Well, let’s just get this out of the way. True, Eternals is the worst reviewed Marvel Studios film yet, with a pretty terrible 48% rating on Rotten Tomatoes. But did that scare away viewers? And what did the viewers that did show up think of the movie?
Poor reviews be damned because Eternals made $71 million at the box office, which is lower than earlier projections that expected the film to open in the $80-85M range. But worldwide, Eternals took in $161.7M, the second-best opening weekend of 2021, after F9‘s $163M. And Eternals didn’t open in much of the Middle East and other more conservative regions that blocked the film due to gay content. On the flip side, this was the best non-local opening during the pandemic in Korea.
In North America, yes, it does appear that overwhelmingly negative critical reviews did keep some from checking out Eternals on its opening weekend. But among those that saw it– did they like it? Exit polls indicate that people agreed with critics to a degree, with it getting the lowest MCU scores yet– a B via CinemaScore and 77%/3½ stars via PostTrak. On Rotten Tomatoes, Eternals‘ audience score is a decent 81%. It’s not stellar, but much higher than its critics’ score, and bear in mind, Rotten Tomatoes requires that audiences be certified in order to leave a review, meaning that have to prove they actually saw the picture, so there is no review bombing like on IMDb.
- Eternals (Disney) – $71M/Wk 1
- Dune (Warner Bros.) – $7.6M/Wk 3 – Total $83.9M
- No Time To Die (United Artists) – $6.1M/Wk 5 – Total $143.1M
- Venom: Let There Be Carnage (Sony) – $4.4M/Wk 6 – Total $197M
- Ron’s Gone Wrong (Disney/20th Century Studios) – $3.6M/Wk 3 – Total $17.6M
Eternals is likely to drop pretty majorly next weekend, but it will stay at #1 as no major movies are opening, as studios usually give MCU flicks a wide berth. The weekend after that sees the opening of Ghostbusters: Afterlife.
Did you see Eternals? Does it deserve the negative reactions?
