Poll: Most Disappointing Summer 2016 Movies

Apropos of Shannon’s article earlier this week about how this has been the worst movie season in recent memory, let’s put it to a vote. Which movies from the summer of 2016 disappointed you the most?

The unofficial start of the summer movie season seems to get pulled earlier and earlier every year. For the purposes of this poll, I’m defining summer as the beginning of May until now. As a result, a few of the year’s most divisive films don’t qualify. ‘Batman v. Superman’ opened in March, and I just can’t see how that could be called summer.

I’ve tried to list most of the notable wide releases from the past three months. If I missed something, please vote Other and tell us in the Comments. A few of the options were actually pretty popular and acclaimed (including ‘Finding Dory’), but I figure somebody somewhere probably found them disappointing, so I included them.

I’ll have to sit this vote out as an interested observer. As usual, I didn’t get out to the cinema hardly at all this summer. The only movie on this list I saw was ‘Star Trek Beyond’, which I enjoyed for the most part. I won’t be able to form strong feelings about the others until I catch up with some of them on Blu-ray.

Vote for as many titles as you disliked.

Which Summer 2016 Movies Disappointed You?

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20 comments

    • Josh Zyber
      Author

      Shoot, I was looking at a release calendar that listed that one by a premiere date in April. Since people have already started voting, the best I can do now is add it to the bottom of the poll. Sorry.

  1. HuskerGuy

    Although I haven’t seen all of them, it was easily Suicide Squad for me. I went in with low expectations and it somehow managed to still disappoint. What a terrible, garbage movie.

    • NJScorpio

      I haven’t seen the majority of the movies on this list, but for me as well, ‘Suicide Squad’ disappointed without having seen it…purely because my only expectation was that it help boost the quality of the DC Cinematic universe.

  2. Alex Diestler

    I was the opposite on some of these. I have been pleasantly surprised by the movies I’ve seen this year, I genuinely enjoyed Civil War, Star Trek, and Ghostbusters (Kate McKinnon could make me laugh by reading a Windows 3.1 manual). Batman v Superman (I know it wasn’t technically a summer release, but I only saw it last week) and The Secret Life of Pets were my disappointments, and both for the same reason. They were both too bleak. Batman v Superman was almost a chore to watch for how dour and serious everyone was and Secret Life of Pets had a cast of ostensibly kid-friendly characters who were so cruel to each other that I couldn’t root for a single one of them.

    BTW, who was disappointed by Ben-Hur? Is it even out yet?

    • Chris B

      Agreed on the secret life of pets. From the trailers I expected the humor to be much more clever with some of the gags aimed at the adults much like Pixar’s movies. And there was definitely some overly-dark content that wasn’t appropriate in a kid’s movie at all.

    • Patient O.T.

      If you watched SNL, you’ LOVE McKinnon – ALL she does is READ….Cue Cards. She can’t even bother to learn her lines. She is awful.

    • William Henley

      I was very pleased with Ghostbusters, Star Trek and Pete’s Dragon, so I am with you on those.

      On the flip side, we had Independence Day, Warcraft, and Alice Through the Looking Glass.

      I missed all others at the theater, but I may pick up a few of these (at least in rentals) once they hit Blu / VOD.

  3. Lord Bowler

    My biggest disappointment was with Independence Day: Resurgence. I was really hoping for a fun action movie like the original, even as I expected it not to be as good as the original movie.

    I’ve not seen most of the movies on this list, as movies that don’t interest me, I wait for Netflix, etc.

    I enjoyed the following movies, despite being a little disappointed by them:
    ‘Warcraft’
    ‘X-Men: Apocalypse’

    I was not at all disappointed by:
    ‘Batman: The Killing Joke’
    ‘Captain America: Civil War’
    ‘The Legend of Tarzan’
    ‘The Shallows’
    ‘Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows’

    I still need to catch the following before their runs end:
    ‘Ben-Hur’ (I expect I’ll be disappointed by this as nothing could top the Charlton Heston Classic)
    ‘Jason Bourne’
    ‘Suicide Squad’
    ‘Star Trek Beyond’

  4. Shayne Blakeley

    I also haven’t made it to the theater much this summer, mostly because of the reviews and word of mouth on movies I otherwise would have jumped at (X-Men, Star Trek, Suicide Squad) which is disappointing in it’s own right. Although after voting that way I thought of a candidate for “other” I should have chosen, we went to see the Absolutely Fabulous movie, being big fans of the series and it’s now one of only three movies I’ve ever walked out of the theater on.

  5. Kram

    From this list I’ve only seen Ghostbusters and Star Trek.

    I was actually pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed Ghostbusters. It’s not a classic or anything (or even close), but it was fun and I laughed more than I expected.

    Star Trek was dumb, but I can’t say it was disappointing because I didn’t think I would like it. Actually, I probably liked it more than I expected to. It was easily my favorite of the newer ones.

  6. I chose the Netflix/Blu Ray answer. I find it hard to enjoy a movie at the theater with all the inconsiderate assholes out there. Playing with their phones, kicking your seat, crying babies, I could rant for quite a bit more but I’m done.

    • Patient O.T.

      It’s illegal- but I have often seriously considered getting a Cell phone jammer just because of the inconsiderate jerks at movies.

    • I’ve read this more than a few times in comments here and on movie message boards in general: apparently, some people like playing with their phone in the cinema. It’s something I never notice when I visit the theater. It makes me wonder: why would you look at your phone when you’ve just paid a lot of money for a movie ticket? Can’t you just watch the movie, and check your phone after the movie? (unless there’s an emergency)

  7. Csm101

    I saw five summer blockbusters: BFG, Finding Dory, Secret Lives of Pets, Ninja Turtles, and Ghostbusters. They were all enjoyable, and I went with my daughter to all of them but Ninja Turtles, so that was a fun experience. Ghostbusters could’ve of been funnier and Finding Dory left me a bit dissapointed although there were circumstances that didn’t allow me to completely get into the movie. Overall, I had a good time, but getting my ass to theaters is a lot harder lately. There were about four more movies I intended to see theatrically, but just couldn’t get motivated enough to do so. It will be a big blind buying season come this fall. I guess you could say I saw six of the summer movies as I did watch a bootleg of Suicide Squad. It was okay. Worst Joker I’ve ever seen. Luckily he wasn’t in the movie that much.

  8. Clark

    I’ve seen most of these movies, but chose not to see The BFG. I’m a huge Spielberg fan, but the trailers made this movie look like garbage.
    I can’t say I was disappointed by Warcraft, since I didn’t expect much from it. (And yes, it was very bad.)
    I kinda liked Ghostbusters and X-Men Apocalypse, and I really don’t understand all the hate for Alice Throught the Looking Glass, it was actually pretty good (better than Alice in Wonderland).
    To me, the greatest disappointment of the year – and of all times – is Independence Day 2. From the first five minutes of the movie, I could tell I was in for one of the worst experiences of my life. The story is dumb, nothing makes sense, and the actors don’t even try to be convincing. I was expecting something like Jurassic World – fun, energetic and with cool characters – but what I got was just a CGI fest with no heart, no soul, no logic and absolutely no fun.

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