Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez’s new movies are equal parts critical junk

It’s easy to forget tabloid favorites Ben Affleck and Jenifer Lopez they have day jobs that involve things other than chasing the paparazzi and accidentally creating a rich menagerie of memes, but the coincidence of the high-profile married couple releasing blockbuster movies on the same day isn’t planned after the two Hypnotic and The mother took a pounding.

Robert Rodriguez’s sci-fi action thriller has been the director’s passion project for the better part of two decades, but the end result was under fire for being little more than a Christopher Nolan clone, except on a much lower scale. . At the time of writing, Affleck’s latest foray into genre territory holds a 39% Rotten Tomatoes rating.

Meanwhile, Lopez has been running and gunning for Netflix alone The mother, which premiered on the streaming service today. Needless to say, it hasn’t avoided the platform’s regular pitfall of putting big names in generic shoot ’em ups, with the film’s approval rating on the aggregator site sitting at a low 38%.

On the plus side, at least they won’t be able to argue about who got the better end of the deal, though The mother Being a Netflix original at least means it doesn’t have to worry about those pesky ticket dollars, which may yet prove to be in short supply for Hypnotic. Affleck has The lightning to come, however, it’s a good thing he’ll appear in at least one big-screen effort this summer that people will more than likely enjoy en masse.