I Just Watched This 2000s Flick That Was Panned by Critics—and It's Actually Really Good

Jennifer Garner got absolutely ripped for this role, which only added to her appeal as the badass Elektra. While the fight scenes were picked apart by action film enthusiasts, I found Garner convincing due to her years of leading the hit series Alias, which at that point had been on the air for over four years. Elektra also has a fun opening scene that gets the action going as Elektra drops into a dark warehouse out of nowhere to confront a few enemies who have called for her. Now is it the best action movie you will ever see in your lifetime? No, but does it do the job of keeping you entertained throughout? Yes, it does.

Looking back, I think people expected way too much out of this action/comic book movie, which was intended to be nothing more than just that. Personally, I don’t expect Academy Award-winning writing and acting performances in these types of films. Instead, I put the emphasis on the visuals, and the cinematography was phenomenal. I found myself engrossed in all of the cinematic elements from Garner’s overall look and styling, to the background shots of the city and the camera angles during the fight scenes. It’s *so* 2000s, and that’s perhaps why I enjoyed it so much.

Okay, not so much a reason why I loved it, but an explanation for why Elektra may have received the bad reviews it did. I truly believe this film was a product of bad timing. Allow me to explain: the previous year had just seen the release of the 2004 movie Catwoman, which starred Halle Berry and was also critically panned by critics and viewers.  The reasons for Catwoman’s backlash was exactly the same as Elektra’s—criticisms of the writing, acting and not staying true to the comics. In the years since, not only has Catwoman gone to become a cult classic with many realizing the negative overreactions were blown out of proportion, but time has revealed that the original script was frequently changed over and over again by Warner Bros. during filming, which limited the writing and acting capabilities of those involved.

I personally believe this happened with Elektra as well, and that the “tolerance” for a woman taking on a comic character in a film that didn’t stay true to the original storylines, was even less by the time this film was released. While Elektra hasn’t developed the cult-following of Catwoman, I wouldn’t be surprised if due to this Deadpool & Wolverine cameo, more people start doing exactly what I just did—giving Elektra a re-watch and realizing that it wasn’t “bad” at all.