Quentin Tarantino reveals why he scrapped ‘The Movie Critic’

Been there, done that.

Director Quentin Tarantino, 62, has finally revealed why he decided to scrap “The Movie Critic” as his 10th and final film.

“No one’s waiting for this thing, per se,” the famous filmmaker began on Friday’s episode of “The Church of Tarantino” podcast. “I mean, I can do it whenever I want. I mean, it’s already written. So okay, let me just not start it right now.”

“Let me try writing it as a movie, and let me see if it’s better that way. And I was like, ‘Oh, okay, no, I think this is going to be the movie.’ And then it wasn’t,” he continued. “I pulled the plug on it. And the reason I pulled the plug is a little crazy.”

“The Movie Critic,” which the “Pulp Fiction” director announced in March 2023, started as an eight-part series before Tarantino reworked the script into a feature-length film.

However, in April 2024, it was revealed that the “Kill Bill” filmmaker had abandoned the movie for a different project.

“But there was a challenge that I gave to myself when I did it,” Tarantino continued. “Can I take the most boring profession in the world and make it an interesting movie?”

“Every Tarantino title promises so much, except ‘The Movie Critic,’” he explained. “Who wants to see a TV show about a f–king movie critic? Who wants to see a movie called ‘The Movie Critic’? If I can actually make a movie or a TV show about somebody who watches movies interesting, that is an accomplishment.”

Tarantino also dispelled “bulls–t” rumors that “The Movie Critic” was a direct sequel to 2019’s “Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood,” which starred Leonardo DiCaprio, Brad Pitt and Margot Robbie in the leading roles.

“It’s a spiritual sequel to ‘Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood’ insofar as they take place in the same world and they take place in the same town,” he clarified. “But there were no crossover characters. Cliff Booth was never in ‘The Movie Critic.’ That’s all a bunch of bulls–t. That never was the case ever, ever, ever.”

Before scrapping it for a different mystery project last year, Tarantino revealed that “The Movie Critic” was set in 1977 California and “based on a guy who really lived but was never really famous, and he used to write movie reviews for a porno rag.”

But unlike his eight other movies, and despite not being a direct sequel, Tarantino admitted that “The Movie Critic” would have been too similar to “Once Upon a Time…”

“I wasn’t really excited about dramatizing what I wrote when I was in pre-production, partly because I’m using the skillset that I learned from ‘Once Upon a Time in Hollywood’ of ‘How are we going to turn Los Angeles into the Hollywood of 1969 without using CGI?’” he explained.

“It was something we had to pull off. We had to achieve it. It wasn’t for sure that we could do it,” Tarantino added. “‘The Movie Critic,’ there was nothing to figure out. I already kind of knew, more or less, how to turn L.A. into an older time. It was too much like the last one.”

Meanwhile, there is a “Once Upon a Time…” spinoff sequel in active development at Netflix – although the “Reservoir Dogs” filmmaker is only writing and producing the project.

“The Adventures of Cliff Booth,” which sees Brad Pitt reprise his “Once Upon a Time…” character, is being directed by David Fincher.

Tarantino ended the podcast by insisting that he is not worried about releasing his 10th and allegedly final film – and that fans shouldn’t be worried either.

“It’s a little crazy to listen to podcasts and hear all these amateur psychiatrists psychoanalyze as if they f–king know what they’re talking about about what’s going on with me, about how I’m so scared, alright, of my 10th film,” Tarantino said.

“‘Oh my god! Oh my god! I’m so fragile about my legacy. What’s going on? I’m paralyzed with fear!,’” he concluded. “I’m not paralyzed with fear. Trust me.”