Sylvester Stallone has fronted several franchises over the years, but here's why Escape Plan is his worst. Following the success of Rocky, Stallone had trouble following the movie up with a solid hit. Sequels weren't really in vogue during this era, and he was advised against making Rocky II, with the original director John G. Avildsen flatly refusing to return. Stallone took the reins himself, and the sequel became another surprise success. Rocky Balboa is now Stallone's most enduring character, and he has reprised the role many times over the decades, with 2018's Creed 2 being the former boxer's most recent outing.
Stallone, maybe more so than any other Hollywood actor before him, embraced sequels both as a way to continue exploring the same character and for their in-built commercial appeal. Tonally, First Blood - which wasn't the first movie to introduce John Rambo - and Rambo: First Blood Part 2 are very different, with one being a grounded survival thriller and the other being a bombastic war movie. This switch in genre allowed Rambo to become a cultural icon, however, and Stallone returned to the part a further three times. In 2010, he also created The Expendables series, which paired him with other beloved action icons like Jet Li, Dolph Lundgren and Arnold Schwarzenegger; the fourth entry is set for release in 2022.
While Stallone seemingly had the midis touch when it comes to franchises, there have been a few non-starters, such as 1995's Judge Dredd. The Expendables franchise paired Stallone with his former on-screen rival Schwarzenegger, but these team-ups weren't fully satisfying since the latter's role in each movie amounted to an extended cameo. Their first true pairing came with 2013's Escape Plan, a prison movie that cast Stallone as a security expert mysteriously locked away in a supposedly inescapable prison; Schwarzenegger played a fellow prisoner who helps him put that theory to the test. The movie was a fun if forgettable thriller that did surprisingly well overseas, leading to the Escape Plan franchise, which sadly happens to be Stallone's worst action movie series.
The only thing of note the Escape Plan sequels did was pair Stallone with Dave Bautista - who later admitted to signing on to the films just to work with Sly. Escape Plan 2: Hades saw Stallone's Ray Breslin and his security team imprisoned in the titular facility where inmates are forced to fight, while Escape Plan 3 (AKA The Extractors) saw Stallone's - who has many movie regrets - Breslin breaking into an old prison to save his fiancee. Despite being produced for a reported $20 million and featuring a talented cast, Escape Plan 2 looks and feels very chintzy, with a boring storyline and repetitive fight sequences. Stallone himself later spoke out against the sequel, dubbing it the "most horribly produced film" of his career in an Instagram post.
Escape Plan 3 was received a little better and benefitted from a more grounded, practical approach to locations and fights. However, it's still a very skippable film, and despite prominent billing, both Stallone and Bautista basically play supporting roles. Stallone seemingly agreed to make the third entry - which was helmed by his longtime friend John Herzfeld - as some kind of redemption for Escape Plan 2: Hades, but the trilogy is easily the worst franchise of Stallone's career. Breslin isn't a very compelling character, the setpieces aren't memorable and there's little fresh or inventive about any of them. Stallone himself didn't write or direct any of the Escape Plan movies either, and given his creative stamp on the Rocky or Rambo movies, maybe this is partly the reason they didn't live up to his usual standards. Either way, it appears Escape Plan 4 won't be happening, which is probably for the best.