2024 has produced a few movies which critics and audiences can’t seem to agree on, and their Rotten Tomatoes scores highlight the way they have split opinion. Rotten Tomatoes gives two scores to a movie. The “Tomatometer” score measures critical opinions based on published reviews, while the newly-revamped “Popcornmeter” score offers a way for audiences to log their own opinions. It’s often the case that these two scores are very close to one another, but a few movies break the system.
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More often that not, if there’s a big difference between a Tomatomer score and a Popcornmeter score, it’s because a movie is a simple crowdpleaser that critics don’t care for. Critics are more focused on the craft of a movie and the ideas behind it. Many people also think like this, of course, but the majority of the public rate a movie based on how entertaining it is. Movies like Venom: The Last Dance and It Ends With Us have exposed the gap between critics and audiences in 2024.
10 Venom: The Last Dance
Tomatometer: 41% – Popcornmeter: 81%
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7/10 100 8.4/10 Venom: The Last Dance
Director Kelly Marcel Release Date October 25, 2024 Cast Tom Hardy , Chiwetel Ejiofor , Juno Temple , Rhys Ifans , Stephen Graham , Peggy Lu , Clark Backo , Alanna Ubach , Cristo Fernández , Jared Abrahamson , Hala Finley , Dash McCloud , Andy Serkis , Reid Scott , Jack Brady , Ivo Nandi , Jake Allyn , Otis Winston , Jacob Tomuri , Brooke Carter , Fflyn Edwards , Elijah Cook , Norma Butikofer , Elizabeth Cook , Angie Hsu , Martin McDougall Expand
Venom: The Last Dance has a huge gulf between its Tomatometer score and its Popcornmeter score, but Sony wouldn’t have been worried about the poor reviews. Every Venom movie so far has had a similar opinion gap between the critics and the audience, starting with the 50% difference of 2018’s Venom. Critics and audiences never see eye-to-eye on Tom Hardy’s Venom movies, so it’s apt that the trilogy’s final movie continues this trend.
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|
The Venom Franchise On Rotten Tomatoes |
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|
Movie |
Tomatometer |
Popcornmeter |
|
Venom (2018) |
30% |
80% |
|
Venom: Let There Be Carnage (2021) |
58% |
84% |
|
Venom: The Last Dance (2024) |
41% |
81% |
Venom: The Last Dance delivers more exciting symbiote action scenes, and it also revives the oddly charming dynamic between Eddie Brock and Venom. Tom Hardy’s performance is key to most of the movie’s positives. Critics may have turned their noses up at the unrefined nature of the Venom trilogy, but Venom: The Last Dance sets up the future of Sony’s Spider-Man universe with hope that it can turn things around.
9 Madame Web
Tomatometer: 11% – Popcornmeter: 56%
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3/10 5.8/10 Madame Web
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*Availability in US Director S.J. Clarkson Release Date February 14, 2024 Cast Dakota Johnson , Emma Roberts , Adam Scott , Isabela Merced , Sydney Sweeney
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As soon as the first trailer was released, Madame Web became the target of online ridicule, with clunky expository dialogue like “He was in the Amazon with my mom when she was researching spiders right before she died” getting the meme treatment on social media. Madame Web soon sunk to a dismal 11% Tomatometer score, showing how critics poked holes in the plot, the characters and the action scenes.
While nobody is claiming that
Madame Web
is a masterpiece, critics may have been overly harsh.
Madame Web‘s big divide between critics and audiences is interesting, because there’s a difference of over 40%, but neither group rates the movie as fresh. The only takeaway is that audiences decided that Madame Web wasn’t quite as bad as many people prepared themselves for. While nobody is claiming that it’s a masterpiece, critics may have been overly harsh, not allowing themselves to appreciate the movie’s good qualities.
