Movie fans recall some of their biggest prequel pet peeves

There are certain strengths to the elusive prequel film; the opportunity to play around in an established world without having to directly follow the events of your predecessors is a creative dream come true, and the restraints that do exist, such as needing to keep certain characters alive, typically result an even more enticing creative challenge.

But whether you’re Captain Marvel, Army of Thieves, or most of the Star Wars content at this rate, they’re almost never safe from an eye-rolling nudge-nudge-wink-wink moment or a throwaway explanation for one of the previous film’s Easter eggs. In light of this, the gang over at r/movies have opted to complain about the most exhausting clichés that prequel films tend to offend with.

One user lamented the cheeky sideplots that serve as origin stories for specific objects in a film, such as Solo‘s mirror dice explanation or the flintlock pistol reveal in Prey. A minor offense, perhaps, but maybe a wholly unnecessary one, too.

Another responder declared their gripes with two characters having a relationship that was completely absent in the original film, calling out the then-unheard of connections between C3PO and Darth Vader, as well as Professor X and Mystique, both pairs of whom previously had no connections to one another.

And then, of course, there’s the age old problem of trying to create life-threatening dramatic tension with a character that we know is alive in the present day, to say nothing of the inverse case where we already know that the character is dead by some other means.

When it comes to any pre-established world, caution must be exercised when introducing a new entry, as the canon is often heavily guarded by an eagle-eyed fandom just waiting for someone to slip up. And with prequels being among the trickier beasts to stir together, we wish the best of luck to anyone bestowed with such a challenge.