The first reviews for Space Jam: A New Legacy are in: the film currently stands at an unfortunate 45% on Rotten Tomatoes. Given the 1996 Space Jam remains the highest-grossing basketball movie of all time, the opportunity for Warner Brothers to capitalize on a sequel had always been in the air. After the first film's star Michael Jordan refused to reappear in a sequel, the possibilities widened to Tony Hawk, Tiger Woods, and even NASCAR driver Jeff Gordon. It wasn't until 2014 that Miami Heat star LeBron James was finally announced to be Jordan's successor, with filming beginning in 2019 and the movie releasing in theaters and HBO Max in 2021.
The new film is ultimately not a sequel but a reboot, with no direct plot expansion on the 1996 film. In A New Legacy, James and his son Dom have become trapped in the digital world by an evil A.I.: Al-G Rhythm (a pun on "algorithm," played by Don Cheadle). To escape, James has to round up the Looney Tunes for a game of basketball against Rhythm's digitally enhanced team: NBA and WNBA superstars with potent enhancements. Produced by James, Ryan Coogler of Black Panther, Maverick Carter of More Than A Game, and Duncan Henderson Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, the film seemed to have its dream team making a family-friendly basketball classic for modern audiences.
Critics have given Space Jam: A New Legacy mixed-to-negative reviews on Rotten Tomatoes, with a score of 45% on 11 reviews.
Wenlei Ma at News.com.au gave it a 2.5/5, saying,
"It's hard to not feel like you've been swimming in some WB marketing executive's wet dream for two hours."
Doug Jamieson at The Jam Report echoed the sentiment, rating it the same 2.5/5., saying,
"Splashes of nostalgia and homage can be a wonderful thing, but this sequel rarely takes the time to stand on its own two feet."
However, some critics enjoyed the fanfare of intellectual properties, with Graeme Tuckett of Stuff.co.nz reframing it under the lens of being "a love-letter to the movies and to the people who make them" and awarding the movie a slightly more favorable 3.5/5.
Gatekeepers of the original film would do good to remember that Space Jam itself also stands at a 44% critic rating on Rotten Tomatoes. At the time, critics also decried it as a vehicle for peddling off Looney Tunes stuffed animals and Happy Meals with no real substance. Beyond that, it was widely disregarded as a piece of Michael Jordan propaganda, functioning as sanctification for a player almost immediately deemed to be the greatest of all time. There have even been allegations that the villain was modeled after Bulls GM Jerry Krause (a regular antagonist for Jordan) and that Space Jam was just an off-court opportunity for Jordan to dunk on his un-jerseyed opponents.
Pandemic restrictions have been lowered, and moviegoers are antsy to return to theaters. Already, Black Widow has had the highest-grossing opening since Stars Wars Episode IX, and F9 just made Fast & Furious the fifth-highest grossing franchise ever, passing X-Men. For basketball fans, nostalgic movie fans, and families, Space Jam: A New Legacy's purpose of being marketing mayhem for both itself and other WB properties is still poised to have an incredible return on its investment, regardless of critic praise or decrial.
Source: Rotten Tomatoes
