Disclaimer: I’m a blind film critic, and i typically watch films with audio description. This film has audio description, produced by International Digital Center, narrated by Sri Gordon, available on Netflix.

Trapped. Hopeless. I accept my fate each time. I reminisce of Shellly Duvall in The Shining, as she can hear the thwack against the door. only my hell is different, it is the repetitive knock until finally the door shatters, and i hear “Here’s Tyler!” As Tyler Perry never relents it is impossible to miss him. He’s like the equivalent of the needy boyfriend who comes to you asking if you missed him, when all he did was leave to go to the bathroom for a minute. No, Tyler, I don’t miss you. You are suffocating us with your persistence in releasing as many films as humanly possible.

This is not a tenable formula for success, which is why nearly all of Perry’s streaming output is somehow less memorable than Adam Sandler’s barrage of Happy Madison mediocrity he keeps making with Netflix. At least every once in a while, Sandler has a hit, or a watchable film. perry is proving to be a deeply inadequate director when he can’t attract top tier talent like Taraji P Henson (Straw) or Kerry Washington (The Six Triple Eight).

Never mind, the last time we saw Madea was July 2025 at her destination Wedding, which I tied with War of The Worlds for worst film of that year. Just a few months later, in February 2026, Madea is back. Make no mistake, while this is a Joe centric story, he couldn’t resist the urge to get in drag again. The plot of the film, as quickly as I can explain it, is that Perry’s strait laced Brian has a kid BJ or KD or something like that, who is like Urkel 2.0, and doesn’t understand why HBCU’s still exist. After all, you don’t see white colleges. Against his better judgment, and after his son decides to road trip with his white friends to Pepperdine, Brian asks Joe to take him on a college road trip, because Brian’s job is so damn demanding.Joe is a caricature of what Perry thinks black men somewhere must be like, trapped in a different time period, crude, crass, stubborn,and misogynistic. Meanwhile, DJ is the kind of annoying Gen Alpha kid who will exfoliate and do his skin care routine in a truck stop bathroom. These two are insufferable, and yet, this was better than some of Perry’s other films.

While he has a hard time actually saying it, it is clear Perry actually had something to say here about blackness, racism in a modern age, diversity, affirmative action, generational trauma, and some big boy ideas Perry is no longer capable of truly conveying through one of his films. He used to use Madea as a vessel for tough subject matters, like domestic abuse, but since then, perry has abandoned the church play format, because in no way is a film where Joe sticks his dick in a glory hole going to bring in any church ladies.

When you ask the two most obnoxious polar opposites to have some kind of meaningful conversation on race, masculinity, and identity in a modern age, it loses its focus really fast. Perry can’t keep up with the film, and it’s like trying to let Harry and lloyd from Dumb and Dumber teach us about anti-semitism, or any other serious topic. it just doesn’t work, because the two people talking, are both insufferable, and complete idiots.

However, the film gains a bright star in the presence of Amber Reign Smith, who plays Destiny, a sex worker that Joe purchases for his recent high school grad. Turns out Destiny is quite trapped, and BJ comes to her aid. Thank God, Destiny is presented honestly, as Amber is given the chance to almost center the film. She could have saved it, as her plot evolves with TJ and they are clearly headed in a relationship direction. it is one of the few bright spots. the others are just the occasional joke that might get a chuckle. This is not as offensively awful as Madea’s Destination Wedding, and actually comes to the table with something to say, if Perry could only figure out his messaging.

The audio description on Madea films are often a bit lackluster to his dramas, some of which have truly memorable description, like Mea Culpa. Sri is always a welcome voice on a Tyler Perry joint.

Refreshingly, Perry finally brings purpose and messaging to a film, but now has no idea what to do with it, and leaves it to the two most obnoxious characters to solve all the problems.

Rotten: 4.5/10