Remember The New Guy / Live-Action Films

• Back to the Future Part II: When Needles appears in 2015, the film makes it clear that he's an older version of someone Jennifer knows from 1985, but we've never seen him before. And it's not until the end of the next movie that we get to see the teenage version of Needles that was already known to both Marty and Jennifer.
• A Better Tomorrow ends with the hero, Mark, getting shot a dozen times, but because of Chow Yun-fat's popularity, when the sequel comes by it's revealed that Mark actually has a twin brother, Kent, who's living in America during the events of the first film. Which every returning character said they knew him all the time and have been anticipating his return, despite never mentioning Kent at any point of the first film.
• A few characters who were in Divergent but got left out of the film adaptation, such as Uriah and Marlene, appear in The Divergent Series: Insurgent along with the rest of the Dauntless. As the first film mainly focused on Tris and her three friends, we can assume they were there but we just didn't see them.
• For the Downton Abbey film there's Lady Maud, Lord Robert's cousin who is a lady-in-waiting to the Queen and never mentioned at any point in the show. The in-universe justification is twofold: she's kept her distance from the Crawleys and being a woman, she has no claim on Downton anyways (the main story revolved around the Succession Crisis surrounding Downton) and thus little relevance to the plot.
• Dracula: Prince of Darkness features Dracula's loyal servant Klove, who revives him after his death in Horror of Dracula, despite being nowhere to be seen or mentioned in that film.
• Played for laughs in Dungeons & Dragons: Wrath of the Dragon God. The mage Ormaline claims her familiar Ona has been at her side through many adventures when it suddenly becomes relevant, but none of her long-term adventuring companions have ever seen the dove before. It is immidiately killed off in the same scene.
• The Fast and the Furious:
  • Hobbs & Shaw introduces Deckard's younger sister Hattie, who neither appeared nor was mentioned in Fast & Furious 6, Furious 7 or The Fate of the Furious.
  • F9:
    • It's revealed that Dom and Mia have a brother named Jakob, who was never mentioned nor was it stated they even had a brother until this film. This is even more egregious since Mia said in Fast & Furious that Brian is Dom's only brother, contradicting Jakob's existence. Possibly justified since Dom had long disowned Jakob for (accidentally, but he didn't know that yet) killing their father and never felt like mentioning him before.
    • This also applies to Elle, as Han saved her as a little girl sometime before The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift. Although Elle was working with Han before his supposed death, she didn't appear nor was mentioned in Tokyo Drift.
  • Fast X:
    • The Villain Opening Scene reveals that Hernan Reyes' son Dante played a role in the vault-stealing scene from Fast Five, despite not actually appearing in that film.
    • Dom meets the late Elena's sister Isabel, who was never mentioned in previous films.
    • Aimes, who is Mr. Nobody's successor and The Mole for Dante who also played a role in Fast Five, was never mentioned either.
    • Oddly, when Dom meets Mr. Nobody's daughter Tess, he reveals that Mr. Nobody already mentioned having a daughter, which happened offscreen.
• Freddy's Dead: The Final Nightmare revealed that Freddy Krueger had a wife, whom he killed when she discovered his murderous ways, and a daughter. None of the previous A Nightmare on Elm Street films indicated this and the implication was that he was a reclusive loner.
• Ghostbusters: Afterlife introduces Callie, who is revealed to be the daughter of Egon Spengler. According to Egon's notes on a note card seen at the 1:26:37 mark, Callie celebrated her second birthday in 1984. Therefore, she was born in 1982. Which means she was born before the first two movies despite Egon mentioning no partner or children.
• The Godfather:
  • Frank Pentangelli in Part II is supposed to be a high level member of the Corleone family since the beginning even though he doesn't appear at all in the first movie. The reason he was created was because Clemenza who was in the Part I and was supposed to be in Part II couldn't be used because the actor playing him did not return.
  • The third film has the previously unmentioned Don Altobello who is not simply an important mafiosa but a very long term, trusted ally of the Corleones - he is Connie's godfather.
