Am I the only one who longs for the days when sequel titles were honest? If it’s a sequel, put a damn number 2 in the title. If you want to get fancy, use a roman numeral. These days nearly every movie is a franchise, but you’d never know it from the movies’ titles which all tack on weird subtitles and strange limericks in order to avoid the stigma of actually being a sequel. Thank god for Spider-Man, the only franchise with the balls to throw a number 2 or 3 in the title.
The latest sequel to get a title that pretends it is not a sequel, is the upcoming second Punisher movie. On their official press site, Lionsgate has spilled the beans on what they’re calling it. No, it won’t be Punishers Requiem. They’re calling it Punisher: War Zone. I guess that’s better than Punisher: Stuff Goes Boom, but I’d have preferred a more specific title like Punisher: The Sequel To That Movie That Really Sucked And Probably Didn’t Deserve Another Shot And Oh Yeah We Had To Recast The Punisher Role Because The Other Guy Thought Making A Sequel To An Awful, Unprofitable Movie Was Kind of Dumb. But, that’s probably a little too long to fit on a poster.
So get ready for Punisher: War Zone, coming soon to a dollar theater or DVD bargain bin near you.
