Action is one genre that is consistently popular on Netflix. There is a strong audience demand for action movies on the streamer, be they Netflix originals or licensed тιтles. Netflix has had great success with action movies like The Gray Man (2022), Extraction 2 (2023) and Ad Vitam (2025), and Red Notice (2021) remains the most popular Netflix movie of all time.

In addition to finding success with its own action flicks, Netflix has also long been a place where licensed тιтles can enjoy viewership success. These тιтles don’t need to have been successful in theaters, and even movies that earned poor reviews or bombed at the box (or both) can strike a chord with viewers on streaming. ᴀssᴀssin’s Creed (2016) starring Michael Fᴀssbender, for example, which failed both critically and commercially, ended up becoming a top 10 Netflix hit seven years after its release. Now, a 2024 action movie has accomplished the same feat.

Aftermath Becomes A Top 10 Netflix Hit

The 2024 Action Flick Scores Third Place

After a muted hybrid release at the 2024 box office, Aftermath

has just pushed its way into the Netflix top 10 list. Directed by Patrick Lussier and written by Nathan Graham Davis, the action movie stars Dylan Sprouse as Eric Daniels, a PTSD-stricken war veteran who becomes trapped on a Boston bridge with his sister after ex-military revolutionists take everyone hostage. In addition to Sprouse, the Aftermath cast features Scream franchise star Mason Gooding as antagonist Jimmy “Romeo” Roken and Severance star Dichen Lachman as Samantha “Doc” Brown.

New data from Netflix reveals that Aftermath now ranks as the third most popular movie globally on the streamer for the week of February 10 – 16. The film has racked up an impressive 15.6 million hours viewed and 9.9 million views in total, putting it ahead of тιтles like Shrek (2001), Shrek 2 (2004), Back in Action (2025), and The Witcher: Sirens of the Deep (2025). Aftermath ranks in the top 10 in seven countries, and is number one in the U.S., U.K., Australia, New Zealand. Check out the full global top 10 chart below:

What Aftermath’s Netflix Viewership Means For The Movie

The Action Film’s Reception Explained

Aftermath received only a very limited theatrical release on November 1, in addition to becoming available on VOD that same day. This certainly explains why the film wouldn’t even have reported box office totals. This kind of release isn’t unusual for an action B-movie like this, and it joins a long line of direct-to-video films that stretch back decades. It’s not clear what Aftermath‘s budget was, but it was likely quite low to accommodate this style of release.

On Rotten Tomatoes, Aftermath doesn’t even have a critics score because there are so few reviews for the film. The audience-led Popcornmeter score, however, is a dismal 22%, suggesting that most who watch the film don’t enjoy it. It’s curious that a film with such a negative reception has become a success on Netflix, but the streaming service’s algorithm and the recognizable faces in the movie’s cast are evidently enough to encourage viewers to click on the film’s tile. Though it would have been easy to brand Aftermath a failure, the new Netflix data certainly complicates this picture.

Source: Netflix