You can almost picture Hollywood executives meeting in a boardroom to try and figure out what to do with the next installment in a franchise that’s been running out of ideas. Somebody takes a long drag of a cigarette, suggests they head beyond the stars and into outer space despite not being a sci-fi property, before the rest of the gathered brain trust pause for a second and then erupt into a round of applause.
It might not go down exactly like that, but based on some of the sequels we’ve seen over the years, it may not be too far off, either. In the case of Fast & Furious 9, fans spent years suggesting that Dominic Toretto and the family take a trip outside of our own atmosphere, only for Justin Lin to oblige in suitably ludicrous fashion. He even revealed that he consulted NASA, but we can only imagine how that went down among the agency’s best and brightest.
On a similar note, Redditors have been suggesting the best and most unexpected sequels that pivoted away from their origins and went cosmic, and the conversation was kicked off by Hellraiser: Bloodline, which would have arguably been a much better film were it not the victim of a torturous production.
Fan favorite slasher Jason X is definitely worthy of a mention, too, with Mr. Voorhees doing what he does best with the aid of some newfangled futuristic gadgets after being cryogenically frozen. Sadly, Danny Trejo didn’t get in on the act in Machete Kills in Space, but Austin Powers did in The Spy Who Shagged Me, and fared much better than Roger Moore’s James Bond did in Moonraker.
It sounds preposterous on paper, and it usually is in practice if we’re being honest, but that doesn’t mean it’s not fun.