Get ready for your favorite toys, video games, legos, pets, and dragons to return to a movie theater near you.
A History of Animated Sequels
Around the turn of the millennium, animated sequels were mostly direct-to-video affairs, an easy way to cash in on VHS revenue streams without cluttering the multiplexes. This was not necessarily an indictment of their quality, despite the lackluster reputation that Disney’s later offerings cemented for the whole concept – anyone who thinks Beauty and the Beast Enchanted Christmas isn’t a masterpiece can fight me.
But that’s how things were done, with very few exceptions (Rescuers Down Under, which bombed; Toy Story 2, which was a direct-to-video sequel promoted to the box office big leagues; Swan Princess 2, which was in 97 theaters for a single weekend; and the Care Bears trilogy).
But a single ogre from an upstart animation studio changed the game in 2001. Dreamworks Animation was a fledgling studio competing against the mighty Disney, so when Shrek became the 13th-highest grossing film ever in the US, it was a no-brainer to make a sequel. So three years later, Dreamworks released Shrek 2 into theaters.
In 2004, Shrek 2 was the third-highest grossing movie ever in the US, behind only Titanic and Stars Wars (with copious reissues). It remained the highest grossing animated film ever until 2016, when 3D and inflation finally allowed Finding Dory to surpass it. With that kind of success, a whole new business model for animation was created: the animated franchise.
In many ways, this was Dreamworks trying to catch up to Disney. When Disney had a successful animated film, that film became an infinite cash cow through theme parks, Broadway musicals, and obscenely lucrative merchandising. Dreamworks didn’t have that kind of infrastructure, so they had to just keep making movies until the franchise was no longer lucrative.
Thus, ten years later we had four Shrek movies (plus a spinoff), three Madagascar movies (plus a spinoff), and ambitious press releases about how there would be six How to Train Your Dragon films and eight Kung-Fu Panda films.
Other studios got in on the fun. Blue Sky Animation committed to churning out an Ice Age movie every few years, until one could practically see the bored interns’ fingerprints on the assembly-line production of Ice Age 5. Illumination arrived late to the party with Despicable Me, but wasted no time in turning it into a trilogy and crafting a spinoff franchise.
One thing all these sequels had in common was a two or three year gap between installments; there was a frenzy to get them into theaters while the kids who loved the first one were still young enough to desire seeing the next one.
Amid the fracas of talking animals and minions, it appeared that the animation studios under Disney’s umbrella wouldn’t join in at first. Until this year, Walt Disney Animation kept crafting original animated features, with more and more impressive returns.
But Pixar took on a hybrid strategy that was fascinating to behold. They did not dramatically increase their output from one film a year (ensuring that a Pixar movie remained an event), but began to alternate between sequels and originals. While everyone decried the “death of Pixar,” Pixar managed to remain on top both in terms of box office and critical acclaim.
Pixar’s Difference
What made Pixar’s strategy different was the length of time between sequels. The shortest term was between installments of the Cars franchise: five and six years. That was an eternity for other animation houses, but was positively rushed by Pixar standards, and the studio openly admitted that the Cars films were all about selling merchandise to help the bottom line. Animation that looks as good as Pixar’s needs a lot of car toys sold to pay for it.
But other than Cars, Pixar’s sequels arrived over a decade after the prior installments. There was eleven years between Toy Story 2 and 3, twelve years between Monsters Inc and Monsters University, thirteen years between Finding Nemo and Finding Dory, and now (for the record!) fourteen years between Incredibles and Incredibles 2. (If the pattern holds, I guess we’re getting Ratatouille 2 in 2022!)
This ran counter to all the other studios’ wisdom, but it paid unimaginable dividends. By waiting long enough, the Pixar sequels were transformed into cultural events as the anticipation became utterly frenzied after so long a wait. Toy Story 3 was the first animated film to make a billion dollars worldwide. Finding Dory dethroned Shrek 2 as the highest-grossing animated film in the US.
And Incredibles 2 just posted the eighth-highest opening weekend ever, head and shoulders above any animated film even when adjusted for inflation.
Of course, it’s not all about the wait between sequels – Pixar’s sequels have also been astoundingly high-quality, and their predecessors are beloved the way few films are. On the one hand it’s hard to argue that Ice Age 3 would have made twice as much money if we’d waited ten years for it. But on the other hand, conventional wisdom stated that How to Train Your Dragon 2 should have made gobs and gobs of money, but didn’t because audiences hadn’t had a chance to miss Toothless because of the mere four-year gap (which also saw two seasons of a TV show featuring them).
Pixar’s sequels become cultural events by virtue of how long they were anticipated. Toy Story 3 became a generational touchstone by having Andy age in real time, and allowing the kids who grew up with the first two films to still see themselves in Andy. Anecdotally, the movie came out the month I graduated high school, and it was even referenced in speeches during my graduation.
It resonated with us in a way few other movies ever have. Monsters University took its protagonists to college, just as kids who saw the first one were probably in college themselves. And for Incredibles 2, nothing more need be said than the furious shriek that nearly started a riot in my movie theater on opening night: “Put away your phone, we waited fourteen years for this!”
