All good things must come to an end, and that includes The Tinder Swindler's dominance of the Netflix movie chart.
After a three-week reign as Netflix's most popular movie, The Tinder Swindler has been toppled by a slightly unusual contender. The movie in question? A Netflix original comedy film from Tyler Perry titled A Madea Homecoming.
“A Madea what now? we hear you say. Well, A Madea Homecoming is the twelfth(!) movie in the Madea Cinematic Universe (yes, you read that right) that Perry created in the late 1990s. Madea, whose full name is Mabel "Madea" Earlene Simmons, has also appeared in 11 plays and one animated film.
But we got sidetracked. According to the latest update to the Netflix Top 10 charts, which reveals the most popular Netflix movies and TV shows among subscribers over the past week, A Madea Homecoming has overtaken The Tinder Swindler and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre at number one. . And from afar too.
A Madea Homecoming didn't come out until Friday, February 25, but it certainly made its mark on Netflix's top 10 movies list. The comedy flick racked up 31,56 million hours viewed in its first two days on the streaming giant, nearly double that of its closest rivals.
In contrast, The Tinder Swindler, which comes in second place, only recorded 17,67 million hours of viewing. That's a notable drop from its third week on the platform, when it garnered 34,45 million hours, and a far cry from its total of 64,7 million in its second week of release.
Texas Chainsaw Massacre, which came in third place, racked up 17,44 million hours of viewing. Downfall: The Case Against Boeing and Despicable Me 2 took fourth and fifth place, respectively, but each movie racked up less than 10 million hours each.
The victory for A Madea Homecoming is all the more surprising for its critical reception. The film currently has a 44% rating on review aggregator site Rotten Tomatoes, with Odie Henderson of Roger Ebert.com calling it "a disaster, as usual." Still, Netflix audiences seem to have enjoyed it. A Madea Homecoming has a 75% rating among viewers on Rotten Tomatoes, and there's a much more diverse array of reviews from the audience compared to critics who weren't wowed by Perry's latest film.
However, it appears that A Madea Homecoming benefited greatly from its late February release.
Aside from a few Netflix original foreign language movies, Texas Chainsaw Massacre, and a documentary on American race car driver Bubba Wallace, Netflix's movie offerings were pretty slim in the second half of February. Thus, subscribers looking for a new movie to watch were left with little choice, a situation that no doubt helped the cause of A Madea Homecoming.
It will be interesting to see if Perry's latest film continues to top the charts in early March. A host of licensed movies, including Chadwick Boseman with 21 Bridges, as well as Shrek 1 and Shrek 2, have already landed on the streamer. And, with Netflix original movies like Against the Ice and The Adam Project coming out very soon, we'd be surprised if A Madea Homecoming retains its crown for much longer.
For more Netflix movie content, check out our best Netflix documentaries and best Netflix movies under two hours to see which classics you may have missed. We also publish our own Netflix Top 10 Movies list every week, if you want to see a more detailed breakdown of the most popular titles.