(no subject)

[jfb]

In Roger Ebert's Answer Man column this week, a reader states that "the third installment of all trilogies is either a disappointment or just terrible, even if the second film was great." He goes on to ask why people make third installments, but my immediate thought was: Are there counterexamples? Trilogies where the third film is really good and/or better than the first two?

Ebert gives a couple of examples (and ignores the question as stated). Can you guys think of any others? I've mentioned that I liked the third Matrix best, but that wasn't saying much, and anyway I know nobody agrees with me. A good third movie in a series that went on beyond three would be fine, too. Was the third James Bond movie the best one? I don't even know what it was.

Comments

[wrog]

How about the Pink Panther series?

In fact, it's very odd to watch the first movie (The Pink Panther, which actually stars David Niven and Robert Wagner) because you realize that when they made it, they had no idea that the Clouseau character, who has relatively little screen time, would become so popular.

Then you get the second movie, A Shot in the Dark which was really more of an experiment to see if Peter Sellers could carry a movie all by himself as Clouseau. It's rather bare-bones; doesn't even have Dreyfuss (Herbert Lom) in it.

It really wasn't until the 3rd movie (Return of the Pink Panther) --- which took another 9 years to come out --- where everything comes together and the series is truly established (to the extent that Edwards could then churn out 4 more movies in somewhat rapid succession, never mind that 3 of them completely suck and two of them were after Sellers died...)