DrogeMiester's Top 10 WORST Movies of 2016

Earlier this week I gave you my list of my top 10 favorite movies of 2016. Now it's time to flip the script and give my top 10 least favorite movies of 2016. As I said in my best list, I didn't see every movie this year. When it comes to bad movies, this is especially true as there was quite a bit of movies that I simply chose to skip and I don't really feel bad about it. Yes, I do have enough followers that I try to see all types of movies, good or bad, and I do find pleasure in seeing a bad movie in order to warn people to avoid it. It's also fun to write a review that absolutely destroys a bad movie. It's just that sometimes I come across a weekend with several releases and I prioritize the better movies which causes some movies to fall by the wayside. I do my best to catch up with the highlights so I can have a good list here, but this year I had enough worthy contenders for this list that I decided that what I had seen was good enough. And of course there have been many times when a movie that everyone claimed was bad ended up being enjoyable for me, so I usually do my best to go in with an open mind. With all that said, out of the movies that I did see, here are my least favorite. Enjoy!

10- Alice Through the Looking Glass

If I'm being honest, I'm not really the best judge of "Alice in Wonderland" as a franchise in general. Disney's original animated film based on the book that I've never cared to read just feels like a teenage girl experimented with drugs for the first time and went on a bizarre acid trip. I don't get it. I've never liked anything to do with "Alice in Wonderland" and I certainly didn't like Tim Burton's horrifically awful 2010 live action remake that only made over $1 billion worldwide because it was the next big 3D aftar James Cameron's "Avatar" revolutionized the genre starting in late 2009. I know my stance on this is very controversial, but as it turns out, my opinions of this unnecessary sequel that was a major box office flop certainly hasn't been controversial. All my friends who do love "Alice in Wonderland" also hated this movie as it doesn't even have the crazy acid trip that it's predecessors have. This is a boring, lifeless piece of garbage that I literally predicted the whole plot to frame by frame. Disney should've titled it "Alice in Wonderlessland." The only thing good that came out of this is that "Just Like Fire" song by P!nk, even though it literally had nothing to do with the movie.

9- Gods of Egypt

This movie was dead on arrival when it hit theaters late February and was one of the first major flops of the year. That's because of the huge controversy surrounding its white-washed cast. This is a movie about Egyptians and Egyptian Gods and there are literally no foreign actors. Just a bunch of white Americans. But that's not even why the movie is bad. This represents everything wrong with Hollywood today. In addition to the white-washing, this also sexualizes every female character, is chalk-full of bad acting and has a horrific story line. This is one of those attempted blockbusters that the studios decided they only need to focus on fancy special effects in order to make a movie. Sure, I enjoy myself some good special effects, but when it looks like no one involved even gave one thought to creating a good movie to go along with those fancy, glossy special effects and ended up offending half the country in the process, that's really frustrating and I'm glad we united together to reject this film. The only reason this isn't higher is because it is the type of movie where you can put in and have a good time with your friends making fun of it "Mystery Science Theater 3000" style. I can't say that for some of these other attempted blockbusters that I'm about to talk about here in a second.

8- Assassin's Creed

Like this one. Man, this was a frustrating movie to endure. 2016 was the year that video game movies were supposed to turn the corner. Instead we had "Warcraft" and "Assassin's Creed" officially confirm that video game movies just don't convert well to the big screen. If any video game movies were going to make the transition, it was these two movies. "Warcraft" is lucky enough to miss this list, but "Assassin's Creed" isn't quite as lucky. This video game franchise has such good lore that should've made a fantastic film. They even had a good director and a perfect cast, yet they still couldn't get it right. This movie spends most of it's time in the present and barely any time in the past. It should've been the other way around. That's problem No. 1. Problem No. 2 is that I didn't care one bit about what was happening in the present. Problem No. 3 is that when they finally went to the past, the action sequences were so bad that they almost gave me a headache while I was watching them. They literally got nothing right in this film. And I would honestly rather sit on my couch and watch one of my friends play this video game for hours than be subjected to this movie again.

7- Independence Day: Resurgence

For some reason people were actually excited for this sequel. I wasn't. So many red flags went up during every phase of this movie's promotion, the first of which was that it was directed by Roland Emmerich. The man has proven time and time again that he does NOT know how to make a movie and the fact that so many people love the original "Independence Day" was probably more of a fluke. I was baffled at how so many people thought that this track record would magically change with an "Independence Day" sequel that was probably 17 years too late and DIDN'T include Will Smith, which was the main reason that original film actually worked. Sadly it turns out that I was right. This movie is an epic disaster. The story line makes no sense. None of the new characters are even worth caring about. The cast that does return looked bored the entire time. The action sequence nearly put me to sleep. We were only a part of the way through and I quickly found myself cheering for the aliens to just blow up the Earth and put us all out of our misery so we don't have to be subjected to any more "Independence Day" sequels ever again. I really hope the sequel that they setup in the last scene never comes to fruition. Luckily the box office receipts mean my wish might come true.

6- Ben-Hur

Here's a novel idea. Let's take one of the most iconic films ever made, throw it in the blender, chop it to pieces and put it back on screen to see if we can make some quick money with the brand name recognition. And let's hire the director of "Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter" to try to pull this off. Yeah, no. Another one of Hollywood's major problems today is this trend of taking iconic masterpieces and remaking them in hopes of a quick cash grab. The 1959 "Ben-Hur" is one of the top 15 highest grossing movies ever when adjusted for ticket price inflation and one of my all-time favorite movies. No one wanted a remake. And thankfully no one saw the remake as it could only muster $26 million domestically off of a $100 million production budget. In theory this could've worked with the right director and the right script, but instead this goes down in history as the textbook example of what NOT to do with a remake. They literally took the heart and soul out of "Ben-Hur" with this remake. The major themes that make "Ben-Hur" so great were an afterthought. The movie had no life. No purpose. No meaning. The main focus was on the two major action sequences that it's nearly 60-year-old predecessor did better. That's embarrassing.

