As “Wicked: For Good,” the second part of last year’s phenomenon simply known as “Wicked,” makes all the money in the world, let’s take a look back at the history of the two-part film trend and ask ourselves: Should it stop?
As the “Harry Potter” and “Twilight” film serieses were coming to a close, studios didn’t want to say goodbye to their steady profits, so…they didn’t. They split their final installments into two films. The two-parters would shoot at the same time and be released a year apart. Both parts of both finales were massive successes.
“Hunger Games” followed suit with less profitable results, and the “Divergent” series fared even worse with part two being scrapped because part one did so badly.
Now we’ve had “Dune,” “Spider-verse,” “Fast & Furious,” “Mission: Impossible,” and, of course, “Wicked.” But “Wicked: For Good” is the only second part of a film to actually hit its release date as planned. “Fast X” and “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse” are still currently unresolved with their next installments that were meant to release last year, still not coming for, at minimum, two more years. “Dune” pulled the rug out from audiences with part two not providing closure but rather ending with another cliff hanger that is supposed to be resolved next year sometime. Ish. And “Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning Part Two,” retitled to” Final Reckoning” after Part One was bodied by Barbenheimer, ended the Tom Cruise franchise years after it was supposed to.
The two part movie stretches material thin and makes worse movies but more profits, or it just takes so long that it just becomes frustrating for audiences. I realize studios are primarily motivated by the “more profits” part of the equation but these two-part films suck for audiences. Let’s leave them behind, please.
