Netflix gets an epic new number-one movie - just don't look at the reviews

Zack Snyder is back. The second part of his Rebel Moon sci-fi epic, Rebel Moon - Part Two: The Scargiver is here, and is easily the most popular movie on Netflix right now.

The film is comfortably the most-watched Netflix movie across the world right now, although its key rival is the unlikely-sounding Woody Woodpecker Goes to Camp, according to Flixpatrol.

Scargiver’s arrival has also given the original Rebel Moon - Part One a short in the arm too, seeing it rise to fifth on the chart globally. Viewers are particularly keen in Nigeria, apparently, where the Rebel Moon films currently occupy the two and second slots.

The original peaked at 34 million views in a week, but will this second part match the original?

Here’s where the Rebel Moon story gets a little less rosy. The original film did not receive great reviews, and neither has the sequel.

While early social media reviews suggested Rebel Moon - Part Two: The Scargiver would be an improvement upon the original, it has actually ended up with a worse overall rating.

Part one has a 21% freshness score at Rotten Tomatoes, compared to 18% for the sequel. Yikes. However, Metacritic tells a slightly more rosy story, as The Scargiver has an aggregate score of 36%, compared to 31% for the original.

So what, if anything, went wrong with Rebel Moon?

Vulture says it’s the combination of being a clear take on well-trodden ideas (Star Wars, basically), matched with a general lack of excitement. “There’s nothing original about Rebel Moon. But in a genre with such well established beats, that at least feels more forgivable than the fact that it also has nothing resembling a pulse,” it says.

Variety says the movie should probably have been a single two-hour movie, not a pair of them. “Put “Part One” and “Part Two” together, and it’s clear that “Rebel Moon” is a four-hour movie that could have been told in two hours. It’s not really “epic” — it’s just stretched-out,” it says.

Digging deep for a more positive take, we come to HeyUGuys’s 3-star review, which still is far from stellar.

“While an improvement on Part One, a feisty cast and genuinely impressive action scenes don't make up for the emotional void at the heart of the film. Snyder's fans will eat it up, everyone else will be left wanting something more substantial,” it concludes.

Despite the Rebel Moon movies’ poor reception, there has been chatter about more from this series from Snyder himself.

However, we may at least get a break from Rebel Moon even if the Netflix execs are game for more of his Star Wars knock-off movies.

In an interview with Digital Spy, Snyder suggested he might alternate between the Army of the Dead and Rebel Moon franchises. Who’s still up for Army of the Dead 2?

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