Two is Better Than One

Greg is writing about trilogies where the third installment was best. He picked some good ones and I don't really have any to add off the top of my head. However, I do think there is another interesting class of movie franchises: series where the second film was better than the rest. The obvious one for me is Terminator 2. Even though I liked the first one, I'd also list Aliens.

The alien franchise also displays the rare characteristic where the third film was bad so they soldiered on anyway in space marine style to create a fourth film that was at least a bit better than the third.