I haven't had a chance to read through the whole thread, so someone probably has talked about this point.  The biggest problem of the third movie is they are usually running out of ideas and make too many nods to the original movie and it comes off as cheesy.  People like me always roll my eyes, "Been there done that!"

Back to the Future III is a perfect example of this.  Now BTTFIII is an OK sequel, but they have the typical 'Marty wakes up next the Lea Thompson character and doesn't know what year it is...."  or "Marty had to evade Biff or Griff cause he insults him and Biff/Griff usually ends up in horseshit.

I think the reason of this is the writer feels you know the characters at this point, so they know its an easy laugh to bring up something from the original movie just in a different setting in the 3rd movie. 

Escape from the Planet of the Apes - I personally feel like this is the only sequel to The Planet of the Apes that came anywhere close to the level of the original. I love Beneath the Planet of the Apes, but only because it is pure camp and I find it amusing.

The Voyage of the Dawn Treader (being the third book in The Chronicles of Narnia) - (Never seen the film for the record, am only talking about the book) after a fairly dry followup to The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe with Prince Caspian, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader was an extremely thrilling ride for a very small version of me the first time I read it. Still my favorite of the series.

Fallout 3 - While a lot of old time Fallout fans moan about what a horrible continuation of the series this game was, but I have never been able to help but absolutely love it. One of the most enjoyable gaming experiences I have ever had. I tried playing the originals a bit, but they just aren't the type of game that I have ever had any interest in, so it stands to reason fans of those games aren't fans of the one I enjoy.

Monkey Island III: The Curse of Monkey Island - A lot of MI fans, myself included, have never considered this on par with the first two, but personally I still found it extremely enjoyable to play. I consider it The Return of the Jedi of the Monkey Islands.

Rogue Squadron III was pretty impressive.

Dark Forces III: Jedi Knight II: Jedi Outcast was also pretty amazing, but unfair to list since it was the first, second, and third parts of three different series, so it probably shouldn't count.

The PlayStation 3 was a bit of a let down as a followup for the phenomenal PlayStation 2.

Ziggy Stardust said:

I'm so glad I'm not the only one who thinks this.

Actually, I've spent many hours discussing the Inklings back during my university years, and you and I are definitely not alone on The Voyager of the Dawn Treader thing.

I am just glad you didn't say something like, "Uh, The Horse and His Boy is the third Narnia book. Duh!"

Then you would have been just as dead to me as that blue guy who's user name starts with b and ends with v.

That goes without saying!

In fact, Escape is what made me realize how much I really enjoyed Curse. While playing Curse I just kept thinking, "Ah man, more Monkey Island, this is great! But it just isn't quite the same..."

Then Escape came along, and I once again gobbled it up and beat it in a few days, had fun along the way but still felt that, "Ah man, more Monkey Island, this is great! But it just isn't quite the same..."

A few years later a second replay of Curse was every bit as enjoyable as the first time, and perhaps even more fun because I'd anticipate coming up on the parts I had really enjoyed the first time through. But an attempted second replay of Escape proved completely unenjoyable. After a relatively short distance into the game for the second time, all it took was thinking about the inevitable Monkey Kombat I'd have to once again suffer through toward the end of the game to convince me my time could be better wasted.

Escape is a distraction worthwhile for anyone who just can't get enough MI and is willing to play a crappy game to get their fix. But Curse on the other hand is a genuinely great adventure game, even if it doesn't mesh so well with the original games and isn't the third part that was intended by the series creator.

Ziggy Stardust said:

Since when has The Horse and His Boy been the third book?

For a while, actually. Go look on amazon right now for a brand new set of the books, it will have the chronological ordering*. This was adopted shortly after C.S. Lewis died. In a letter from a fan, the fan mentioned a debate regarding the order the books should be read in, the publication order, or chronological order. Lewis responded saying something along the lines of either way works, but now that he is thinking about it chronological order makes a lot of sense. I've read the letter several times, and it doesn't come off as a hard definitive decision on the subject, and comes off more as a "huh, hadn't really thought about the possibility of people reading them chronologically, that is a neat idea, but feel free to read them as you like". Yet after his death they decided to change the order of the books because that was "the author's preferred order", as determined by that letter to his fan.

My local Barnes & Noble has this beautiful single volume hardcover edition of the entire series, I want so badly, but I hate the idea of having them bound together out of order.

*Chronological order: The Magician's Nephew, The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe, The Horse and His Boy, Prince Caspian, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, The Silver Chair, The Last Battle; published order: The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe, Prince Caspian, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, The Silver Chair, The Horse and His Boy, The Magician's Nephew, The Last Battle.

Yeah, I have both the special editions on my 360, I love that they left the old graphics in there and was one of those who wished you could hear the voice overs with the old graphics in the first game and was grateful to see they rethought that for the second. I wish they would make a path to add it to the first game (Guybrush looks unforgivably bad in that on too though). I love how seemlessly you can change the graphics too with just the press of the select button, it is fun to be on a screen with the new graphics and want to remember what it used to be like and can with the simple press of a single button, or be playing the classic graphics and wonder what the new take on a scene is.

I really hope they go as far as to release Monkey Island three in HD. The way the cartoons were drawn looked great already and it already has full voice, so if they just make it widescreen and uprez it to HD, that be pretty cool. I'd pay $10 to have it on my 360 beside the other two.

I've heard the "new" (few years old now) episodic Monkey Island game was pretty good (I think from Nanner in part), but I have never gotten around to playing it. Really the idea of a new Monkey Island game doesn't interest me at all, but I do enjoy visiting old ones for nostalgia sake.