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8 Kinds Of Kindness
Tomatometer: 72% – Popcornmeter: 48%
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7/10 10/10 Kinds of Kindness
Director Yorgos Lanthimos Release Date June 21, 2024 Cast Emma Stone , Jesse Plemons , Willem Dafoe , Margaret Qualley , Hong Chau , Joe Alwyn , Mamoudou Athie , Hunter Schafer
Straight off the back of his Oscar-nominated sci-fi movie Poor Things, Yorgos Lanthimos teamed up with Emma Stone once again for Kinds of Kindness, a comedy anthology movie that’s soaked in Lanthimos’ quirky, surreal style. It hasn’t earned reviews on par with Poor Things, or Lanthimos’ other big hits, The Favorite and The Lobster, but it’s still rated as fresh on Rotten Tomatoes. Audiences, on the other hand, have given it a rotten rating.
Related Every Yorgos Lanthimos Movie, Ranked
Yorgos Lanthimos has made several successful movies over the years, though his distinct style means that some were received better than others.
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It’s often the case that audiences are more forgiving of movies, so it’s relatively rare to see a Popcornmeter score much lower than a Tomatometer score. Kinds of Kindness, like most anthology movies, is a little uneven in its execution. Critics are more likely to appreciate the ideas behind it, however. The low Popcornmeter score proves that audiences have been less forgiving of Lanthimos’ experimental style on this occasion.
7 Fly Me To The Moon
Tomatometer: 65% – Popcornmeter: 90%
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8/10 9.5/10 Fly Me to the Moon
Director Greg Berlanti Release Date July 12, 2024 Cast Scarlett Johansson , Channing Tatum , Woody Harrelson , Ray Romano , Jim Rash , Anna Garcia , Donald Watkins , Noah Robbins , Christian Clemenson , Colin Woodell , Nick Dillenburg , Christian Zuber , Gene Jones , Joe Chrest , Stephanie Kurtzuba , Colin Jost , Dariusz Wolski , Peter Jacobson , Lauren Revard , Njema Williams , Gary Weeks , Todd Allen Durkin Expand
Channing Tatum and Scarlett Johansson’s retro romcom received mixed reviews from critics, but audiences offered a much kinder assessment. From the 1960s charms to the breezy humor, Fly Me to the Moon is a precision-engineered crowdpleaser. It helps that it’s fronted by two of the most charismatic movie stars in the business. Its 90% Popcornmeter score marks it as one of the year’s most popular comedies.
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It isn’t too much of a surprise to see Fly Me to the Moon scoring highly with audiences, considering that romantic comedies often win over the public. Fly Me to the Moon also benefits from the fact that there have been so few lighthearted romcoms in recent years that even pass the basic standards of watchability. In this way, Fly Me to the Moon is a throwback to the style of the 2000s, despite its 1960s setting.
6 Despicable Me 4
Tomatometer: 56% – Popcornmeter: 87%
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6/10 5.5/10 Despicable Me 4
Director Chris Renaud , Patrick Delage Release Date July 3, 2024 Cast Steve Carell , Kristen Wiig , Miranda Cosgrove , Steve Coogan , Pierre Coffin , Joey King
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Until 2024’s Despicable Me 4, critics and audiences seemed to be aligned in their opinions on the Despicable Me movies. However, Despicable Me has a huge split, giving it the lowest Tomatometer score of the franchise and the highest Popcornmeter score of the franchise, excluding the Minions spinoffs. Depending on who you ask, Despicable Me is either the very best or the very worst movie so far.
|
The Despicable Me Franchise On Rotten Tomatoes |
||
|
Movie |
Tomatometer |
Popcornmeter |
|
Despicable Me (2010) |
80% |
83% |
|
Despicable Me 2 (2013) |
75% |
85% |
|
Minions (2015) |
55% |
49% |
|
Despicable Me 3 (2017) |
59% |
53% |
|
Minions: The Rise of Gru (2022) |
70% |
89% |
|
Despicable Me 4 (2024) |
56% |
87% |
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Putting the Minions movies to one side, the Despicable Me franchise has been steadily slipping down the Tomatometer ever since its first entry. However, the audience response tells a completely different story. While reviews have targeted Despicable Me 4‘s overstuffed plot, weak villain and lack of emotional development, audiences seem satisfied by the cartoonish physical comedy of the minions and Steve Carell’s expressive voice acting.
