Top 10 Most Disappointing Movies of 2025

Top 10 Most Disappointing Movies of 2025

2025 is almost over. That means it’s time to reflect back on 2025 with the biggest surprises, biggest disappointments, and the best and worst films of 2025. Today I’m sharing my picks for the 10 biggest disappointments of 2025. Let’s get started!

10. Elio: 2025’s Pixar film and surprisingly one of the few animated films to release in theaters. Pixar and Disney’s track record this decade haven’t been great and they bomb. Based on that, I debated not putting this movie on the list because my excitement for it wasn’t particularly high. For me, I found Elio to be one of the most mediocre and bland films that Pixar has done. What’s so frustrating about this movie is that the original director of the film, Adrian Molina, went to the same high school as me. He’s about 20-30 years older than me, I’ve never met him. But it’s cool that somebody from my small town in Northern California is working for Pixar and making movies for them. Because they reshot and reworked the movie the movie feels like a jumbled mess of ideas and it couldn’t pick if it wanted to be a fun and uplifting story or a more serious film. The film isn’t terrible but when Pixar was fantastic for so many years at making original films and you get a film like Elio that feels like bottom tier Pixar, that’s disappointing. 

9. Fountain of Youth: I actually forgot about this movie until I was looking over my 2025 movie ranking and saw this film on there. This is an action adventure in the vein of Indiana Jones and National Treasure starring John Krasinski, Natalie Portman, and more familiar faces directed by Guy Ritchie. That’s a mix of talent and genres that should make for a very fun and exciting show that I’ll enjoy. The film we got is just another streaming movie that feels generic and lifeless. There’s nothing about this movie that makes it feel unique or special. It’s a movie that could’ve been directed by anybody and could’ve starred anybody. It’s a film that you have a fun enough time watching it but completely forgot about it the moment you finish watching it. A film with that much talent, talent that I really enjoy shouldn’t be so forgettable. Beyond that, it feels like a movie that’s pulling inspiration from great action adventure films but doesn’t do the hard to earn those moments the way that films like Indiana Jones and National Treasure did. The film isn’t terrible but it’s so mediocre and forgettable. 

8. Song Sung Blue: This is one that wasn’t on my radar until July when I saw Hugh Jackman’s one man show in New York City and told us about the film. The trailers came out and they really worked for me. I was actually pretty excited for this film and what it would be. The film we got has a lot of great moments, some great performances especially from Kate Hudson. But the film overall is very underwhelming and it was trying to do much too much for what the movie is. The film is about the love story between Jackman and Hudson and their journey of being this Neil Diamond tribute band and all of the complications that comes with that. But the film is also about their daughter and the struggles she’s going with. But it’s also about Kate Hudon’s injuries and recovery. There’s just a lot that the movie is trying to tackle in a short amount of time. Because of that, everything feels underdeveloped, nothing feels as fleshed out as it should be. You can imagine a better version of this movie that’s 15-20 minutes shorter that’s more focused. I like the actors involved and of course the soundtrack is fantastic but it’s all in an underwhelming movie. 

7. Bring Her Back: A smaller budget horror that released back in May from the directors of Talk to Me. Talk to Me was one of my favorite movies of 2023 and it surprised me with just how good it was. I was very excited for this movie, I didn’t see a trailer so I didn’t know what the movie was about. For the first 65%-70% of the movie I was really on board and digging this movie. It’s creepy and unsettling at all of the right moments. The directors are great with gore so there’s a lot of gnarly and bloody images that stick with you. The performances in the movie, whether it’s the child actors or Sally Hawkins are really good. Unfortunately, the big thing holding it back is that they make some choices in the third act that killed the movie for me. All along the way the movie was trying to be shocking and horrifying but didn’t earn those moments. You’re watching a film with a string of stupid moments happening but without the conflict or the story to build up to those moments. I was really excited to see what these directors would do after Talk to Me and now after watching Bring Her Back, I’m not quite as excited as I want to be. 

6. The Electric State: This is one that a lot of people really crapped on. Many people claimed it was one of the worst films of the year and decade. This movie certainly isn’t great, it’s deeply flawed but I don’t think it’s as bad as its reputation is. But when you look at the talent involved and the budget this movie should be 10x better. It’s a post-apocalyptic sci-fi adventure about robots battling against an evil government, it stars Chris Pratt and Millie Bobby Brown, it’s directed by The Russo Brothers, and it cost over $300 million. That combination should’ve made for a great film that was one of the best movies of the year. For whatever reason, The Electric State is another example of a totally bland and mediocre streaming movie. There’s nothing unique or special that this movie brings to the table. Despite having a lot of actors that I really like, directors that have made some of the best blockbusters of the last 10 years they created a movie that’s nothing at all close to what the movie could’ve or should’ve been. It’s kind of in the same category as Fountain of Youth as a movie that you have fun watching but totally forget about the next week. 

