Dismal reviews of Will Smith’s new sci-fi film Bright failed to put off Netflix fans as more than 11 million users streamed the movie in its first three days of release.
The fantasy buddy cop action-comedy stars Will as a Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) officer forced to partner with a mystical orc, played by Joel Edgerton, to hunt down a nuclear weapon everyone is prepared to kill for.
Bright, which was made on a $90 million budget, launched online and in select theaters on 22 December (17), and despite being savaged by critics, it proved to be a popular pick among Netflix viewers in the U.S. in its launch weekend (22-24Dec17), according to Nielsen estimates.
The report suggests Bright was a more popular viewing choice for Netflix customers than the second season of royal drama The Crown, but not as hot as season two of supernatural thriller Stranger Things, which averaged 15.8 million viewers upon its release in October (17).
The willingness of film fans to check out Bright for themselves has helped director David Ayer clock up an 89 per cent audience-approval score for the movie on review site Rotten Tomatoes, a stark contrast to the poor 26 per cent rating given by critics.
And that’s good news for Netflix officials as they had already ordered a sequel prior to Bright’s release, with Smith set to return as leading man.
