WB Just Bought Rotten Tomatoes/Flixster. Can we still trust their ratings system?

So, this morning Warner Brothers confirmed the purchase of Rotten Tomatoes/Flixster. Personally, I use both as a quick reference guide before making the decision to go the the theater to see a film. It seems to be a gigantic conflict of interest, and I now feel that I won't be able to trust the rating system on either.

Some say it is the end of the world. Others say it is non-news and that those ratings haven't been trustworthy for a long time. Either way, FAST FIVE received a 79% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, which is a higher rating than HANNA, THE ADJUSTMENT BUREAU, and HP: DEATHLY HALLOWS PART I.

I am curious to see what you all have to say on this one.

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Rotten Tomatoes just averages all published movie critics into a single score, so I don't think WB is going to be hillarious and choose not to put certain reviews on there. As for Fast and Furious, it probably is better than all the movies you listed.

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Yeah, I understand how Rotten Tomatoes works. In my post, I mentioned that I have been using both for some time now. Flixster alone is the #1 app that people use for movie reviews and showtimes. Flixster uses the Rotten Tomatoes review meter as their rating system. I think it would be naive to think that the studio would not use this to their advantage, especially when there is sooo much money at stake. It would not be difficult for them to pick and choose which reviews to compile. This sort of thing is sort of common practice at this point. By the way, are you familiar with the F&F franchise? Not exactly Oscar bait.

While I can understand the concern, I'm not sure if it's really "naive" to think they might not mess with it, for two reasons:

1) It'd be pretty darn scandalous.
2) They'd almost definitely get caught.

Obviously they can decide which reviews to include...but it'd be blatantly obvious really early on. People can easily compare which reviews used to be let in versus which ones aren't any more. And they'll definitely notice if a specific reviewer has a review for one film posted, but not for another. That means they'd have to try to single out which reviewers are generally negative about their films, but I'll bet it varies way too much for that to be reliable, and people would notice that, too, anyway. And all this would probably just be to sway a few points one way or the other, most likely.

So, I hope people keep an eye on this, but it's hard to imagine how they could really change much, let alone do so without people noticing.

As for the latest Fast & Furious movie; I think the positive reviews are real, and just responding to what sounds like a much more self-aware, trying-less-to-be-serious vibe. Most reviewers are decent enough to review a film for what it's trying to be, so I can see a majority of them giving a film like that decent marks if they conclude that it simply delivers on exactly what it promises.

What this really does is reveal Rotten Tomatoes' fundamental weakness, which is that it doesn't (with its topline number) distinguish between a barely positive review and a genuinely glowing one. Metacritic, which compensates for that (albeit imperfectly), has it a bit lower at 68. But that's high enough and there are enough reviews for each that it's clearly legit.

I see what you are saying about F&F. The more I think about it, RTs rating system is perpetuating the problems with the biz. Complex plots, intricate concepts, and new ideas often polarize audiences and critics alike, which leads to great films receiving a lower rating than one that has a mass appeal and receives a decent, albeit lukewarm, rating on RT. Thanks for the insight. It is clear I need to find better references regardless. Good thing I found MovieForums.

There are certain films that make RT's shortcomings clear; I remember How to Train Your Dragon getting something like 98% on it. Now, I loved that movie, but the kinds of movies that get 98% or better on the Tomatometer are usually in the LOTR/Dark Knight vein. When you looked at the average score, though, it was very good but not great. In other words, a film can achieve an unusually high rating if it's the kind of film that almost everyone will at least think is pretty good, and HTTYD was exactly that kind of film.

Anyway, I still like the Tomatometer and find it helpfully for quick judgments on borderline films, or to tell me when my preconceptions about a film are way off one way or the other. It's very useful at the extremes; less so in the 50-60% range.

If for nothing else, it's good to read a breadth of reviews which are easy to hand.

And considering Inception is still #9 on IMDB, collective opinions on the Internet really can't be taken too seriously.

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The only thing Rotten Tomatoes is good for is the Rotten Tomatoes, warning alerts for the bombs. To use it as a precise numerical evaluation of a movie's value is silly.

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It's not like any other studio printed false reviews to promote their movies right?


RIGHT?!?!?!?!?!

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Suspect's Reviews

Thanks for recommending Metacritic. I am finding myself agreeing with the percentages more often than not. Thank you to all of the wise fellows who have helped me realize the folly of my Rotten-Tomatoes-dependent ways. Even if it in turn shined a spotlight on my full frontal n00bity.

Something to note is how they do take time to post certain reviews. In the case of Thor which held a 90% until about Saturday, and it's now currently at 78%. Not that I followed that particular case much, a lot of reviews come in on Friday.

I think the positive reviews are real, and just responding to what sounds like a much more self-aware, trying-less-to-be-serious vibe. So, we can still trust their rating system.

Don't really see how an aggregating type of site can be influenced, As a reader of reviews, I am more skeptical sites/publications with single reviewers taking money under the table

Does anybody really care about the credibility of a site called Rotten Tomatoes?

Sure. They're a pretty decent aggregator and lots of people (myself included) use RT as a rough guide. I don't trust them much between 40 and 60%, but at the extremes it's rarely wrong. And, of course, on some level their credibility is merely that of whatever critics they list.

Looking at the poor reviews for Green Lantern, I don't think WB is doing any tampering (yet).

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