At a time in film history when huge stories are carefully planned across a series of movies, it can be hard to tell where the boundary is which defines a sequel. With franchises like James Bond, Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, and the vast universes of Marvel and DC, it seems like everything has a sequel, or is a sequel, or that there is no such thing as a sequel, just the next chapter. But films are not just moving picture books that can be bound together by a good marketing department. The very best films stand alone as masterpieces of storytelling art, and don't depend upon previous or further installments to be brilliant.

Sometimes a great, stand-alone work of cinematic art will inspire a sequel that does justice to the original. But most of the time, sequels of film industry masterpieces fail to live up to the special qualities that made the original so great. A movie that gives audiences something they’ve never imagined, or tells a completely satisfying story, or finishes in a perfectly gratifying way may deserve a sequel, but that doesn’t mean a sequel should necessarily be made. A bad sequel can detract from the original in an extremely regrettable way. From that perspective, here are six outstanding films that would have been better off without their sequels. Will Avatar be the next to join them?

Movies That Gave Audiences Something They’d Never Imagined

The dynamic blending of sights, sounds and writing are what make movies an art form capable of telling stories that captivate audiences like no other. From time to time, a visionary filmmaker will create a film that magically transports an audience to a place they could never have imagined or experienced in any other way. Sequels of these groundbreaking films have a unique danger of relying on the wonder of a first impression that has already happened. Two examples of great films whose sequels could not live up to their own uniqueness are 2001: A Space Odyssey and The Matrix.

2001: A Space Odyssey

A single astronaut in 2001 A Space Odyssey in the tunnel of a ship
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer

Stanley Kubrick’s unmistakable style of filmmaking turned the intriguing and incomprehensible script of 2001: A Space Odyssey into a slow-burning, one-of-a-kind theater experience that remains a landmark in movie history. Audiences left the theater knowing they had seen a great achievement in cinematic art, even if they didn’t understand what they had just seen.

Although the screenplay for 2010: The Year We Make Contact was based on a novel written by the original author (science fiction legend Arthur C. Clarke), the sequel had no chance of recapturing the wonder and artistic excellence of the original. Without Kubrick at the helm, the movie could only resort to bland imitations of direction and dialog that, in trying to explain the unexplainable of the first film, erased much of the artful mystery that kept audiences thinking and talking about 2001: A Space Odyssey long after leaving the theater.

The Matrix

Carrie-Anne Moss as Trinity and Keanu Reeves as Neo
Warner Bros.

On the surface, The Matrix seemed like it would be just another one of several 1990s convoluted cyber-tech thrillers, but when the curtains went up, audiences were given a movie experience they could never have imagined. Not only did it have astounding visuals, jaw-dropping effects, and pulsating action, but the fascinating and metaphorical world of The Matrix was built around an epic story about the power of belief that touched audiences deeply.

The Matrix was so unique and successful, the temptation to add to the story was probably impossible to resist. When the sequels came out, more of the same astounding visuals were entertaining, but the world was no longer new and exciting, and the story went backwards, quickly degenerating into the convoluted cyber-tech thriller the original had so masterfully avoided.

Movies That Told Perfectly Satisfying Stories

Many outstanding films manage to cover every essential aspect of a compelling story in one remarkable movie. They leave sequels with no place to go, and with no way to improve upon or add to what’s already been done. And yet, many studios still try to make lightning strike twice, and the results not only look like brazen money-grabs, but can change the direction of an original work of cinematic art or tarnish its reputation. Two examples of this can be found in the 1970s classics Jaws and Rocky.

Jaws

Brody, Quint, and Hooper in Jaws
Universal Pictures

With a compelling screenplay co-written by best-selling author Peter Benchley, the magnificent direction of Steven Spielberg, a monumental score from John Williams, and the acting talent of Robert Shaw, Roy Scheider, and Richard Dreyfuss, Jaws was an incredible, must-see thriller in the summer of 1975. It was so compelling, it had audiences flocking to theaters and staying away from beaches.

Related: Jaws: How a Masterpiece Produced a Terrible FranchiseOf course, every sequel of Jaws had nothing to do but tell the same story of the same danger in the same cinematic ways, with degrading talent and increasingly contrived situations and unbelievable gimmicks. The shark died in the first film; with nowhere good to go, the sequels became a well-funded parade of aquatic tension and jump scares that disgraced the excellence of the original.

Rocky

Rocky
United Artists 

What made Rocky the Best Picture of the Year in 1976 had almost nothing to do with the story of a man becoming the best boxer in the world. Above all else, Rocky is a story about the power of love, and everyone's love of the underdog. When Rocky finds someone he loves more than himself, and is loved in return, he finds the strength to rise from the canvas of his compromised life to keep trying, to keep fighting. When Rocky and Adrian embrace in the ring at the end of the film, nothing else matters. It’s over. The beautiful story has been told.

The Rocky sequels lost no time going in the opposite direction, though, leaving behind what made the original worthy of the highest film industry honors that it earned. Through the many sequels, Rocky Balboa gets more chiseled, more tan, and less articulate as testosterone-driven wins become all that matters. The franchise reaches an all-time low when Rocky’s climactic win is what keeps the Cold War from escalating.

