The 15 Worst Movies Of 2024

When it comes to picking the worst movies of the year, there are an abundance of options. The advent of streaming has produced a, shall we say, steady stream of critically reviled garbage that racks up views before disappearing from the algorithm forever. If you've already forgotten such titles as "Lift," "Atlas," and "Trigger Warning," you're not alone: it's likely that even those film's stars — Kevin Hart, Jennifer Lopez, and Jessica Alba, respectively — have forgotten them as well. Yet it almost feels like punching down to target these already memory-holed classics. When it comes to naming the year's worst films, you've gotta aim higher.

There are few experiences as demoralizing as watching some of our brightest stars and biggest directors waste their time on lackluster material, yet year after year, there are a handful of examples of just that. No one sets out to make a bad movie, but even the most talented among us stumble every once in a while. And when the mighty fall, they fall hard. Here are the worst movies of 2024, based on Rotten Tomatoes scores, box office numbers, and everything in between.

Cast: Henry Cavill, Bryce Dallas Howard, Sam Rockwell, Dua Lipa, Samuel L. Jackson

Director: Matthew Vaughn

Rating: PG-13

Runtime: 139 minutes

Where to watch: Apple TV+

The marketing campaign for "Argylle" hinged on a question the movie promised to answer: who is the real Agent Argylle? The fictional one is the star of a popular spy novel series cooked up by author Elly Conway (Bryce Dallas Howard), who suddenly finds that real life is imitating the plot of her next book, meaning there must be an actual Agent Argylle. Although the trailers hyped this up as a major twist, it was spoiled years ago by a tweet announcing the project. It ultimately didn't matter, though, as audiences couldn't have cared less about the real Argylle's identity by the time this overblown franchise non-starter finally opened and bombed at the box office.

Critics were even less enthused about the $200 million flop than audiences were. Helmed by "Kingsman" director Matthew Vaughn and featuring the likes of Henry Cavill, Sam Rockwell, Dua Lipa, and Samuel L. Jackson, it featured "enough plot twists to make a daytime soap blush," wrote Jake Coyle of The Associated Press, and "shows just how little that can add up to."

Cast: Cate Blanchett, Kevin Hart, Jack Black, Arianna Greenblatt, Jamie Lee Curtis

Director: Eli Roth

Rating: PG-13

Runtime: 101 minutes

Where to watch: Available to rent or buy via VOD

You could probably count on one hand the number of good movies that have been adapted from video games, and "Borderlands" isn't one of them. A sort of "Guardians of the Galaxy" meets "Mad Max," it centers on a ragtag group of misfits, led by bounty hunter Lilith (Cate Blanchett), who get into adventures on the raucous planet Pandora. It was directed by Eli Roth, who has tried to branch out from the extreme horror of "Hostel" and "Cabin Fever" into more mainstream fare. But based on the anemic critical and commercial response to his latest outing — Looper's own review called it a boring slog through the wasteland — it might be a while before he puts away the fake blood again.

The film's failure feels even more pronounced at a time when shows like "The Last of Us" and "Fallout" have taken video game adaptations in exciting new directions. "It is, in no uncertain terms, a horrendous waste of time, talent, and pixels," wrote David Fear for Rolling Stone. "Not even the pleasure of seeing Blanchett twirling pistols and kicking ass can salvage this."

Cast: Bill Skarsgård, FKA Twigs, Danny Huston

Director: Rupert Sanders

Rating: R

Runtime: 111 minutes

Where to watch: Available to rent or buy via VOD

Remaking "The Crow" would seem blasphemous were it not for the fact that this latest version became so quickly nonexistent. The 1994 film about a rockstar who returns from the grave to avenge the murder of his girlfriend was forever marked by the premature death of its star, Brandon Lee, who died during filming when an improperly loaded prop gun misfired. Bill Skarsgård takes over the Lee role, and does his level best to pay tribute to the late actor while making the role his own. Yet as critics pointed out, no one could save this box office turkey.

While it certainly isn't sacrilegious to reinterpret James O'Barr's graphic novel for the 21st century, there doesn't seem to be much reason motivating this one other than brand recognition. "Instead of a bold new vision, 'The Crow' offers a confusing, uninteresting sleepwalk through a disjointed dream of a comic book movie," opined Meagan Navarro of Bloody Disgusting.

