Yearender 2025: War 2, Son of Sardaar 2 and more! The year when sequels lost their spark

In the year 2025, Bollywood once again repeated its game with the sequels, and this time it became even more intense. For years, sequels had their own separate fan base, with familiar characters, a sense of nostalgia, and the same geography of the film and all this with different stories and more improvised versions. In brief, sequels had been makers’ safe gamble and were profitable most of the time. However, this year turned out to be different, as audiences grew tired of back-to-back sequels. As a result, cinema halls for most sequels, even several highly anticipated ones, such as WAR 2 has empty theatres. Even those films that earned good reviews were not able to become massive money churners and were left to be watched on OTT.

Hrithik Roshan, the Greek god of Bollywood, has the ability to hook viewers with his charm alone - his acting and screen presence comes later. The actor returned to the big screen with the highly anticipated War 2. To make the film even bigger and appeal to audiences in the South as well, the makers brought Jr NTR on board. Adding to the glamour was Kiara Advani. However, even with this powerful trio with millions of following, the movie failed to churn out big numbers. The film’s script, filled with juvenile elements that audiences had already seen in numerous films, worked against it. As a result, the movie was unable to surpass the lifetime collection of War, its first part. Made on a budget of Rs 400 crore, the film earned Rs 364.35 crore worldwide, according to multiple reports.

2025 witnessed another addition to the slapstick comedy franchise, and this one turned out to be even dirtier and messier. The no-brainer script became a major letdown, as the film once again came with the same formula, one murder, cringe jokes, luxury locations, and a cartoonish script. This left audiences fuming and even broke their trust when it comes to spending their hard-earned money on such films.

Although the movie managed to earn average box-office numbers and entered the Rs 100 crore club. But this addition to the franchise was not needed at all.

Ajay Devgn was on a roll this year, and it would not be wrong to call him the sequel king of 2025. Starting from 2024 with Drishyam 2, which did wonderful business at the box office, expectations were high. However, in 2025, the graph went down, up, and down again.

This year, Devgn appeared in sequels across drama, comedy, and romantic comedy genres. While Raid 2 emerged as a hit, the other two films, Son of Sardaar 2 and De De Pyaar De 2, did entertained the audiences but not with the same energy as their first parts did. The impact on box-office numbers was average due to people losing interest in theatres and increasingly preferring OTT platform, which is both time- and money-saving option.

All these films earned decent reviews and decent numbers, but that was all. They came and went from the box office without leaving any lasting impact.

Kesari Chapter 2, Akshay Kumar’s courtroom drama, turned out to be average on most fronts. While it earned strong reviews and managed to bring audiences to theatres with solid performances from Akshay Kumar and co-star R. Madhavan, Ananya Panday also delivered a impressive performance.

The film was affected by the growing audience mindset of waiting for an OTT release, but it still managed to earn decent numbers, approximately Rs 145 crore. These were not great figures, but when compared to other sequels that wrapped up their theatrical runs far too early, Kesari Chapter 2 did well and proved to be a worthy addition to the historical franchise and left audiences impressed.

Akshay Kumar finally delivered a film that earned both strong reviews and decent box-office numbers, something many of his post-pandemic films had struggled to achieve. What worked in favour of Jolly LLB 3 was the strong base created by Subhash Kapoor’s first two films. As a result, audiences returned to theatres to watch what magic both Arshad Warsi and Akshay Kumar, the two Jollys together brings. The courtroom drama featured less comic relief compared to the earlier installments, but it impressed viewers with its storytelling and performances