• GoldenEye sets up Alec Trevelyan as "006" and one of James Bond's oldest friends, in spite of never being mentioned by name, and once by number, in the entire series. Then again, GoldenEye was supposed to be a soft reboot of a franchise which was never big on continuity in the first place (Trevelyan is only slightly more conspicuous in his sudden appearance as Countess "Tracy" Bond is in her lack of direct mention), and Bond's fellow 00-agents never were in focus throughout the films.
• Halloween (2018) features Deputy Frank Hawkins. He was one of the cops patrolling for Michael in the original movie, though he's only properly introduced here. Granted, we didn't see any other cops in the original other than Brackett — and Halloween Kills begins with a flashback explaining that he only encountered Michael a while after Laurie Strode was rescued.
• Halo: Nightfall introduced a never-before-seen Covenant species, the Yonhet, despite taking place after the original Halo trilogy. In this case, 343 Industries somewhat covered their tracks by introducing them as part of an entire "Covenant Fringe", a collection of Covenant-allied species too weak to have seen military action against the humans during the Human-Covenant war, and too small in population to be of much notice to the core Covenant races.
• The Harry Potter movies had a habit of keeping minor characters who were introduced in earlier books out and having to shoe-horn them in later on down the road when they became necessary to the plot.
  • Arabella Figg is suddenly introduced in the fifth film as the Dursleys' neighbour who is secretly a Squib member of the Order. In the books, she has been seen since the first, and her connection to the Order doesn't come out of nowhere; the fourth book namedrops her when Dumbledore calls for the reactivation of the Order following Voldemort's resurrection.
  • Lavender Brown isn't in the first five films (well, sort of), but she suddenly materializes in the sixth film as a major supporting character. In the books, she is a Gryffindor girl in Harry's generation, and has been a recurring character since the first book.
  • Bill Weasley, the eldest Weasley sibling, doesn't appear until the seventh film, where he and Harry act like they've never met before. He actually makes a cameo in the third film as part of the Weasley family photo taken in Egypt, but isn't identified (and certainly not played by Domhnall Gleeson). In the books, he has been mentioned since the first but doesn't meet Harry until the fourth.
  • Mundungus Fletcher, an Order member, also doesn't show up until the seventh film. Interestingly, he is mentioned in passing in the fifth film, while he is properly introduced in the book it's based on (in the books, he's been mentioned since the second).
  • Aberforth Dumbledore is a complicated example. In the books, he is first mentioned in the fourth, actually shows up in the fifth and sixth but is not identified by name, before being properly introduced in the seventh. In the films, he has a brief cameo in the fifth film, is mentioned in the seventh film and then shows up to be properly introduced in the eighth. While this technically corresponds with the books, his unidentified appearance in the sixth book sets up the plot point about him possessing the other half of the shattered two-way mirror Sirius gave Harry, enabling him to send Dobby to help Harry in the final book. As a result, this creates a glaring Plot Hole about the mirror thing, especially since the scene where Harry received the mirror was also cut in the fifth film (therefore making his possession of the broken mirror in the films inexplicable).
• Highlander:
  • Highlander II: The Quickening just sort of... drops a new Big Bad, General Katana, into MacLeod's backstory and expects the viewer to roll with it. Hell, it drops an entire new backstory into MacLeod's backstory (that MacLeod is actually a space alien who has been politically exiled by Katana from planet Zeist) and acts like it all fits together despite the new backstory being almost completely incompatible with any of the details from the original film.
  • Highlander: Endgame had two major examples: Jacob Kell, Connor's former childhood friend who betrayed him and murdered his mother, and Kate/Faith, Duncan's Immortal ex-wife. Made even worse by the fact that Highlander: The Series had previously stated in no uncertain terms that Duncan never had a wife and never would marry.
• The Hills Have Eyes Part II: The Reaper is Papa Jupiter's brother, but in the first movie, Fred says that he and his wife only had one daughter before Jupiter's mother died giving birth to him, leaving him alone with his son and daughter. This adds to the Fanon Discontinuity and Canon Discontinuity feelings about the movie.