Starring: Brandy, Andrew Burnap, Neal Huff, Kathryn Hunter

Directors: Max Eggers, Sam Eggers

Rating: R

Runtime: 94 minutes

Where to watch: Available to rent or buy via VOD

The A24 horror film has become a brand unto itself, thanks to critical and commercial successes like "Hereditary," "Pearl," and "Talk to Me." Yet even the best batters strike out every once in a while, as was the case with "The Front Room." Brandy stars as Belinda, a pregnant anthropology professor whose elderly mother-in-law, Solange (Kathryn Hunter), moves in after her husband dies. The horrors of taking care of your near-invalid in-law are nothing compared to the strange occurrences that happen once Solange arrives.

"The Front Room" was directed by Max and Sam Eggers, whose brother, Robert Eggers, has quickly become one of independent cinema's leading horror auteurs with "The Witch" and "Nosferatu." Although you'd think the apple wouldn't fall far from the tree, it seems to have rolled down the hill a little bit. Reviews were mixed at best, with Tomris Laffly of Variety calling it, "A mean-spirited, gross-out hagsploitation exercise."

Starring: Zachary Levi, Lil Rel Howery, Jemaine Clement, Tanya Reynolds, Zooey Deschanel

Director: Carlos Saldanha

Rating: PG

Runtime: 90 minutes

Where to watch: Netflix

It took two full years for "Harold and the Purple Crayon" to make it to the screen, as filming began all the way back in spring of 2022. Given the response from critics and audiences, it might have been best to just keep it on the shelf. Adapted from the bestselling children's book by Crockett Johnson, it imagines the four-year-old Harold as a full-grown adult (played by Zachary Levi) who draws himself into the real world and learns some life lessons along the way.

The live action/animation hybrid aspires to be a modern day "Elf," right down to the casting of Zooey Deshanel as the widowed mother of a young boy (Benjamin Bottani) who befriends Harold. But as Katie Walsh of the Los Angeles Times pointed out, Levi is no Will Ferrell. "There's something deeply strange about his performance here," she wrote, "grinning and mugging with childlike wonder in a way that can only be read as disingenuous."

Cast: Jack Kesy, Jefferson White, Adeline Rudolph

Director: Brian Taylor

Rating: R

Runtime: 99 minutes

Where to watch: Available to rent or buy via VOD

Did you know there was another "Hellboy" reboot released this year? You'd think that Hollywood had learned its lesson after 2019's disastrous reimagining starring David Harbour, yet you'd be wrong. This time, it's Jack Kesy playing the giant red demon with a heart of gold, who works with a top secret branch of the U.S. government to take down a coven of witches living in the Appalachian Mountains.

Mike Mignola's Dark Horse comic was perfect material for Guillermo del Toro, the leading director of dark fantasy films for adult audiences. In all of the ways his two "Hellboy" movies succeeded, the two without his authorial voice failed. Critics scorned "Hellboy: The Crooked Man," which was reportedly made on the cheap and looked it. In the words of Leslie Felperin of The Guardian, "no amount of budget could make up for the sputtering mess of a script, or the dead-on-the-inside expressions of the cast."

Cast: Tom Hanks, Robin Wright, Paul Bettany, Kelly Reilly

Director: Robert Zemeckis

Rating: PG-13

Runtime: 104 minutes

Where to watch: Available to rent or buy via VOD

Few films have had as lasting a cultural impact as "Forrest Gump," even if modern reassessment hasn't always been kind. So there was a great deal of curiosity surrounding "Here," which reunited that Oscar-winner's main creative team: director Robert Zemeckis, screenwriter Eric Roth, and stars Tom Hanks and Robin Wright. Yet this adaptation of Richard McGuire's graphic novel, which spans centuries of history from the vantage point of one fixed perspective on a single spot of land, failed to live up to its starry pedigree.

Zemeckis has been more focused on technology than storytelling as of late, and the film's technical prowess can't compensate for its narrative deficiencies. A story of multiple families (and even a few dinosaurs) who occupy the same home throughout generations, the film was a critical and commercial failure. "It's a bold formal choice to regard the world through a fixed point in space," wrote Alison Willmore for Vulture, "and, unfortunately, it's all in service of the biggest pile of schmaltz you'll see this year."

