Dominic Corry: The worst films of 2013

Dominic Corry shares his pick of the worst movies of 2013.

Dominic Corry unveils his list of the worst films of 2013.

I try not to be a hater. I really do just love movies. But in the interests of journalistic balance, after my Best of 2013 earlier this week, please allow me to present my worst of the year in movies:

Worst Superhero Movie of 2013: The Wolverine

How do they keep messing these up? From very early on in the comics, the character of Wolverine positively beamed with cinematic potential, but they can't seem to do him justice in solo movies (or group ones for that matter, if we're getting serious). All the talk ahead of this film's release centered around righting the wrongs of X-Men Origins: Wolverine, instead, they just wrote more wrongs.

Worst Animated Film of the Year: Planes

Cars was Pixar's worst movie, and this airborne retread was an even more shameless bid for licensing dollars than Cars 2.

Worst Action Movie of 2013: A Good Day To Die Hard

So bad it made the exorable Die Hard 4.0 look like Die Hard 2: Die Harder. Bruce Willis' acting indifference has rendered him unable to project even his trademark smirk. Who signed off on this turkey? It had all the flair of a lump of dirt.

Worst Horror of 2013: The Conjuring

I was all ready to embrace this film - I love old school haunted house movies, and James Wan is an always-interesting director. But the whole thing rested on very familiar tropes executed with no originality. It felt totally cut-and-paste.

Worst Sequel of 2013: The Hangover Part III

Everyone involved talked about avoiding the repetitious pitfalls of Part II and taking the series out on a high, but there was no fun to be had in this laugh-free zone. The characters don't even seem to like each other by this point, seeing them squabble and snipe all through this movie was trying.

See Also: Kick-Ass 2. The first one promised so much, the second one delivered so little. Machete Kills.

Worst Thriller of 2013: Paranoia

This started off with a pedestrian concept and squandered what little potential it had with a superlatively generic execution. A fine addition to Harrison Ford's Hall of Shame.

See Also: Runner, Runner

Worst True Story of 2013: Diana

How could such a train wreck be so boring? The answer will teach us nothing.

See Also: The Fifth Estate.

Worst Romantic Comedy of 2013: About Time

Rom-com monster Richard Curtis demonstrated aggressive disregard for even the most basic elements of time travel in this film, which managed to somehow be even more cloying than Love Actually.

Worst Blockbuster of 2013: After Earth

Heretofore to be known as Nepotism: The Movie, this leaden sci-fi thriller was doomed by the charmless spawn of Will, Jaden Smith, who perpetually sports the face of a thirteen-year-old forced to join a choir by an insistent parent. I always try to find the good in M. Night Shyamalan's movies, but this broke my resolve.

See Also: Jack The Giant Slayer; Percy Jackson: Sea of Monsters should've been called Percy Jackson: Sea of Monster. There was only one.

Worst Comedy of 2013: Identity Thief

One of the two credited writers of this film, Craig Mazin, co-hosts a fascinating screenwriting podcast with Go and Big Fish scribe John August called Scriptnotes. Although he comes across as a pretty learned fellow on the podcast, Mazin has credits on some of the least funny comedies of all time - Scary Movie 3; Scary Movie 4; Superhero Movie; The Hangover Part II. I was all ready to like Identity Thief, but it too, is terrible. I don't think I laughed once, and I'm a Melissa McCarthy fan from back in the Stars Hollow days. Anyone else out there seen The Nines? It's awesome!

See Also: I wanted to like The Heat, but it too sucked. I was also hugely disappointed by This Is 40, but only cause I love Apatow's other movies so much.

Worst Product Placement Movie of 2013: The Internship

I try to take a pragmatic approach to product placement in movies in these uncertain times, but the degree to which the plot (and especially the 'uplifting' finalé) of The Internship was designed to highlight Google's various products of services made me retch.

Worst Twilight Wannabe of 2013: The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones

Cherry-picking a handful of incredibly tired tropes and draping them across some attractive teenagers does not a franchise make. This made Twilight look like The Godfather.

See Also: Warm Bodies. Ugh.

Worst Ending of 2013: World War Z

I liked this film overall, but the famously re-jiggered ending felt like it was from a totally different movie. Or worse, a mini-series. Dramatic resolution be damned - the original ending (mayhem in a Russian gulag!) sounded waaaaay cooler.

Worst Movie of 2013: Movie 43

The least funny "comedy" of all-time. Every skit in this paper thin anthology hung on a one-note premise that couldn't sustain a single-panel cartoon strip. The performances were self-congratulatory and smug. Let there never be a Movie 44.

Agree? Disagree? What were your worst movies of the year? Comment below!