[makeitdouble]

I agree with your take on platform where there is near 0 barrier to entry. Netflix for instance, or TV programming. Casual people will be less willing to go through reviews to device on a piece, and they'll also probably have had other customer reviews or view count guide them in their choice.

It is albeit different if to watch the movie you need to carve 3 hours of your time-off, go to a theater and pay 15€. Instead of randomly choosing a movie currently airing in your local theater, you might want to know if it's something you have any interest for (Imagine watching Edge Of Tomorrow thinking it will be some Star Trooper like spectacle). In that setting I think people expect critics adjust their assessment to the target public of the movie and give an accessible review of the piece. Which is super hard, but that's what they are expected to do.

[watwut]

I had both casual and "serious" periods. And in casual period I just check IMDB score, genre and few top mini-reviews there. That is it, I definitely wont read full length article to figure out whether I want to see the movie. Half casual movie watching experience is about social anyway, you go because friends go and selection of movie is less important.

In periods when I am more interested, I don't read what movie critics write to determine whether I will see the next action movie. I read that to learn more about movies, to find movies that are different or because reading it is fun.

My point here is that movie critics nowdays are not all that much serving the function of "make average person know whether they will like the movie". Average person has easier lower effort ways to find that.