Sequels

With a few exceptions (Star Wars?), sequels are generally known to be a weak follow-up to the original piece. I’ve found however, that in some cases, the second part of a story has been better received than part one. I would be interested to hear if anybody else has had the same experience.

The one that immediately springs to mind is Aliens, which is as good, if not better than, the original film.

An interesting topic especially if you knew the history of sequels made by Hollywood. You see, sequels have always been made since probably the days of silent movies. However, Hollywood, and any production company didn't want to invest money in anything that didn't have a chance of a profitable return. Thus, sequels often were very low financed. Now anybody sensible enough would reason that low financing usiallymeans people associated with such a sequel means they are not going to put forth their best effort, meaning the director, script writer, and sometimes even the actors themselves. So sequels historically never made a profit higher than the first movie.

Then in about the early 70's, there came out a couple of sequels that didn't seem so cheap, and Hollywood seemed shocked that a sequel could make as much if not MORE than the original movie. Some would guess at Star Wars and they wouldn't be half wrong. But Star Wars was the proof that sequels could be fiscally profitable. In my mind, the movies that tested the waters was the Planet of the Apes series.

Now not every sequel since then has shown profitability, but prior to that sequels had two chances of success; slim and none.

As someone else had said, sometimes you can tell by how it was written, that the concept of a sequel was justthrown together (that it wasn't planned from the beginning). Back to the future 2&3 seems like a glaring example of poorly composed scripts simply designed to be a cashcow.
However, other stories like Lord of the Rings, or even Howto train you dragon show well executed scripts that show it was planned from the beginning. HTTYD 4 probably being an exception to that rule.

I was actually referring to stories on LSF that have a part two rather that sequels in general but maybe I didn't make that clear. The comments above are nonetheless interesting.

There is a story (probably apocryphal) that following the success of a film called The Virgin Queen back in the 50's there should be a sequel and "Son of the Virgin Queen" was suggested

There was a story that the film The Madness of King George III was retitled the Madness of King George in the US so that people wouldn’t what happened to parts 1 & 2.
As for sequels here it’s kind of hard to tell. I haven’t seen many that aren’t part of a series and that’s more than 2 stories.

I rarely do sequels but I did one called "A New Old Mom" which has vastly outperformed the original "Still a Mom" in terms of feedback................much to my genuine surprise.

As for movies? Besides the classics that are easily Googled, I tend to think of Evil Dead 2 and Army of Darkness as progressively better films from the original Evil Dead, which seemed to lack confidence in pursuing the humor potential of the series.

Most sequels suck though. It's not a rule without exception, but the exceptions are so extremely rare that they become topics of trivia. If sequels were prone to being superior offerings, seeking exceptions would hardly qualify as a "good question".

In my opinion "A Deal's A Deal" by ChardT was as good as "The Talk." That's something I would have thought would be impossible when I first read "The Talk."

When it comes to the bulk of my series they were written as a single story and broken in to parts. I rarely write true sequels, preferring to finish the story before posting.

Any of the serials could be considered sequels, as they continue the story.

@Shadowspnk
I disagree.

A serial is a single narrative divided into episodes that has a "beginning" in the first episode, an "ending in the final episode, and however many episode between containing the "middle."

A sequel is an entirely separate narrative (with its own beginning, middle and end) that simply follows the original narrative in time and within the same "universe," often with the the same characters and setting.

And while we're on the topic, a "series" is slightly different (though more akin to an original and it's sequels). A series is a group of independent stories set in the same "universe" than can be read in any order.

I know these terms are often used interchangeably here, but they mean different things.

I myself do NOT write sequels (not that I really write anything anymore), because when I finish a story that has its own beginning, middle and end, I am done with it (unlike other authors who will often return to write more). I have wrtten several longer stories published here as serials, with the individual episodes not containing anything close to separate complete narratives. As an author, I'm very aware of the difference.

I would note that I did write two stories that could be considered parts of a series, since they were both in the same "universe," but neither is a sequel to the other because there no chronological relationship (they also happen not to include any if the same characters. I'd wager that not even my regular readers (those that still frequent the library) could name the 2.

I DO NOT WRITE SEQUELS!!!