Over the last few years, movie goers have seen a noticeable rise in sequels to fan favorite movies being produced. Movies like Freakier Friday (2025), the sequel to the 2003 blockbuster Freaky Friday, Top Gun: Maverick (2022), the sequel to Top Gun (1988), Twisters (2024), a standalone sequel to the original Twister (1996), along with many others have made many of us question: why now, twenty-some years later?
The answer isn’t as simple as it seems.
Financial security
Sequels became popular in the 1970s because they were lower risk financially, due to the existing fanbase from the first installment(s) and their brand recognition. Studios leverage nostalgia and the familiar characters and universes to bring audiences back again and again. Effectively making sequels the safe option studios could rely on for income.
As it turns out, sequels have been outperforming original movies for the last two decades. Stephen Follows, a film data researcher, looked at the 100 highest grossing films in the US from 2005 to 2015. He found that “the number of top grossing films which were sequels has more than doubled.” In 2024, an article on Yahoo Finance reported that sequels have been “driving the bulk of the industry’s highest-grossing films” since 2016. Meaning that most of the profits studios are making from the box office are coming from sequels. Exceedingly so, that many have dubbed 2024 the year of sequels.
Financial reasons are a plain and simple answer behind this but if this isolated outcome is placed in the context of everything happening in the entertainment industry within the same time frame, there is something bigger going on here.
Rise of streaming
The rise in studio’s reliance on sequels seems to coincide with the rise in popularity of streaming platforms.
In 2007, Netflix launched its first streaming service that was available through a separate device that connected to your TV. By the early 2010s, other services such as Hulu and Amazon joined Netflix and streaming apps became available on most smart TVs and streaming devices. Since then, there have been hundreds of these streaming services launched by companies.
According to the Pew Research Center, in 2025, 83% of Americans watch streaming services, with 55% of that 83% watching streaming only and the other 28% watching both streaming and cable or satellite. This is a significant change from the 90% of TV households that were cable subscribers in 2010, according to Forbes.
This shift from physical media to digital streaming has changed the way the average person consumes media. Prior to streaming, producers could afford to make their money back from the box office because DVD sales were a huge part of their revenue. Since then, licensing fees for tv and streaming have replaced that revenue. Except now, licensing fees are most often determined by how the movie performed in the box office.
Despite finances and changing technology, there is one more important factor to consider: demand.
Audience demand
A recent survey conducted by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research found that “American moviegoers are more likely to stream a film than see it in the theaters,” citing both convenience and cost as factors in that shift. Though out of those, younger adults tend to watch more new movies but prefer streaming over going to the theater.
Considering these statistics and the fact new movies struggle in the box office, it makes sense why sequels have overtaken original movies. Without the younger audience, original movies are more difficult to justify producing.
This final factor completes the trifecta of circumstances that have launched sequels into the spotlight.
While sequels have taken priority on the business side, this evolution to survive in a new competitive environment secures their future. Though the entertainment industry will still face the audience demand for original movies, making it safe to say they are not going anywhere either. Only time will tell if the originals will relive their glory days once again or sequels with remain prominent in the ever changing environment of the entertainment industry.
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