Send in the clowns – aka, the people who allowed themselves to get excited for Joker 2, going by its worrying Rotten Tomatoes score.
Lest we forget, 2019’s Joker also suffered a steep drop from its initial acclaim. It won the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival and became an Oscars front-runner… and then more people saw it, transforming what seemed to be a hard-to-deny masterpiece into something a lot more divisive.
Joker: Folie à Deux also premiered in Venice, but the early word wasn’t as strong, initially landing at 58% on Rotten Tomatoes. That’s only 2% away from a Fresh rating, and remember: that doesn’t mean it’s the equivalent of a 5.8/10. It means 58% of critics’ reviews were deemed positive overall – that’s still over half!
However, as the hotly anticipated sequel gears up for release this weekend (October 4), an increasingly common takeaway has emerged from preview screenings: it’s not very good.
Joker 2 now has a Rotten Tomatoes score of 47%, dropping 11% over the past month. That’s based on over 90 reviews, so it’s a pretty firm score at this point.
The sequel takes place in the immediate aftermath of the first movie, with Arthur locked up in Arkham while he awaits his trial. He meets Lee (Lady Gaga, playing a version of Harley Quinn), and chaos ensues.
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In our review of Joker 2, we called it a “bitter pill to swallow [that] will largely be forgotten… while fun in spurts, its musical pivot is more of a detriment, leaving this half-baked idea entirely skippable.”
Yes, if you weren’t aware, Joker 2 is a musical. That sealed its fate as a polarizing follow-up, but from a quick scan of viewers’ reactions on X/Twitter, it may have larger issues.
“If you liked the first Joker, you will not like the sequel. If you did not like the first Joker, you will outright hate and despise Joker 2,” one user warned, while another called it a “shallow mess… it’s all wasted on a story actively wanting to put off fans of Joker.”
No spoilers here, but its ending is already proving to be contentious. “Just saw spoilers for the Joker 2 ending… what the actual f**k,” one user wrote, and another tweeted: “So did we all see the same ending to Joker 2 or am I dreaming?”
Joker 2 hits cinemas tomorrow, October 4. Find out if its age rating is suitable for kids, if Joker is connected to the Batman universe, and 10 movies like Joker you can watch before the sequel.
