The original Joker from 2019 holds an impressive 89% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes, reflecting widespread viewer appreciation for Todd Phillips’s dark character study.
However, the 2024 sequel Joker: Folie à Deux tells a starkly different story, with audiences rating it at just 36-37%—a dramatic collapse that represents one of the most significant drops between franchise entries in recent cinema history.
This article explores what these scores reveal about both films, why audience reception diverged so sharply, and what Rotten Tomatoes audience scores actually tell us about a film’s quality and appeal.
The contrast between these two scores is particularly noteworthy because it shows how divisive the sequel became among viewers, with the audience score actually falling below the critics score—a reversal that happens relatively rarely and suggests the film disappointed more general audiences than it did professional reviewers.
- Audience Score Joker: Table of Contents
- How Did the Original Joker Perform with Audiences on Rotten Tomatoes?
- The Shocking Decline in Audience Reception for Joker: Folie à Deux
- What the Rotten Tomatoes Scores Actually Measure
- Understanding Why Audience Reception Diverged Between the Two Films
- The Broader Patterns Revealed by These Scores
- How to Interpret These Scores When Choosing Films
- What These Scores Tell Us About Cinema and Audience Preferences
- Conclusion
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Table of Contents
- How Did the Original Joker Perform with Audiences on Rotten Tomatoes?
- The Shocking Decline in Audience Reception for Joker: Folie à Deux
- What the Rotten Tomatoes Scores Actually Measure
- Understanding Why Audience Reception Diverged Between the Two Films
- The Broader Patterns Revealed by These Scores
- How to Interpret These Scores When Choosing Films
- What These Scores Tell Us About Cinema and Audience Preferences
- Conclusion
How Did the Original Joker Perform with Audiences on Rotten Tomatoes?
The 2019 Joker commanded significant audience enthusiasm, with its 89% audience score indicating that roughly 9 out of 10 viewers who rated the film found it worthwhile.
This strong audience backing stood in contrast to a more measured critical reception at 68%, showing that general moviegoers connected with the film more strongly than professional critics did.
The film’s blend of psychological thriller elements, Joaquin Phoenix’s committed performance, and its exploration of societal isolation resonated particularly well with viewers who might not typically gravitate toward art-house cinema. Audiences appreciated the film’s willingness to present an unflinching portrait of mental illness and urban decay without offering easy answers or redemptive arcs.
The 21-point gap between audience and critic scores is notable—it suggests the film had broader populist appeal beyond critical circles, translating to strong word-of-mouth recommendations and repeat viewing among fans who found the psychological narrative compelling.
The Shocking Decline in Audience Reception for Joker: Folie à Deux
Joker: Folie à Deux experienced a meteoric fall in audience favor, dropping from 89% to just 36-37%—a 52-point collapse that few franchise sequels survive. What makes this decline particularly significant is that it represents not just disappointment but a fundamental rejection of the film’s direction by mainstream audiences.
The sequel’s audience score even dipped below its critics score of 39%, which is relatively unusual and indicates that general viewers were even harsher in their judgment than professional reviewers.
However, the gap between critical and audience scores tells an important story about the film’s target appeal. While critics maintained a degree of respect for Phillips’s artistic ambitions, audiences found the film to be either too experimental, too slow-paced, or too disconnected from what made the original compelling.
This inverted critical-to-audience relationship is a rare red flag that suggests the film alienated its own potential fanbase rather than attracting new viewers.
What the Rotten Tomatoes Scores Actually Measure
rotten Tomatoes audience scores represent the percentage of viewers who rated a film on their platform with a 3.5 or higher rating out of 5 stars.
This is a binary calculation—either a viewer’s rating falls into the “positive” range or it doesn’t—which means the scores reflect how many people found a film worth recommending, not the intensity of their feelings.
A film with an 89% audience score doesn’t necessarily mean viewers gave it perfect marks; it means roughly 89% of raters felt it was good enough to recommend to others.
For the Joker films specifically, this measurement methodology helps explain the dramatic shift. The original film maintained broad appeal across diverse audience segments, with most viewers rating it favorably regardless of whether they connected with its bleak tone.
The sequel, by contrast, appears to have polarized audiences into much smaller camps—many viewers apparently gave it ratings below the 3.5 threshold, which instantly categorized it as a negative score in the Rotten Tomatoes system.
Understanding Why Audience Reception Diverged Between the Two Films
The factors contributing to the sequel’s audience rejection are multifaceted. The original Joker succeeded partly because it introduced audiences to an unexpected take on a well-known character, arriving as a genuine surprise in 2019.
