I can only think of three "way too late" sequels that were any good --
Mad Mad: Fury Road
Top Gun: Maverick
Finding Dory
If
Twisters were to succeed as a film, I think there are some lessons to be learned here --
(1.) DO NOT REHASH THE SAME PLOT AS THE ORIGINAL FILM. A few references and homages are okay, but this one needs to stand on its own with its own characters and conflicts.
Stay as far away from
The Force Awakens as you can.
(2.) Adding diversity is fine if it fits the story or makes an interesting point (e.g.,
Fury Road and its feminist characters and themes,
Maverick and its female and nonwhite pilots that are treated as professionals and not there to meet some quota/Phoenix is not treated as eye candy but only as a pilot). But if all you got is "It's an inferior version of the film you've already seen but diverse!" then you have a problem.
(3.) Older characters can't "start" where they "ended" decades previously in the last film. A lot of time has passed, much has changed. How about we use Maverick as a demonstration of this --
Maverick at the end of
Top Gun had matured from the hotdogging "go it alone" punk that he started as, learning much about loss and the terrible burden of responsibility for your decisions from Goose's death and the need to make, trust, and support friends in saving and making peace with Iceman.
Maverick at the beginning of
Maverick is a man who has lived a long life and is burdened with regrets. Goose still haunts him in the background, he alienated Goose's son/Maverick's metaphorical son being overprotective, his womanizing ways cost him his best a chance at a wife and stable family life, and Iceman, instead of his rival, is now his best and lifelong friend. He's not just a hotshot who learned a few lessons the hard way, he's a real person late in life with a lifetime of burdens from the decisions he's made hanging over him.
As opposed to...
When we first meet Han Solo in
A New Hope, he's an arrogant, selfish smuggler with one friend (and one who seems to only barely tolerate him as much as you can interpret Wookie speech).
He has completely changed by the end of
The Return of the Jedi. He's a general in the Alliance military, leads a special forces unit, and willing to put himself in danger to protect his friends. He throws himself in front of a wounded Leah and gives Lando his beloved
Millennium Falcon to pilot during the attach on the second Death Star because he knows it gives him the best chance of success and survival.
Come
The Force Awakens... he's a deadbeat smuggler again. WTF!?! Did nothing happen???
Philip Seymour Hoffman was so overqualified for
Twister.
And I loved it.
Him
blasting the "Boléro" section from Deep Purple's "Child in Time" over the prairies and yelling "LOSER!" over and over again at the Dread Pirate Roberts was some high-quality cinema.
