Retro Review: The Jaws Franchise (1975 – 1987)

All four Jaws movies have finally come out and I did my first ever Jaws Marathon.  I watched all four movies back to back and it was a task.  If Jaws was the top step of a staircase, the drop-off from Jaws to Jaws 2 is about two step, from Jaws to Jaws 3 about 5 steps and from Jaws to Jaws the Revenge is like falling down the staircase.  Either way, it was a task, but it was fun.  So lets break these movies down a little.  We will start with Jaws and work our way to the bottom, or to the last movie.

I will not drone on and on about these movies, these reviews will be short, like a paragraph.  Do I like them, are they worth watching?  Well we all know the first movie is a masterpiece, but what about the rest?

The marathon has been fun, will I ever do it again?  Hell yes!

Jaws (1975)

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Classic, Jaws is nearly perfect film.  Not just a horror film, I have said many times, I think Jaws transcends horror.  There are a couple of other horror films that do this, Psycho, Alien and the Shining to name a few.  In talking about the movie on its anniversary, today, I mention…

Jaws is an essential horror film, put a star on it.  My question is, does Jaws belong in our Horror Hall of Fame.  I am sure Jaws will make its way on the Horror Syndicate’s Top 100 coming in October.

Jaws is a great movie and sometimes it sucks that it is not a standalone horror classic.  I once did not think of Jaws as a horror movie or horror series.  But in talking to many passionate horror movie fans, they help think of the series as a slasher movie and Jaws is the killer.  He is like Jason or Michael Myers.  It works and Jaws is a slasher movie.  See, works on many levels.

IMDB.com has a 8.0 rating of for Jaws and I rate it 9.4, nearly perfect.

Jaws 2 (1978)

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Jaws 2 seems to be meant to follow the first movie and it does have any of the familiar trappings, but it does not even come close to the original.  The story isn’t bad, but the ending is a little…too much for me.  There are some great scenes in the movie, but I think it about 30 minutes too long and I don’t like the end.  I like the shark is scarred and it seems they used similar effects from the first movie.

Not a bad sequel and 100% the best sequel for Jaws.

IMDB.com has a rating of 5.7 for Jaws 2 and I give it a 6.0 rating.

Jaws 3-D (1983)

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At the height of the 1980s 3-D craze, comes Jaws 3-D.  The story is not bad, the characters are not bad.  The 3-D effects ruin this film.  I think a lot of the movie works in different ways, but even if they 3-D effects, it looks terrible.  The Blu Ray is awful and not worth the money.

I think Jaws 3-D is, at time a mess.  But overall not terrible and again, at times, fun.

IMDB.com rates Jaws 3-D at 3.6, its not that bad, I rate it at an even 5.0.

Jaws the Revenge (1987)

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Chief Brody’s wife has gone bat-shit crazy!  By the time of this movie, Chief Brody has died from a heart attack…or fear of the shark.  His youngest son has been attacked by a shark seeking revenge against the Brody family.  Then the shark chases the last two remaining Brody’s to the Bahamas, in warm water and continues its search for revenge.  Michael Caine is in the movie, but he is…I don’t know.  The movie is not good, I tried to watch it and enjoy and even defend the movie.  Ellen Brody also goes after the shark…ugh.  The ending is preposterous.

I actually saw the Revenge before the other movies and at one point in time I thought it was great…I was 8 years old.  Jaws the Revenge is considered on of THE worst movies of all-time.

IMDB.com has a rating of 2.8 and I again think that is very low, I have it ranked as 4.0.

Thanks for checking this out.  I want to mention the Blu Ray releases.  The movies look good with the exception of Jaws 3-D.  Jaws 3-D looks terrible, hell my DVD is better.  The best part is the the Blu Ray spins and covers match up with the art.  If you’re a collector, these are for you, for collecting purposes only.

 

About Ray Marek III 699 Articles
I have been watching horror films since I was 6 years old. The story, one Saturday night, my mom and I were watching movies and she fell asleep on the couch. We had the channel set on HBO and the movie we were watching ended and the next one, A Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy’s Revenge. This was some time in 1986. I watched then entire film, I was sitting on the edge of my seat. When my mom woke, she asked me what just ended and I told her, “Freddy”. That was all I talked about for weeks and finally she broke down and rented more horror films for me. She rented, the Texas Chainsaw Massacre part 2, Re-Animator, Friday the 13th VI: Jason Lives and Halloween II. I watched all and fell in love with horror films forever. 5 Horror Films to Watch Inferno (1980) A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984) The Beyond (1981) Friday the 13th VI: Jason Lives (1986) Horror of Dracula (1958)