There's a new number one Netflix movie - just don't read the reviews

There’s a new hit movie at Netflix, topping the charts both at stat aggregator Flixpatrol and Netflix’s Tudum portal.

What’s the movie? Zack Snyder’s Rebel Moon Part One: A Child of Fire, a sci-fi epic made for just a fraction the cost of a Star Wars movie. Snyder’s production budget for the two parts of the Rebel Moon series was reportedly $166 million.

It is the number one movie globally by quite some margin according to FlixPatrol, listed as the top movie in 73 countries on the day we write this.

Tudum suggests Rebel Moon Part One: A Child of Fire was watched approximately 24 million times, racking up 54.1 million hours viewed, between December 18 and December 24.

These opening figures beat recent releases like Reptile, They Cloned Tyrone and Old Dads, even if it's not close to the 88 million hour opening week of Extraction 2 earlier this year.

Rebel Moon Part One: A Child of Fire sees Sofia Boutella’s Kora mount a defence against the Imperium, in what is basically Snyder’s take on a sci-fi epic in the Star Wars mould.

Sounds promising, doesn’t it? Well, the critics were not keen.

Rebel Moon Part One: A Child of Fire sits at 25% fresh over at Rotten Tomatoes. And even one of the most positive reviews, from Globe and Mail’s Barry Hertz, calls it “inimitably watchable trash.”

Harsher reviews highlight its lack of originality, and how the sci-fi visuals and ideas are let down by a weak story that drags a bit.

If you're game for a bit of derivative sci-fi fun, you may well have a better time than the reviewers. And the Rotten Tomatoes audience score, while not stellar, is much stronger at 63%.

Will it all start to make sense and come together when the second part arrives? We have our doubts, but at least there’s not too long to wait for the conclusion.

Rebel Moon: Part 2 -- The Scargiver is due for release on April 19.

• Not keen? Check out the best movies on Netflix instead