plans for two more films exploring androids and eventually leading up to the original Alien, but 20th Century Fox deemed Covenant a disappointment and scrapped them. Alien: Romulus and Alien: Earth later revived interest in the brand in 2024 and 2025 with little connection to Prometheus or Covenant, and I doubt Scott will direct another Alien prequel.

Wonder Woman 1984 tarnished the character and helped end the DCEU

Wonder Woman 1984 followed a DCEU that was largely a mess apart from the first Wonder Woman, which I frankly love and which earned real goodwill for Patty Jenkins. With Justice League a disaster, Jenkins seemed to have free rein for the sequel, and the trailers revealing Steve Trevor's return raised eyebrows, though fans, myself included, gave it the benefit of the doubt. Delayed by COVID, it released in December 2020 in theaters and on HBO Max.

Wonder Woman 1984 scored 57% on Rotten Tomatoes with a 73% audience score and a 5.3 on IMDb, grossing $169 million, though comparing that box office to the first film is not really fair given the pandemic streaming release. What matters more is how bad the film actually was. It has a nonsensical plot and weak characters, but the real problem is the degradation of Wonder Woman herself, including a scene where she sexually assaults someone, alongside a script that portrays nearly every man besides Steve as a sexist pig. Wonder Woman is supposed to be empowering, and I have almost never seen a movie less empowering than this one.

Patty Jenkins had plans for a third film, but it was scrapped even before James Gunn took over, and her planned Star Wars movie was canceled too. Six years later there has still been no new Wonder Woman film and no plans for one, making this movie, in some ways, the nail in the coffin for the DCEU itself.

Independence Day: Resurgence proved a 20 year wait can kill a sequel

The original Independence Day was an instant hit in 1996 with likable characters and iconic moments, and unlike most films on this list, there was genuine, sustained desire for a sequel from the early 2000s onward. It still took 20 years to arrive, mostly because studios were not thrilled with the scripts they had. As I remember it, the reaction by the time it finally happened was more like, "Oh, they're finally making an Independence Day sequel. Okay."

Independence Day: Resurgence scored 29% on Rotten Tomatoes with a 30% audience score and a 5.2 on IMDb, grossing $389 million on a roughly $165 million budget, not a bomb but not great, and unable to reach even half of the original's worldwide gross despite the two-decade wait. The core problem is that it is essentially the same movie as the original but with a far less relatable world and a far less energetic cast, and Will Smith's absence was jarring given how much he did for the first film. I include this one even though Independence Day is barely a franchise, because the long wait made the original feel bigger than it was, similar to Avatar 2, and success here could have spawned an actual franchise.

X-Men: Dark Phoenix went out with a whimper amid the Fox acquisition

Dark Phoenix, the last X-Men film before the Deadpool movies, suffered from a pile of behind-the-scenes factors. The biggest was Disney finalizing its purchase of 20th Century Fox in March 2019, just three months before release, which made it obvious a reboot was coming and drained excitement, much like the later DCEU films that everyone knew did not matter. Coming out a month after Avengers: Endgame did not help either, since audiences coming off that emotional high had little appetite for this film.

By multiple cast accounts, the production reportedly went through difficulties, with scenes cut and the third act changed. Simon Kinberg had originally planned the Dark Phoenix story as two films, but Fox rejected that, forcing everything into one movie that suffered for it. Dark Phoenix scored 22% on Rotten Tomatoes with a 64% audience score and a 5.7 on IMDb, grossing $252 million on a $200 million budget, barely a third of what Days of Future Past made five years earlier. I do not think this film killed the X-Men franchise, since Disney was moving on from these characters regardless, but it did not do the franchise any favors, and I am not certain any of these younger actors are returning for Avengers: Doomsday.

Shazam: Fury of the Gods flopped as a lame duck DC movie

The first Shazam was a pleasant surprise in 2019 for a DCEU that had mostly been rough up to that point, giving fans some hope for the brand. Its sequel was delayed by production concerns about the young cast aging out of their roles, and then by COVID, so Fury of the Gods did not arrive until 2023, roughly four years later.

Shazam: Fury of the Gods scored 49% on Rotten Tomatoes with a surprisingly high 85% audience score and a 5.9 on IMDb, grossing an embarrassing $134 million, barely a third of what the original made even though that film was not a box office giant either. The movie plays as generic superhero content, possibly a result of COVID affecting production, and it suffered further from being a lame duck release after James Gunn had already announced his DC reboot, making every 2023 DC film feel inconsequential. The film's performance did not kill an already canceled DCU, but it did coincide with a quiet end to Zachary Levi's momentum in the role, following political comments he made that turned parts of Hollywood against him, and I would be shocked if we saw him play Shazam again.

Terminator: Dark Fate could be the final nail for the franchise

The Terminator franchise has struggled for decades to produce a sequel worthy of the first two films, with every entry since Terminator 2 going its own direction without meeting expectations. Terminator: Genisys was meant to launch a trilogy that never happened after its disappointing reception, so Paramount tried rebooting again with Dark Fate, built as a direct sequel to Terminator 2 while ignoring Terminator 3 and the other spin-offs, with James Cameron heavily involved though not directing.

Despite that spark of optimism, the film generated almost no interest and became a box office catastrophe. Dark Fate scored 70% on Rotten Tomatoes with an 82% audience score and a 6.2 on IMDb, decent ratings that did not translate to money, grossing just $261 million on a $185 million budget and losing the studio over $100 million. The film opens with John Connor killed without a single line of dialogue, a choice that angered a lot of fans and likely drove some away before they even saw it. Similarly to Genisys, the film reportedly was meant to start a trilogy that never continued after its poor performance, and seven years on there has been no follow-up. There are allegedly plans for a Terminator 7, though I expect it will have nothing to do with Dark Fate and will probably fail as well.

Do you love some of these movies, or hate them all?