5 It Ends With Us
Tomatometer: 56% – Popcornmeter: 90%
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5/10 6.3/10 It Ends With Us
Director Justin Baldoni Release Date August 9, 2024 Cast Blake Lively , Justin Baldoni , Brandon Sklenar , Jenny Slate , Hasan Minhaj , Amy Morton , Kevin McKidd , Isabela Ferrer , Alex Neustaedter , Robert Clohessy , Robyn Lively , Megan Robinson , Robin S. Walker , Emily Baldoni , Adam Mondschein , Caroline Siegrist , Steve Monroe , Daphne Zelle Expand
It Ends With Us is the first movie adaptation of one of Colleen Hoover’s novels. Hoover has developed a huge following in recent years, partly owing to her popularity on BookTok, so a movie adaptation of hers was only a matter of time. It Ends With Us earrned close to $350 million at the box office on a budget of just $25 million, which highlights the extent of Hoover’s influence.
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Related 7 Colleen Hoover Books That Should Be Movies After It Ends With Us’ $206 Million Success
With the box office success of It Ends With Us, production companies should look to these 7 books by the Colleen Hoover for movie adaptations.
The types of people who are more likely to watch It Ends With Us and review it online are those who are already familiar with the story, so it’s not a shock to see it with such a high score on the Popcornmeter. Fans have praised the faithful adaptation, as well as Blake Lively’s performance in the lead role. Movie critics are less likely to hold such affection for the source material, so their reviews have been more mixed.
4 Red One
Tomatometer: 33% – Popcornmeter: 90%
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3/10 21 8/10 Red One
Director Jake Kasdan Release Date November 15, 2024 Cast Dwayne Johnson , Chris Evans , J.K. Simmons , Lucy Liu , Kiernan Shipka , Bonnie Hunt , Kristofer Hivju , Nick Kroll , Wesley Kimmel , Mary Elizabeth Ellis , Wyatt Hunt , Lanz Duffy , Marc Evan Jackson , Ashleigh Domangue , Cody Easterbrook , Jon Rudnitsky , Morla Gorrondona , Jenna Kanell , Rod Maxwell , Fedor Steer , Octavia Grace , Matthew Zuk , Cora Kass , Ahmad Ghafouri , Jeff Chase Expand
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Dwayne Johnson’s movies are usually designed to appeal more to audiences than movie critics, so it shouldn’t come as a surprise to see that Red One is much more popular with the general public. This continues a trend that can be seen in some of his other big blockbusters. Black Adam and Red Notice also have terrible Tomatometer scores and outstanding Popcornmeter scores, and these are just some of his movies from the last few years.
Black Adam
and
Red Notice
also have terrible Tomatometer scores and outstanding Popcornmeter scores, and these are just some of Dwayne Johnson’s movies from the last few years.
The real surprise about Red One isn’t that it has been derided by critics, but that it has so far struggled at the box office. The gargantuan $250 million budget was always going to cause problems, but Red One was still expected to get off to a stronger start, considering the combined star power of Dwayne Johnson and Chris Evans. It could still improve as Christmas draws nearer, but its critical response will remain rotten.
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3 Don’t Move
Tomatometer: 73% – Popcornmeter: 38%
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7/10 8.8/10 Don’t Move
Director Brian Netto , Adam Schindler Release Date October 25, 2024 Cast Kelsey Asbille , Finn Wittrock , Daniel Francis , Moray Treadwell , Denis Kostadinov , Kate Nichols , Skye Little Wing Dimov Saw , Dylan Beam
Don’t Move is another movie that critics were more fond of than audiences. The Netflix horror movie follows a woman trying to escape from a serial killer while a paralytic agent slowly shuts down her body. It’s an interesting premise, but critics and audiences mostly disagreed on the execution. Don’t Move received some positive reviews praising the atmosphere of tension, and the performances by Kelsey Asbille and Finn Wittrock.
