Netflix Fighting Drama Dominates Every Other Streaming Service in Debut

Bruised, an MMA-themed drama from Netflix, reportedly scooped up more viewers than almost anything else on streaming when it debuted last month, according to official numbers released by Nielsen. The movie amassed an estimated 654 million minutes of viewing time between November 22 and 28, 2021, second only to Netflix’s own mega-hit Red Notice, which the streamer has said is already one of its most-watched movies ever. What’s interesting is that even with a huge gap between Red Notice (954 million minutes) and Bruised, the latter manages to beat out every other movie on streaming by at least 50 million minutes.

Halle Berry stars in and directed Bruised, which sees her playing a down-on-her-luck former MMA fighter. Because of the nature of Nielsen — which delivers more exact numbers than most other ways of estimating streaming viewership — the movie is now just over a month old, and it will be interesting to see whether the film remains significant in upcoming Top 10 charts or not, since it did not seem to generate much buzz.

Response has been decidedly mixed from both critics and audiences, with the review score from both groups hovering around 55% on Rotten Tomatoes. It fairs ever-so-slightly better with audiences, 56% of whom have given it a “fresh” ratings as opposed to 53% from critics, but given how wide the disparity can be between those two categories, that hardly seems like a huge number at all.

Here’s the official synopsis for Bruised: 

Jackie Justice (Halle Berry) is a mixed martial arts fighter who leaves the sport in disgrace. Down on her luck and simmering with rage and regret years after her fight, she’s coaxed into a brutal underground fight by her manager and boyfriend Desi (Adan Canto) and grabs the attention of a fight league promoter (Shamier Anderson) who promises Jackie a life back in the octagon. But the road to redemption becomes unexpectedly personal when Manny (Danny Boyd, Jr.) — the son she gave up as an infant — shows up at her doorstep. BRUISED marks the directorial debut of Academy Award winner Halle Berry and also stars Adriane Lenox, Sheila Atim, Valentina Shevchenko, and Stephen McKinley Henderson in a triumphant story of a fighter who reclaims her power, in and out of the ring, when everyone has counted her out.

You can see Bruised on Netflix now.