• Jason Goes to Hell: The Final Friday introduces Jason's half-sister Diana. No mention had been made about living Voorhees family members in preceding Friday the 13th films. However, Friday the 13th Part VI: Jason Lives was originally planned to include an appearance by Jason's father Elias (who would have bribed someone to have Jason properly buried rather than cremated after the Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter), and the scene was included in the novelization. It was cut from the final film though.
• Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom introduces Sir Benjamin Lockwood, an elderly businessman who is said to have helped develop the dinosaur cloning technology with John Hammond decades ago. Despite this, he was neither seen nor mentioned in the original Jurassic Park movie. The character is essentially a Suspiciously Similar Substitute for Hammond (right down to the cane with an insect in amber as pommel), who couldn't appear in the film due to Richard Attenborough having passed away in 2014. That being said, Lockwood has a Dark Secret that would justify Hammond never mentioning him or downplaying his role in developing the dinosaur cloning technology.
• Lampshaded and parodied in Last Action Hero, in which the Show Within a Show Danny is magically transported into is the fourth installment of the popular Jack Slater action film franchise.
  • It turns out that Slater's young adult daughter from his failed marriage is in town, and at one point in the story she is taken hostage and needs to be rescued. Danny points out that Slater has never mentioned his daughter before and is annoyed that the filmmakers are introducing a new character into the franchise in this manner.
  • Lampshaded in a different way when we meet John Practice, who in the Slater-verse is introduced as one of Slater's old cop buddies. Danny correctly pegs him as a traitorous bad guy because he's played by F. Murray Abraham ("He killed Mozart!"), though presumably also because he'd never been mentioned before.
• Men in Black 3
  • O never appeared in the first two films but apparently had been working at MIB for at least as long as K had.
  • In-Universe, one of J's first signs that something is wrong is when instead of K, he's greeted on the way to work by AA, who addresses J as his partner even though he's not someone J or the audience have ever seen before.
• Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: The Movie features a new Evil Space Alien as part of Zedd and Rita's crew, the pig-like Mordant, who essentially replaced Squatt and Baboo (and to a lesser degree Finster) while serving the former duo's role of being the dimwitted comic relief. Early versions of the script were going to explain that he was in fact Goldar's cousin visiting for the summer, but the final movie leaves this out, and so there's just a brand new pig alien accompanying Zedd, Rita, and Goldar as they release Ivan Ooze that they're all already familiar with.
• Done deliberately and repeatedly in Monty Python and the Holy Grail, with King Arthur's entourage growing and shrinking exactly as needed for the current scene being played. Special mentions go to Patsy, to Brother Maynard and his disciples, and of course to Arthur's entire army that appears in the very last scene and is implied to have been there off-screen throughout the entire movie.
• In Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales, we get Salazar, the legendary pirate-hunter. He was never mentioned in any of the previous instalments, all of which involve pirate-hunting. We also learn that he single-handedly almost extinguished piracy in Jack's youth. Even though we've so far met several pirates older than Jack (including Jack's own father). In Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End, we also learned that the council of the Pirate Lords had never before convened in Jack's lifetime. Which they really ought to have done in order to try and deal with a gigantic threat like Salazar.
• While the addition of Flo to the Barden Bellas in Pitch Perfect 2 is feasible in-universe, the movie doesn't really bother to explain to the viewers who she is or when she joined the group, instead more or less acting like she's been there as long as the others have, despite being totally absent from the first movie.
• The Room (2003) has a really lazy example. With about 20 minutes left in the movie, a new character, Steven (whose name is mentioned only in the credits) suddenly appears and becomes deeply involved in the plot. Presumably, we're not supposed to notice that he suddenly appeared from nowhere without an introduction. Word of God is that Steven is supposed to be a replacement for the psychologist character Peter (whose actor left the production), but the audience is given no hint of this; indeed, Steven looks nothing like Peter, he doesn't even dress like him.
• Scream:
  • Scream 3 reveals that Randy Meeks has a sister, Martha, one whom Sidney and Dewey are quite familiar with, it seems, despite her existence not being hinted at in the previous films. Gale, on the other hand, is surprised when Martha is revealed to be Randy's sister.
