20 2000s Movies Audiences Loved, But Critics Hated

10. Fast & Furious

It may be something of a cliché, but the Fast and the Furious franchise truly has been a rollercoaster ride. After starting hot, things began to flag until the injection of Dwayne Johnson's star power presence; a tide that was ridden high, with things now cooling down again as the series comes to a close.

Fast Five was the first film where audiences and critics were even close to the same page, something that seemed unthinkable just two years before with Fast & Furious.

Though offering little new or different aside from doubling down on just how ridiculous and unbelievable the stunts became, and instead bringing the same style of motorised action that fans were used to, there was still an audience for Vin Diesel and his crew after four chapters of the story. Everyone knew what they were getting, and were happy whenever another instalment released in cinemas. 

However, what audiences felt as familiar, critics saw as sequel after sequel offering diminished returns for a franchise they weren't particularly crazy about in the first place. The critics' score on Rotten Tomatoes has never outweighed that of the audience score for the franchise (though it came agonisingly close with Furious 7), and Fast & Furious was something of a rock bottom. Had proceedings continued without the introduction of Luke Hobbs (Johnson) at this point, it's fair to say the audience score may well have dropped to match that of the critics.