It's April Fools Day, and if I'm going to do a "worst of" list, it's going to be today. First, I should include the caveat that I'm not a professional critic and not obligated to watch the real bottom-of-the-barrel dreck that I do my best to avoid. At the same time, I'm not going to go for the obvious choices, like Disney's live-action "Snow White" and Amazon's "War of the Worlds," because you already know that they're terrible. Instead, I'm going to focus on more low-profile examples of very bad movies you may stumble across by accident. Here we go.
Havoc - This made the list because somebody might see that there's a new Gareth Edwards film starring Tom Hardy, and think that they're in for a movie like Edwards' "The Raid" films. Unfortunately, the long-delayed "Havoc," shot all the way back in 2021, is not anything close. It's a chaotic, barely coherent mobster movie with a couple of decent action scenes, but utterly hopeless plotting. How were the performances? I couldn't tell.
Opus - Ayo Edibiri had a tough 2025. While "After the Hunt" and "Ella McKay" may have disappointed, "Opus" was clearly the worst thing she appeared in last year. Written and directed by a first time filmmaker, this wacky cult film starts off well enough with John Malkovitch as the charismatic leader/pop star, but quickly falls apart as the plot turns into a series of absurd trials and sketches. Was it supposed to be funny? I wasn't laughing.
Love Hurts - It ticks me off that we have two recent Academy Award winners, Ke Huy Quan and Ariana DeBose, and the best project they can get to star as the leads in is this very substandard action-comedy. I don't want to pile on too much because it's clear that there was some effort put into the action and fight scenes. However, it doesn't cohere at all, and I'm worried that Quan's not going to get more chances as a leading man.
Wolf Man - I wonder if the whole elevated horror trend has gone too far. Why does the new version have to be about generational trauma? Just because the new "Invisible Man" was about gaslighting, do all the monster movies have to be social commentary now? Is the werewolf as a metaphor for primal rage just not enough anymore? Anyway, it was rough seeing Christopher Abbott and Julia Garner floundering through this mess.
Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning - There are some defenders out there who point out that the two big action sequences in "Final Reckoning" are very impressive and thrilling to watch. However, the rest of the movie is still bad, especially a first hour that is composed entirely of montages, flashbacks and way too much exposition. I like having Rolf Saxon back, it's just not worth the aggravation to get to the few scenes that work.
Playdate - I really shouldn't have watched this. I don't like Kevin James movies in general, but I thought it was worth giving Alan Ritchson a shot. Boy do I regret it. Ritchson is playing the kind of aggro numbskull whose tough-love parenting tactics should have instantly attracted the ire of every Karen in earshot, and the whole movie makes a joke out of fatherhood in a way that's very unpleasant. Even "The Family Plan 2" managed better.
Oh. What. Fun. - I don't know what Michael Showalter and this overqualified cast were thinking with this premise. A mom's response to being accidentally left behind on a holiday outing is to shame her family on national television? If it were a darker, more astringent kind of comedy it might have worked, but instead this rarely strays far from the tone of your typical holiday streaming movie. At least Joan Chen is still getting work.
The Old Guard 2 - Finally, the most disappointing sequel of the year was "The Old Guard 2," which managed to recruit Uma Thurman as a new baddie, but jettisoned everything we liked about the first film. The lore makes no sense, the plot ties itself in knots, and to make matters worse, the ending just sets up a third film and calls it a day. I don't think we're getting that third film, by the way.
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