Going to share more bits from the article which I definetly think is worth a read :
"Flipping this coin over, though, we can find plenty of cases of bandwagon pile-ons, with reviews growing increasingly negative and accusatory toward a film, a filmmaker, a studio, or even the fanbase of a given franchise. There was a time when entertainment writers at major outlets were literally publicly calling for reviewers to write negative reviews of Christopher Nolans movies to teach his fans a lesson, based purely on supposed principle of preventing too much praise for the director and thus too much validation of his fans. There are film critics who posted bad Rotten Tomato ratings before they even saw a movie, publicly admitting they did it just to troll fans whom the reviewer felt were out of line (one such critic was booted from Rotten Tomatoes after his actions were publicized and many other writers myself included alerted the site to the abuse of the Tomatometer).
2013′s The Lone Ranger suffered a prolonged negative narrative that began when the film was still in production, and that bad buzz turned into outright hostility in the press. Reviews didnt just disapprove of the film, they acted offended at its very existence. Online reviewers in particular engaged in a game of one-upsmanship to see who could write a snarkier headline or pull-quote bashing the film. Similar such things have happened before, when the first many reviews set the tone and the rest of the press are afraid to deviate too far from the established official artistic sensibilities of that narrative.
Its hard to just point to this or that frenzied media reaction and declare one is legitimate and another isnt. However, we draw lines in the world every day of our lives. The words hyperbole and bandwagon exist for a reason, they have definitions and we apply them when the conditions appear to justify it. To use an earlier example, we all recognize that yes, of course the Gore the exaggerator narrative during the 2000 presidential election was disingenuous and lazy, and is a clear example of the press grasping a cheap, simple idea and piling on with it. And while assessing art is of course about subjective taste, there are also operating truths and realities about technique and skill and craftsmanship and about the role of observers who have enough history and varied experience to offer more informed critiques and analysis that can be reasonable guides in allowing us to take certain claims of subjective opinion less seriously than others. If someone tells me The Godfather is a bad film but Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2 is a masterpiece of cinematic art, then Im not going to take their opinions seriously at all, and Id argue they are as close to objectively wrong as artistic opinion can get.
Thats an extreme example to make the point that there are lines we would all surely admit exist, and the question then becomes how much hyperbole or outrageous claims cross a line. You may not agree with me about every instance, and I may not agree with your examples every single time, but I bet wed find at least some common ground regarding certain more overt examples.
Suicide Squad wasnt liked by everyone, and thats okay. It clearly wasnt even liked by a majority or plurality of viewers, and thats okay, too. The film like most films has flaws, and things that appeal to me might not appeal to you. If every single other review besides my own had been negative, that alone wouldnt even prompt me to view the media coverage with skepticism. What does give me pause, however, is when I see headlines of increasing extreme assertions, claiming the film is one of the worst movies of all time, that it is possibly the most disappointing film ever made, that it is an insult to the concept of art and cinema, that its not even an actual movie, and so on.
Really? More disappointing than, just for one example that instantly jumps to mind as a reasonable counter-example, The Godfather Part III? Or The Color of Money (a sequel to The Hustler
written by Richard Price
with Paul Newman reprising his iconic role
staring new up-and-coming movie star Tom Cruise
directed by Martin Scorsese)? Anticipation and expectation were so high for a super-villain comic book movie that it trumps those and other examples? Not most disappointing this year, mind you most disappointing ever, in the history of cinema. Likewise, the claim that its not even a real movie, and that doesnt have an actual story at all, is ridiculous to the point of seeming like mere satirization of precisely the sort of exaggeration it actually is. And anyone who honestly thinks its the worst film of all time or even on the shortlist of contenders needs to see more films, apparently.
So intense has the bashing become, the press was caught up in the grip of flop fever. Despite Suicide Squad opening to record-breaking numbers, media reports focused on the Friday-Saturday drop as the most important part of the weekend performance. When it set a record for the biggest first Monday in August, the reports noted it was a larger percentage Sunday-Monday decline than a host of other films, ignoring the fact most of the comparisons were to movies opening in earlier summer months when weekday box office tends to be much higher or on holiday weekends where Mondays enjoyed an added boost from vacationers.
So it is that we went from bad reviews to articles seeming to try to one-up each other in how badly they could malign the film and how extreme could be their claims about its lack of any artistic merit, and that led right into coverage that paid more attention to rumors and negative what if the bottom falls out? scenarios than the actual numbers coming in day after day. Negativity snowballed, and meanwhile the increasing exaggerated claims plus the contradiction between financial data and press focus on gloom-and-doom prognosticating created a snowballing perception among fans that their worst fears of an anti-DCU bias were legit after all. This latter development in fan perceptions arises partially from the fact fans seem to latch onto negative news or bad rumors faster and with more intensity these days than positive news, so they often dont notice the many positive articles and neutral press coverage since those reports are overshadowed by doomsaying headlines elsewhere that attract more attention. The negativity is real and frequent, but the margin between negative and positive coverage is really more narrow than it appears to fans.
More to the point, I dont feel the overall bad press coverage and exaggerated behavior is due to some sort of anti-DCU conspiracy or even any general dislike for DC among the critics. Its simply the way the press works when a negative story gets traction early on and the rest of the press join in. The process favors piling on, so thats what happens, and when the press smell blood they are likely to pounce, so after the negative reactions to Batman v Superman proved so successful at generating more readership, inertia kicked in and the first set of negative reviews for Suicide Squad linked up with the prior negativity and it spoke to a larger narrative the press could latch onto. If this had been a couple of Marvel films, or some other set of franchises, the same concepts would apply and the same outcomes could have happened. So fans should move past accusations of pro-Marvel bias or whatever conspiracy theories they suspect exist, because I assure you that you need look no further than simple typical media trends and reactions to explain whats going on here some of the time although not all of the time, or even most of the time, since I really want to drive home the point that both sides of this equation go too far in their pronouncements of (a) existence of unreasonable bias or (b) total lack of any possible ulterior press motives or bad media trends.
Most reviewers do a good job of articulating why they like or dislike a film, and most do so with honesty and integrity. Likewise, most fans are not rushing to start petitions to silence everyone who dislikes things the fans like, nor do most fans resent the very existence of opinions that differ from their own. But lazy journalistic tendencies do exist, bandwagons and negative narratives are a very real part of press coverage, and denying it merely makes the press seem untrustworthy or incapable of recognizing their internal problems. Fans meanwhile have to recognize the bad actors in their own midst, be less reactionary about bad reviews and less accusatory of the media, and be willing to admit that people can love characters and comics while also criticizing the cinematic adaptations.
Some of the writers giving Suicide Squad the worst coverage might simply be suffering from burnout from having to chase after the blockbuster superhero genre month after month just to stay current and relevant and so might have less enthusiasm for these films late in the year than most other folks. Im lucky, I love this genre imagine, though, if you were a film reviewer who didnt like a genre much, but whose editors insisted you spend a great deal of your time watching that genre and finding ways to attract more readers to more articles about that genre. Everyone, even professional filmmakers and film reviewers, have preferences and dislikes, and there is a tipping point where you feel overwhelmed or just flat-out tired of something after a while. Fair or not, it happens, and it doesnt mean someone is a bad person or mean or has an ulterior motive to try to intentionally harm a film you or I love."
