The absolutely savage things critics said about 'Fifty Shades Freed' will have you LOLing

Don't see the movie until you read these scathing reviews.
 By 
Proma Khosla
 on 
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Original image has been replaced. Credit: Mashable

Fifty Shades Freed is currently rocking a 9% on Rotten Tomatoes, but don't expect the critics to keep this cash-magnet sex thriller (I'm guessing?) down.

The final installment in E.L. James' Fifty Shades trilogy lands in theaters Friday, and critics delighted – for the last time – in ripping it apart.

Mashable's Angie Han, for one, just wants to point out that no one in the film is good at their job. Seriously. Not a one.

Here's what others thought:

Note: This post has been updated as more scathing reviews roll in.

Kaitlyn Tiffany and Lizzie Plaugic, The Verge:

Jamie Dornan’s American accent sounds like he dipped his tongue in numbing fluid, which could very well be a filming survival tactic. His demeanor in each scene is that of a man who just woke up from a nap, except his nightmare is still going.

Chris Nashawaty, Entertainment Weekly:

“You own this?” she asks as if chloroformed into a Kardashian fairy tale. “We own this,” he replies. Jesus wept.

E.L. James, 1; Feminism, 0.

Director James Foley (yes, the same James Foley who somehow once directed Glengarry Glen Ross and then apparently lost a best with Satan)

Robbie Collin, The Telegraph:

The French title, Cinquante Nuances Plus Claires, has a certain purring mystique that at felt quite promising, but as far as nuances on screen were concerned, I counted zero.

This is a film in which one of the more emotionally detailed performances is given by a product-placement Audi.

Dornan fought so valiantly with his dialogue in parts one and two, but in this one he just looks spent, playing his scenes with a thousand-yard stare that reminded me of Cillian Murphy’s PTSD-stricken soldier in Dunkirk.

This 28-year-old playboy libertine with famously unconventional tastes turns out to be big on Wings-era Paul McCartney. I give him six months of marriage before he clears out the S&M gear from the Red Room of Pain and puts in a train set.

Stephen Whitty, New York Daily News:

Tie me up, tie me down, make me watch bad films. Just no more “Fifty Shades,” please.

There’s also a trip to Paris, the return of an old flame, and even a subplot about a man-hunting architect. It all goes nowhere — like the rest of the film.

Why are Hyde’s eyes always red? Has he been crying? Did he finally read the script?

Johnson and Dornan never connect. She rolls her eyes like a cranky teenager. He stares at her like a constipated cow.

Guy Lodge, Variety:

“You own this?” Anastasia asks...“We own this,” her husband smirks in reply, as the film practically pauses for our applause, and maybe even a rosewater tear, at the shared privilege of it all. How far they’ve come.

Foley, at his best a slinky genre stylist with a tobacco-acrid edge

Indeed, a sex-free, PG-13 version of “Freed” could be cut without shedding a second of narrative coherence...

Manuela Lazic, Indiewire:

In cinema as in sex, a dose of self-awareness can do wonders.

Jack Hyde (Eric Johnson), whose motivations remain vague and whose story arc is resolved in less time than it takes Christian to untie his wife’s ankle belts.

Jordan Mintzer, The Hollywood Reporter:

But in terms of drama, or melodrama, or just bad drama, Freed rarely delivers the goods while trying hard to give fans what they came for...For good measure, the filmmakers also toss in a butt plug.

Jack Hyde — talk about a character name: Like Grey or Steele, its metaphorical weight smacks you in the face with all the subtlety of a giant dildo.

Emily Yoshida, Vulture:

This is a trilogy about a charming, intelligent young woman with just the right amount of self-awareness and sense of humor about herself, who happens to have a twisted kink for monogamy with the most boring man in the world...a woman who by all appearances has her head screwed on right and yet still keeps coming back to the affluent void that is Christian Grey

They’ve gone and gotten themselves hitched, because that is the greatest expression of romance these films can envision, complete with a Paris honeymoon and a basic-bitch sterling silver Eiffel Tower charm bracelet gifted over the Seine.

Jordan Hoffman, Vanity Fair:

We’re to believe that a relationship that began with a contract of dos and don’ts specific enough for a line item on anal fisting never got around to “hey, whatcha think about kids?”

The ephemeral nature of these movies, whose flimsy plots barely reach the legal definition of feature films, recede until we’re left with what’s essential: titter-worthy sex scenes and luxury goods.

Christian is a sentient slab of abdominal muscles with a limitless black card.

Peter Travers, Rolling Stone:

Audiences are in for two hours of cruel and unusual punishment...Can sex, referred to here as "kinky fuckery," really be this dull, this sanitized, this devoid of human interest?

Quicker than the flick of a cat o' nine tails, Fifty Shades Freed suddenly turns into a thriller with guns, car chases and last-minute escapes. It just so happens that the filmmakers are equally as incompetent at this genre as they are at generating erotic heat in Christian's playroom.

There is no movie regardless, just a series of glossy tableau that lack even the vulgar charge of real porn. At this point, Johnson and Dornan can't even go through the motions of spank-pant-rinse-repeat with any conviction. They look as bored as we are.

Jeannette Catsoulis, The New York Times:

If another sequel shows up, though, I’m going to have to use my safe word.

Fifty Shades Freed hits theaters Feb. 9.

Topics Reviews

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Proma Khosla

Proma Khosla is a Senior Entertainment Reporter writing about all things TV, from ranking Bridgerton crushes to composer interviews and leading Mashable's stateside coverage of Bollywood and South Asian representation. You might also catch her hosting video explainers or on Mashable's TikTok and Reels, or tweeting silly thoughts from @promawhatup.

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