5- Me Before You

I'm going to spoil this movie. And if you don't want to read, you can jump to the next movie. Because I can't talk about this movie without talking about the ending. The boring and predictable Nicholas Sparks style of romance dramas are movies that I usually choose to skip. But for some reason all my friends wanted to see this movie a month after it came out, so I decided to be social and bit the bullet and went with my friends. And the experience infuriated me. Here we have a movie about a man who had everything. After an accident leaves him paralyzed, he's now lost everything. However, this amazingly attractive woman comes into his life and shows him that, despite his losses, life can still be enjoyed and lived to its fullest. What a great, positive message this movie could've shared. But instead this idiot of a character decides that life is still not worth it and commits assisted suicide. I don't need all of my movies to be wrapped in a pretty, little bow, but in this instance I left the theater feeling disgusted and horrified at what this movie was promoting and teaching. If life gets rough, just give up and kill yourself? What? Yet a lot of girls loved this movie. I don't understand why.

4- Norm of the North

I didn't actually see "Norm of the North" in theaters. Do you want to know why? It's because I was too embarrassed to walk up to the box office person and ask for a ticket to this movie. Even if I purchased my ticket on the machine, I would've still had to walk up to the dude who takes your ticket so he can rip it in half and tell me where my theater was. I couldn't even do that. I'm dead serious. So I watched it online several months later because I knew this belonged on this list and I was so right. This was such a stupid animated movie that it took me a few days to get through. I could only handle small segments at a time. This movie tries to be funny and cute, but instead makes you cringe every time they try. The story line of the movie tries to be creative, but is just awful. This tries to be politically relevant, but ends up not making any sense. I'd say this is the type of movie that is only useful for distracting your 2-year-old early in the morning, but I wouldn't even want to subject a 2-year-old to this movie. There's so many other shows on Netflix for young kids that are actually useful and somewhat interesting that I don't know why you would waste your time with "Norm of the North." And all you need to do is watch the trailers and you'll know exactly what I mean.

3- Nine Lives

Two kids movies in a row. I feel like a grumpy old man right now. And I was seriously tempted to put this at No. 1, but the group of kids that I saw this with in theaters actually laughed a lot throughout, so maybe that's worth something. But outside that, this movie is almost worth seeing so that you can witness the horrific atrocity that they put together. I was literally shocked at how bad this movie was as I was watching. First problem is that can you predict the entire movie just by looking at the poster. I mean, Kevin Spacey is a mean, grumpy old man that doesn't give his family the time of day and thus gets punished by getting turned into the family cat. You know how that premise is going to turn out. But that's not even half of the problem. The sound mixing, editing and visual effects are so lazily put together that it's rather shocking. Never once do you believe that Kevin Spacey's voice is coming from the cat that is on screen. They don't even bother to make the cat move and act like a real cat would. I was embarrassed for these filmmakers. Then we have the plot. I don't even know where to start. It leaves you dumbfounded the whole time. And the biggest surprise of all is that this comes from a respected director and includes respected actors. How did this even happen?

2- Zoolander 2

If you want to know an embarrassing secret of mine, I never saw "Dumb and Dumber" or "Anchorman" until their respected sequels came out. In both cases I watched the original and sequel back to back and enjoyed all four films a lot more than I probably should have. I had every intention of having the same experience with the "Zoolander" movies. Then when I watched "Zoolander," I hated my experience so much that I couldn't get myself to go see the sequel in theaters. So I didn't. That would've been too many brain cells lost in one week. I eventually bit the bullet and watched the movie on Amazon Prime a month or so ago. Ouch. I may hate "Zoolander," but I can understand why it's considered a cult classic. The sequel, though, I don't understand how any person on Earth could enjoy. The movie feels like a bad parody of itself. Ben Stiller, Owen Wilson and Will Ferrell - actors I do enjoy at times - were trying so hard to be funny, but I instead wanted to punch each of them in the face. I decided to keep track of how many times I laughed during the movie and I didn't even make it to two. That's how dumb this movie was. And my one laugh was more of a brief chuckle. I think the best performance in the movie is given by Justin Bieber. And he only has like a 30 second cameo.

1- God's Not Dead 2

With my least favorite movie of 2016, I officially look like one of those angry atheists that is mad that Christian filmmakers are putting out "religious propaganda" in order to convert people to Christianity. That couldn't be farther from the truth, though. I actually do consider myself an active Christian that tries his best to help people understand that God does live and that he loves everyone. But in doing so, I will definitely make an effort to steer non-believers far from this horribly offensive film franchise. The other movies on this list made it because they are simply bad movies. This one tops the list because, not only is it a bad movie, it's an offensive movie that paints Christianity in a bad light. All the Christians come off as pompous and arrogant. All the non-Christians are portrayed as evil, whether they be atheist, Muslim or whatever. As if you can't be a non-Christian and still be a good person living a successful, happy life. Then we have all logic and reason completely thrown out the window with the story they set up. We eventually get to a court case where we're trying to prove God's not dead. And their arguments in favor of God are honestly pretty bad. Not to mention that everything leading up to this court case is completely unrealistic and laughable. I love God. But I HATE this franchise with a fiery passion. It really needs to die. Please don't turn this into a trilogy.