Which actor has appeared in the most sequels?

Posted On August 7, 2025August 7, 2025

In modern Hollywood, the sequel rules the roost. Nary a weekend goes by without a new instalment in the latest blockbuster franchise hitting cinema screens, and at the end of the year, the list of top earners is 90% comprised of sequels.

While it would be easy to complain about Hollywood’s lack of originality and lament how it wasn’t always this way, that line of thinking will only drive cinephiles mad. Until the business finds a new path, or a new swathe of original movies proves capable of competing with the latest superhero movie or animated extravaganza at the box office, our current sequel-obsessed landscape isn’t going anywhere.

One inevitable outcome of the ever-expanding reliance on franchise storytelling, though, is that many of the industry’s biggest stars have begun gravitating to roles they can reprise. Actors, after all, go where the work is, and if Hollywood is pumping out sequels, then those are the parts that will be coming their way.

In truth, even the most sequel-phobic stars have succumbed to their allure in recent years. Until he made The Equalizer in 2014, Denzel Washington had studiously avoided sequels. A decade later, he’s made three Equalizer films, chewed the scenery in Ancient Rome in Gladiator II, and signed up to join the Marvel Cinematic Universe in Black Panther 3. Similarly, until the 2010s, Tom Cruise’s sole franchise was Mission: Impossible, but when he saw the way the wind was blowing in Hollywood, he added two Jack Reacher movies and Top Gun: Maverick to his arsenal.

But what about the stars who have never shown the same reluctance to sign up for a sequel or ten? Well, several contenders could feasibly vie for the title of “actor who has appeared in the most sequels”, and a couple of them may surprise you.

For example, the actor who has lent his oddball talents to the third-most franchise role appearances in history is Willem Dafoe, a star few cinephiles would tend to associate with Hollywood’s reliance on IP. Yet, the list of sequels he has been a part of includes Clear and Present Danger, Speed 2: Cruise Control, Once Upon a Time in Mexico, XXX: State of the Union, Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, and, of course, several Spider-Man movies.

In another surprising result, Stellan Skarsgård is the sixth most sequel-heavy actor in history. From Exorcist: The Beginning to Angels & Demons, by way of Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again, Dune: Part Two, and a host of Marvel/Pirates of the Caribbean movies, Skarsgård has made the most of Hollywood’s sequel frenzy.

Interestingly, and perhaps unsurprisingly, the vast majority of stars who have been in the most sequels are male, with female stars lagging considerably. Is this because female actors don’t have as much interest in sequels, or is this another example of Hollywood’s continuing failure to offer remotely the same number of roles to women as they do to men? The answer is undoubtedly the latter.

This means Michelle Rodriguez and Zoë Saldaña are the most sequel-friendly female stars, with Rodriguez appearing in most of the Fast and the Furious instalments, as well as Resident Evil: Retribution and Machete Kills, while Saldaña has racked up huge box office numbers in a host of Marvel, Avatar, and Star Trek films.

At the end of the day, though, the actor who takes the crown as the sequel champion is blindingly obvious to anyone who has watched mainstream Hollywood movies in the last three decades. It is—surprise, surprise—Samuel L Jackson, a man who once signed a nine-picture deal with Marvel to star as the superspy Nick Fury. He’s since left that deal in the dust, yet shows no sign of walking away from the character anytime soon.

Amazingly, Jackson has appeared in 19 distinct franchises, and nearly 40 movies in total within these series, which puts him well out in the lead. Aside from starring in more Marvel movies than is strictly healthy for one person, he has also pulled sequel duty in films going back to the early ’90s, including The Exorcist III, Patriot Games, Die Hard with a Vengeance, Glass, Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard, Spiral: From the Book of Saw, the XXX series, and the Star Wars prequels.

So, after crunching these numbers, you may ask yourself if any actor will ever be able to wrestle this particular crown away from Hollywood’s premier “bad motherfucker”. I’d wager the answer is simple: unless Willem Dafoe bags himself a Marvel role, it’s highly unlikely.

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