The sequel, conversely, faced heightened expectations and the inevitable comparison problem—audiences familiar with the original had specific expectations about tone, pacing, and narrative direction that Folie à Deux reportedly subverted in ways many found frustrating rather than innovative.
Additionally, the sequel’s runtime, musical elements, and structural choices may have limited its crossover appeal. While the original tracked the descent of Arthur Fleck with thriller-like momentum, Folie à Deux reportedly adopted a slower, more operatic approach.
For audiences seeking the psychological intensity of the first film, this tonal shift represented a departure rather than an evolution, which likely contributed to the sharp decline in favorable ratings.
Word-of-mouth reviews and early audience reactions can significantly influence how others rate a film, which may have accelerated the negative perception once initial viewers expressed disappointment.
The Broader Patterns Revealed by These Scores
The 52-point drop from the original to the sequel represents a cautionary tale about franchise expectations and audience fatigue. In many successful franchises, audience enthusiasm carries forward with each installment—viewers return because they loved the first film and want more of the same.
The Joker films demonstrate what happens when a sequel’s creative vision diverges sharply from what made audiences embrace the original. This is particularly relevant in superhero and comic book adaptations, where audiences often have strong preconceived notions about characters and storylines.
One important caveat: audience scores can fluctuate over time as new viewers discover films and rate them years after release. While these percentages represent the current consensus, they’re not frozen in time.
Additionally, Rotten Tomatoes audience ratings skew toward people motivated enough to create accounts and leave ratings, which may not perfectly represent the general viewing population who simply watch and move on.
For Joker: Folie à Deux specifically, early negative word-of-mouth may have discouraged casual viewers from watching at all, meaning the rating reflects primarily those who made a deliberate choice to see it despite initial reviews—a smaller, potentially less enthusiastic sample.
How to Interpret These Scores When Choosing Films
When you encounter Rotten Tomatoes scores, it’s valuable to consider both the audience and critic percentages together rather than in isolation. The original Joker’s 89% audience/68% critic split told viewers that this was a populist success that also earned critical respect.
Conversely, Joker: Folie à Deux’s 36-37% audience/39% critic split sends a different signal—a film that failed to connect with mainstream audiences despite some defenders in the critical community.
Neither score tells the complete story, but together they provide a nuanced picture of where a film’s appeal lies.
The stark difference between these two films offers a practical lesson: a high audience score suggests broad accessibility and word-of-mouth potential, while a low score—particularly one that underperforms even the critical consensus—signals that viewers found fundamental issues with the film.
For potential viewers, these contrasting scores suggest that enjoying Joker might not guarantee enjoyment of its sequel, despite shared characters and thematic elements.
What These Scores Tell Us About Cinema and Audience Preferences
The dramatic collapse in audience favor for Joker: Folie à Deux raises interesting questions about where filmmaking is headed and what audiences expect from sequels to successful films. The original’s 89% score reflected a rare instance where mainstream audiences and art-house sensibilities aligned—a film dark enough for critical consideration but accessible enough for general viewers.
The sequel’s apparent inability to maintain that balance suggests audiences remain hungry for film experiences that combine artistic merit with broader entertainment value.
These scores will likely become part of the broader conversation about franchise sequels and creative risk-taking in Hollywood. While critical discourse might celebrate Folie à Deux’s ambitions, the audience score serves as a stark reminder that audience loyalty cannot be assumed, even when a previous film resonated powerfully.
For filmmakers and studios, this represents data worth examining closely when considering future directions for established properties.
Conclusion
The Joker films offer a compelling case study in how audience expectations, creative direction, and word-of-mouth can dramatically shape how a film is received.
The original’s 89% audience score represents a rare consensus around a psychologically challenging character study, while the sequel’s 36-37% audience score reflects a significant rejection by the very viewers who might have been expected to follow the film’s director to another Arthur Fleck installment.
These numbers matter not just as abstract metrics but as windows into how different audiences connected with or reacted against specific creative choices.
When you’re evaluating these films for yourself, the Rotten Tomatoes scores provide useful context but shouldn’t be your only consideration. If you’re interested in dark, character-driven cinema, the original Joker’s high score suggests broad accessibility alongside artistic depth.
If you’re considering the sequel, knowing that it alienated even the original’s supporters might help you set appropriate expectations—it’s clearly a different creative vision, which will appeal to some viewers and disappoint others.
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