In many ways, this speaks to a larger trend in pop culture: with enough time, the nostalgia will build for a property to make the revival into something huge. Just look to Jurassic World, Will and Grace, Roseanne, Cursed Child, Force Awakens, etc. But it’s more potent for animated films because children watch those, and no nostalgia is as powerful as that for your childhood favorites. Pixar has been playing a very smart, very long game with its movie releases.
Once we have finished watching Incredibles 2 an incredible number of times, all eyes will turn to the upcoming year’s slate of movies. And there, we find something absolutely fascinating: all the major animation studios (except Blue Sky) will be releasing long-gestating sequels. Much of this completely breaks with tradition, and it will be fascinating to watch.
Upcoming Sequels
First on the calendar: Wreck-It Ralph 2, in November. Ralph returns to the movies after 6 years, a sweet spot between the decade-long wait from Pixar and the three-year wait for all other animated studios. In many ways, Ralph is the most surprising member of this cohort, because Walt Disney Animation has totally shied away from releasing sequels in theaters. But that looks to be changing, with Frozen 2 on tap for the following winter.
Wreck-It Ralph wasn’t even one of Disney’s big hits in recent years. And it’s hard to say if six years has generated enough nostalgia for it to make the sequel a box office blowout. It appears that Ralph is going to be a test case – if he does well in a second outing, we may soon revisit the world of Zootopia or see what Moana’s been up to. If not, Disney will stick to what’s been working for them for the last 80 years, and keep making original films.
Next February, WB will release Lego Movie 2, exactly five years after the original was released. It’s interesting to note that five/six years between sequels seems to be the new thing, it’s been unproven at the box office thus far. The first Lego Movie was a surprise success, so the question for WB (which has struggled ever since) is whether lightning will strike twice.
Worrying is the fact that last year there were two Lego movies released theatrically: Lego Batman did pretty well, but Lego Ninjago bombed at the box office. WB must be hoping that audiences will differentiate between Lego movies and THE Lego Movie franchise – otherwise they may find themselves to be a one-hit wonder animation studio.
The following month, March 2019, Dreamworks will release the concluding film in the How to Train Your Dragon trilogy. They’ve been more patient with their dragons than with their other franchises, waiting four years between installments. But they’ve also taken the unusual decision to drastically age up the protagonist (Hiccup), faster than real time, so he is now an adult even as his original fans might still be teenagers.
Shrek passed the torch to Toothless in 2010, making the latter Dreamworks’ flagship franchise in terms of box office and critical acclaim. But especially as new animation studios (Illumination, WB) have undercut Dreamworks, Dreamworks may have gotten overenthusiastic about the few successes it’s had. There have been well over 100 episodes of TV about the Dragons of Berk, with the most recent being released this February.
Part of what makes Pixar’s sequels into such an event is how desperate fans are to spend more time with their beloved characters after a decade-long separation. Dreamworks has not given anyone a chance to miss Hiccup and Toothless.
The trailer for …Dragon 3 is epic and promises an emotional conclusion to the series, but we most hope that everyone is equally excited about it. This film may also be something of a last hurrah for Dreamworks – its upcoming schedule is filled with sequels to its C-list movies, and there just may not be room for it at the table when so many other studios are at the top of their game.
Almost a year from now, in June 2019, Illumination will release their first sequel outside the Despicable Me franchise: Secret Life of Pets 2. Unlike the other sequels we’ve been discussing, it’ll come out less than 2 years after the original, as is Illumination’s norm.
The original movie remains Illumination’s highest-grossing film in the U.S. This sequel will be what determines whether Illumination is more of a Dreamworks (multiple top-tier animated franchises) or a Blue Sky (one franchise they beat to death, and middling results otherwise).
And the year of animated sequels will be capped by another long-awaited Pixar sequel next June: Toy Story 4. This is new territory for Pixar – none of their films have spawned more than one sequel aside from Toy Story.
In typical Pixar fashion, Toy Story 4 arrives nine years after the last one. As discussed earlier, few franchises are as beloved as Toy Story… however, few franchises have as perfect an ending as Toy Story 3. Even as it seems ridiculous to bet against Pixar given their track record, Toy Story 4 is being met with more trepidation than anticipation. Pixar finds itself in the unusual position of trying to sell audiences on a sequel they may not want. It will be a referendum on whether Pixar can extend its franchises indefinitely, like the other studios, or whether it should craft definitive endings.
Through a fluke of scheduling, all of the top-tier animated sequels are being released in the next twelve months. Though they are all in different situations, coming from different studios, with different histories and expectations, they are all connected. We know Hollywood has gone totally sequel-crazy of late; the next twelve months will determine whether (and how) the animation studios follow suit.
Of course, there’s still the question: do we want more animated sequels, or do we want strictly originals? On the one hand, the rampant sequelitis has not changed Hollywood for the better. On the other hand, it’s hard to argue that we shouldn’t have movies like Toy Story 2 and 3, Shrek 2, How to Train Your Dragon 2, and Incredibles 2. What do you think?
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