10 Most disappointing moments in highly anticipated film history...

Even after the mess that was the Star Wars prequels, fans held high hopes for the 4th Indiana Jones film, with a quiet whisper of more to come. At least Steven Spielberg couldn't let George Lucas *beep* this up? Could he? It was more than obvious a few minutes into this clunker that it was the famous horrid script that had been circulating the internet for years. How Lucas ever talked Spielberg into using this concept is beyond me and most fans everywhere, I mean come on, what the hell are aliens doing in an Indiana Jones movie!!!

This and number 1 have to be tied, and they are both a given. Two of the most anticipated film sequels (prequels, whatever) in film history. Fans came in droves to see what looked like a return to a galaxy far far away, that they remembered so fondly. The special edition releases of the original trilogy a few years before foretold the tale we all should have seen coming. 2 plus hours of cartoony toy commercials. The excellent documentary contained on the 2 disc DVD shows exactly how the film fell apart in production, and the cluster-*beep* they had on their hands when they viewed the first rough cut. The look on the faces of everyone in the room is priceless, and would echo to the fans worldwide in the months to follow. The backlash can still be felt to this day to the unnerving way that George Lucas bilked the world out of millions with this extravagant middle finger to film fans all over.

This monster movie was meant to be a monster success before it even got out of the gate, with an add campaign and marketing scheme that played like gangbusters, and showed Hollywood that it could market and sell an inferior product to the masses, as long as they make all their money the first weekend. Godzilla did make money, but word of mouth spread quickly that the movie wasn't very good, and the fact that Godzilla's appearance was so highly guarded was for good reason, considering the beast looked nothing like everyone remembers, and more like something from Jurassic Park. It didn't help that the story was overly silly, and the acting was mostly over the top. I had fun the first time I saw this movie opening weekend, but I couldn't help but feel the camp factor creep in as the movie played on. Like Howard the Duck this movie will go down as one of the most expensive turkey's in movie history, along with that movie about those people on that big boat that sank that's like 12 hours long.

The first Iron Man was of course, a surprise success, and well regarded among comic book fans. The second film, though, like Spider-man 3 and a lot of other Marvel entertainment since, reeks of a group of people struggling to make art among powers that are only worried about the bottom line and box-office return. The story is choppy and the characters are all over the place. It seems like the movie was almost taken away from Jon Favreau at the end of production. I know that behind the scenes a lot of talent has cut ties with the Marvel universe, usually after only 1 run. Most of the problems seem to be of the financial variety. Sad that a company that started off so promising with the idea that good talent, and good stories equals good comic-book film-fair, is the first to say that the "Superhero's" are the stars, and it doesn't matter who's behind the mask, as long as a movie gets made. This is only partially true, sooner or later your fans will turn against you, and they already have started to make their voices be heard in a lot of ways.

Sam Raimi's third and final chapter in his Spider-man trilogy is boring, and ludacris. Like most movie's on this list, the trailer seemed like we were going to be treated to a good helping of Spidey-brand action, only to be given a great big steaming pile of mushy crap. The second film is well regarded, and a very good movie, let a lone sequel. High hopes for the third film, as I would say, next to Batman, Spider-man has the best rogue gallery of all superheros. If the script had been handled better, and Raimi not forced to make so many decisions he was against, this third film may have been a success. Spider-man 3 started showing the rips at the seams in Marvel's unraveling, and quick-flip for a buck, universe.

I personally enjoyed this film, just as much as the original, but it seems many fans were disappointed from the second Transformers film. Because of this I put it on this list. I can understand why many fans would be disappointed, I myself had fun, but I also didn't get a chance to spend ungodly amounts of money at the theater to see it either, in that case, had I, I might have been upset as well.

Austin Powers was a surprise hit for Mike Myers, and the sequel was even more successful, and well received. In the third go around though, things were getting very played out. Of course it didn't help that in that time period Austin Powers was so parodied and had saturated American pop culture. Like many, I enjoyed the second film even more, unfortunately Goldmember is just like a greatest hits record of all the best gags from the first two films, that were already over-played everywhere else. This was also the beginning of this rumor that Beyonce can act as well, one that everyone has seemed to believe.

After the highly successful Shrek 2, Shrek the Third would be a no brainer of course. I enjoyed the second go around better than the original, as a lot of fans did. Shrek the Third seemed promising, like all the films on this list, but the movie felt a little stale, and the story was just getting boring now. Only a third of the laughs, and a third the fun as the last two, at least the fourth and supposedly final chapter was a bit more entertaining. I am hopeful for the Puss In Boots prequel to Shrek 2 though.

Rocky V was more of a disappointment in the sense that Rocky III and IV were extremely popular and IV was the highest grossing Rocky to date, V had become more of a joke over the past 5 years when it finally came to be. The concept was there, but the movie is cheesy and depressing at times. Granted it had more of a serious tone than the last few installments, but that tone was washed away by a lot of the cheese. Thankfully in 2006 Stallone put a fitting close on Rocky's life.

Bryan Singer's heart was in the right place, the idea seemed like it may work. Just didn't get off the ground like Superman should have. The concept if you haven't seen the movie, is Singer assumes we have all seen Richard Donner's 1978 film, and most likely the sequel, and decides to try and throw us back into that universe, with a little bit of his own fresh twists on things. It has it's moments, and obviously the least disappointing on the list. Considering ignoring re-setting up the characters for everyone so Mr. Singer could move the story along with more action, the film is slow moving, the plot is a bit of a head scratcher, and has some serious moments where you start to question what a lot of the characters are doing, and what they really do or do not know. 2/3rds of it is well casted, while the rest is not, especially the mis-casted Lois Lane. I won't begin to nit-pick through this film, but it was pretty evident that it was not going to be the revival we had all hoped for as Superman fans.