It’s been so long since National Treasure 2 came out that people might need to be reminded that if a third movie does make it to the big screen eventually the story is going to have to be something exceptional since the last two movies have uncovered treasures that are absolutely phenomenal and are hard to top. In the first movie there was the treasure of the Knights Templar that was simply too great to quantify, while in the second movie the city of gold was discovered beneath Mount Rushmore. The third movie would need to top both of those in a way that would defy the imagination and possibly eclipse both movies in terms of scale and story. If that was all that was in the works however that might be enough, but it sounds as though, according to Kevin Burwick of MovieWeb, there’s also an idea to create a National Treasure series on Disney+, though the thought is that a movie would offer a much easier way for people to accept a series as it would grant a much greater amount of content and continuity. Plus, the series will be working with a younger cast, while the movie will be attempting to bring the same cast back together, which is bound to be at least a little bit difficult but could hopefully happen.
Here’s the thing about these movies, they’re interesting and despite being wildly inaccurate in some cases they are fun, but so far the first two have made due with a bit of history here and there that’s been factual and then gone off on a wild tangent of revisionist history in order to keep the Gates family at the forefront of a couple of big historical finds that basically would have made them world renowned and possibly even bigger targets than before for anyone and everyone that wanted to find a buried treasure. To say that there aren’t any more ideas to research and come up with would be false since there are plenty of mysteries left in the world when it comes to buried riches and hidden clues that might eventually lead to a find of the century, but again, that bar is already set pretty high and the second movie didn’t really reach it that easily. In the era of sequels and reboots though that doesn’t become much of a consideration since people are so fixated on going back to the well for the same franchise over and over that it’s now bound to take a true and agonizing flop to really get studios to halt and desist when it comes to continuing an idea. Matt Goldberg of Collider has more to say on this matter. National Treasure was actually pretty enjoyable in the first movie since it offered up a story that was original enough that it could be embraced by the audience and it did have a decent cast.
This time around however the concern is that the movie isn’t just going to flop, but that it could very well be hyped up to such a degree that it will crash and burn upon being shown on the big screen. Being pessimistic about its chances before it’s even put into production might sound like a bad idea since there are plenty of people that can make a movie like this work without much of a hitch. But at the same time it’s hard to be too excited since the second movie didn’t really move up from the first so much as move forward and slightly down. The big problem with more than one sequel is the fact that at this point the idea of who the characters are, what they’re doing, and what they’re all about is established, but without any real upward movement or drastic change it’s fair to say that they’re standing in place while the rest of the world is moving around them, and people get tired of this since the lack of innovation and change doesn’t make for a great movie experience. I could be wrong and entirely off base, and in the case of most new movies I’d definitely hope so, but continuing a franchise in this manner is still something that’s hard to get behind largely because the sequel already showed that the idea is being watered down and there’s not much chance for it any longer. How in the world do you beat finding a city of gold?
Plus, at what point does this become a modernized Indiana Jones ripoff? Sue Millinocket of Movie Rewind had something to say on this point. Some might say that the first and second movies are both great examples of a contemporary story that is basically and Indiana Jones tale that focuses on American artifacts instead, but there are others that would defend the idea that National Treasure is a story all to itself and doesn’t need to be compared to anything. We’ll see how that holds up when the movie and the series comes around.
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