Slashdot Mirror
DC Fans Angry Over Rotten Tomatoes 'Justice League' Ratings (wired.com)
Rotten Tomatoes launched a new movie-review series called See It/Skip It last week -- but it just made some people hate the site even more. An anonymous reader quotes Wired:
Rotten Tomatoes, the review-aggregator-slash-Hollywood-agitator, had irked DC fans by withholding its Justice League score until Thursday night's See It/Skip It premiere -- even though a wave of reviews for the film had already been posted online. The move was ostensibly a ploy to get viewers to tune in for the show, yet others saw a greater villainy at work: Was Rotten Tomatoes, which is owned in part by Warner Bros., actually trying to shield the studio from an inevitably bad grade that could help kill its opening weekend?
The See It/Skip It pushback -- which involved a lot of Tweet-screaming -- was a reminder of just how controversial Justice League had become... With Justice League having earned a less-than-expected $96 million in its opening weekend, the lowest ever for a DCEU title, the movie will likely be seen as a Flash-point moment for DC movies as a whole. Considering how some DC obsessives have reacted to the films' bad reviews -- there have been death threats in the past -- the conspiracy theory is actually a somewhat measured response... But there's another reason for all the pre-release pressure on Justice League: With the exception of this summer's Wonder Woman, the previous DC entries have all earned disappointingly low scores on Rotten Tomatoes... For some fans, the low scores felt like a referendum not only on [director Zack] Snyder's work, but the DC Extended Universe franchise as a whole -- so much so, a few defenders even began to speculate as to whether Rotten Tomatoes was manipulating the DCEU data (or, at the very least, grading the reviews on a much steeper curve than the Marvel films). Such theories filled message boards and Quora discussions, and there was even a Change.org petition to shut the site down that collected more than 23,000 signatures... Dangling the [Justice League] verdict in front of fans, and putting off the inevitable, felt like a misuse of power.
"They just want to focus on the negative," one DC fan told the Chicago Tribune. Meanwhile, the film's director has endorsed a Change.org petition calling for the release of his original edit of the film.
Justice League cost nearly a third of a billion dollars to produce. On Thanksgiving Day, it earned less money than Disney-Pixar's film Coco.
The See It/Skip It pushback -- which involved a lot of Tweet-screaming -- was a reminder of just how controversial Justice League had become... With Justice League having earned a less-than-expected $96 million in its opening weekend, the lowest ever for a DCEU title, the movie will likely be seen as a Flash-point moment for DC movies as a whole. Considering how some DC obsessives have reacted to the films' bad reviews -- there have been death threats in the past -- the conspiracy theory is actually a somewhat measured response... But there's another reason for all the pre-release pressure on Justice League: With the exception of this summer's Wonder Woman, the previous DC entries have all earned disappointingly low scores on Rotten Tomatoes... For some fans, the low scores felt like a referendum not only on [director Zack] Snyder's work, but the DC Extended Universe franchise as a whole -- so much so, a few defenders even began to speculate as to whether Rotten Tomatoes was manipulating the DCEU data (or, at the very least, grading the reviews on a much steeper curve than the Marvel films). Such theories filled message boards and Quora discussions, and there was even a Change.org petition to shut the site down that collected more than 23,000 signatures... Dangling the [Justice League] verdict in front of fans, and putting off the inevitable, felt like a misuse of power.
"They just want to focus on the negative," one DC fan told the Chicago Tribune. Meanwhile, the film's director has endorsed a Change.org petition calling for the release of his original edit of the film.
Justice League cost nearly a third of a billion dollars to produce. On Thanksgiving Day, it earned less money than Disney-Pixar's film Coco.
Let me get this straight, when Batman vs. Superman came out the conspiracy was that Rotten Tomatoes was colluding with Disney/Marvel to tank the movie but this year it’s that it was trying to hide bad reviews to not tank a DC movie? Seems Warner Bros. needs to work harder on being more consistent in their conspiracy plots...
Meanwhile, the film's director has endorsed a Change.org petition calling for the release of his original edit of the film.
Oh here we go again. The simple fact is that Snyder is not a good director. If you can't tell a story in 2 hours, you're not a good story teller. Stop trying to cram 4 movies into a single one.
I do believe that Joss Whedon's reshoots did more harm than good, but if the film had been watchable to start with, then WB wouldn't have requested Whedon to do so.
Summation 2
Mutant...superhero...weird. It didn't matter what they called me. I was free at last to indulge in my fantasy of wearing women's nylons and yoga pants. 'Cause that's what people who get superpowers do - they wear gay clothes.
