Avatar: The Last Airbender was a hit animated series on the children's TV channel Nickelodeon. Hoping to piggyback on the success of the series, producers got to work on a live-action movie. M. Night Shyamalan was brought on as writer and director, so you already know this is going to end badly.
And end badly it did! Critics and viewers alike had a litany of complaints after watching the film--including bad acting, bad writing, and unfaithfulness to the source material. It ended up being one of Shyamalan's most-hated films, picking up a Razzie award for Worst Picture and a 5% score on Rotten Tomatoes.
I don't know if I would say that Adam Sandler has any "good" movies, but his work does at least exist on a spectrum of bad to worse. The 2011 film Jack and Jill might be his most heinous offense, though.
Starring Sandler as both Jack Sadelstein and his twin sister, Jill, the movie was basically a trainwreck from start to finish. Some critics did praise Al Pacino's performance, but it wasn't enough to keep the movie afloat. It ended up with a 3% Rotten Tomatoes score and a Razzie "win" for Worst Picture and Worst Actor.
Every entry in the Twilight saga was hot garbage, but only 3 of the 5 movies actually released in the 2010s. But among those--take your pick; they're all terrible.
In Twilight's defense, these were movies made for children based on books written for children, so cinematic greatness was going to be an uphill battle anyway. But that doesn't really excuse other aspects, like star Kristen Stewart's lifeless performance or the heavy doses of teen melodrama.
Movie 43 is an anthology comedy film, which makes it a little hard to describe its plot--there are just so many stories going on. But take comfort, dear reader, in the fact that almost each and every one of them was terrible. Even with big-name stars like Kristen Bell and Richard Gere, there was no saving this movie. In fact, Gere tried to get out of his acting obligations once he realized what a trainwreck this was going to be.
One movie critic described the film as "the Citizen Kane of awful," and we're inclined to agree. Being an anthology film, there was plenty of criticism to go around--which led to 10 of the 13 directors winning Worst Director at the 2013 Razzies and every screenwriter sharing the award for Worst Screenplay.
Poor Kirk Cameron is trying his hardest to spread the message of Christianity to the world, but he just can't seem to do anything besides beat his audience over the head with simplistic, saccharine morality tales. And Saving Christmas might be his worst attempt yet.
The 2014 film follows a fictionalized version of Cameron as he tries to put "the Christ back in Christmas," but his "heathen" audiences were having none of it. Heck, even several Christian critics tore him a new one for making the rest of the faithful look bad with his bad acting and hackneyed script. It was so bad, it managed a rare 0% rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
If you thought the movie adaptation of Twilight was bad, just wait til you see the movie adaptation of what was originally self-published Twilight fan fiction. We're of course talking about Fifty Shades of Grey.
Released in 2015, the movie has little to no plot besides its explicit scenes. I honestly don't know more than that and don't care to be enlightened. Nothing against what consenting adults want to do in their private time, but the bad pacing and laughable dialogue that filled the movie can't be explained away.
Obviously, since I am not a kid, I am not the target audience for a kid's movie. However, there are some kids movies that simply are so bad they need to be judged by kids and adults alike. One such movie is The Emoji Movie.
The film follows an emoji who wants to be a different emoji, so clearly, the stakes are sky high. And while the plot is nothing to write home about, many complaints centered around the fact that this was such a smartphone-centric movie being marketed to children. However you feel about plots or children, there's plenty to hate in this hot mess of a film.
The musical Annie has been turned into a movie a few times, but none were worse than the 2014 adaptation. Starring Cameron Diaz, Rose Byrne, and Jamie Foxx, Annie looked good on paper. There was a star cast, a tried-and-true story, what could go wrong?
Lots of viewers took issue with the message of commercialization that wasn't present in the original, and Cameron Diaz's performance was highly polarizing--with some loving her and some absolutely hating her. This was actually her last movie before retiring from acting. Did sweet Little Orphan Annie do her in? Stranger things have happened.
