If 8 had followed through on its narrative promises, it would have had a chance. But unfortunately, much like a modern LLM that exceeds its context window, it lost its way in the final act.

As for sequels, we are at a weird time in history. Due maybe in part just how prevalent media is and how easy (relatively) it is to create, we've been super-saturated in "like X but with Y" stories. We have dedicated websites mapping tropes. It's hard to come up with anything that hasn't been done a few million times. AI will probably accelerate that, and I can't say I know what comes next.