Black Adam wins over fans as the new film has earned the highest ratings from Rotten Tomatoes audiences since Christopher Nolan’s Dark Knight trilogy.
DC’s latest release Black Adam has the best audience rating on Rotten Tomatoes for any DC movie since the Dark Knight trilogy. Black Adam, starring Dwayne Johnson in the title role, was released on October 21 and earned $26.7 million at the box office on its opening day. During the opening weekend Black Adam earned $67 million domestically, making it the biggest opening weekend of Johnson’s career.
While the film did huge numbers at the box office, critics and audience members alike gave the film mixed reviews. DC fans openly mocked Black Adam for his writing, which has been described by some as all of “lazy“to downright”awful.” Day Black Adam was released, the film’s critic rating on Rotten Tomatoes landed at 45%, making it the lowest Rotten Tomatoes critics’ rating for a DC film since Justice League in 2017. While audiences praised Johnson’s performance along with the film’s visual effects and fight scenes, it seemed that Black Adam was on track to be another flop for the DC Extended Universe.
Now, 3 days later Black Adam‘s release, the audience scores on Rotten tomatoes is in. Audience gave Black Adam a whopping 90%, with over 2,500 verified reviews. In contrast, the critic score has dropped to 40%. This gives Black Adam the highest audience rating for a DC movie since the Dark Knight trilogy, with 2012’s The Dark Knight Rises with an audience score of 94%.
Why are critics and audiences so divided about Black Adam?
Although the scores of the audience and the critic often differ, Black Adam has the largest gap between audience and critic in DCEU history. The DCEU has a history of low Rotten Tomatoes scores, with Justice League comes in at 40%, Batman vs Superman at 28%, and suicide squad at 26%. However, the franchise’s films will often do a little better with audiences, and when it comes to blockbusters, the critical scores are often much stricter. Some positive audience reviews praised Black Adam because it was just a fun DC movie, while others focused on the ingenuity behind the film’s theme of confronting evil not with good, but with violence. DC fans who just wanted to see Black Adam on the big screen seemed to enjoy the film, despite the flaws that critics often cited.
As Black Adam is still seen by viewers around the world, there is still time for the Rotten Tomato scores to change. Closing a huge 50-point gap is a big task, though, and the critics’ score has only gotten worse over the opening weekend. although Black Adam is a hugely divisive film, it certainly does what DC is supposed to do: generate word of mouth. While there is debate as to whether Black Adam will be the fresh start the DCEU needs, the movie is definitely on its way to becoming a DC cult classic.
Source: Rotten tomatoes