Just In Time For Halloween: The 12 Best Horror Movie Sequels Of The Last 35 Years

Since this is Halloween weekend, and I’ve already written a few bits and pieces about Halloween Kills, I thought I’d use the occasion to dive into the “best” (using my patented formula of math, science and dark magic) horror movie sequels ever made. For the record, this list is my list, which won’t match your list because what fun would that be? Oh, and for this discussion, I am including prequels where applicable and am confining it to American theatrical movies. So, if your favorite Wrong Turn direct-to-DVD sequel or your favorite Japanese Grudge installment didn’t make the cut, there you go. These will be in order of release date, because I’m a coward that way. And now, without further ado…

Aliens (1986)

box office: $183 million on an $18.5 million budget

A film so well-received (rave reviews and an Oscar nomination for Sigourney Weaver) that it, along with Rambo: First Blood part II (also written but not directed by James Cameron). tricked Hollywood into thinking that every vaguely successful fantasy blockbuster could be a never-ending franchise. This terrific example of successfully upping the ante (Cameron allegedly pitched the film by writing “Alien” on a chalkboard, followed by an “s” which he then turned into a $) sends Ellen Ripley into battle against countless acid-spewing monsters, turning a monster-in-the-dark horror flick into a terrifying and relentlessly exciting Vietnam parable action spectacular. The film still holds up like a champ, exercising now unthinkable restraint in terms of getting to the action as it takes its time developing its crew of doomed mercenaries. The payoff is more than worth it, both in terms of top-flight Hollywood action and in terms of turning Ripley into perhaps the definitive Hollywood action heroine.

Friday the 13th part VI: Jason Lives (1986)

box office: $19.4 million worldwide on a $3 million budget

This was the first Friday the 13th movie I ever saw, and I distinctly remember thinking to myself as a wee lad “I wasn’t aware these were supposed to be funny.” Alas, most of the Jason flicks aren’t this witty (it opens with a riff on the James Bond intro and features young campers hiding under the bed asking each other “Well, what *were* you going to be when you grew up?”) and frankly most of them aren’t this good. To the extent we can call any Friday the 13th movie “good,” this was another case of a sixth installment artistically reviving a franchise after a lukewarm fifth chapter, think Saw and Star Trek. It has its share of grisly kills, macabre comedy and just enough character work (including a now-grown Tommy who accidentally brings Jason back to life via a poorly-timed lightning strike) to qualify as the best of the bunch.

A Nightmare On Elm Street 3: The Dream Warriors (1987)

box office: $44.8 million worldwide on a $4.6 million budget

I offer no disrespect offered to those who prefer Wes Craven’s original or Wes Craven’s New Nightmare. Chuck Russell and Frank Darabont’s The Dream Warriors, itself a course-correction after the mediocre (fascinating gay subtext notwithstanding) Freddy’s Revenge, is at the very least the prototypical Fred Krueger horror fantasy. Robert Englund strikes the right balance between camp comedy and genuine menace. The kids (survivors in a mental ward under the presumption that they attempted suicide) are surprisingly sympathetic, which makes the violence sting. The adults (personified by a returning Heather Langenkamp, newbie Craig Wasson) are far more intelligent and empathetic than those usually found in a teen slasher flick. Nightmare 3 really leans into the notion of dream sequences set inside Freddy’s nightmare world, and the special effect wizardry is part of what set this 80’s slasher series apart from the stalk-and-kill pack. The Dream Warriors represent an ahead-of-the-curve look at teen horror as a tool for personal empowerment.

Hellraiser II: Hellbound (1988)

box office: $12.1 million worldwide on a $6 million budget

Hellbound is what I pictured in my head as what Hellraiser would be before I saw Hellraiser. That’s no slight on Clive Barker’s 1987 classic, but the film is a surprisingly small-scale family-specific murder melodrama with the supernatural horrors existing as a motivation and/or on the fringes. This $6 million sequel fully commits to the bit, with Kirsty Cotton (Ashley Laurence) surviving the first film only to get a front-row tour through the horrific (and initially X-rated) world of Pinhead and the Cenobites, with unthinkable sights and sounds playing out like a fever dream horror fantasy variation on Jim Henson’s Labyrinth (and yes, Pinhead has his own personal thirst community just like Jared the Goblin King). I didn’t see this one until later in life, but the sheer technical wizardry on display for what even 30 years ago was a smaller budget (and sans today’s technology) is almost mind-boggling.

