Austin Powers Movies Ranked: Best to Worst

I rank the three Austin Powers films on four things: how sharp the spy parody is, how many jokes land per scene, how well the supporting cast carries the story, and how well the film holds up on a rewatch. This is my opinion, not a poll, and I would rather pick a side with reasons than split the difference. If you want the wider picture first, the Austin Powers movies hub lists all three films, and the Austin Powers movies in order page explains how to watch them.

Does box office decide the order? No, and the numbers show why. Box Office Mojo puts The Spy Who Shagged Me at more than $313 million worldwide, Goldmember at about $297 million and International Man of Mystery at about $68 million. Money tells you how many people showed up, not which script is tighter, so I use it as context only. The full breakdown sits on the Austin Powers box office page.

1. Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery (1997), directed by Jay Roach. The first film is the best one, and it is the leanest at 89 minutes. The setup is simple and well built: a 1960s British spy and his enemy Dr. Evil both freeze themselves, and in 1997 Dr. Evil wakes to find his old plans already happened and his lieutenant Number Two running Virtucon as a legitimate business. His $100 billion demand is the film's best running gag, because it shows how little he understands the modern world. The effects look cheap, which the A.V. Club oral history ties to the small budget of $16.5 million, and early test screenings went poorly. In my opinion that limited scale helps, because the film has to rely on character, and Elizabeth Hurley as Vanessa Kensington plays it straight enough to make Austin look ridiculous. It is also the clearest Austin Powers Bond parody, since it mocks the gadgets, villains and secret lairs of the James Bond films from the outside.

2. Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me (1999), directed by Jay Roach. This is the funniest film, and it is a close second overall. It sends Austin to 1969 to recover his stolen mojo, and it introduces Mini-Me, played by Verne Troyer, and Fat Bastard, one more role for Mike Myers on top of Austin and Dr. Evil. Heather Graham joins as Felicity Shagwell, and Seth Green's Scott Evil gets more to do. Box Office Mojo lists a $33 million budget and an opening weekend of about $55 million. It ranks below the original because many of its best bits are bigger versions of jokes from the first film, so the surprise is gone even when the laughs are not. If a laugh count were my only test, it would win.

3. Austin Powers in Goldmember (2002), directed by Jay Roach. The third film has the strongest guest cast in the series, with Michael Caine as Nigel Powers and Beyoncé as Foxxy Cleopatra, and the 1975 setting gives the costumes and sets plenty of color. Goldmember, the gold obsessed Dutch criminal, is Myers working at full stretch. My complaint is crowding: a tractor beam, a kidnapped father, a time trip and several returning faces share 94 minutes, and few scenes get room to breathe. It had the biggest budget at $63 million, yet its worldwide gross of about $297 million came in under the second film's. The title also drew an objection from MGM and Danjaq, according to UPI, which shows how closely the series sat to the franchise it was teasing.

What about Austin Powers 4? It cannot be ranked, because it does not exist yet. No release date has been announced, and the film is best described as in development. The current status is on the Austin Powers 4 page.

If you only have time for one, start with International Man of Mystery, then see where to watch Austin Powers for the services carrying each film.