5. Wicked: For Good: My mom is probably going to kill for me including this movie on the film. If you didn’t know, Wicked was one of my favorite movies of last year. It was my pick for the biggest surprise of 2024. I was very excited to see how the story ends and spend more time in this world with these characters. I went in knowing that the part of the play is a big step down in quality from the first part where the songs aren’t as good, I went into the movie knowing. I’ll say this, the movie did get better for me on second watch. But I still think it’s a deeply flawed film that didn’t capture the magic of the original. One of the things I loved about the original was the character and how charming they were. You wanted to spend more time with them almost the instant you met them. The inherent nature of this film and where they’re at, it means that several of them are all at odds with each other. So part of the charm and magic of the first film is lost. The songs here don’t reach the greatness of the songs from part one. None of them are bad but none of them are as good as they should be, especially compared to part one. The film’s pacing isn’t good, it’s all over the place with feeling too short and too long at same time. I didn’t hate this movie. I went positive in my review and I stand by that, but it’s not as good as it could’ve and should’ve been. 

 

4. The Smashing Machine: After years of weird headlines and box office bombs. Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson decides to pivot from being the movie star to giving a dramatic performance. His performance is easily the best part of the film. He’s able to portray so many different mannerisms that don’t feel like The Rock. The way that he looks and talks doesn’t feel like you’re watching The Rock. The biggest issue with this movie is that it feels like they trimmed 30-40 minutes of plot. The film feels like it’s doing a greatest hits of Mark Kerr’s life but lacks the compelling story that ties all of them together. They’ll introduce this idea of drug addiction into Mark’s life and they have one scene with it and then the next he’s in the hospital because he overdosed. But the film doesn’t make it clear or obvious that time has passed that it got worse. There’s several moments in the film that don’t carry any level of weight or importance because the film doesn’t do the hard work to earn those moments. This is most prevalent with Emily Blunt’s character who doesn’t get developed at all and you don’t understand the choices she’s making. I was really hoping that The Rock doing a dramatic and subtle performance would be in a better movie. He’s deserving of the Oscar and awards nominations. I’m afraid that this film bombing will hurt The Rock doing any more dramatic performances in the future. Because this film showed that he can act but I wish it was in a better movie. 

3. Mickey 17: The latest film Bong Joon-Ho, the director of Parasite. If you don’t know, Parasite is one of my favorite films of all time. I was absolutely floored leaving the theater because I loved it so much. Naturally, I was very excited for whatever Bong would do next. He revealed he was doing a sci-fi satirical comedy with Robert Pattinson, Mark Ruffalo, Toni Collette, and other familiar faces and I said “sign me up”. I loved the trailers for the movie, this became one of my most anticipated films of 2025. The film has a lot to enjoy, I dug a whole lot about this film from the ideas to the performances. But overall, the film felt underwhelming and that the mix of the themes and ideas didn’t come as organically as they did in Parasite. This movie explores life and human nature. The movie does make you ponder your own life in very interesting and clever ways. Robert Pattinson is giving a wild and fun performance showcasing his true acting range that he can be funny and emotional at in one. But the movie is trying to do much and explore too many ideas that some of it feels underdeveloped. Steven Yeun’s doesn’t feel pointless to the film, but his relationship with Pattinson feels undercooked despite their being a long history. I was watching a movie that I was hoping would be just as smart and clever as Parasite but ended up getting a movie that has interesting ideas and good performances but in a movie that’s not as smart and thought provoking as it should be. 

2. Shelby Oaks: The directorial debut from Chris Stuckman, a great YouTuber who reviews movies. For this reason alone, I was very excited to check this movie and support a YouTuber’s dream of making movies. It’s really heartbreaking to put a movie like this on a list like this. Where I really wanted to like this movie more than I did, I wanted to be able to praise this film and be confident in Chris Stuckman’s future as a filmmaker. Unfortunately, I didn’t think this movie worked all that well. The most disappointing part of the film was the ending. Because the film did a great job of building the tension and the intrigue of what’s going on and what happened to this missing girl. All along the way you’re building up to the final answers and reveals and you get that…in the most satisfying way possible. The movie sort of just ends, the ending to this movie doesn’t at all feel like a proper ending. It just ended and my entire audience went “really?” I was really invested in the first 80%-85% of the film and then it just ends and sort of ruins the movie for me. Because of the different filmmaking styles being used it means that it’s breaking basic screen writing techniques, so the pacing is a bit of a mess. I really wanted to like this movie, I think Stuckman shows promise as a director but needs work as a writer. 

1. The Fantastic 4: First Steps: The third and final MCU film to release in 2025. I was very excited for this movie because I loved the trailers and loved the aesthetic and vibe that they were going with. It had its own unique vibe to it that feels unlike any other MCU movie. They got a bunch of very exciting actors to play the lead roles. And it’s one of the final films before Avengers Doomsday so I was just excited to see what this movie would do for the future of the MCU. When it comes to the cast, the chemistry amongst them was great. You needed strong chemistry between them in order for the film to work. Vanessa Kirby is probably the standout here, she’s carrying a lot of the emotional weight of the film and she’s a great actress and she’s showcasing just how talented she is. Unfortunately, while I liked this movie a lot about this movie. I found the whole film to be underwhelming. Because a large portion of the film is about them using science to try and stop Galactus, it means that our characters aren’t really using their super powers for a large percentage of the film. There’s not a lot of action in the film, there’s more science mumbo jumbo that’s not as exciting when you want to see them use their powers. It’s also a movie that feels like chunks were cut out, the film montages over about 15-20 minutes of plot in the first act. The times when we could’ve seen them use their powers we didn’t. I was really hoping this would be another great MCU film like Thunderbolts* and I know I have the hot take because a lot of people loved this film. I didn’t hate it, I just really wanted it to be better.