Jordan Peele’s body of work includes some of the most talked about horror movies of the past eight years. The latest film from his production sure, the psychological thriller Him, just debuted with the lowest Rotten Tomatoes score yet for a project he’s been involved in.
The film follows a young football player, played by Tariq Withers, who finds himself under the wing of a star quarterback portrayed by Marlon Waynes. It released September 19 to a slew of less-than-stellar reviews by critics and audience members alike.
On Rotten Tomatoes, the site that scores films based on aggregated reviews, Him was met with an abysmal rating of 29% based on 92 reviews, as of writing. By comparison, Peele’s first film, Get Out, has sustained a score of 98% eight years after release.
Early reviews of Him praise the film’s performances and stylistic choices, but are harsh on pretty much every other aspect. One top critic, Amy Nicholson of the Los Angeles Times, says Him “wants to be The Substance with jockstraps.” Another critic, Bilge Ebiri from Vulture, calls it “a high-budget student film.”
The Rotten Tomatoes audience score, while higher at 58% at time of writing, is still full of mostly negative reviews, like one calling it “pompous, annoying, disjointed, boring, and ridiculous.” Even that user, though, had to praise the film’s cinematography by Kira Kelly. Over on Letterboxd, Him is not doing much better with a total of 2.8 stars out of 5.
Jordan Peele’s Role in Him
It is worth noting that unlike Get Out, Nope, and Us, Jordan Peele was not in the director’s chair for Him. Instead, Peele produced the film under his production company Monkeypaw Productions while leaving the directorial duties to Justin Tipping. Tipping is known mostly for directing television episodes of The Chi, Joe vs. Carole, and Twenties.
While Peele may not have been making as many creative decisions as he usually does on his feature-length horror films, he is still receiving most of the blame online for the shortcomings of Him. As the leader and face of Monkeypaw Productions, Peele has been closely attached to this project.