Seriously, I couldn't tell you who are DC heros and who are Marvel heros and who are off-brand heros. I can tell you that there are way too many stupid-ass superheros.
It has only become an issue for Hollywood in more recent years. The problem is not Rotten Tomatoes, but the quality of films Hollywood is producing.
There is very little worth seeing. Half the films seem to be superhero films, which many people have no interest in. The other half are remakes, reboots or generally trash.
Typical of snotty rich Americans who cannot conceive of anyone else except themselves. Self righteous bigoted one percenters who think a movie is more important and spend countless hours debating it.
People seem so damned intolerant of anything anymore. You have people who, if you don't agree with everything they espouse, no matter how unrealistic it may be, you are labeled a hater, a bigot, stupid, intolerant, whatever. Frankly, I'm sick of it.
Just two days ago, my wife and I were over at her mother's for Thanksgiving, and my wife's brother, the youngest in the family and still in university, trotted out this "Thanksgiving is white privilege bullshit". Universities... supposedly places where differing thoughts and opinions can swirl around, have become bastions of intolerance for any differing opinion or belief.
Really? Petitioning the federal government to release a movie edit? Shit like this, no wonder this country is a laughingstock.
First of all, I just have to say: First world problems on this one...
Second of all, people have to realize that critic reviews have, almost since the time of Shakespeare, been overly critical of media that is primarily audience targeted and for lack of a better term fun to experience. Critics want edgy, ground breaking artistic media because for the most part they watch way too many movies and are burnt out and cynical. The rest of us who watch maybe 25 movies a year are for the most part just looking for a good time. The best barometer I have found to figure out if I will enjoy a movie or not is the Amazon reviews score and reading the top positive and top negative. There is always the risk of a spoiler, but it is a far better barometer because normal people are giving their impressions. As traditional media and newspapers die, so too should the movie critic industry. It is an antiquated system that is neither useful nor necessary in the modern era.
If you disagree, please post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like
Maybe the fact that DC movies in general are getting unexpectedly low ratings and box office results. Which is all fine in my book, I hope that at some point the studios will return to regular old fashioned blockbuster movies to pass the summer (or winter), instead of the current overload of superhero garbage.
If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
Maybe the fact that DC movies in general are getting unexpectedly low ratings and box office results.
Unexpected how? I’ve seen both BvS and JL movies and thy were shit so the low ratings were entirely expected. As to the second half, BvS made nearly $900 million. How much more were you expecting it to make?
People are slowly reverting to their savage, primitive, tribal nature.
For centuries, if not millenia, people have fought and died to pull humanity out from the depth of barbarism and into the light of civilization. Slowly but surely, things like war, genocide, blodshed, slavery, human traficcing, sexual exploitation of women and children, linching, mob mentality and superstitions have been replaced with collaboration, gender equality, the state of law, justice, education, knowledge and science.
But in the last few decades, all of this has started to go all to hell. Extremists, both right and left-wing, once confined to the shadows, are now more and more emboldened to come out in the open. Religious superstitions and sects and sprouting everywhere. There's a systematic war on science. People are being judged, condemned, and executed (both phisically and figuratively) by social media linch mobs. delusional conspiracy theorists are spreading like a disease. Bearded savages in the middle-east are trying to push human civilization back to the dark ages. Democracies are slowly turning into fascism, police states, and other forms of tyranny.
"May you live in interesting times". This surely is true from a sociologist/anthropologist point of vew, but this is certainly not the kind of world I feel confortable raising my children in.
The problem with these movies is not that they are stories about superheros.
The problem is that they are all flash and no depth. The plot lines are not only thin, but full of characters acting in ways that make zero sense given their motivations. That kind of artificial drama isn't just unfulfilling to watch, it is outright insulting to the fans.
The apparent target audience for these movies is a global audience of people that do not speak English, and hence need dialog that can very easily be translated to short sentences that are easy to read during action scenes. It is leaving the American audience feeling very justifiably snubbed by the owners of content that they have been loyally consuming since they were children.
This business of trying to keep us in the dark about what a flop a movie is until after we have gone out and seen it is just icing on the cake.
I think it's the fact that Warner repeatedly gave DC to directors who
a) wanted to put their own stamp on the characters- ignoring canon.
b) made DC movies distopic and unpleasant.
c) made DC characters known for avoiding killing into murderers (which for many people who were DC fans for decades meant we wouldn't see these abominations nor recommend them to our friends).
d) spent more time on special effects than on character development.
