I think you’re right. It seems to me that for a lot of blockbuster type movies, they’ll start high and go down. Also Pajiba, a movie review blog I really like, talks a little bit about how the early reviews don’t necessarily bode well:
There are only 11 reviews. Letting a dozen bloggers see a movie is not the same as having screenings for movie critics. Clearly, they just want the RT rating to stay at an artificially high level for as long as possible. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if RT was the entire reason they let those dozen bloggers watch the movie. Well, that and those hilarious pull quotes in the ads with the actual source of the quote written in 5-point font.
What, never seen the original Japanese Iron Chef?
Rainbow Brite and the Pits of Doooooom.
Sometimes having daughters was really painful.
It’s already been done.
Well, since 9/11, destroying new york is off limits…except when they did it in Cloverfield last year…
I got nothing.
Oh, because nobody cares if you piss off the french.
To go back to the main topic, I’m worried this is going to be another Transformers(which I still haven’t been able to get all the way through. Granted, I haven’ted tried to watch it drunk, but still…). The lack of advance critic screenings isn’t helping that.
If only this was the version coming out in the theater. I’d be more likely to pay for this… 
Yeah, RT lards it up with nobodies–and while nobodies are entitled to their opinions, calling the “critics” tends to be overly generous.
Metacritic is better, and they’ve only got 1 review up so far (and it’s not good).
This is an outrage!
Where’s my gun? The time for revolution has come!
I don’t know. I suppose, like most people, I enjoy movies on different levels. It’s no Ghandi or Chariots of Fire, but it looked like a fun action movie. Yes, I liked Iron Man, and I liked the Transformers too. They were enjoyable visually, and there was enough of a story to bring it all together.
FTR, I don’t automatically like all explosion type movies. I didn’t care for Transformers 2.
Hopefully the Megan Fox parts made it a passable experience.
I went to go see Doomsday when it was in the theater. One of my best friends and I had the entire theater to ourselves, and we were thus able to MST3K through the whole thing. It was one of the most glorious experiences of my life. My only regret is that there was so little dialogue that we couldn’t find much to repeat, so we were stuck with things like pantomiming screaming and then turning to punch someone next to you in the face.
In summary: Some things are so bad, they’re awesome.
There was an bit on this movie on NPR this morning. It talked about how it is not being screened for critics, but they are doing shows and AF and Army bases. Something about, rah rah, we want to please our core audience, or something like that. Sorry, it aired at 4:30 am so I was not fully awake…
Except for Doomsday, which was so great is was orgasmic. Fifty years from now it will be recognized as one of the all-time classics and the scene where the soldier with a machine gun gets run down by a knight in full armor on horseback will be considered iconic. The world is luckier to have a movie like Doomsday in it.
OK, a bit over the top perhaps, but Doomsday was a lot of freakin’ fun.
They let the British critics see it, and two of the resulting professional reviews were published this morning.
Here’s a link to Tim Robey in the Daily Telegraph:
And here’s Nigel Andrews in the Financial Times:
"Nothing stays still in G.I. Joe either. But there is an inertia born of ceaseless, stupefying animation. Various brainy spectators at the preview – those under 12 – appeared to understand the plot. The film critic fraternity was left for half-dead, groping for enlightenment amid the crashing man-monsters, sizzling military hardware, galumphing battles and “human” characters cleansed of idiom or irregularity. There is no character here we could call flesh-and-blood: not Sienna Miller, a moving centrefold wired for vocal technobabble; not even Jonathan Pryce, US President, whose best line follows the film’s best scenic eyeful. When the Eiffel Tower keels over and collapses, the man in the Oval Office mutters concernedly to his aide: “The French will be upset.”
If anything, I suspect they’re being too kind.
Harry Knowles has seen it, and something tells me he has a greater pull over the GI Joe fanbase than say Roger Ebert.
Bottom line, people are gonna go see it, it’s a popcorn flick.
Harry Knowles has zero credibility anymore. He gets routinely lambasted by talkbackers own his own site for having become a studio shill years ago, and constantly giving positive reviews to CGI crapfests. He gave a rave review to Attack of the Clones, for cripes’ sake.
Yo, Joe!
Maybe he just likes CGI crapfests, not unlike the average summer blockbuster moviegoer.
If it’s at least as good as Transformers it will clean up.
The headline to that first review is brutal:
I notice the RT rating has now dropped to 65% and will doubtlessly be well into the splat range by saturday.