Up until the release of Eternals, the Marvel Cinematic Universe boasted an impeccable track record of critical acclaim, with the first 25 installments in the superhero franchise winding up garnering Fresh ratings on Rotten Tomatoes.
To put that into perspective, no film series that’s run for five or more installments has even come close to matching that success, so to do it 25 times over is incredible.
The Wizarding World managed nine in a row before Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald came along, and while it isn’t technically a franchise even though they all exist in the same universe, Pixar made it to eleven before Cars 2 was greeted by an apathetic shrug, and it remains the only one of the animation powerhouse’s 24 features so far to hold that unwanted distinction.
The MCU’s hot streak had to end sometime, and Eternals has been sliding downwards ever since reactions began rolling in several weeks back. In a further unwanted statistic, the cosmic epic’s Rotten Tomatoes score has now dropped to 49% with 286 reviews having been counted.
Of course, fans are vehemently in disagreement after deeming Eternals worthy of an 83% user rating, but it’s become par for the course on the aggregation site that critics and audiences hold very different opinions.