Marvel movies are famous for being well-received by both critics and audiences alike, but when you actually look at the statistics, you’ll find that fans and reviewers rarely share the same opinions. We’re seeing this in extremis right now with Eternals. In the run-up to its release, Chloe Zhao’s MCU debut was lambasted by critics, becoming the only Marvel Studios film to open with a Rotten score on Rotten Tomatoes. Since it arrived, however, fans have been a whole lot more positive.
So it’s worth comparing and contrasting Eternals‘ RT scores with the rest of the MCU. As per the reputation, the Tomatometer score (AKA the critical rating) and user score for many Marvel Studios movies line up almost exactly. The Avengers, Captain America: The Winter Soldier and Spider-Man: Far From Home are three cases where critics and fans both rated the films above 90%. However, in many other instances, critical ratings are glowing while fans aren’t so blown away.
Critics were full of praise for Ant-Man and the Wasp, giving it 87%, but audiences only thought it was pretty good at 75%. A similar phenomenon happened with Black Panther. Rave reviews put it at a near-perfect 96% score while fans rated in almost 20% lower at 79%. The most drastic instance of this occurring is Captain Marvel, whose strong 79% Tomatometer score is offset by its terrible 45% user rating, no doubt influenced by the review-bombing it suffered.
Meanwhile, sometimes audiences loved a Marvel flick and critics were ambivalent. Look at Black Widow — 79% from critics but fans rated it 91%. The same goes for Thor: The Dark World and Avengers: Age of Ultron. But, again, Eternals takes things to another level. With just 47%, critics practically hate it while fans think it’s better than Black Panther at 80%.
According to critics, then, the best Marvel movie is Black Panther and the worst is Eternals. But for the fans, Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings — at 98% — is currently in the top spot with Captain Marvel dwelling at the bottom. Let us know your own choices in the comments.
