The reviews for Suicide Squad have come in and the critical reaction wasn’t good. Despite the hype the latest movie in the DCEU has currently mustered a 29% rating on Rotten Tomatoes and the backlash from fanboys has been swift with an online petition being formed calling for the website to be shut down. Because of this, we at Monkeys Fighting Robots will look at five notorious film-related petitions that have blighted the internet.
5. Ban the Wayans Brothers from Releasing Theatrical Films
First up is a petition set up by Korey Coleman, the creator of the defunct website Spill.com and current owner of the entertainment website and Youtube channel Double Toasted. Coleman was an animator and still reviews movies and he has set up a petition to stop the Wayans Brothers from releasing theatrical movies and force them to be released on the straight-to-DVD/VOD market.
Coleman’s justification is the Wayans Brothers could make a deal similar to what Adam Sandler did, and, as he quoted on Charge.org:
‘More importantly, with Marlon Wayans’ films going straight to home video, I will not have to endure any more of his spoofs in the theatre. I literally can’t take it anymore. I see this as a win-win for Wayans and critics who have the same sentiments as myself.’
The petition was set up in January 2016 and at the time of writing has received 1,000 signatures, 500 short off its target.
4. Stop Uwe Boll Directing
The oldest petition to make it onto this list was the petition to force the infamous Uwe Boll from releasing any new movies, and it was reported that Dr. Boll would have quit if the petition reached one million signatures.
Back in the mid-to-late noughties, Uwe Boll was the king of the bad movie, often buying up cheap game licenses and adapting them into films. He was churning out crap at alarming regularity, ranging from video game adaptations, horror movies, and vigilante flicks. He was able to fund his films using a German tax loophole where investors could use any lost investments as a tax write-off.
The petition was formed in 2008 and has now ended achieving 353,835 signatures in July 2012. Stride Gum even supported the petition, offering people who signed the petition a free pack of gum if the petition reached a million signatures by May 14, 2008.
The petition is now closed, but its seems it is no longer needed because Boll has fallen into obscurity – his movies no longer get the traction they once did and his crowd funding for Rampage 3 fell flat on its face.
3. Remove Zack Snyder from DCEU
Zack Snyder is a highly divisive director, the reviews and audience reactions to his movies can attest to that. His efforts on Man of Steel and Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice are the worst offenders where audiences are divided into two main camps – people who love or hate the movies.
Two petitions have been formed to stop Snyder from making any more movies in the DC Cinematic Universe. The first was started in the US calling on Zack Snyder to be replaced from directing the Justice League movies – the other came from India and demanded that he be removed from the DCEU entirely. The Justice League petition has over 17,498 signatures and the DCEU petition has 2,337.
These petitions have been unsuccessful, Snyder is directing Justice League and a trailer was released at Comic-Con and Snyder is attached as a producer on The Flash and Aquaman and has a story credit on Wonder Woman.
A counter-petition to keep Snyder as Justice League director was also formed on Change.org and has over 6,000 signatures.
2. PG-13 Deadpool
Earlier this year Youtube film critic Grace Randolph started a petition asking Fox to release a PG-13 cut of Deadpool. Her reasoning was the eight-year-old child of a fan was a superhero fan but was not allowed to go because it was R-rated. This petition quickly gained attention as reported on by many websites and Randolph was ridiculed for her stance – her Youtube video on the subject has 12,327 dislikes to the 1,672 likes.
The idea of a PG-13 Deadpool movie would have been an incredibly stupid idea because the character’s comic-book counterpart was very violent, crude and foul-mouthed and to anyone who has the Deadpool movie will know cutting it down to a PG-13 rating would have been a mammoth task.
Randolph has also gained a reputation for being a contrarian; she has often given good reviews to poorly received movies e.g. Jack and Jill and vice-versa. She also entered into a feud with film critic John Campea saying he was in the pay of Marvel Studios despite Campea giving Batman vs. Superman: Dawn of Justice a positive review.
1. Rotten Tomatoes Forced to be Shut Down
The dumbest film petition is also the most recent, the one calling on Rotten Tomatoes to be shut down. This is an example of fanboy whining at its worst with people crying out there is a conspiracy that Marvel have paid off critics to give their movies good reviews and their rivals poor ones. This ignores the fact that Suicide Squad has not even been released in theaters yet, so most audiences have not seen the movie. It also ignores other sites that collate movie reviews like Metacritic which gave Suicide Squad a 43% rating.
The petition and its founders ignore the fact that Warner Brothers used to own Rotten Tomatoes and still has a minor stake in the website – if there were a conspiracy it would have been more likely that Warner Brothers would have tried to manipulate critic’s scores in their favor.
The petition to shut down Rotten Tomatoes is the worst example of people wanting to suppress opinions of people who don’t agree with their viewpoint.
