Movie Franchises With the Longest Time Between Sequels

In a time when everything seems to be a sequel or a prequel or a remake, we’ve gotten used to movie franchises dominating the box office for years, even decades, while their IP is mined until there’s nothing to be mined from it anymore. But not every successful movie turns into a franchise, and even when they do, sometimes it can take a while for us to lay eyes on the next installment.

Any movie that sees a moderate amount of success immediately sparks a sequel conversation, but whether or not those sequels actually come out depends on factors no one director or actor can bend to his will. When studios drag their feet, creatives move on to different projects. When global conflict breaks out, shoots are put on hold when it turns out their locations would put their stars in jeopardy. Maybe the actors would love to do it, but no studio would greenlight a sequel to an obscure cult flick. Nevertheless, the ideas keep floating around, and sometimes they’re lucky enough to land in the lap of just the right people, and everything works out.

These are the sequels that have traversed the nine circles of development hell and have come out the other side, bigger and better than anyone could have imagined. Sequels no one thought would ever happen, sequels no one wanted at first, and sequels that became shorthand for “movies that will never come out” when things truly seemed hopeless. If anything, the fact that these movies even exist should be a comfort in and of itself: Anything is possible, even another Gladiator movie.