Cast: Joaquin Phoenix, Lady Gaga, Brendan Gleeson, Catherine Keener, Zazie Beetz

Director: Todd Phillips

Rating: R

Runtime: 138 minutes

Where to watch: Available to rent or buy via VOD

Given the massive success of the first "Joker," no expense was spared in bringing its sequel to the screen. But all the money in the world couldn't keep "Joker: Folie à Deux" from tanking so hard with critics and audiences that a third film would be unfathomable. If the first "Joker" was inspired by "Taxi Driver" and "The King of Comedy," this jukebox musical in which Arthur Fleck (Joaquin Phoenix) falls in love with Lee Quinzel (Lady Gaga) while on trial for his murder spree is indebted not only to "New York, New York," but apparently to the "Seinfeld" series finale as well.

"Folie à Deux" feels almost like a repudiation of its predecessor, a cinematic middle finger to the fans who helped "Joker" gross $1 billion worldwide and the Oscar voters who showered it with trophies. In likening it to another franchise directed by Todd Phillips, Kyle Smith of The Wall Street Journal wrote, "The falloff in quality from 'Joker,' a genuinely searing innovation in comic-book movies, to this one is so steep that it's comparable to the dropoff between 'The Hangover' and 'The Hangover Part II.'"

Cast: Dakota Johnson, Sydney Sweeney, Isabela Merced, Celeste O'Connor, Tahar Rahim

Director: S.J. Clarkson

Rating: PG-13

Runtime: 116 minutes

Where to watch: Netflix

Long before "Madame Web" hit theaters, a particularly cringe-worthy line of dialogue from its trailer went viral. Even if you haven't seen this critically-reviled superhero flick, you've at least heard Dakota Johnson say, "He was in the Amazon with my mom when she was researching spiders right before she died." If nothing else, "Madame Web" might become a camp classic where fans show up just to shout that back at the screen. But given its paltry box office returns, there's little hope that this origin story — about a clairvoyant paramedic named Cassandra Webb (Johnson) who must save three future Spider-Women (Sydney Sweeney, Isabela Merced, Celeste O'Connor) from an evil explorer (Tahar Rahim) — will become a full-blown franchise.

With a ridiculous ending and contrived connection to the Spider-Verse, "Madame Web" shows the waning fortunes of the once-dominant superhero movie genre, of which only one 2024 release — "Deadpool and Wolverine" — was a hit. "If there's one positive, it's that Madame Web is so completely forgettable, it's unlikely to do any damage to the cast's career prospects going forward," said Hannah Strong of Little White Lies.

Cast: Dwayne Johnson, Chris Evans, Lucy Liu, J.K. Simmons

Director: Jake Kasdan

Rating: PG-13

Runtime: 123 minutes

Where to watch: Prime Video and in theaters

Creating a new Christmas classic brings with it the prospect of financial dividends that could last decades, so it's easy to understand why Dwayne Johnson would want to make "Red One." Considering that it's failed to crack $100 million at the domestic box office, however, it's hard to imagine many families making this an annual holiday tradition, especially considering the reviews were ho-ho humdrum. 

The action flick, about the North Pole's head security honcho (Johnson) joining forces with a bounty hunter (Chris Evans) to save Santa Claus (J.K. Simmons) from kidnappers, was already plagued with bad press before it even opened over Johnson's on-set behavior, which reportedly caused the budget to inflate to $250 million. Setting that aside, there's still an abundance of excess to this yuletide misfire that throws everything at the wall in place of a compelling story. As Zachary Lee of RogerEbert.com put it, "It's all gaudy wrapping with no substance," making it the worst possible Christmas present.

Cast: Lewis Pullman, Makenzie Leigh, Alfre Woodard, John Benjamin Hickey, Bill Camp

Director: Gary Dauberman

Rating: R

Runtime: 113 minutes

Where to watch: Max

If there's one constant in American moviemaking, it's adaptations of Stephen King novels. There's hardly a King book that hasn't been brought to the screen, some multiple times and in various formats. His 1975 horror novel "Salem's Lot" has been adapted three times now, first as a 1979 miniseries, then a 2004 miniseries, and again as a feature film that debuted on Max this year. Given the middling critical response to this latest version, it's possible we might see another one in the future. 

Lewis Pullman plays the King surrogate, Ben Mears, an author who returns to his hometown of Jerusalem's Lot. Although he's in search of inspiration for a new novel about his childhood, he instead finds a vampire preying on the locals. "'Salem's Lot isn't a disaster," penned Jacob Oller of The A.V. Club, "but a bloodless and frail version of the story drained of its vitality." In a new golden age of elevated horror, being just good enough isn't good enough anymore.

