8 Reasons Why Fans And Critics Can’t Agree On Superhero Films
3. It's A Rather New Occurence
I was frankly amazed when Fant4stic got a single-digits RottenTomatoes score. Not because it didn't deserve it (it most certainly did), but because the critical body hadn't erred on the side of caution on a comic book property out of fear of angering the fans. Which is exactly how things had felt for the past decade. I'm not saying people would give good reviews to bad movies, but that there'd be a propensity for three star reviews, just to keep things sweet.
Should Iron Man 2 have 72% on RottenTomatoes? What about Spider-Man 3's 63%? Did X-Men: The Last Stand deserve a higher rating than Apocalypse? There's obviously other concerns, like number of critics registered on the site ten years ago, but there's clearly been a general shift in how comic book movies are rated (and wider geek properties too - before The Phantom Menace's 3D re-release, each of the Star Wars Prequels was Fresh).
The reason why is a mixture of causes - putting aside general quality, stagnation of old tropes and the desire for constant innovation is chief amongst them - but the point is that this age of critics hating on comic book movies is rather young. And this shift happening now, just comic book movies are starting to pay attention to comic books, is naturally fuelling conflict with those who, well, like their comic books.