The 20 greatest horror movie sequels

We’ll start here because not only is “Scream 2” a good sequel, but it’s, naturally, about sequels. After all, the conceit of “Scream” was that it was a meta slasher. “Scream 2” is, in turn, a meta slasher sequel. Unfortunately, after this one, the franchise never really managed to have the same juice, with the five following movies anywhere from pretty good to mediocre.

It took a while for George A. Romero to get a chance to make a sequel to “Night of the Living Dead.” To be fair, he made his seminal zombie movie on basically zero budget, and so it took a little time to get the ball rolling, not to mention to get a sequel going. It took famed, polarizing Italian filmmaker Dario Argento to get “Dawn of the Dead” going, and the film was released a decade after the first. This movie was a huge hit and arguably the one that has been most influential in the horror genre.

We’re doing two films from the “Living Dead” universe because this was built out of a schism. John Russo co-wrote “The Night of the Living Dead,” and then he and Romero had to divvy up the rights. Romero was able to keep making sequels to the film (part of the reason for the delay between movies), but Russo got the rights to use the words “Living Dead” in future movie titles. Hence, many years later, “Return of the Living Dead,” a punk-infused zombie comedy that is completely nuts and totally rules.

“Gremlins” is a horror-comedy, as is “The New Batch,” but the latter is so comedic as to barely qualify as a horror movie. However, it still counts as one of the best sequels ever made. Like “Return of the Living Dead,” “Gremlins 2” goes all out, being nuts and having fun. It’s meta, it’s silly, it’s a little gross but not disgusting. All in all, a great outing from Joe Dante.

They’ve made a lot of “Halloween” sequels. Most of them are bad. They’ve tried different things, like anthology stories and reboots, but they haven't worked well. Definitely related, John Carpenter only directed the first one. The first of the latest iteration of “Halloween” is good, though. Jamie Lee Curtis returns as Laurie, and everything after the first movie is retconned out. Now, the sequels to this movie are also pretty poor, but “Halloween” did work.

Well, we also enjoyed the first couple of “Scream” movies, so maybe we just have an affinity for Wes Craven’s meta side. “New Nightmare” is the seventh Freddy Krueger movie, but it isn’t really a “Nightmare on Elm Street” movie. See, in this movie, the “Nightmare on Elm Street” movies are movies, and Heather Langenkamp plays herself as the actress who played Nancy. Wes Craven appears as himself! What happens, though, is that Freddy emerges from the cinematic world and begins to hunt down the cast and crew of the “Elm Street” films.

Okay, the “Nightmare on Elm Street” franchise is quite iconic, so we will go with one more that is properly in continuity, not just a meta movie where “The Dream Master” is a movie. “The Dream Master” is the best of the other sequels. Yes, it’s made by unimaginative sleaze master Renny Harlin, but sometimes that’s what a movie needs. This is just solid slasher filmmaking within the parameters of the logic of Freddy Krueger, and either the special effects budget was improved, or the crew used the budget better.

When “Paranormal Activity” was a hit after being made for essentially zero dollars, sequels were inevitable. Found footage horror is about as cheap to make as any subgenre. The movies after “Paranormal Activity 3” are mediocre to bad, and it’s not surprising that the second film wasn’t ready to crack how to make a sequel work. The third film, thus, is a prequel, but that managed to work well.

This is a case where a sequel is also effectively a remake. “Evil Dead II” does a lot of retelling of “The Evil Dead,” but with a higher budget and a lighter touch. “The Evil Dead” is a nasty horror film with touches of humor. “Evil Dead II” is a humorous horror film with touches of nastiness. We also want to shout out “Army of Darkness,” which is the “Evil Dead” formula but in a sword-and-sandals adventure movie.

The “Child’s Play” franchise had fizzled out after three movies, but after a break they decided, “Let’s try some stuff.” It can be a lot of fun when a flagging franchise tries some stuff. “Bride of Chucky” is a horror-comedy that pokes fun at the seriousness of the first three films. Chucky becomes a funnier, even campier, character, and sometimes you need a movie about a killer doll to be a bit funny.