Starring: Casey Affleck, Laurence Fishburne, Emily Beecham, Tomer Capone, David Morrissey

Director: Mikael Håfström

Rating: R

Runtime: 108 minutes

Where to watch: Available to rent or buy via VOD

In "Slingshot," Casey Affleck plays John, an astronaut aboard a spacecraft headed towards one of Saturn's moons. As the crew awakens from hibernation in preparation for a "slingshot" around Jupiter, another astronaut (Tomer Capone), becomes convinced that the ship is incapable of completing its mission, and tries to organize a mutiny against the captain (Laurence Fishburne). John's own grip on reality begins to unravel as he sees hallucinations of his girlfriend (Emily Beecham), who's back on Earth.

All of this has the makings of a great science fiction thriller, but the results are as sleep-inducing as a hibernation pod. Audiences stayed away in droves from the critical misfire, which was dumped into theaters to little fanfare. "Unfortunately, even Affleck can't fill the vacuum in between all the predictable beats and the insufferable series of twists and reveals that undercut any empathy for the characters," wrote Richard Whittaker of The Austin Chronicle.

Cast: Harriet Slater, Adain Bradley, Avantika

Directors: Spenser Cohen, Anna Halberg

Rating: PG-13

Runtime: 92 minutes

Where to watch: Netflix

Horror movies are a reliable moneymaker regardless of quality, as evidenced this year by "Tarot." Abysmal reviews didn't scare away diehard genre fans, although its low overall gross hints that they weren't exactly inspired to recommend it to their friends. The setup is fairly simple: a group of hot young people play around with a deck of tarot cards and unwittingly unleash an evil force that kills them one by one. It's the same basic premise that's been used and reused in horror outings ranging from "A Nightmare on Elm Street" to "Final Destination," though rarely has it been botched this badly.

As Anna Bogutskaya of Empire put it, "'Tarot' is a personality-less horror that doesn't overly concern itself with either character or plot. It's here to deliver one thing and one thing only: cool kills." Unfortunately, the kills delivered aren't cool enough to make up for that deficiency.

Cast: Jerry Seinfeld, Melissa McCarthy, Jim Gaffigan, Hugh Grant, Amy Schumer

Director: Jerry Seinfeld

Rating: PG-13

Runtime: 97 minutes

Where to watch: Netflix

God only knows what compelled Jerry Seinfeld to make "Unfrosted," save for his lifelong love of breakfast cereal. Perhaps he felt he needed a greater creative challenge in his post-"Seinfeld" days than simply grabbing coffee with comedians in cars. Either way, his big-budget satire that portrays the creation of the Pop-Tart with all of the importance of the space race is a perplexing enterprise indeed.

"Unfrosted" has no shortage of talent, as every comedy star under the sun came out to work for the man who (along with Larry David) redefined the sitcom forever. Unfortunately, the jokes — which are all over the place to begin with — are as stale as a day-old toaster pastry. Critics were unkind to Seinfeld's directorial debut, which David Ehrlich of IndieWire called "the cinematic equivalent of a kid mixing every cereal from his parents' cupboard into a giant salad bowl with the hope that a splash of milk will magically blend the various flavors into something palatable."

Cast: Dakota Fanning, Georgina Campbell, Olwen Fouéré, Oliver Finnegan

Director: Ishana Night Shyamalan

Rating: PG-13

Runtime: 102 minutes

Where to watch: Max

2024 was the year of the Shyamalans, as two of M. Night Shyamalan's daughters made splashy movie debuts. While singer-songwriter Saleka played a pop star in her dad's latest movie, "Trap," her sister, Ishana Night Shyamalan, made her directorial debut with "The Watchers." Although the critical response to Ishana's film is unenviable, she should take comfort in her father's own career ups-and-downs and see that there's always room for improvement.

The setup of "The Watchers" is right in the Shyamalan wheelhouse: Dakota Fanning plays Mina, a young artist who gets stranded while traveling through the woods in Ireland. She finds refuge in a cabin with three strangers (Georgina Campbell, Olwen Fouéré, Oliver Finnegan) who are terrorized by mysterious creatures. As is the case with her dad's movies, there's a great deal of atmosphere and a twist ending, as well as the kind of screenwriting choices that have often infuriated his detractors. "Ishana may well have a shining career in horror ahead of her," wrote Colleen Morrissey of The Chicago Reader, "if she can escape the narrative sins of her father."