A surplus of sequels

‘Creed III’ and ‘Scream VI’ hit theaters

STELLA SCHNEIDER / ASST. A&C EDITOR / THE USD VISTA

This March, many franchises are releasing more content from their respective series. For production companies, a formulaic approach to a movie series attracts fan bases and economic success with each new installment. As a result, many franchises release multiple films around the same premise, in hopes of generating great profit. 

Released on Mar. 3, “Creed III” is another installment of the “Rocky” franchise, which began in 1976. Despite being the ninth film in the series, fans are still invested in the story, as it’s evolved over time. The first film was about Rocky Balboa, played by Sylvester Stallone, and his boxing career. After five films about Balboa’s boxing and other important people in his life, the franchise pivoted to focus on his protégé, Adonis (Donnie) Creed, played by Michael B. Jordan. 

“Creed III” collected an estimated $58.6 million at the domestic box office, and approximately $100 million worldwide on its opening weekend. This is the third “Creed” film in the “Rocky” franchise. Despite having no connection to Stallone’s character, Balboa, the latest Creed installment still earned the best opening weekend in series history. In this film, Adonis Creed is thriving in his career and with his family when his childhood friend, Damian, played by Johnathan Majors, reappears after time in prison. The former friends ultimately face off in a boxing match. Majors rose to fame in the past few years and most recently played an important role in “Ant-Man and The Wasp: Quantumania.” 

USD junior Avery Leininger saw “Creed III” opening weekend and has been a fan of the “Rocky” franchise for some time now. 

“It was cool to let Michael B. Jordan have his moment and focus solely on his story and his character,” Leininger expressed. “It’s kind of necessary [focusing on Creed instead of Rocky], or it would [just] be the same thing again and again. But it would’ve been nice if Sylvester Stallone had a feature here or there.” 

Acting as Michael B. Jordan’s directorial debut, this is the first film in the franchise to provide a stylistic change to the often formulaic boxing story. As a result, some fans are happy with the change, including USD junior Avery Leininger. 

“The movie stands out from the other franchise movies, because the filming was really different, the camera work and cool effects I haven’t seen in movies like this really stood out,” Leininger expressed. “The emotion stood out because usually there wasn’t a really clear person you are rooting for because you’re more sympathetic to the other characters, like Damian, and it wasn’t so clear cut on who a villain was, which I loved.”

Another film recently released from a popular franchise is “Scream VI.” Released on March 10 as the sixth installment to the series, the film follows four survivors of the villain Ghostface, as the protagonists move to New York. Earning  $44.5 million at the domestic box office and $67 million globally, “Scream VI” is successful thus far. One of the main characters of this film is Tara Carpenter, played by Jenna Ortega. This past year, Ortega rose to fame as Wednesday Addams in the new Netflix show, “Wednesday.” As a result, many fans of her work followed her to the “Scream” franchise, bringing more popularity to the already famous series. 

Both “Creed III” and “Scream VI” are still bringing fans to the theaters because of their refreshing take on a longstanding series. With that being said, there are still people who find popular franchises to be redundant. 

USD Senior Vice President and Provost, Dr. Roger Pace is a fan of independent and smaller films, unlike most franchises. As a professor of multiple film classes on campus and one of the professors to start the Sundance Film Festival class during intersession, Pace is well-versed on most film-related subjects. In regards to series like “Rocky” and “Scream,” Pace expressed concern.

“Even the [series] I enjoy, you’d have to admit that they’re getting stale. Inevitably a good idea runs its course and if you keep it alive just for the economics, you’re going to get kind of stale performances,” Pace explained. “But after the pandemic, those are the films bringing people to the theaters, it exaggerated the risk avoidance… small films just aren’t being seen by people.”

Series like these tend to have economic success and large crowds, leaving those to wonder if the repetitive nature of these formulaic films will continue to have such a grand effect on cinema. While these films are performing well in theaters, many fans ponder the future of the franchises.