It's a good thing that this movie has been promoted as a comedy, because you wouldn't know it from watching.

| Original Score: 0.5/4 | Apr 8, 2024

Good comedies, of course, can make the tragic feel bittersweet, but Ricky Stanicky bungles its tone to the point that the whole affair comes across a little depressing.

| Original Score: 2/5 | Mar 12, 2024

Unfortunately, despite the best efforts of a game John Cena in the title role, the laughs are a little thin on the ground.

| Original Score: 2/5 | Mar 10, 2024

This is not to disparage the talents of likable stars Zac Efron and John Cena, not to mention a terrific supporting cast. I’m not sure even an out-of-retirement Daniel Day-Lewis and an in-his-prime Eddie Murphy could rescue this material.

| Original Score: 2/4 | Mar 9, 2024

Ricky Stanicky is a comedy that delivers nothing but tedium, wasting a clever idea by repeating the same jokes over and over.

| Original Score: 2/5 | Mar 8, 2024

It is all quite preposterous, and every time Mr. Cena performs a selection from Rod’s filthy repertoire, one cringes. But he makes the most of the part, abandoning any hint of a post-wrestling persona.

| Mar 7, 2024

The film is an awkward mix of blithe farce and mawkish life lessons, and when in doubt it doubles down on the middling, madcap tone. The laughs are patchy.

| Mar 7, 2024

Cena wants it to work so bad you can taste it, but the 16-time World Wrestling Entertainment champion can't salvage material that would be too dopey for a seventh grader's creative writing class.

| Original Score: D | Mar 7, 2024

Nothing seems remotely real, ever, not even the blindingly bright lighting. The one bright spot is Cena, who is quite good. Like his character, who goes above and beyond to adeptly play Ricky Stanicky, Cena really and truly commits.

| Original Score: 1.5/4 | Mar 7, 2024

Playing this filthy-minded, flop-sweating boozehound, Cena barges into the plot with the get-it-while-you-can gusto of a raccoon upending a trash bin.... I found myself rooting for the film to get it together for Cena’s sake — to care as much as he does

| Mar 7, 2024

So much of “Ricky Stanicky” is juvenile and joyless, playing on drawn out jokes, bottom shelf masturbation punchlines, and varying degrees of cringe comedy.

| Original Score: 1.5/4 | Mar 7, 2024

Efron gets stuck with another slipshod script in Ricky Stanicky, a sad demonstration that what was once considered outrageous, transgressive and anarchic now just seems crass, tired and witless.

| Mar 7, 2024

Ricky Stanicky might be imaginary and doesn’t measure up to its promise, but in terms of that basket within the wrestler-turned-actor’s filmography, it at least fits Cena like a glove.

| Mar 7, 2024

Your mileage may vary, but it’s probably safe to assume that most audiences will lose patience with the stale plot machinations of the movie’s second half, when Ricky Stanicky trades its high-key hijinx for a distended mess of sitcom-level shenanigans.

| Original Score: C | Mar 7, 2024

It’s less effective near its overly contrived finale. But Cena’s performance is a revelation — he’s the real deal as both actor and comedian.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Mar 6, 2024

The problem with Farrelly as a director now, which may be to his credit as a human being, is that he’s too kind for that sort of broad humor any more.

| Mar 6, 2024

A raunchy, R-rated return to form for the “Dumb and Dumber” co-director: an unapologetically lowbrow buddy movie, featuring the funniest performance yet from up-for-anything wrestler John Cena in the title role.

| Mar 6, 2024

There are a few laughs but, at nearly two hours, Ricky Stanicky far outstays its welcome.

| Original Score: 2/5 | Mar 6, 2024

Little more than a creaky lark that fails to generate consistent laughs, even if it proves that John Cena is a charming goof-off who’s game for anything.

| Mar 6, 2024

Where the antics of Tag’s characters effectively captured the stupid joy of acting like your younger self while hanging out with your oldest friends, Ricky Stanicky is stupid in a much less joyful way.

| Original Score: 1/4 | Mar 6, 2024