There have been so many superhero movies churned out recently that we forget them as quickly as we see them. In the case of 2015's Fantastic Four, that's probably for the best.
The film was panned as dull and joyless, which put it in direct contradiction with its comic book source material. And there were also several glaring continuity errors thanks to necessary reshoots. The movie was so bad that it tied with Fifty Shades of Grey for the Razzie for Worst Film.
If we're being super generous, the first Transformers movie was maybe kinda okay if you squinted at it right. But every sequel that followed was just the worst--especially Dark of the Moon.
While the special effects were impressive as always, its story, dialogue, and basically everything else was criticized. That seems to be a recurring problems for movies that are heavy on the CGI. In 2012 it was nominated for the Worst Picture Razzie, but was tragically beaten out by Jack and Jill.
Nicolas Cage? In a bad movie? I can barely wrap my head around the idea. But if you conveniently forget Outcast, The Wicker Man, Gone in 60 Seconds, and about 50 other movies, you're left with one of his worst--Left Behind.
Based on the apocalyptic Christian book series of the same name, Left Behind follows a group of people trying to survive after the Rapture. Christian or not, in practice the movie sounds like a pretty average apocalyptic thriller, but there was nothing pretty average about it--it was all pretty bad. The poor script and bad acting were primary targets, but critics pretty much tore everything about this movie apart.
When will Hollywood learn that live-action movies of cartoons never work? They apparently didn't get the message before Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles was released in 2014.
While the CGI turtles might be a little disturbing to look at, the real sin of this movie is that it's just so oppressingly boring. They are talking, anthropomorphic turtles and yet you'll still struggle to keep your eyes open through the whole thing. While it didn't take home the Razzie for Worst Picture, Megan Fox did pick up a "win" for Worst Actress for her role as April O'Neil.
Did the world really need a sequel to Paul Blart: Mall Cop? The genuis producers behind Paul Blart: Mall Cop 2 sure thought so!
Any marginally redeeming qualities the original may have possesed have been entirely stamped out in the sequel. Although Kevin James is not a terrible comedian, his shtick starts to wear thin by about...five minutes into the film. And while the movie did nag several Razzie nominations, it was so bland that it wasn't even bad enough to win them.
The original Zoolander was pretty silly itself, but it managed to amass quite the following. Unfortunately, Zoolander 2 just couldn't maintain the legacy of the first.
Even with a big budget and an all-star cast (including Ben Stiller, Kristen Wiig, and Will Ferrell), Zoolander 2 just couldn't keep it together long enough to manage to be funny. Many critics rightly pointed out that the movie wasn't as much a movie as it was a sequence of celebrity cameos.
Dirty Grandpa starred Robert De Niro and Zac Efron. An unexpected duo but those can make for the best comedy, right? Wrong.
The movie follows a grandfather and grandson on a spring break trip, and it tries to be an over-the-top gross-out comedy. The only thing it achieves, however, is gross. We truly hope De Niro is ashamed when he looks back at this movie, just like the rest of us are.
Let's get personal here for a minute--I am both a legitimate fan of the musical Cats and a fan of movies that are "so bad they're good." The 2019 movie adaptation of the musical should have been a match made in heaven for me, and yet, I still found myself walking out of the theater just as Jenifer Hudson began her anemic rendition of "Memory" at the end of Act 1.
Critics and audiences alike hated this movie on all fronts. Sure, the big problem is the creepy cat CGI, but that was far from its only flaw. I think its real problem was the tone of the movie--this is a musical where people sing and dance in cat costumes and yet they tried to make the film gritty and serious. Also, they had to alter the lyrics to "Old Deuteronomy" to account for the fact that Judi Dench is a woman. She's already a CGI cat, why not a CGI male cat?
There is no shortage of pandering nostalgia these days--it seems like every time you turn around there's a remake of a classic movie or a reboot of a beloved TV show. The 2015 flop, Pixels, tried (and failed) to hop on that obnoxious nostalgia bandwagon.
