Taking Back the Reins
As lovers of film many of us think about missed opportunities. Not only do we write and talk about the films that do exist, but we also write and talk about the films that don’t — the projects and sequels that were teased or anticipated that never saw the light of day. Sometimes when we read about the plans for cancelled films we may just as easily count our blessings that we were spared from their existence. I’m fascinated by ‘what ifs’ and ‘what could have beens’.
One of the most common imaginings myself and other film buffs entertain involves directors and their abandoning of franchises. Rather than return for the next installment they, for one reason or another, are replaced and the story continues without them. Fans and writers regularly muse and speculate about how things would have turned out differently had a director stayed on with a series, and whether their leaving was good or bad.
But every once in a while our speculations are put to the test. A small number of directors who had left a film series behind have returned to the helm, after several years and several installments have come and passed. To fans and critics announcing a director’s return to a franchise can be met with excitement, but also trepidation. The reasons for a director’s absence and comeback are often the subject of rumour and scrutiny. Why did they leave? What prompted their return? And perhaps the most salient question, was their renewed involvement everything we were hoping for?
Wes Craven, A Nightmare on Elm Street
In 1984, following his success with The Last House on the Left and The Hills Have Eyes, Wes Craven created a new terrifying and inescapable monster who attacks us when we are at our most vulnerable — in our dreams as we sleep. In the original A Nightmare on Elm Street, Freddy Kruger is a perverse killer who revels in torturing and murdering teens in theatrical and bloody displays as the dream world creeps into reality. A new icon of horror was born that has since amassed generations of fans with its originality, inventiveness and scares.
New Line Cinema, relishing the film’s box office success, wanted a horror franchise in the vein of Friday the 13th, but Wes Craven wasn’t interested in making a sequel. The subsequent five entries varied in quality from the good (A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: The Dream Warriors) to the awful (A Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy’s Revenge and Freddy’s Dead: The Final Nightmare), but as the franchise progressed the tone of the movies changed for the worse. Freddy had transformed into a punning, prankster caricature of his former self that negatively damaged his horrific aspects — he stopped being scary. Freddy Kruger had become neutered.
In 1994, ten years after the original film, Wes Craven and New Line Cinema released Wes Craven’s New Nightmare. Looking to undo the damage done to the character and make Freddy scary and relevant again, New Nightmare took on a post-modern, meta-textual spin. Where the 1984 film has Freddy blurring the boundaries between the waking and dream worlds, Wes Craven’s 1994 return has Freddy breaking the boundaries between fiction and reality as he terrorizes Heather Langenkamp, the actress who played Nancy in the first and third installments. The result was the restoration of Freddy as a source of menace and horror.
Martin Campbell, Bond
Beginning with Dr. No in 1962, the James Bond franchise had produced 16 films and seen four actors play the British spy when Martin Campbell directed Bond 17 (a.k.a. Goldeneye) in 1996. Goldeneye would introduce the fifth actor to play Bond, Pierce Brosnan, and modernize the long-running series, which had in recent years seen diminishing returns with the late Roger Moore and two-time Timothy Dalton films. Campbell had Bond face up to his past actions and outmoded behaviour, best encapsulated in Judi Dench’s M calling him “a sexist, misogynist dinosaur. A relic of the Cold War”. Goldeneye was a fresh start and a new direction for a new bond. Or at least that was the plan.
After Goldeneye had reinvigorated the Bond franchise, the Brosnan era quickly reverted back to the puns, farcical villains and ludicrous set pieces that bloated many of the earlier films. After the embarrassing spectacle of Bond 20, Die Another Day, the franchise needed another course correction.
Following in the wake of films such as The Mask of Zorro, Martin Campbell was hired once again to update Bond, but now for the 21st century. It would be a new fresh start, and a new beginning. Casino Royale in 2006 introduced Daniel Craig as a newly-promoted 00 agent on his first assignment, using Ian Fleming’s first James Bond story as its template. This 007 was rough and vulnerable and inexperienced, and he had none of the baggage of his predecessors. Martin Campbell’s Casino Royale was a bold statement, declaring James Bond was back and better than ever.
