The best way to get through a weekend is binge watching a series of films, preferably that have something to do with each other. So to help out people trying to figure out how to make the most of a weekend at home, here are the 8 best film series to binge watch, whether in one go or two.
Star Wars
There are 8 movies Star Wars out and about, with the 8th one, ‘Rogue One’, still not out on Blu-Ray at the time of these lines being written. The sheer size of this saga might make it difficult to see in one weekend unless you really have nothing else to do, but you can obviously split it between trilogies. You can buy Star Wars I-VI in single box sets and The Force Awakens as a standalone. What’s the right order of watching it?
Back to the Future
A much shorter but just as fun film series is Back to the Future. From a groundbreaking first one which introduces us to this version of time travel, to the second one which takes place in the present, future and past, and the third one, which brings us to the Wild Wild West, this is the best weekend binge movie series in terms of quality and its time consumption.
The Lord of the Rings
The film that probably made trilogies and the whole idea of filming back-to-back-to-back or something like that fashionable again is not a simple undertaking. The extended Blu-Ray edition runs over 720 minutes long, but it’s epic, huge and fun. Why not the Hobbit? I thought the third one really hurt the quality of the entire trilogy. Two movies to tell that story would have been enough.
Harry Potter
Harry Potter is another film series that is going to take probably more than one weekend to complete, unless you have a lot of available time. However, 8 films is enough with this series. The 7th book being split into two films was something of a money grab decision, but it also made sense in terms of telling the story: A LOT happens in the final book, which is why both Deathly Hallows films work well, unlike the way the Hunger Games finale fizzled for being too stretched out.
Marvel Cinematic Universe
Marvel continue their cinematic dominance over DC with their supposedly convoluted yet simple to follow films, which includes the Iron Man, Thor, Captain America and Guardians of the Galaxy series, and other stand alones like Ant-Man and Dr. Strange, while all of them keep building up to the big events in the Avengers films and Civil War. You can find all the films in stand alone versions (14 of them so far, which means more than one and maybe two weekends), or go for the luxurious box sets for phase one and phase two.
The Godfather
Drifting away from the more geeky vibe of the first few films, but it’s hard to find a better trilogy than the Godfather. Even if the first two films are vastly superior to the third one, it’s hard not to enjoy the more modern tale of an older Michael Corleone, in one of the more influential film projects ever made.
X-Men Movies
The X-Men cinematic universe also includes two Wolverine films (three if you include Logan, but it’s still in the cinemas), but we left them out of our binge. In both the original trilogy (2000-2006) and the latest one (2011-2016), the third film was a bit off the high standards set by the first two, but is still fun to watch. The high point, in both trilogies, are the second films: X2 and Days of Future Past.
Christopher Nolan’s Dark Knight Trilogy
A very sharp contrast to the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Christopher Nolan resurrected the Batman franchise and showed the world how to do a comic book movie the dark way. The Dark Knight (the second film in the series) is probably the best comic book movie of all-time, but this entire series is a genre masterpiece.
