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The Odyssey trailer was one of the most hated on YouTube, yet audiences gave the film a 97% Rotten Tomatoes score after watching it. A July 2026 study by the digital entertainment platform JB.com shows that Chrisppher Nolan’s latest film isn’t actually the only movie the internet got completely wrong before release.
9 out of 10 viewers who saw The Odyssey trailer hit a dislike. Now the film is out, and people are calling it one of the best things they've watched all year.
The Little Mermaid teaser got 2 million dislikes on YouTube, then audiences gave the film 93% on Rotten Tomatoes.
A third of people who saw the Mufasa promo weren't buying it, but the film finally won them over with an 88% Tomatometer score.
The research looked at popular films that got a hostile reception on YouTube before their release. It recorded the number of likes and dislikes on each movie's official trailer and calculated what percentage of all reactions were negative. That figure was then compared to the film's current Rotten Tomatoes audience score. Films that finished below 70% with audiences were left out, so every movie on the list is one that genuinely won people over after a rough start.
Here's a look at the top 5 movies that audiences judged too soon:
1. The Odyssey (2026)
Rotten Tomatoes audience score: 97%
Trailer dislikes: 913,000
Dislike rate: 89.6%
The Odyssey was misjudged by the Internet too soon. Its trailer got nearly 1 million dislikes, with 9 in every 10 viewer reactions being negative. This was some of the most hostile receptions any movie preview has seen on YouTube. However, as the film is out now, audiences are giving it a 97% score on Rotten Tomatoes, which means this might be one of the biggest comebacks in film history.
2. The Little Mermaid (2023)
The Little Mermaid was also judged unfairly at first. It collected as many as two million dislikes on YouTube, with 84% of viewers reacting negatively. Much of the hate centered on the casting of Halle Bailey in the lead role. But after its release, it became clear that Bailey had actually nailed the character, and audiences gave the film a 93% score on Rotten Tomatoes.
3. Rust (2024)
Next is Rust, which had skeptics even before it had a trailer. The movie became infamous after Alec Baldwin accidentally discharged a prop gun on set, killing cinematographer Halyna Hutchins. By the time the trailer dropped, 60% of all reactions were negative, with many viewers unwilling to separate the film from what happened during production. That said, after release, those who actually watched it gave it a 71% score on Rotten Tomatoes.
4. The Marvels (2023)
The Marvels also had a rough time before it even hit theaters. Nearly half of all trailer reactions on YouTube were negative, making it one of the more hostile receptions for a Marvel release in recent years. Fan skepticism was so high that the teaser got 275K dislikes on YouTube. However, it seems most of the people loved the movie once it actually came out, giving it a 79% score on Rotten Tomatoes.
5. Mufasa: The Lion King (2024)
Mufasa faced the kind of skepticism that follows most Disney prequels. Fans of the original weren't convinced another Lion King story was necessary, and around 1 in 3 trailer reactions came back negative. The dislike count reached 22K before the film opened. Once it did, the nostalgia took over. Audiences who grew up with Simba gave Mufasa an 88% score on Rotten Tomatoes, one of the bigger turnarounds among the films studied.
The CEO of JB.com commented on the study:
"The Odyssey is a good case study in how Internet reactions can completely miss the mark. The backlash was mostly about casting. Lupita Nyong'o as Helen of Troy, Elliot Page as a Greek soldier, Travis Scott as a bard. And a lot of it turned into a full-blown culture war after Elon Musk called out Nolan publicly. But the people who actually bought tickets had a completely different experience. The film broke Nolan's own audience score record on Rotten Tomatoes and earned $263 million in its opening weekend, his best-ever global launch."
from Review Blog https://ift.tt/yksOjeZ
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