When you do a film as unique and original as 'Napoleon Dynamite,' it's hard then try to repeat what audiences loved the first time.
The first film is everything you want to say and how you want to say it. Lots of directors will do that and do it really well, but the second film is not so easy.
It's always an enormous pressure when you do a sequel. The demands are so high, and it's expensive.
'Independence Day,' ever since we did it, there's been enormous pressure to follow it up.
A sequel is going to be a pressure no matter who directs it. A sequel is only made when the original film works.
I did not want to write one of those sequels that famous first-book authors get into where everybody says, 'Oh yeah.'
I've always found the second book in a series is the hardest to write.
There is a lot of pressure to top yourself... to come up with a 'Rumours II,' and that seemed like a trap.
It's tough to make a sequel that stands up to the original especially one that has, over the course of time, become a bit of a cult favorite.
'The Conjuring' was a massive success, and honestly, it set the bar quite high. So I was nervous about making the sequel, and I wasn't sure if it will still have the same impact as the first one did. But that's what moved me to make the sequel.
A lot of people have trouble with their second novel - the dreaded sophomore jinx. I wrote three books in between the two novels, and they just weren't very good.
The difficulty of writing a second novel is directly proportional to how successful the first novel was, it seems.
Where do you go after something like 'Pacific Rim?' Which, for me, was such a moment, to have this thing and see it all come together, and it's big, and it has this cult following... You ask yourself, 'What's next?'
I didn't want to play it boring and safe. I also didn't want to innovate too much. Second albums, man, they're even scarier than first ones.
A sequel is such a daunting thing, because you don't want to lose the magic and the charm of the first one.
Some people make a great film and then they can't follow up.
I was keenly aware that everybody would have loved for me to do a close sequel or a spin-off to 'Marley and Me.'
