John Cena's New R-Rated Netflix Movie Debuts To Disappointing Rotten Tomatoes Score

John Cena isn’t having the best luck with his newest movie.

The actor’s new, R-rated Netflix movie has debuted to a disappointing Rotten Tomatoes score, despite drawing in a sizable audience during its first week on the platform. Cena’s movies and TV shows are a mixed bag of quality. While he’s earned plenty of praise for roles like the DCU’s Peacemaker and the 2025 Prime Video comedy movie Heads of State, he’s also been critiqued for movies like Ricky Stanicky and Vacation Friends. This mixed bag means sometimes, it’s hard to tell how each of his new movies will perform.

Now, Rotten Tomatoes has confirmed a disappointing debut for Cena’s newest Netflix feature, Little Brother. According to the website, the movie currently sits at a 39% critics score based on 31 reviews as of writing. According to critics, the movie feels like a rehashed version of the Bill Murry comedy What About Bob, only with Cena and his co-star, Eric André, in the spotlight. While the pair’s chemistry earned praise, the writing and nature of the comedy involved didn’t land with too many critics.

The story of Little Brother follows Cena as real estate agent Rudd Landy, whose perfect life and shot at fame via a reality TV show is disrupted when psychiatric hospital patient Marcus Pinchel (Eric André) lands in his life. Rudd helped Marcus in a Big Brothers program many years ago, leaving a big enough impression for him to find him again. What follows is the pair at odds with one another, slowly growing closer, and getting into comedic situations. However, the presentation was, for many critics, unimpressive.

In addition to critic reviews of Little Brother, the movie also scored a 46% from audiences on Rotten Tomatoes, based on over 100 reviews. What makes this interesting is that, following its release on June 26, 2026, the movie became an instant success on the platform. Netflix’s data indicates the comedy was the Number 2 English language movie for the week of June 21 to June 28, 2026, earning 23.4 million hours viewed across 14 million viewers. It snuck into the Top 10 for 82 countries upon its debut.

Little Brother adds another dud to Cena’s movie career, which has seen a number of straight-to-streaming movies that earned low Rotten Tomatoes scores over the last three years. Although 2025’s Heads of State earned positive reviews, it broke a six-movie rotten streak for the actor, something that appears to be back with a vengeance. As for André, this is his second rotten movie of the year, the first being the Prime Video sports comedy Balls Up. It’s an unfortunate development for both their streaming movie careers.

Although the Netflix movie earned negative reviews from critics and viewers alike, Little Brother still managed to score some initial viewership upon its release. However, it doesn’t seem like this will stick considering the movie’s overall reception. It’s unfortunate considering the chemistry of the two lead actors, but something that denotes poor quality for the movie overall.