don't feed the trolls

Sorry Trolls! You Can’t Down-Vote a Movie on Rotten Tomatoes Until It’s Actually Out

Photo: JOSE JORDAN/AFP/Getty Images

Fans of misogyny were dealt a terrible e-blow on Monday. Rotten Tomatoes has limited comments on its site. From now on, you can’t down-vote or bad-mouth a movie until it’s actually out. “As of February 25, we will no longer show the ‘Want to See’ percentage score for a movie during its pre-release period,†Rotten Tomatoes wrote in a blog post Monday. “We’ve found that the ‘Want to See’ percentage score is often times confused with the ‘Audience Score’ percentage number.†It used to be that users of the aggregate rating site could express interest for a film before it came out, by clicking either Want to See or Not Interested. But internet trolls started hacking the system, spamming movies that fell into their disfavor with Not Interesteds until a movie’s reputation had no hope of recovery. Commenting on a film during its pre-release period will also be a thing of the past, according to the blog post: “Unfortunately, we have seen an uptick in non-constructive input, sometimes bordering on trolling, which we believe is a disservice to our general readership.†Los Angeles Magazine puts the tipping point at a coordinated campaign to tank Captain Marvel, the Brie Larson–led ’90s throwback.

Rotten Tomatoes Changes Commenting Policy to Combat Trolls