Top 10 Worst Unfinished Movies That Were Actually Released

Top 10 Worst Unfinished Movies

Welcome to WatchMojo, and today were going to be counting down our picks for the films that were released with incomplete production elements, unfinished visual effects, or cobbled together prints.

Back in 2001 the jury was out as to whether Dwayne The Rock Johnson could crossover into mainstream Hollywood success. The notorious CGI work on The Mummy Returns didnt exactly do the pro-wrestling legend any favors, since the films climax featured a barely recognisable version of Johnson as the Scorpion King. There were, thankfully, a number of other features released close enough to The Mummy Returns to build up some steam for [1] Johnsons acting career, but his big-screen debut was very nearly a one-and-done. The rest of the film wasnt nearly as disappointing as the CGI Scorpion King, thanks to Brendan Fraser and the rest of the cast picking up the slack.

Ask any major Hollywood director out there and youll probably find at least one cinematic skeleton in their closet. David O. Russell utilized a pseudonym on the final print of Nailed, also known as Accidental Love, in 2015. This was thanks to the American Hustle director effectively abandoning the footage he shot for Nailed back in 2008. The years in between saw a print being cobbled together, a new title added, and the final product being released, all without Russells involvement. The unfinished nature of the film is clear from viewing its final version, as audiences are left without a proper resolution to this romantic comedy.

Do you remember ZhuZhu Pets? Do you remember the ZhuZhu Pets movie? Well, bet you didnt know that a second ZhuZhu movie was released back in 2012 sort of, anyway. A televised version of the second, unreleased film, The Power of Zhu, was discreetly distributed in France and Brazil, under the title The Amazing Adventures of Zhu. This was done covertly by Universal, and the company was then sued for its handling of this second entry in a four picture deal with Cepia LLC. Its unclear as to why The Power of Zhu wasnt released straight-to-DVD like the first film, but critics and lost media enthusiasts surmise that it either came down to quality or tax issues.

Fans of the franchise had to wait over two decades after the failure of this film in order to receive their R-rated reward. Lawrence Kasanoff, who produced Annihilation, admitted in Luke Owens 2017 book Lights, Camera, Game Over!: How Video Game Movies Get Made, that the films effects were unfinished. The final product received a rushed release in order to meet a planned date, rather than allowing for a completed creative vision. Granted, the film has achieved some latter-day appreciation from the so bad its good crowd, but this is a textbook example of an IP receiving little-to-no attention from its production company.

The world misses John Candy. Well always remember this all-time-great cinematic funny man, but we just wish Wagons East wasnt his final effort. The star tragically died during the production of this critically-panned comedy western, and the final print utilized a number of creative patches to hold the entire thing together for release. There are reused shots of Candy, various script rewrites, as well as body-double and CGI stand-ins for when Candy absolutely needed to be on screen. Its unclear as to whether or not Wagons East might have succeeded if Candy had lived to see the production through to the end. As it stands now? Well just watch Uncle Buck instead.

1976s Grizzly was an example of the animal attack subgenre of exploitation cinema. Its unclear today whether the footage shot by director André Szöts in 1983 couldve ever stood up as a sequel to William Girdlers cult classic. All we have is a reworked version of the workprint, which was leaked online. Interestingly, Charlie Sheen, Laura Dern and George Clooney make early-career appearances in the 1983 footage, albeit briefly. The films co-producer, Suzanne C. Nagy was abandoned by her original investor, and the end results of Grizzly II: Revenge, released almost forty years later, feel like a desperate attempt to have something to show for all of this production hell.

There have been numerous adaptations of author Michael Crichtons work, from the critically acclaimed Jurassic Park, to the less-beloved The Andromeda Strain and The 13th Warrior. The production budget of Sphere was eaten up by a lot of underwater photography. The movie was set to release on December 12, 1997, but amid poor testing, it was pushed to February the following year. A month before release, director Barry Levinson did reshoots, but it wasnt enough to save the film, which feels rushed and unfinished. Call this one a case of what could have been.

Its one of the most infamous insults to audiences in cinematic history - a horror movie with an ending that made viewers so mad that it routinely tops lists such as this one. Were talking, of course, about The Devil Inside. Specifically, it was the gall of its creators to end their tale of demonic possession with a car crash and direction to a website for audiences to seek more information. To be fair, the films screenwriters stuck to their guns and defended their decision to cut The Devil Inside in this fashion. Unfortunately, that doesnt negate the fact that this flick, which barely runs 83 minutes, was essentially released without an ending.

Ray Bradbury is another legend whos had plenty of adaptations of his work hit the silver screen. Movie fans will likely want to forget 2005s A Sound of Thunder, however, as would most of those involved with this doomed production. The films original budget of $55 million would probably not have been enough to bring Bradburys time-travel adventure to life, and the revised budget of $80 million wasnt much better. The company behind A Sound of Thunder, Franchise Pictures, went under during post-production. As a result, the end product went out with unfinished effects; a sad end to what could have been a worthy addition to Bradburys cinematic legacy.

Its one of the most notable box office disasters of this last decade, an embarrassment for nearly everybody involved. There was a lot of attention paid to the WTF levels of bizarreness from the special effects of Cats. The visuals here are more than just an uncanny valley of feline creepiness; this is downright unsettling cinema. The re-release of Cats attempted to fix the unfinished CGI on the actors and backgrounds, but by that point, it was too late. The word bomb was already firmly attached to Cats, and it was never going away. And we will always have the memories, like them or not, of watching this trainwreck firsthand.

What do you think couldve saved these films? Let us know in the comments!