Honestly, I think all the headlines about Holmes & Watson being the worst comedy of the year are going to end up making it a film that people discover later on & are pleasantly surprised that it isn't the worst movie they've ever seen. It is a C- comedy that is getting F- grades
I think all the articles about audiences walking out and it being so bad that even Netflix wouldn't save it give a false impression of it. I also think that critics are always angrier when a movie isn't screened (esp. if it means they all had to spend XMAS day watching it)
This is perhaps an uncool opinion but although the movie is a mixed bag and suffers in comparison to the previous to Ferrell/Reilly pairings, I don't get a 0% on Rotten Tomatoes feeling from this movie. (I guess it's up to 7% now, but still.)
My feeling watching it in the theater on XMAS Day was that it was VERY hit and miss-- but when it hit, it was funny. But I didn't walk out thinking this was the total disaster that I'm reading about.
It reminds me a little of when George Lucas put out his final film-- the CGI animated movie Strange Magic-- which is a not-great-but-certainly-watchable-movie-for-young-kids-- and critics panned it so hard that it was initially also at 0% on RT.
Sometimes the piling on becomes its own thing, a kind of merry sport & often it is about more than just the movie itself. But I also think it does a disservice to when a TRUE cinematic disaster finds its way to theaters, when people act like a mere disappointment is an epic dud
