Top 10 Worst Netflix Movies of the Year So Far

There was quite a lot of hype for “Spaceman.” It has an all-star cast including the likes of Adam Sandler, Carey Mulligan, and Paul Dano (well, his voice). It was directed by Johan Renck, an Emmy-winning filmmaker who worked on the likes of “Breaking Bad” and “Chernobyl.” But yeah, it just did not work. “Spaceman” is endearing and well-intentioned enough, with some fantastic production design and admirable work from the talented cast. It was also plagued with iffy writing, underdeveloped characters, and some eyebrow-raising plot choices. That’s not to mention the mountain of cliches and painful pacing issues. We wanted it to shoot for the stars, but we’re settling for orbit.

Mack is a sports journalist wanting to settle down with the man of her dreams. That man is Nick, a war correspondent who recently got a job at her newspaper. So, instead of courting him with charm and friendliness, Mack decides to run some “plays” with her friends to win his heart. There’s one major problem with this movie. Mack is totally unlikable, both immature and kinda creepy. It also doesn’t help that the movie is formulaic as heck and riddled with tropes, including the age-old “girl realizes that she loves her best friend” ending. To think, this movie with a stalker for a protagonist was this year’s Valentine’s Day offering.

Oh, Seinfeld, how did it come to this? The legendary comedian continues his run of mediocre movies with “Unfrosted,” a stylized recreation of the Pop-Tart’s invention. Yes, the premise sounds a little dry, but with the right tone, style, and director, it definitely could have worked. Seinfeld attempted to do something fun with it, imbuing the film with iconic comedians, a wacky tone, and an eye-popping color palette with retro design. None of it really worked. Like a bad Pop-Tart, all the ingredients are there, but it didn’t come together to form a satisfying whole. Whether it was the easy jokes (cow farts, anyone?) or reliance on cameos over good writing, “Unfrosted” was, well, unfrosted.

Another Netflix rom-com, another movie riddled with genre tropes. To its credit, this one has a dash of originality, containing some fun magical elements. You see, Maddie loves Paul, who is marrying her best friend Emma. When Maddie finds a wishing bench and a magical fairy, she wishes that she was marrying Paul instead of Emma. That’s about where the fun stops. What follows is cliche after cliche, especially once Maddie starts falling for another man. With uninspired writing and a generally cheap appearance, these tropes aren’t given any juice. They’re just the same boring beats we’ve seen a thousand times before. But hey, at least Ireland is nice!

Director F. Gary Gray has a very solid filmography and is no stranger to helming smart, well-crafted thrillers. We don’t know what the heck happened here. “Lift” is about a group of thieves who are blackmailed into stealing gold from a moving airplane. The film desperately tries to be “Mission: Impossible,” with a ragtag group of professionals doing all sorts of scheming, fighting, and conniving to steal a valuable object from an impenetrable location. But it was made with a fraction of the talent. “Lift” is what would happen if you had ChatGPT write a heist film - a soulless mishmash of genre cliches and a plot that doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. Apparently, Netflix is also getting in on the doldrums of January.

Tyler Perry attempts to make a legal thriller. The results are exactly what you would expect. Kelly Rowland stars as Mea, a defense attorney who takes the case of Zyair Malloy, an artist accused of murdering his girlfriend. Yawn. Like rom-coms, legal thrillers are a dime a dozen, and you’ve seen far better versions of “Mea Culpa” before. The movie looks pretty enough, but it’s plagued by bad writing that results in plot holes, stupid characters, a checklist story, and some absurd dialogue that you have to hear to believe. It’s reminiscent of all those trashy legal thrillers from the ‘90s - not campy enough, not good enough, impressing no one.

Like many movies before it, “Atlas” is about artificial intelligence turning on humanity and deciding that it needs to go. Enter Atlas Shepherd, who is called in to stop the robot uprising. While the film has two credited human writers, we wouldn’t be surprised if this was secretly the first case of AI writing a movie about itself. In any case, “Atlas” is as generic and lifeless as its writing. Unlike the character she’s named after, Jennifer Lopez cannot hold the weight that this role requires of her. “Atlas” is one of Netflix’s biggest swings of the year, but it’s a foul ball at best.

Look, we hate to criticize kids’ movies, but this one deserves it. This is a sequel to a movie that allegedly came out in 2017, but we have no recollection of that, and you probably don’t, either. This one sees the anthropomorphic bird getting into goofy shenanigans at a summer camp and attempting to stop the inspector who wants to shut it down. This is the type of cheap, straight-to-DVD movie that you throw on to distract the kids for ninety minutes. The type that gives kids’ movies a bad rap. If you’re over the age of five, “Woody Woodpecker Goes to Camp” has nothing for you, unless you want to see what Mary-Louise Parker has been up to.

We hate to say it, but Zack Snyder has sunk to a new low with his “Rebel Moon” series. The first movie was the national laughingstock of the Christmas 2023 season. We don’t know how, but “Part Two” made us laugh even harder. The story makes no sense, the writing is full of clunky exposition, and the acting does absolutely nothing to engage or elicit even the slightest bit of immersion. We admire Snyder’s ambition, but he really dropped the ball with this. Given the massive budget and universal derision, Netflix cannot be happy with their return on investment. Then again, apparently there’s four more movies coming, so maybe they are…

Don’t be fooled - this movie has nothing in common with “Father of the Bride” and is worse in every conceivable way. This one concerns Lana, a woman who learns that her daughter is marrying her ex-boyfriend’s son. It’s a little bit of everything - a cute comedy about letting go of your kid. A rom-com about rekindling lost love. A goofy “Meet the Parents”-esque romp with awkward situations. But you know what they say - jack of all trades, master of none. It’s yet another predictable movie full of cliches, which seems to be Netflix’s bread and butter as of late. Despite the presence of stars like Brooke Shields, Miranda Cosgrove, and Chad Michael Murray, it cannot jump over that “made by committee” hurdle.

Did you see any of these flicks? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below!