By: Anannya RajeshOnce reserved for rare blockbusters, sequels are becoming a regular feature of Malayalam cinemaAs ‘Drishyam 3’ wraps up a successful theatrical run and begins its streaming journey, its success raises an obvious question: Are sequels becoming a fixture of Malayalam cinema rather than an occasional exception? For most of the industry’s history, they weren’t. Follow-ups were few and far between, reserved only for the rare breakout hit.The clearest proof of that shift isn’t ‘Drishyam’ at all; it is ‘Vaazha’. Nobody set out to build a franchise when the film went into production. It was a modestly budgeted title, cast almost entirely with newcomers, with no star name and no built-in audience. Yet it succeeded well enough to earn itself something no one had planned for: A sequel. ‘Vaazha 2’ followed and did even better than the first. That order of events matters: Newcomers, no built-in audience, and a franchise that only took shape once the film had already worked on its own. It runs against an idea the industry has held onto for years, that you need star power to launch anything worth continuing.“When a movie like that becomes a success, the confidence that we get is that instead of using stars, we can do a second part with newcomers,” Harris Desom, producer of the ‘Vaazha’ franchise, says.Four sequels came out in 2026 alone: ‘Drishyam 3’, ‘Aadu 3’, ‘Vaazha 2’, and ‘Mohiniyattam’, the follow-up to ‘Bharatanatyam’.
That is a lot for an industry that used to treat original stories as the default. Whether this counts as a full-blown ‘sequel era’ is debatable, but the pattern is hard to miss.Part of the explanation is streaming. Actor Saiju Kurup, who worked on both the ‘Aadu’ films and the ‘Bharatanatyam’ and ‘Mohiniyattam’ series, points to ‘Aadu’ as an early case. It flopped at the box office, then found an audience later through DVDs, torrents, and digital platforms. That slow-building popularity eventually led to ‘Aadu 2’, and then ‘Aadu 3’. ‘Bharatanatyam’ had a similar afterlife; its streaming numbers were strong enough to convince makers that ‘Mohiniyattam’ was worth making.What both films show is that a franchise no longer has to prove itself in one opening weekend. A modest release can find its audience much later, on a platform, and that delayed audience is now enough to justify a sequel.
The success of newcomer-led ‘Vaazha’ and the slow climb of ‘Aadu’ are really two versions of the same thing: Content earning its audience on its own schedule, without a star doing the work up front.That doesn’t mean sequels are a safer bet, Desom says. “Risk factor is never low. Cinema is always accompanied by its risk factors.” If anything, success raises the pressure with every instalment. “Vaazha 1’ was successful, ‘Vaazha 2’ was an industry hit,” he says.
“When ‘Vaazha 3’ comes, we have that baggage with us.”Risk factors are never low, and a sequel carries almost the same risk as the first film, says Kurup. “To sustain its box-office run, the film has to entertain. There is no guarantee a sequel will succeed simply because the first film was a hit.” What gives a sequel its initial advantage, however, is not the story but the audience’s attachment to its characters, he adds. “The nostalgia associated with sequels can be attributed not to the story but to its characters,” Kurup says. Audiences come back because they want more time with people they already know, not necessarily the same story again. That familiarity gives a sequel a headstart too: “The second part does not need time for character establishment because people are used to seeing them and they have liked the characters.”Filmmaker Rosshan Andrrews takes a more guarded view. He agrees sequels usually follow a hit, “sequels are almost always made when a film becomes a great success,” he says, and doesn’t shy from the commercial logic either. “From a business angle, it is perfect,” he says, pointing to how a hit strengthens theatrical, satellite, streaming and overseas prospects for what follows. Still, he doubts sequels often beat their originals, citing ‘The Godfather’, ‘The Terminator,’, and the recent ‘Dhurandhar 2’ as proof that a great sequel is genuinely rare. Having directed remakes himself, he knows how hard it is to revisit familiar material without it feeling limiting.Desom insists ‘Vaazha 2’ was a creative call before it was a business one. “We had a better script for the second than we did for the first,” he says. Kurup doesn’t separate the two: “Creative evolution happens because of market response. If the first part did not get a good response, no one would think creatively about extending it.” Nobody involved thinks a sequel takes anything away from the film it follows. The original still stands on its own; the sequel gets judged separately, by the same audience that liked the first one. A recognizable name might get people through the door, but as Desom puts it, “content takes precedence over brand value.”Malayalam cinema is clearly building more franchises than it used to. What hasn’t changed is what decides whether they last: Not the title, not the nostalgia, just whether the film itself is good enough to watch. If it is, audiences show up again. If it isn’t, no franchise name will save it.