Movies That Ended Perfectly

Sometimes a movie finishes so well, that just one more second of story — or even one more frame of film — would diminish what has already been accomplished. Director Christopher Nolan is an example of a filmmaker with a master’s touch for great endings, as seen in The Dark Knight Rises, Interstellar, and Inception. There are many other numerous examples of great endings in the history of film, but it’s always a shame when a sequel spoils those perfect endings. Two examples of that happening in significant films are Unbreakable and The Silence of the Lambs.

Unbreakable

Samuel L. Jackson and Bruce Willis in Unbreakable (2000)
Buena Vista Pictures
Distribution

Unbreakable, arguably M. Night Shyamalan’s best film, is a superhero origin story that’s not really about having superpowers or being a superhero. Like The Matrix, it’s a story about the power of belief (something Shyamalan also explored in his underrated subsequent film, Signs). Belief is so powerful here, that it gives purpose to the hero and restores the love and unity of his family. By the end of the film, those in the audience are believers too. Leaving the details of future heroics to the imaginations of the viewers was the perfect way to end a story about belonging and belief.

The sequels take that promising and wide-open future away from Unbreakable, confining the hero’s potential and even destroying one of the remarkable accomplishments of the original film by revealing that the belief gained in Unbreakable didn’t save the family after all, but instead shattered it. Split was an intriguing film in its own right, especially since it was not marketed as a sequel, and it nicely set up the idea of a final showdown in Glass. But despite the fun plot twists and quality filmmaking, these sequels sadly detract from the artistic depth of Unbreakable.

The Silence of the Lambs

Hopkins in Silence of the Lambs
Orion Pictures

It’s the inspired combination of what's known and what is unknown that creates the perfect ending for the 1991 Best Picture winner, The Silence of the Lambs. After all that has transpired, knowing that Hannibal Lecter is out there somewhere, and not knowing what his insanity and twisted sense of honor will make him do, was the right recipe for the perfect ending — as satisfying as having a side of fava beans and a nice Chianti with liver.

Related: Hannibal Lecter Movies in Order: How to Watch Chronologically and By Release Date

In taking away the not knowing by bringing Hannibal Lecter and Agent Starling back together again (with a different actress), the 2001 sequel Hannibal pulls the rug out from under the perfect ending of the original. The star power of Anthony Hopkins (and an eerie fascination with the idea of cannibalism) brought audiences back, but after all the additional drama, the story could only go right back to where it began, making the extraordinary ending of The Silence of the Lambs feel ordinary in the process. The subsequent Hannibal Lecter movies brought painfully diminishing returns, but if anything, the Hannibal TV series was a revelation for how to reboot a franchise without ruining the original.

An Artistic Hat Trick: The Imagination, Story, and Ending of Avatar

James Cameron movie Avatar
 20th Century Studios

We've examined three kinds of movies in which sequels are unwarranted — movies that gave audiences something beyond their imagination, movies that already told a complete story, and movies that ended perfectly. It's arguable that Avatar fits all three of these classifications.

There were plenty of negative reviews of Avatar when it came out in 2009, and they were in monotonous agreement: This story has already been told, the dialog is uninspired, it’s all icing and no cake… But far more critics (and nearly all viewers) understood that they were experiencing something extraordinary — a completely original story with sophisticated scripts wasn’t what the experience was about.

What made Avatar a masterpiece for imaginative audiences was the way it checked all the boxes. It took them to a world which they never could have imagined and painted it perfectly with the finest of brush strokes. It gave them a story that pulled them in as it unfolded, with small victories and setbacks that played out with strong characters, and finished in the most satisfying of ways. Avatar was and remains everything a stand-alone masterpiece needs to be.

Muddying the Waters of Avatar: Can the Sequels Live Up to the Original?

Avatar: The Way of Water
20th Century Studios

After 13 years, a sequel to Avatar has finally arrived. Will it muddy the waters of Avatar the same way sequels did for The Matrix? Not necessarily. James Cameron is a world-class writer, director and producer with several of the greatest successes in film history already under his belt, including Titanic and The Abyss. And with Aliens and Terminator 2, he showed that he had the skill to successfully change the course of a franchise.

Also, sequels do sometimes get it right, even when the artistic excellence of the first film has stacked the odds against them. One of the remarkable and brilliant things about The Godfather Part II was that it felt like the second half of the same Oscar-winning movie (after a two-year intermission). It didn’t try to up the ante by outshining its predecessor. Instead, it focused on recapturing the same movie magic, and in doing so, became the defining sequel in cinematic history.

At the very least, Avatar: The Way of Water and any other sequels will delight most Avatar fans and sell an astonishing number of tickets and subscriptions. From an industry perspective, its chances of failure are almost zero (though, according to Cameron, it does need to make roughly $2 billion just to break even). But from an artistic perspective, its chances of failure are significant. Everything about the original Avatar, both the tangible and intangible, came together in a very rare and special way. Here’s hoping that James Cameron can beat the odds and make that happen again. And soon enough, audiences will be judging for themselves.