The Marvel Cinematic Universe’s track record of critical and commercial success is nothing short of astounding, with the franchise having earned in excess of $25 billion at the box office and seen every single one of its installments end up with a Fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
However, the early consensus for Eternals isn’t painting a particularly encouraging picture, with Chloé Zhao’s cosmic epic sitting very close to the bottom of the pile. At the time of writing, the millennia-spanning saga holds a 71% score on Rotten Tomatoes with almost 50 reviews in the bag, which is the lowest number the MCU has seen since Thor: The Dark World, widely regarded by many fans as the weakest installment in the entire series.
Chris Hemsworth’s second solo outing marks the low point at 66%, with The Incredible Hulk second-bottom at 67%, while Eternals is one point behind the derided Iron Man 2‘s 72%. This definitely isn’t what we were expecting from a two-time Academy Award winning filmmaker boarding the most popular franchise on the planet, but it’s still early days.
Those numbers could rise or fall dramatically by the time we get to November 5, though, but it’s got to be viewed as a disappointment internally that Eternals is proving to be so polarizing almost two weeks out from release.