While there are some “hard number” metrics to cite when it comes to how a movie is received, Rotten Tomatoes, Metacritic, IMDB, there’s one that gets circled back to more than others when it comes to audience reception: Cinemascore.
This usually measures what’s a “crowd pleaser,” skewing higher in terms of blockbusters a lot of the time as it tries to measure audience satisfaction. Now, Captain America has the lowest Cinemascore in MCU history, a B-, which may not sound that bad, but in context, it definitely is, especially when you see the overall chart. That would be:
A+
- The Avengers
- Black Panther
- Avengers: Endgame
A
- Iron Man
- Thor
- Captain America: The First Avenger
- The Avengers: Age of Ultron
- Guardians of the Galaxy
- Ant-Man
- Doctor Strange
- Spider-Man: Homecoming
- Thor: Ragnarok
- Black Widow
- Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings
- Spider-Man: No Way Home
A-
- Iron Man 2
- Thor: The Dark World
- Captain America: The Winter Soldier
- Ant-Man and the Wasp
- Captain Marvel
- Avengers: Infinity War
- Spider-Man: Far From Home
B+
- The Incredible Hulk
- Iron Man 3
- Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2
- Eternals
- Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania
- The Marvels
B-
- Captain America: Brave New World
As you can see, it’s the only one in the B- category, and this is a pretty stark difference with something like Rotten Tomatoes audience scores, which have an 80%. Notably this is even lower than every DCEU movie including ones like Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice and The Flash, which at least have Bs.
Initial box office receipts are pretty good, and better than other low-scored MCU movies, but this still has to be somewhat alarming for Marvel to have a movie received this poorly. As it stands, this is the third lowest scored film on Rotten Tomatoes, the lowest scored film on Metacritic and the lowest scored on Cinemascore now.
The film sets up Sam Wilson to lead The Avengers going forward, which will presumably be the case across Avengers Doomsday and Avengers Secret Wars. I actually think this may be okay given that the problem is not Sam Wilson himself, but the writing and directing of this movie, including marketing that gave away the entire big “twist” of the movie (Ross turning into Red Hulk) from day one. If Wilson’s Cap is better handled in the future, things could be fine. But still, this is not what Marvel or Disney wants to see with its brand new, important blockbuster.
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