  • Scream 4:
    • Sidney stays with Kate and Jill Roberts, her aunt and cousin from her mother's side, while she visits Woodsboro. The fact that Maureen Prescott has a sister was never brought up before, which is strange since Scream 3 explored her past. It also makes you wonder where they were when Woodsboro was terrorized by Ghostface 14 years ago, which itself came on the heels of Maureen's murder. Jill's absence is at least understandable since she would have to be a toddler back then.
    • Judy Hicks tells Sidney that they were classmates back in high school, and were in the drama club together, indicating that they were friends, if not buddies. Obviously, Judy was nowhere to be seen in the first film. Sidney herself admits that she doesn't remember her, since she dealt with a lot of issues in the interim.
  • Scream (2022):
    • Wes Hicks, the son of the aforementioned Judy Hicks, is introduced as a major character in the film. He wasn't so much as hinted at in the previous film despite his mother's status as a supporting character. However, since Judy's life is not really touched upon in the fourth film (perhaps due to Law of Conservation of Detail), this might be more justified.
    • Cristina Carpenter, Sam and Tara's mother, was another classmate of Sidney's from the first film who wasn't mentioned before the fifth film.
• The Smurfs. Gutsy, because Hefty wasn't Scottish enough.
• The Smurfs 2 introduces Hackus and Vexy, two artificial Smurfs created by Gargamel. The fact that they weren't in the previous film(s) is justifiable, as they hadn't been created yet. What isn't justifiable is that the movie never actually introduces them — we just meet them being up to some hijinx as though who they were had already been established.
• Son of Frankenstein introduces Ygor as a grave robber hired by Wolf's father to supply a body for his experiments, but this is the first time he's ever seen or mentioned. In fact, the original film shows Henry Frankenstein robbing graves on his own with Fritz's help.
• Star Wars Episode IX: The Rise of Skywalker: In this final episode of the Star Wars Sequel Trilogy, Allegiant General Enric Pryde is shown as a First Order officer who's served Emperor Palpatine since the "old wars" — that is, the events of the Original Trilogy films (A New Hope, The Empire Strikes Back, and Return of the Jedi) — and it's because of this longstanding loyalty that Palpatine deems him fit for commanding the First Order's forces on Exegol as a replacement for General Hux (who was executed after being exposed as The Mole to the Resistance) and later Supreme Leader Kylo Ren (who undergoes a Heel–Face Turn mid-battle). Yet this is the first time he's shown, having not even appeared in the prior Sequel Trilogy films. Some media of the Star Wars Expanded Universe retcon him into events of those earlier films, explaining that he was doing things for the Galactic Empire and the First Order behind the scenes.
• Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines introduced Kate Brewster, a childhood friend of John Connor, whom he last saw prior to the events of Terminator 2: Judgment Day, and who becomes one of the leaders of the Resistance following Judgment Day, as well as Connor's wife. The previous two films in the series never mentioned her.
  • Her absence is completely justified in the case of the first movie (set in the early 80s), as she probably wasn't even born back then. Her "retroactive" importance is also justified, as the Rise of The Machines is set in an Alternate Timeline in which the Judgement Day and the following war are significantly different from their versions in the first 2 movies (due to the destruction of the first Terminator's remains in the end of the 2nd movie). It is very likely that John Connor and Kate Brewster never met again after their childhood in the original timeline, and that her relation with Connor and leadership of the resistance only happen in the new altered timeline. After all, both T-850 (older and heavier version of T-800 with different components) and TX, as well as the "early Terminators", are established to be "novelties" of the new timeline, so they are deliberately different from the Terminators and other machines in the first 2 movies.
• Parodied at the end of Top Secret! when Hillary says goodbye to the members of The Resistance. Then she tells Scarecrow that she will miss him most of all.
• War for the Planet of the Apes features a love interest for Blue Eyes named Lake. She's treated as though she has always been a member of the colony, even though she wasn't seen in the previous movie. Red is also said to have been one of Koba's coconspirators in the previous film, but like Lake, he didn't actually appear in it.
• John Chisum, the villain of Young Guns II, was the unheard of partner of John Tunstall. Billy insists that Chisum had always treated him like a son, yet the movie shows that Chisum hates him..