‘Black Panther’ director Ryan Coogler has responded to rumours that pro-DC fans are attempting to sabotage his film’s Rotten Tomatoes aggregate score.
The upcoming Marvel movie starring Chadwick Boseman, Luptia Nyong’o and Michael B. Jordan has outpaced pre-sale tickets of any superhero movie in history. It’s expected to clear $150 million within its opening weekend in America alone.
However, right-wing trolls claiming themselves to be fans of the DC movie universe have announced a campaign to give the movie purposely low user scores on Rotten Tomatoes in protest. Their alleged cause is a resistance against Disney’s spotlight on BME and female characters.
Speaking to Huffington Post, director Coogler responded to this attempt at thwarting the success of his movie: “For me, I’m looking forward to everybody seeing the film. I’m really looking forward to sharing the film with audiences regardless of what their political views are … that’s kind of where I [stand on that]”.
Watch the trailer for ‘Black Panther’ below.
Speaking on the score aggregate website Rotten Tomatoes, Coogler isn’t convinced is an accurate metric of a film’s value: “It can be an oversimplification of what critics are saying about a movie. It’s quicker to look at the consensus than it is to read the articles. But I’m a person who definitely respects film criticism and draws on it in the filmmaking process”.
Read more: The Black Panther premiere looked bloody amazing
Meanwhile, the star-studded tracklist for the official ‘Black Panther’ soundtrack has been revealed including Kendrick Lamar, SZA, Schoolboy Q, 2 Chainz, The Weeknd, and Travis Scott.
‘Black Panther’ is released in cinemas in the UK on February 13. The soundtrack will be released on February 9.