It took over a decade of hard work to destroy the DC movie franchise. And the DC television, comic book, and animated franchises show it is NOT the characters- well at least not the characters in the comic books. It IS the characters in the movie (except for wonder woman). And even as a guy, I could do without Snyders gratuitous butt shots of Wonderwoman unless he's planning on doing the same angles for superman and batman. It's howlingly sexist and pulls me right out of the movie and starts me thinking about the Hawkeye initiative everytime she spreads her legs and jumps away from us on screen.
The current DC movie universe is UNSAVABLE.
Junk it. Have an official press release from Warner saying "okay that went the wrong direction- we are starting over."
Start with LOW budget (about deadpool 1 size), "year one" movies- perhaps even using some of your existing popular TV versions of the characters.
Get good writers who are fans of DC. Put an executive producer over the series that likes the characters. Put directors over the films who like the characters but understand they have to maintain a consistent look and feel. Get editors who understand comic books and comic book color schemes. Write films that are character based and based on good comic book arcs. Not major Crisis of infinite earth arcs- just normal "day of the life" year long arcs where the world wasn't at stake. Save that for later.
Get GOOD actors who are not major stars for most of the parts. The current superman actor, Henry Cavill, is fine- but Ben Affleck (who has done a great job) is STILL BEN AFFLECK every time I look at him. You can't have too big of an actor in a superman film- it distracts. Well- I suppose there are a very few actors who can pull it off. LIke Gary Oldman who can be anybody without distracting you. I admit that particular issue is subtle.
But for god's sake, Supergirl's "Superman" portrayed by Tyler Hoechlin nailed the character of both Clark Kent and Superman with about 40 minutes of screen time. Make him your superman.
Then build up to larger movies from those movies.
As a DC fan for decades I want characters who are true to the comic books. But not slavishly. I understand small modifications have to be made to update them for 2017, or to fill in gaps left because not all characters are picked up.
The biggest problem for DC is that it is owned and controlled by movie people who are not comic book fans and they do not get comic books and they think 'superhero' instead of 'character'.
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
They can't give spiderman or the fantastic four 'a rest'. If they do, the characters revert to Marvel.
---
The nice thing about MCU is that every movie is self contained- even the Avengers. They are part of a larger universe but it's hyperlinked. You learn all you need to know about Captain America in the Avengers. If you want to know more, then he's got three movies you can watch. If you don't- then it's not necessary.
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
Desler opined:
I’ve seen both BvS and JL movies and thy were shit so the low ratings were entirely expected. As to the second half, BvS made nearly $900 million. How much more were you expecting it to make?
Yep. And so was the 300 sequel. And every other Zach Snyder movie since 300.
The reason that 300 was such an artistic and box-office success, and every Zach Snyder movie since has been neither, is easy to explain:
300 was a panel-by-panel recreation of Frank Miller's graphic novel. The script (which Miller wrote) was great because it was written by a master storyteller, and because Miller, not Snyder, had editorial control of it. The visuals in the movie exactly re-created the visuals in the graphic novel. Put the two facts together, and you have your answer.
It's the exact same reason that Sin City was such a triumph - although Zach Snyder isn't fit to carry Robert Rodriguez's viewfinder - Frank Miller had creative control of the script, and was intimately involved in crafting the visuals, as well.
By contrast, nothing Snyder has done since then has had a master storyteller's guidance - leaving only his own meager talents as a visualist and utter vacuum as a scriptwriter to power his movies.
(FWIW - Frank Miller is a horrible human being: racist, sexist, reactionary, and mean-spirited. None of that in any way diminishes his talent as a storyteller, or his fist as an artist. Those are both genius level. In other news, Pablo Picasso was an asshole - and a genius. the Universe is unfair. Get a hat.)
(PPS - 300, in both its incarnations, was riddled with cultural, costuming, and historical errors. The Spartans, for instance, were pederasts, just as were all the Hellenic Greek citystate cultures. In the Spartan instance, pederastic relationships continuing until the junior partner was married - which was never permitted until a man reached his 25th birtday - were normal. In most other Greek citystates, continuing such a relationship after the junior partner's beard began to grow was considered prima facie evidence of homosexuality, and thus condemned as abnormal and immoral - in every other citystate except Thebes, that is. Miller's errors with regard to Persian culture, costume, and customs were even more egregious, purposefully racist, and deplorable. I'd certainly be outraged, if I were Persian. Again, though, none of that keeps the graphic novel and the movie from being superb pieces of visual and expositional entertainment, well worthy of the plaudits - and money - they earned. Perspecitve, people ... )
Check out my novel.