About ten years ago, you started to hear it: Longtime Pixar fans complaining that the company had sold out, bowed to corporate pressure, and abandoned their long-standing commitment to originality in favor of a string of sequels.
Yes, Pixar has made a fair number of sequels now. But as of this writing, they only account for nine out of the company’s 28 features — and that includes Inside Out 2. Thatworks out to just under one in every three movies being a sequel.
That’s not nothing. But it should also be noted: A lot of those sequels are pretty good. One or two might be among the best films Pixar has ever made. And five of the nine sequels they’ve made come from just two of Pixar’s 19 distinct film series: Toy Storyand Cars. So it’s not as if they are turning everything they make into forever franchises. (Admittedly, they are working on another Toy Story. And if you want to count Lightyear as a sort of sequel, then I guess that is another one as well.)
So how is Pixar’s batting average at sequels? Let’s take a look by ranking every single one of their sequels to date, from worst (i.e. Cars 2, duh) to best. And yes, I included Monsters University, even though that is technically a prequel and not a sequel. In that it was designed to turn a great individual Pixar film into a larger franchise, it seemed wrong not to throw it in there.
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