Any movie that winds up seeing its release date delayed for an extended period time is inevitably tarred with the brush that it was held back for a reason. While that was true of Gully to an extent, it was off-camera issues that had nothing to do with the project itself that ensured it was destined to fail.
The coming of age drama was shot in early 2018, was shown to the world for the first time in April of 2019, but didn’t score a digital and on-demand release until June of 2021. In between, the mere presence of Amber Heard among the cast was enough to dissuade a lot of people from even giving Gully a chance, matters that were compounded by discouraging reviews.
A 25 percent Rotten Tomatoes score was never going to convince the anti-Heard crowd that the story of three friends from a rundown Los Angeles neighborhood indulging in a wild night of partying before the consequences of their actions came back to haunt them was must-see material, but the widely-panned and socially-conscious story has nonetheless made a comeback on the biggest streaming service of them all.
Per FlixPatrol, Gully has shaken off its reputation as being not very good – as well as the presence of a star who can ignite an argument by mere mention of their name – to become a Top 10 hit in multiple countries around the world. Heard won’t be seen onscreen again until December’s Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom, but even a comic book blockbuster won’t be able to shift the opinions many have of the litigious actress.