The Silence of the Lambs (1991)

box office: $272.9 million worldwide on a $19 million budget

My list, my rules, and The Silence of the Lambs is both an unofficial sequel to Michael Mann’s Manhunter (obviously based upon Thomas Harris’ 1981 novel Red Dragon) and one of the best maj0r-studio Hollywood movies ever made. Director Jonathan Demme and writer Ted Tally adapted Harris’ novel with an emphasis on authenticity and empathy even as they crafted a thriller that serves remains one of the great modern cinematic fairy tales. Anchored by an Oscar-winning star turn from Jodie Foster, who turned Clarice Starling into one of cinema’s great onscreen heroines, and enlivened by Anthony Hopkins’ Oscar-winning and star-making performance as Hannibal Leckter, The Silence of the Lambs kick started a wave of serial killer flicks, few of which held a candle to this subtly macabre, angrily feminist and righteously humanist melodrama. Oh, and it rescued horror from a decade of Halloween-inspired slashers and gave adults at least a few years of prestige, star-driven horror epics.

Wes Craven’s New Nightmare (1994)

box office: $20 million on an $8 million budget

I’m cheating by including two Nightmare sequels, but they are both pretty awesome. New Nightmare is a deconstruction of the slasher genre, an emotionally wrenching portrait of grief, and a terrifying piece of horror. The movie basically unleashes horror icon Freddy Kruger into the real world, where he terrorizes the real actors (Heather Langenkamp, John Saxon, Robert Englund) and filmmakers (Wes Craven, Robert Shaye) who brought him to life. This film operates as Freddy Kruger’s The Shootist and/or In A Lonely Place. Like those films (as well as Jim Carrey’s The Cable Guy and Adam Sandler’s Punch Drunk Love), It takes an iconic and beloved figure and places him in a more real-world environment, where we are forced to acknowledge our guilt for cheering on his prior killing sprees. Kruger’s murders here have devastating consequences as Wes Craven’s New Nightmare does something astonishing: it makes us fear and hate Fred Kruger for perhaps the first time.

Scream 2 (1997)

box office: $172 million worldwide on a $24 million budget

Produced and released less than a year after its trendsetting original, Wes Craven and Kevin Williamson returned with this riff on lousy horror sequels that was itself a terrific horror sequel. The scale is bigger, the scope is larger (with time for two distinctly different musical numbers) and the film leans into the drama and terror of its campus-set murder spree to deliver perhaps the most “epic” slasher flick ever made. Neve Campbell’s Sidney Prescott is forced to reckon with another series of killings rock her college town, and her superb performance helps make this an ahead-of-its-time look at “the final girl” as “empowered survivor,” which is a huge reason why the Scream series still endures. Oh, and the sheer courage in Scream 2 killing off the franchise’s most popular character halfway through was shocking in 1997 and unthinkable now in this ridiculous era of fan entitlement. Scream 2 is the best of the franchise and possibly Craven’s best movie.

Halloween: H20 (1998)

box office: $75 million worldwide on a $17 million budget

This first (and best) reboot/sequel positioning Jamie Lee Curtis’ Laurie Strode as a grown woman fighting back against the man who tried to kill her on Halloween night isn’t going to give anyone nightmares. There’s nothing particularly horrifying about it. But director Steve Miner does something exceedingly rare and surprisingly effective: he doesn’t give the audience what it wants. After a blood-drenched prologue, we know Michael Myers is on his way to find Laurie. We know that those around her are in grave danger. But then… nothing happens. This is not a standard slasher film where someone gets gruesomely bumped off every eight minutes. This one makes the audience wait, which in turn makes the audience sweat and squirm. Miner knows full well that anticipation of violence is what’s scary, so by keeping most of the carnage in the last reel, and offering up a definitive shoulda-been-series finale, he crafts an uncommonly suspenseful little chiller that does Halloween proud.

Texas Chainsaw: The Beginning (2006)

box office: $51.8 million on a $16 million budget

The first Platinum Dunes Texas Chainsaw Massacre remake got the job done in terms of artistically justifying itself alongside the superior 1973 Tobe Hopper classic. But this prequel, while falling into a few origin story traps (minor objects being given narrative significance and an entire franchise’s worth of events happening in a day), cashes in on the ability to do its own thing. It reassert the entire Hewitt family (especially R. Lee Ermey) as primary instruments of terror, not just Leatherface. The film’s plot, about Vietnam enlistees, including a younger brother planning to ditch the draft, arguably makes subtext text. It has the kind of unsubtle “out of the frying pan and into the fire” sensibilities that played well as a 9/11-era commentary. Jordana Brewster and Matt Boomer elevate the material, as the Sheldon Turner-penned and Jonathan Liebesman-directed flick stands as (by default?) the best Texas Chainsaw movie since the very first Texas Chain Saw movie.