With the sequel to “Bride of Chucky,” “Seed of Chucky,” they veered too far into the camp. The franchise hit the skids and was rebooted again years later, this time direct-to-video. And yet, the two direct-to-video “Chucky” movies are solid. “Cult of Chucky,” the better of those movies, gets the nod here.

This is a little tricky because “Aliens” is an outright action movie. However, this is a list of horror movie sequels, so the sequels need not be horror films. “Alien” is a gripping, nasty horror film. “Aliens” is an epic, exciting action movie. They do different things, but they both do their thing as well as any film in their respective genres.

If you want a proper horror film in the “Alien” franchise, here you go. After Ridley Scott had worked through his Big Ideas within the world of “Alien,” the franchise rebooted with an interquel. “Romulus” takes place between the events of “Alien” and “Aliens.” To be fair, there are 57 years between those movies on the timeline. “Romulus” is about new characters (for the most part), but it’s also as nasty as the first film. Not as gripping, but it’s a proper bit of horror filmmaking.

“10 Cloverfield Lane” is only tangentially related to “Cloverfield,” but at least it isn’t shot in an obnoxious way. This film, a small-scale story, is much better than the original incoherent monster movie. A woman awakens after a car crash in a strange house and is told a cataclysmic event has happened, and it isn’t safe to leave. She then begins to wonder if the owner of the house, played excellently by John Goodman, is as dangerous as anything that might be lurking out in the world.

“Psycho” is a classic horror movie, one of the proto-slashers. None of the sequels are good in the traditional sense, but “Psycho III” has some juice that makes it compelling. Anthony Perkins didn’t just return to play Norman Bates; he also directed the film. Perkins getting to direct himself in his iconic role is what makes “Psycho III” so interesting. It really dives into the bifurcation between Norman Bates and “Mother” in a way that is a bit melodramatic, but a big swing we appreciate.

“A Quiet Place” was a surprise hit and a real sensation, but could they make a sequel work? It turns out that yes, they indeed could do so. “Part II” lives up to its name in that it is a real “more of the same” sequel. It turns out there was more meat on that bone, though. After all, the aliens with super hearing aren’t vanquished in the first film. Sometimes going back to the same well works.

Let’s go old school! They’ve been making horror sequels for basically as long as they have been making movies. “Dracula” and the other Universal monsters never had strong sequels back in the day (though the Spanish-language “Dracula” shot at the same time is good), save for Frankenstein. It helps a ton that James Whale was a better director than his Universal compatriots, and that he handled both “Frankenstein” and “Bride of Frankenstein.” The film mined a subplot in Mary Shelley’s novel and created another iconic movie monster in The Bride.

“C.H.U.D.” is better than you might expect, and given that it did not feel fruitful for a sequel, the fact that “C.H.U.D. II” is enjoyable also makes it better than you might expect. Now, it’s also a completely different thing, which the silly subtitle might suggest. “C.H.U.D.” is a serious horror film, essentially a zombie movie, set in New York. The sequel is a horror-comedy set in a small town, featuring plenty of slapstick and '80s cheese. Fortunately, it’s a lot of fun, and that makes up for, you know, certain flaws in the traditional measures of film quality.

Sometimes, a sequel just can’t really work, but a prequel can. “The Omen” is one of the canonical ‘70s horror films; the story of a father realizing the child he had absconded with (the child his wife gave birth to sadly died soon thereafter) may be the literal Antichrist. Instead of more Damien, but without any suspense, “The First Omen” goes back to a few years before “The Omen” unfolds. That does make it one of those sequels/prequels that is, to a large degree, a different story, drafting off of name recognition, but “The First Omen” really works, so we’ll let that slide.

There are, in fact, diminishing returns to outlandish, gory “kills” in a horror franchise. “Final Destination” as a franchise is truly just a series of Rube Goldberg murders, many of them quite violent. After five such movies, though, the ideas ran dry, and interest in the franchise waned. After 14 years away, the franchise returned with “Final Destination Bloodlines,” and it turned out to be probably the best movie in the franchise. It’s got the kills, yes, but it’s also the best-made movie of the six.