Sound of Freedom Comes to mind as a recently brigaded film. Trailer came up for me on Prime and I didn’t realize what it was. I don’t care how embellished the story is, what based on a true story isn’t? But Jim Caviezel‘s acting in the trailer is so bad I can’t imagine sitting through it.
prole@sh.itjust.works 11 months ago
For a few years now, I’ve purposely sought out movies and TV shows on RT and Metacritic with very high critic ratings, and super low user ratings.
The only time this really happens is if reviews are brigaded. If the user reviews were honest, it’s pretty rare that you’d see more than 20-30% difference between critic and user score (MAX). So when you see a critic score of 95%, and user score of 1.8/10, then I know I’m in for a good time. Same with games to a lesser degree.
I’m not even kidding, this is almost always a sure way to find a film or show I enjoy. In fact, I wish they’d introduce a “Controversial” category with things that have a big gap between critic and user scores (though when it goes the other way, that is high user score to super poor critic reviews, it’s almost PureFlix-style Christian propaganda garbage).
phillaholic@lemm.ee 10 months ago
barsoap@lemm.ee 11 months ago
Just to prove you wrong: 32% difference, and yes it’s objectively terrible. Even higher differences can easily occur organically without review bombing when critics happen to be smelling their own farts – which yes is what a definite 100% of those 37% critics who reviewed it positively were doing. I’m seriously worried about their mental state.
prole@sh.itjust.works 10 months ago
Ok… Finding one exception doesn’t really disprove anything. I don’t think I ever claimed that it was a hard rule that every movie fits into. Just a rule a thumb I use to find media that I otherwise might have missed.
phillaholic@lemm.ee 10 months ago
Velma was absolutely review bombed. 39% is on par for what it is considering TV has on average higher rankings than movies do.
barsoap@lemm.ee 10 months ago
Be that as it may it’s still objectively terrible and has more than 30% difference, which was my actual point.
As to review bombing: It would likely not have caught so much flak if it was stand-alone and not a Scooby Doo reboot – then it would simply vanish alongside other terrible shows that few people ever saw and even fewer rated, with middling average score because of course there’s always some people who like something for inexplicable reasons, and without attracting a larger audience those are pretty much the only people who vote because they’re the only ones who care.
But it had a brand name, it walks all over the original (and I don’t mean race swapping who gives a fuck, I mean thematically), is neither witty nor funny nor insightful so… yeah. No need for an organised campaign to draw ire, and if some racists spent time review-bombing it over the race swap then all the better: They wasted their time as noone likes it anyway.
phillaholic@lemm.ee 10 months ago
I don’t buy that argument at all. It was entirely about changing the race of the characters and going after white men. Scooby Doo has been rebooted dozens of times and they just exist, they don’t make the originals worse. This new series is not a betrayal to the source material without Scooby anymore than the first time they had a real ghost. I don’t think I finished it, but it is not nearly as bad as people make it out to be. The Pilot is, but that’s pretty typical especially with a cast full of non-voice actors recording during Covid. By episode two and three everything is better put together. I found it similar to a lot of current high school shows. Mindy received a ton of hate over it too, and she’s neither the show runner or writer of it. She was running two other shows at the same time so it’s hilarious how many idiots claimed she’s a no talent hack over it.
I_Has_A_Hat@startrek.website 11 months ago
I’ve had the opposite experience. I often find that studio cash grabs that rely on nostalgia or low-effort pandering get high critic reviews (which makes me feel like they were paid to do so) and only the user ratings rightfully trash it. Movie reviews seem to be getting a lot more like video games reviews, where a AAA studio shits out a piece of crap, but it’s proclaimed a 8-9 out of 10 by big review companies (looking right at you IGN). Only by listening to the fans or less mainstream reviewers do you get the real picture.
Honytawk@lemmy.zip 11 months ago
Nostalgia has a bigger effect on user ratings than it does on critic reviews.
I_Has_A_Hat@startrek.website 10 months ago
Only if it’s done right. If it’s done as merely a cash grab, most people can tell pretty quick. The new Super Mario Bros., or anything by Disney in the last 4 years are great examples. If you take out nostalgia, they’re pretty poor to mediocre movies. And I think most people are able to notice that.
prole@sh.itjust.works 11 months ago
Yes, and those movies end up with a reasonable gap between the two scores. It will have a lower user score than critic score, but it’s only ever below 2 or 3 if it’s been brigaded. This can be easily confirmed by just reading a few of the user reviews.