10 More Horror Movies Hated By Critics But Audiences Loved
4. Stay Alive
Rotten Tomatoes Score: 10%
Stay Alive was one of horror's great critical punching bags of the mid-2000s - a thoroughly risible piece of work in which those who die in a popular online video game start dying in real life.
Reviews had almost nothing kind to say about Stay Alive, panning the writing, direction, and performances across the board. And while the picture underperformed at the box office, it enjoyed a more welcoming reception on DVD, and currently sits at a 56% audience approval rating.
While that may not be a sky-high figure, the fact that more than half of viewers enjoyed a movie which only 10% of critics did is staggering.
It likely helps that Stay Alive has been reclaimed by genre fans in recent years as something of a campy cult classic, enough that writer-director William Brent Bell revealed - or threatened? - in 2022 that he's working on developing a sequel.