Incorporating lots of references to classic arcade games, Pixels is a movie about aliens invading earth. So that's a totally normal combo, right? Critics were brutal in their reviews, especially of Adam Sandler's performance, and audiences weren't much kinder, either. It currently has a 16% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
Clearly nothing is sacred to Hollywood or this awful 2013 remake of possibly the best Stephen King-inspired movie would never have been created. Someone needs to go to their closet and pray.
Chloe Grace Moretz isn't a terrible actor, but her angsty, "no one gets me" portrayal of Carrie was completely out of sync with the character's sheltered, pitiful personality. Carrie isn't just an outsider--she's a freak. And Moretz didn't seem to notice that distinction. On top of this awkward performance, the pace of the movie is just too slow and boring. When things start going to fall apart, you're likely to cheer, as it means you're almost done with this terrible remake.
Johnny Depp is playing an over-the-top, quirky character? Who could ever imagine such a thing? Just kidding, everyone can. But hopefully you've pushed 2015's Mortdecai deep down into the recesses of your mind.
This comedy thriller about art dealer didn't get any love from critics or audiences. It lost money at the box office, and was critically panned in a lot of publications. It was even nominated for the Razzie for Worst On-Screen Duo...and the nomination was for Johnny Depp and his fake mustache.
A Good Day to Die Hard ended the long-running Die Hard series. But it didn't go out with a bang--it went out with an embarrassing movie.
Audiences and critics really hammered the film for its unrealistic action scenes and cliched script. Action movies are sort of known for those two things, so that's really saying something that they stood out so much in this one in particular.
Greek hero Herculues has been portrayed in all sorts of questionable manners over the years, but none have been as unwatchable as The Legend of Hercules.
Critics and audiences pointed out all the iconic signs of a terrible movie--the acting was bad, the plot was dull, it lacked drama and action, etc. And it definitely didn't help that another Hercules movie had been released six months earlier--and it was much more well received.
We barely needed the original Hangover, much less two sequels that were decidedly even less funny. But between the second and third, The Hangover 3 is the clear loser.
What really puzzled audiences and critics was the fact that this movie seemed to be intentionally less funny thant the first two. It diverged from the iconic Hangover formula and was much more action and thriller oriented. The movie currently holds a 23% on Rotten Tomatoes.
Dumb and Dumber was a great movie...if you were a child in the 90s. Everyone else might have grown up, but Universal wanted another shot at immature humor. Thus, two decades later, Dumb and Dumber To was born.
For fans of the original, watching the sequel can be a little sad. It was one thing for Jim Carrey and Jeff Daniels act like morons when they're younger--it's not as fun when they're 50 years old and behaving the same way.
Unless you already like John Travolta or the mafia, you're probably going to hate Gotti. Heck, even if you love them both, you'll probably still hate this movie.
Travolta (and his definitely real hair) portrays notorious mob boss John Gotti in a biopic that was described as "pretty terrible." Not the most colorful way to say it, but it absolutely hits the nail on the head. Many viewers were most perplexed by the fact that Gotti was portrayed as kind of a nice family man, which maybe runs a bit off course from the real guy.
The Disappointments Room is one of only a few movies to have a "perfect" score of 0% on Rotten Tomatoes. But this isn't mob justice--it's totally deserved.
Like a lot of horror movies, you're hooked at first--mostly because you have no idea what's going on. But the film is never able to deliver any satisfying scares or revelations.
Its bizarre enough that they would want to remake a movie that only got middling reviews when it released. But what makes the Cabin Fever remake really awful is that it's almost identical to the original.
Like a lot of movies that feature young people terrorized in the great outdoors, you'll be rooting for their deaths by the end of this completely pointless exercise.
Poor Adam Sandler didn't have much luck with movies in the 2010s, but The Ridiculous 6 might be his worst work of the decade. It's another one with that rare 0% rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
The movie, which set out to satirize the Western genre, just ended up making everyone mad. Whether it was because people were upset about the portrayal of Native Americans or upset about the fact that it was just a slog of a movie, no one was smiling when the credits rolled.