Saw VI (2009)

box office: $68.2 million on an $11 million budget

Saw VI is ironically, give or take Spiral, the only commercial disappointment in the Saw franchise. It’s also the best film in the now-nine-movie grindhouse horror series, offering the best mix of “lone victim wanders through a house of horrors” tropes with “several people stuck together trying to solve Jigsaw’s traps” stories. This one offers both a deep-dive in the franchise’s hilariously convoluted continuity and a somewhat stand-alone story that requires only the barest knowledge of John Kramer (Tobin Bell) and his grim philosophies. Oh, and the Hoffman plot, during which he has to solve a murder that he himself committed, is the best use of “cops versus Jigsaw” storytelling. Throw in traps with actual survivors, an all-time best trap (the merry-go-round of shotguns), an unapologetic political opinion and a full-circle climax that really should have been the series finale, and you the best Saw movie and a pretty great horror flick sans franchise relevance.

Final Destination 5 (2011)

box office: $157.9 million on a $40 million budget

Not to be a broken record, but this fifth Final Destination flick was a creative revival after a franchise-low of The Final Destination. That shot-in-3-D installment (months before Avatar made that par for the course) was the cinematic equivalent of watching paint dry, but this loose, clever, funny and comparatively character-focused installment may be the best Final Destination since the first one. I mean, plot wise, it’s a Final Destination movie, but the set-ups are superb (there’s a gymnastic scene that would make Hitchcock stand up and cheer), there is ample Tony Todd screen time, the young adult characters are sympathetic, there are a few clever tweaks to the formula and the film’s ending is a well-earned crowdpleasing knockout. Throw in some better-than-average 3-D work (it’s directed by Steven Quale, who was James Cameron’s second-unit director for Titanic and Avatar), and you have the perfect series finale for the Final Destination series.

The Purge: Anarchy (2014)

box office: $112 million on a $11 million budget

While the first Purge used its high-concept hook for seasoning in a low-budget (but still compelling) home invasion story, Anarchy places us deep into a big city wrestling with the complications associated with Purge Night. It’s also where the franchise, which was always about how rich white men game the system to eradicate the poor and people of color, started telling its story from the point-of-view of its prime victims. Carmen Ejogo, Frank Grillo and Michael K. Williams star in this of-the-moment actioner that feels even more jolting after decades of soft-pedaled “fantasy as political metaphor” blockbusters, to the point where James DeMonaco’s The Purge: Election Year felt like the only Charlie Chaplin in the room during the 2016 presidential election. All five movies have their warning-as-prediction value, but you see just one movie in DeMonaco’s frighteningly prescient franchise of “What if crime was legal for one night a year” horror stories, see The Purge: Anarchy.

And the best of the rest…

Yes, I was very much tempted to include The Forever Purge (which genuinely feels like “how America’s gonna end”), but wanted franchise-specific variety. Mike Flanagan’s Ouija: Origin of Evil is a terrific prequel to a lousy initial Ouija flick, while I grow fonder of Rob Zombie’s Halloween II (the director’s cut) every year. Halloween III: Season of the Witch isn’t a conventional sequel to Halloween, while my favorite Child’s Play sequel (Curse of Chucky) was a direct-to-DVD title in 2013.

Eli Roth’s Hostel II has aged well, while The Bride of Frankenstein (1985) and Dawn of the Dead (1978) didn’t make the arbitrary timeline cut-off. I like The Final Conflict quite a bit too, even if it’s mostly for Jerry Goldsmith’s over-the-top score and an early Sam Neill villain turn. I like Evil Dead II and Slumber Party Massacre II just fine, but they just didn’t make the cut.

A Quiet Place part II is a three-star sequel to a four-star gem, while Gremlins II: The New Batch is absolutely a comedy first. Also in the “good, but not on the list” pool are 28 Weeks Later, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 (which to be fair I haven’t watched in decades), The Exorcist III, Bride of Chucky, Doctor Sleep (ideally the 3-hour director’s cut) and the first two surprisingly good Psycho sequels. Oh, and my favorite Conjuring film after the first is probably Annabelle Comes Home.