An animated horror comedy that critics hated and audiences ignored shuffles to Netflix success

Under most circumstances, it would be reasonable to expect that a movie savagely panned by critics and sneered at by audiences before bombing at the box office would be swept under the rug, but for reasons that remain inexplicable to this day, 2017’s forgotten dud Monster Family somehow managed to get a sequel.

The Hotel Transylvania franchise had earned billions of dollars and launched several offshoots, so it wasn’t unreasonable to expect that another horror-tinged animated family comedy would have the potential to do the same. Of course, it would have helped exponentially if Monster Family wasn’t terrible and didn’t fail to recoup the modest $30 million budget from theaters, but you can’t win ’em all.

The Wishbone family are in danger of coming apart at the seams, but their attempts at reconnecting on a night of fun and frolics backfires spectacularly when they all end up being turned into monsters. Emily Watson’s vampire, Nick Frost’s Frankenstein’s monster, Ethan Rouse’s werewolf, Jason Isaacs’ Dracula, and Catherine Tate’s Baba Yaga fill out the principal voice cast, all of whom are about as banal and one-note as you’d imagine.

Even though Monster Family bears the distinction of holding an awful 10% critical score and 22% user rating on Rotten Tomatoes, Netflix subscribers are apparently in a generous mood after deciding to give it the time of day. As per FlixPatrol, Holger Tappe’s disaster has secured a place on the platform’s global most-watched chart, but it’s 96 minutes of their lives they’ll never get back.