13 Prequels That Improved Upon The Original Movies

The Spaghetti Westerns A Fistful of Dollars and For a Few Dollars More feature Clint Eastwood as “the Man with No Name,” a laconic gunslinger. The third film in the trilogy, 1966's The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly, is a prequel which takes place during the Civil War and shows the development of his character, as well as how he took on his signature look seen in the first two installments. Eastwood's character teams up with a Mexican outlaw to find $20,000 that has allegedly been buried in the desert. 

By all accounts, director Sergio Leone perfected the formula in this third installment. It utilizes a more potent visual style, filled with long takes and eye-popping cinematography that captures the majesty of the landscape. The story is better too, having more nuance than the others. As always, Ennio Morricone's unforgettable score contributes significantly to the mood. Though Leone's prior two films are still classics, The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly represents the Spaghetti Western at its absolute best.

The Godfather is widely considered one of the best films ever made, so it understandably seems impossible to top. Yet somehow, The Godfather Part II takes everything that's so captivating about the original and adds more depth and detail to it. In truth, this movie is half-sequel and half-prequel. Part of the story picks up where the first left off, carrying on the tale of Michael Corleone (Al Pacino), while a parallel narrative goes back to 1917 to show the origin story of how his father, young Vito Corleone (Robert De Niro), became a Mafia kingpin.

Those flashback sequences provide essential information about Don Vito. The Godfather Part II compares and contrasts his history with Michael's present, drawing fascinating parallels between the two characters. Perhaps the best way to explain what makes the prequel so phenomenal is that it builds an even greater appreciation for the original.

Released in 2000, X-Men hit a couple of years before superhero movies had their dominant resurgence. It was a terrific screen adaptation of the Marvel characters, although one that was somewhat restricted by a limited budget. Studios weren't yet ready to bankroll $200 million comic book flicks. The 2011 prequel had no such limitations, allowing it to maintain the character-based approach while also adding more spectacular action sequences.

The plot takes place in the early 1960s, as the young Charles Xavier (James McAvoy) and Erik Lehnsherr (Michael Fassbender) start off as friends, only to have their views on mutant powers drive them to different ends of the spectrum. Strong performances, improved visual effects, and thrilling action help elevate X-Men: First Class above the original. The exploration of how the future Professor X and Magneto reached the rift in their respective philosophies gives the movie a stronger story, too.

The original 1968 Planet of the Apes is set in the year 3978, and famously ends with astronaut George Taylor, who has been enslaved by apes on a faraway planet, making the shocking discovery that he's actually not on an alien planet; he's on a far-future Earth. How the intelligent apes took over is left a mystery. Rise of the Planet of the Apes, released in 2011, answers that question. While researcher Will Rodman (James Franco) tests the effects of an Alzheimer's drug, it becomes clear that his experimental subject, a chimpanzee named Caesar, has developed advanced abilities. Matters grow worse when Caesar ends up in a containment facility where he's abused and neglected by the owner. Eventually, Caesar manages to use the drug to enhance other apes' intelligence and leads a mass escape from the San Francisco Zoo.

Planet of the Apes was a phenomenon when it came out, launching a series of sequels. Due to the limitations of effects at the time, though, the apes were pretty clearly humans in makeup. Rise of the Planet of the Apes takes advantage of photorealistic CGI that makes Caesar look and behave much more like a real chimp (with incredible motion capture acting provided by Andy Serkis). That same CGI allows for complex, exciting action sequences far beyond anything possible in the late 1960s. Overall, the prequel brings brand-new sophistication to the long-lasting franchise. 

The 1987 Arnold Schwarzenegger action picture Predator found the actor fighting off an alien menace in the jungle, and it kicked off a wildly successful franchise elaborating on the aliens - known as Predators or Yautja - hunting humans on a number of different occasions. After a few sequels, the 2022 prequel Prey winds back the clock to an earlier encounter with the Predators, back in the early 1700s. The story revolves around a young Comanche woman named Naru (Amber Midthunder), who is desperate to prove her hunting skills to the males in her tribe. She gets a chance when they're stalked by an often-invisible Predator who has arrived from outer space.

The Schwarzenegger movie is by all accounts an entertaining film, yet Prey takes advantage of modern special effects technology to make the action more intense and thrilling than before. Whereas the original was largely a macho action flick, the prequel adds a level of depth, given Naru's position where her skills are doubted by those around her. It has a little more on its mind than Predator did, and it's thrilling to watch how Naru defeats the creature by insightfully observing how it operates and outsmarting it, using the environment to her advantage.

Transformers was a huge hit that spawned a series of increasingly dumb sequels - and one really good prequel. Bumblebee is set in 1987, 20 years prior to the 2007 blockbuster. The prequel puts the the titular Autobot in the spotlight, as a teenage girl named Charlie (Hailee Steinfeld) discovers her Volkswagen Beetle is actually a robot from outer space that can disguise itself as a vehicle. She befriends Bumblebee and helps him escape from the evil Decepticons, paving the way for him to meet Shia LeBeouf's Sam Witwicky two decades later.

The robots in the main Transformers film often lacked personality, Optimus Prime aside. Bumblebee corrects that, making its title character a colorful figure who uses ‘80s-era song lyrics to communicate. The film additionally has a strong sense of fun, and it doesn’t take itself as seriously as Michael Bay's original did. For many fans, Bumblebee is the best entry in the whole series.