If only Quantum of Solace and Spectre hadn’t upset the new order of things…
Ridley Scott, Alien
The transformation of a screenplay titled Star Beast into the science fiction-horror classic we know today is thanks to the vision of director Ridley Scott. He elevated what would have been a run-of-the-mill B-movie into a dark and harrowing story rich in weighty themes and symbolism. The cast, the atmosphere, the cinematography, the art design, the sound design, the alien: the film is still a tour de force of cinematic terror.
After Alien’s release in 1979, 20th Century Fox immediately wanted a sequel, which Ridley Scott was attached to and mentioned in several interviews. None of the ideas Scott had for Alien II at the time didn’t make it to the screen — instead James Cameron was brought aboard by Fox to write and direct the 1986 follow-up, Aliens. In 1991 David Fincher directed Alien 3 (with substantial studio interference) and Alien: Resurrection was helmed by French director Jean Pierre Jeunet, though neither of them were as warmly received as the franchise’s first two installments. Rumours in the early 2000s about Ridley Scott and James Cameron planning to make Alien 5 together were nixed when Fox opted to produce Paul W.S. Anderson’s Alien vs. Predator in 2004 and Aliens vs. Predator: Requiem in 2007.
In 2012 Ridley Scott returned to the universe he created with Prometheus, a quasi-prequel that explored the story behind the Space Jockey (now known collectively as Engineers) seen in the original film. Scott injected spiritual and philosophical concepts into the film that many fans and critics were left dissatisfied with, along with debates about the quality of the screenplay written by Damon Lindelof among others. More recently Alien: Covenant has attempted to bridge the divide between Prometheus and the original Alien, though many of the complaints about the last film continue to plague Scott’s newest effort. The fandom is divided over his renewed interest with the Alien saga.
Bryan Singer, X-Men
Considered by Hollywood to be a relative newcomer, despite having directed The Usual Suspects and Apt Pupil, Bryan Singer’s success with the Marvel adaptation X-Men in 2000 enabled him to helm its sequel two years later. Where comic book movies in the past had been financial and critical failures, Singer’s films paved the way for newer adaptations to be taken seriously. In the wake of X-Men, directors like Sam Raimi and Christopher Nolan continued to change the cinematic landscape for comics in the 2000s, cementing their place in our popular culture.
After X-Men 2’s release Bryan Singer left the franchise behind to direct another superhero movie, 2006’s Superman Returns (and he took James Marsden with him). In his absence, Fox continued the series with Brett Ratner, Gavin Hood, Matthew Vaughn and James Mangold, producing a sequel (X-Men: The Last Stand), spin-offs (starring Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine), and a prequel in 2011 (X-Men: First Class).
With the poor reception to Superman Returns and his later films Valkyrie and Jack the Giant Slayer, Bryan Singer returned to the X-Men franchise, adapting the celebrated story Days of Future Past. Featuring the cast of his first two entries and the new cast from Matthew Vaughn’s X-Men: First Class Singer’s third entry in 2014 was a worldwide hit, and is considered by fans to be one of the franchise’s best. He returned again in 2016 with X-Men: Apocalypse, which was met with more of a mixed response, with people citing its formulaic structure and rehashing of an over-familiar plot.
Singer is still involved with the X-Men franchise in film and on TV, but the franchise has grown beyond his watch. The colossal success of Deadpool in 2016 and Logan have recently demonstrated that the X-Men universe can go on without him.
As exemplified above, a director returning to a film series may be the signal of a franchise in trouble. Their presence can be a statement of a franchise needing to get back on track, and who better than the people who defined (or redefined) them? What happens because of their intervention still boils down to good fortune and an act of faith on the producers’ part, but the motivations of everyone involved are well-intentioned: they want to make the best film they can. Whether they fail or succeed, that’s left for us to decide.
See also:
Paul W.S Anderson, Resident Evil — returned to direct the fourth, fifth and sixth installments Afterlife, Retribution and The Final Chapter. I don’t like any of them.
John McTiernan, Die Hard — returned to direct the third entry, Die Hard with a Vengeance. It was the second highest grossing film of 1995 and is thought by fans to be one the better movies in the series.
Nicholas Meyer, Star Trek — having directed Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan Meyer returned, after Leonard Nimoy and William Shatner directed the next three sequels, with Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country. It’s a great film and was the perfect send-off for the original crew.
Coming soon: After the World has Ended
