The only thing holding successful film franchises like Fast & Furious and X-Men back from creating film after film, year after year, is the cold, hard truth that the actors from the films can't help but age. One way to ensure further franchise success is through spinoffs that sort of tie into the main continuity, but prioritize new stories and new cast members.
Spinoffs are always interesting, but it's rare that they manage to be as good as or better than the original film. The spinoffs that achieve this remarkable feat all have a few things in common: They manage to do something different while reminding audiences of the things they love about the original.
All of the following spinoffs are top-tier franchise entries, but it's up to you to let us know which of them are as good as the original.
When X-Men was released in 2000, it created the possibility that any tangential character from the X-Men, X-Force, Alpha Flight, or the New Mutants could appear on-screen. Deadpool has always been a cult figure, and when he was initially introduced in 2009's X-Men Origins: Wolverine, it looked like 20th Century Fox had tanked any possibility of a standalone film about the Merc with a Mouth.
It took seven years, but Deadpool really gets the character right. Aside from nailing the character, Deadpool absolutely understands the world of the X-Men. The villains all tie into the Workshop, a hospice for former members of the Weapon X experiment, and Deadpool even has to work with Colossus and Negasonic Teenage Warhead, a member of the Hellfire Club and the X-Men.
Characters and setting aside, Deadpool just works. Even with all of the fourth-wall-breaking commentary, it's a straightforward action movie about people with extraordinary powers that feels like a direct descendant of the better X-Men films.
Great spinoff?The X-Men franchise has its ups and downs - with 13 movies (counting the Deadpool series) under its belt, it's hard not to have highs and lows in quality. However, X-Men and X2 remain two of the better superhero movies of the last two decades, and Days of Future Past manages to seamlessly work time travel and the multiverse into its continuity as a way to tell a variety of stories in and out of the universe of the original timeline.
Of all the impressive X-Men spinoffs, Logan and The Wolverine both rise to the top of the franchise's hierarchy through different means. The Wolverine, James Mangold's first swipe at Logan, tells a character-focused story that manages to fill in pieces of his backstory while providing longtime fans with something that they've always wanted to see - Wolverine in Japan. But it's Mangold's second Wolverine film that shows just how much a filmmaker can do with a superhero movie.
Mangold's adaptation of Old Man Logan puts Wolverine in a desolate future where most of his mutant compadres are dead. Beaten and weathered, Logan brings the dementia-riddled Professor X on a cross-country journey to save a girl from certain doom. Action-heavy and poignant, Logan delivers a fitting end to a beloved comic book hero.
Great spinoff?When Disney brought Star Wars into the fold, the company did away with the Expanded Universe (now known as Star Wars Legends), a vast collection of novels, comics, and video games that built upon the original trilogy. This erasure was done in part to streamline the story of a galaxy far, far away for the general public, and also so they could create their own spinoffs on the big and small screens. While the straight-to-Disney+ spinoffs have been successful, Rogue One is the only theatrical spinoff that actually works.
The less said about Solo the better, but in a nutshell, the film tries way too hard to hit the audience's nostalgia buttons, and it never really comes together. That's not the case with Rogue One. This gritty war movie works because it's not trying to mimic the original trilogy so much as it's trying to work in tandem with A New Hope. Where that film is light, Rogue One is dark. Where A New Hope feels like a fable, Rogue One feels like a grounded story about a group of extremists who die for what they believe in.
One of the best things about Rogue One is that it feels like a Star Wars movie. The tech is old and dirty, the worlds are just alien enough, and there's an endless well of hope that runs through the film even when the odds are insurmountable. No one is ever going to say Rogue One is the best Star Wars movie, but by offering something completely different than the rest of the films in the franchise, it becomes necessary in the grand scope of the overall story.
Great spinoff?M. Night Shyamalan's return to the world of Unbreakable surprised longtime audiences who believed they were sitting down for a one-off horror movie with Split. The film follows a group of teenage girls who are kidnapped by a man fostering 23 personalities, along with a 24th known as "The Beast," who happens to be a cannibal with super-strength and nigh-invulnerability. Yikes.
Split is a really interesting and creepy thriller that proves that Shyamalan still has it, but in its final moments, the movie takes a massive chance and reintroduces Bruce Willis as David Dunn, the hero from Unbreakable, setting up a shared universe and promising a showdown between good and evil. Even without the backdoor tie-in to Unbreakable, Split works on every level, and that's why it's such a good spinoff.
Great spinoff?The Lego Batman Movie has no right to be one of the funniest movies of 2017. Essentially produced to sell Legos, this animated spinoff from The Lego Movie uses everything at its disposal to bend the audience to its will, and it succeeds.
Rather than play like a children's movie, The Lego Batman Movie operates more like Airplane! or Clone High than any of its contemporaries. With its piles of visual gags, laugh-out-loud screenwriting, and emotional, grown-up take on the Batman mythos, this is one spinoff that audiences can watch without ever having to see the original.
Great spinoff?The DC Extended Universe isn't as tightly knit as the MCU, but they're trying, and James Gunn's The Suicide Squad is a unique spinoff that both stands on its own while building out the world of Task Force X and Amanda Waller. The inclusion of Waller squarely connects the film to Justice League, Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, and Man of Steel.
While the previous Suicide Squad just flat-out doesn't work, Gunn's take on the material feels unique and meshes well with the rest of the universe, which is an incredibly important part of a successful spinoff.
Rather than worry about shoving in references to the rest of the DC Universe, The Suicide Squad has its own story and a cast of B- and C-level characters who feel like they could turn up in the next Superman or Wonder Woman film. Anchoring all of this is Harley Quinn, a character who's always evolving and never fails to pop on-screen regardless of her iteration. Margot Robbie's take on the character allows her to grow, which is necessary for a legacy character in a long-running franchise.
All of that aside, the thing that makes The Suicide Squad stand out from other spinoffs is that viewers can watch it on its own and find joy without having to watch three (or 30) other movies.
Great spinoff?
