The Crow 2024’s debut audience score on Rotten Tomatoes triples the critics’ score, breaking the franchise trend
The debut of Bill Skarsgård’s The Crow received some discouraging reviews initially. However, on Rotten Tomatoes, the film’s audience score is significantly higher. The Crow recreates James O’Barr’s famous graphic novel, centred around Eric, a man who alongside his girlfriend is murdered by a crime boss. After coming back to life with supernatural powers, Eric seeks revenge. Despite the initial challenging reviews, Skarsgård’s The Crow, featuring FKA Twigs and Danny Huson, had a modest box office debut aiming for a $6-9 million opening weekend.
Rotten Tomatoes has now calculated public reviews for The Crow and it has received an impressive debut score. With over 100 verified reviews, the 2024 reboot has a 64% audience approval rating based on review aggregation at the time of writing this article. This is triple the critics’ score of 21%. This also represents the franchise’s second Fresh audience score, following the original’s 90%.
How does The Crow 2024 compare to the rest of the franchise?
Though the debut score is likely to fluctuate as more reviews come in, the audience score for The Crow is a generally positive sign for the reboot’s ongoing reception. Until now, Brandon Lee’s original cult classic is the only installment in the franchise to receive Fresh ratings from both critics and the audience, while the successive parts were panned by critics and had mixed public reviews.
Considering The Crow‘s extended development cycle, where actors ranging from Bradley Cooper to Jason Momoa were cast as the undead vigilante at various stages, it’s not surprising that the film has performed poorly among critics. This was further exacerbated when reviews for the new version were embargoed until the film’s Thursday night premiere, a tactic typically reserved by studios for films with low expectations. A comparable approach was used by Lionsgate for their other recent release, Borderlands, which also encountered harsh criticism.
Unlike Eli Roth’s Borderlands however, the debut audience score for The Crow on Rotten Tomatoes being Fresh is a promising sign for its box office potential. Positive word of mouth from viewers can be as powerful as good reviews from critics. Given that Lionsgate only spent $10 million to acquire the film and it has a $50 million production budget, it won’t need much revenue to break even for the studio. With no significant releases scheduled until Beetlejuice Beetlejuice on the 6th of September, Skarsgård’s The Crow might hold its position in the box office charts and potentially become an unexpected success.
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