How 'How To Train Your Dragon 2' Beat Sequelitis And Made It To The Oscars — forbes.com

Members of the Motion Picture Academy are not known for rewarding sequels. Look Who’s Talking Too isn’t exactly their bag. And with good reason — followups to hit movies just don’t tend to be very good. Examining Oscar history, one quickly gets a sense of how entrenched that thinking is. Only The Godfather, Part II and Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King have taken home the Best Picture trophy; a mere smattering of others, most recently Toy Story 3, have been nominated in the top category. In the 15 years since the Best Animated Feature category was created in 2000 to accommodate the boom in innovative animated fare, five sequels have made the nomination cut, which attests to the conversely strong quality of overall output.

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