Review aggregator, Rotten Tomatoes rates films. Due to its high number of ratings, the online tool is used by many people as a way to decide if a film is worth watching.
Films that rate high are listed as ‘Certified Fresh’ which means they are popular with critics. If a film rates low then it means that critics are not impressed with the film.
So, how do the Spider-Man movies fair on Rotten Tomatoes? Do they all score high and is there an average rating across the series?
In this post I am taking a look at 12 Spider-Man movies to see how well they perform on Rotten Tomatoes. I am using: Spider-Man (2002), Spider-Man 2 (2004), Spider-Man 3 (2007), The Amazing Spider-Man (2012), The Amazing Spider-Man 2 (2014), Captain America: Civil War (2016), Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017), Avengers: Infinity War (2018), Venom (2018), Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (2018), Avengers: Endgame (2019), and Spider-Man: Far From Home (2019).
The list of Spider-Man movies that I am using includes big screen tales which were made specifically for the cinema. This list runs from 2002’s Spider-Man, which was the first Spider-Man film produced solely for a theatrical release, up to Spider-Man: Far From Home (2019), to provide a flavour of the series.
Films that I have not included on the list are the 1970s Spider-Man movies (both US and Japanese), as these were originally television episodes that were repackaged as films. I have also not included the Lego Spider-Man movie shorts as these have not received a theatrical release.
OK, onto the first of two sets of Rotten Tomatoes ratings, which can provide information about what the critics think of the Spider-Man film series.
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Spider-Man movie ratings on Rotten Tomatoes – based on the opinions of movie critics
With every movie featured on Rotten Tomatoes, the website offers two ratings. The first – the Tomatometer – is a score taken from the combined percentage of a selection of critical opinions.
Here are the Spider-Man movie ratings, according to the Rotten Tomato Tomatometer:
- Spider-Man (2002) 90%
- Spider-Man 2 (2004) 93%
- Spider-Man 3 (2007) 63%
- The Amazing Spider-Man (2012) 72%
- The Amazing Spider-Man 2 (2014) 52%
- Captain America: Civil War (2016) 91%
- Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017) 92%
- Avengers: Infinity War (2018) 85%
- Venom (2018) 29%
- Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (2018) 97%
- Avengers: Endgame (2019) 94%
- Spider-Man: Far From Home (2019) 90%
As you can see, just over half of the films listed above (7/12) score over 90%, which is very impressive. Only one film rates below 50% and that is Venom, which has a score of 29%.
At a glance, the results are very encouraging and if you are new to the Spider-Man movie series you can see it rates quite high amongst critics. But what is the average rating?
Taking the percentages of all 12 and combining them together gives the series an average rating of 79% – which seems quite low considering the scores of more than half of the films, but there is a reason for this.
While the series boasts high ratings (Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, Avengers: Endgame, Spider-Man 2 etc), the lower performing films (The Amazing Spider-Man 2 and Venom) bring down the series average considerably.
OK, now let’s take a look at a different set of Rotten Tomato ratings.
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Spider-Man movie ratings on Rotten Tomatoes – based on the opinions of audiences
The second set of ratings to be found on Rotten Tomatoes are the audience scores. These scores are rated by the audience, and can often differ from the critical ratings.
- Spider-Man (2002) 67%
- Spider-Man 2 (2004) 82%
- Spider-Man 3 (2007) 51%
- The Amazing Spider-Man (2012) 77%
- The Amazing Spider-Man 2 (2014) 64%
- Captain America: Civil War (2016) 89%
- Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017) 87%
- Avengers: Infinity War (2018) 91%
- Venom (2018) 80%
- Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (2018) 93%
- Avengers: Endgame (2019) 91%
- Spider-Man: Far From Home (2019) 95%
As you can see from the list, the audience response to the Spider-Man movies does differ somewhat, with now only a third of the movies (4/12) achieving above 90%. It is also worth noting that the percentage for Venom is very different too, with audiences giving it 80% – which is a huge difference from the 29% that critics give it!
Taking the percentages of all 12 films and combining them gives the series an average rating of 80.58%. This is 1.58% higher than the Tomatometer average.
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To sum up
- Average Tomatometer rating across the series: 79%
- Average Rotten Tomatoes audience rating across the series: 80.58%
So, what does this tell us?
Well, despite there being differences between the critical reception of the movies and the audience reception, on average both the critics and the audience have a similar opinion of the films. The ratings fluctuate between the two lists, but they are largely within a few percent of each other.
Out of both lists, Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse and Avengers: Endgame score well with both critics and audiences alike. Venom is the only notable anomaly, which suggests audiences much preferred the film over the critics.
Overall, the films have a decent average percentage and this demonstrates consistency across the brand.
But what do you think? Do you think the critics get it right when it comes to rating Spider-Man films, or do you think the audience gets it right? Perhaps you think both are right? Whatever your thoughts, please share them in the comments section.
Read more:
- What is the Japanese Spider-Man movie & show?
- How old do you need to be to watch the Spider-Man movies?
- The best episodes of Spider-Man: The Animated Series
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