Related Don’t Move Review: Expansive Spaces Make Way For Claustrophobic Terror In Sam Raimi-Produced Horror
Don’t Move creates a beautiful parallel between the vast expanse of the outdoors and the claustrophobia of a woman trapped in her own body.
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Audiences were overall less positive about Don’t Move, giving it a rotten score of just 38%. What critics saw as tension, audiences saw as tedium, and what critics saw as an intriguing concept, audiences saw as a missed opportunity. Don’t Move is by no means universally disliked among audiences, and it’s worth watching for fans of the horror genre who want to make up their own mind.
2 Harold & The Purple Crayon
Tomatometer: 28% – Popcornmeter: 91%
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6.1/10 Harold and the Purple Crayon
Director Carlos Saldanha Release Date August 2, 2024 Cast Zachary Levi , Zooey Deschanel , Lil Rel Howery , Ravi Patel , Camille Guaty , Tanya Reynolds , Pete Gardner
Harold and the Purple Crayon caught a lot of flak before it was even released, thanks to the decision to turn the main character from Crockett Johnson’s children’s book into a fully-grown adult. Shazam star Zachary Levi plays a grown-up Harold in a mix of live-action and animation that critics gave a resounding thumbs down to. Harold and the Purple Crayon was also a box office bomb, failing to recoup its $40 million budget.
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Harold and the Purple Crayon is an adaptation of a children’s book from 1955, so it isn’t exactly the most zeitgeisty material for a new movie. However, despite its poor box office performance and its woeful reviews, Harold and the Purple Crayon has a healthy score on the Popcornmeter. It’s also been a hit on streaming platforms lately, suggesting that audiences are much more enthusiastic about it than critics.
1 Bad Boys: Ride Or Die
Tomatometer: 65% – Popcornmeter: 96%
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6/10 8.4/10 Bad Boys: Ride or Die
Director Adil El Arbi , Bilall Fallah Release Date June 7, 2024 Cast Will Smith , Martin Lawrence , Vanessa Hudgens , Alexander Ludwig , Paola Núñez , Eric Dane , Ioan Gruffudd , Jacob Scipio , Melanie Liburd , Tasha Smith , Rhea Seehorn , Tiffany Haddish , Joe Pantoliano , dj khaled , John Salley , Bianca Bethune , Dennis Greene , Quinn Hemphill , Derek Russo , Karter Reese Newsome , Levy Tran , Jay DeVon Johnson , Jeff J.J. Authors , Nicholas Verdi , Steven Sean Garland , Jerri Tubbs , Jewelianna Ramos-Ortiz , Enoch King Expand
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The Bad Boys franchise has never been hugely popular with critics, but the last two movies have at least avoided the beating that the originals got over 20 years ago. Bad Boys and Bad Boys II were both rotten, although they were a hit with audiences, both reaching 78% on the Popcornmeter. Since the franchise has been resurrected by Adil El Arbi and Bilal Fallah in place of Michael Bay, it has improved its reputation with both critics and audiences.
|
The Bad Boys Franchise On Rotten Tomatoes |
||
|
Movie |
Tomatometer |
Popcornmeter |
|
Bad Boys (1995) |
43% |
78% |
|
Bad Boys II (2003) |
24% |
78% |
|
Bad Boys For Life (2020) |
76% |
96% |
|
Bad Boys: Ride or Die (2024) |
65% |
96% |
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Although Bad Boys: Ride or Die may score higher on the Tomatometer than Michael Bay’s first two movies, it’s still much more popular with audiences. While it received middling reviews, audiences rated it as one of the best action movies of 2024, above the likes of Dune: Part Two, Monkey Man and The Beekeeper. Will Smith and Martin Lawrence’s comedic chemistry is as delightful as ever, and the plot allows for some creative action sequences, like the shootout at the alligator-themed amusement park.