Matthew McConaughey's New Apple TV Series Debuts To All-Time Career Rotten Tomatoes Record

Published Sep 23, 2026, 12:44 PM EDT Brennan Klein (he/him) is a senior news writer at Screen Rant, host of the Attack of the Queerwolf podcast, and contributor at Alternate Ending and Horror Press. He has been writing and podcasting about pop culture (especially horror movies) for over a decade at platforms including Blumhouse, Fangoria, Dread Central, The Backlot, and Arrow in the Head. Brothers isn't bonding with critics on Rotten Tomatoes. Apple TV's Brothers, which was co-created by David West Read (Broadway's & Juliet), Lee Eisenberg (The Office, Jury Duty), Oscar winner Matthew McConaughey (Dallas Buyers Club), and three-time Oscar nominee Woody Harrelson (The People vs. Larry Flynt, The Messenger, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri), stars McConaughey and Harrelson as fictionalized versions of themselves. The meta story follows Harrelson moving into McConaughey's ranch, where they discover that they might actually be blood-related. The weekly series, which premiered with its first two episodes on September 23, also stars Natalie Martinez, Brittany Ishibashi, Highdee Kuan, and Holland Taylor. Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson reunite in Brothers, which is their first time co-leading a series since True Detective season 1 in 2014. Now, Rotten Tomatoes has aggregated enough critics' reviews of Brothers to give the show an official Tomatometer score. While the score could fluctuate as more reviews are added, at the time of writing, 11 critics have weighed in to give it a score of 55%, which is 5% below the threshold at which it could have been considered Fresh. This marks Matthew McConaughey's first television series in history not to earn a Fresh score. Plenty of Matthew McConaughey movies have earned scores below 55%, including the historical drama Free State of Jones (48%), the romantic comedies How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days (42%) Ghosts of Girlfriends Past (27%), Failure to Launch (23%), The Wedding Planner (17%), and Fool's Gold (11%), the Anne Hathaway thriller Serenity (21%), the Stephen King fantasy adaptation The Dark Tower (16%), the horror sequel The Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Next Generation (15%), and the 2008 comedy Surfer, Dude (0%), which also co-starred Woody Harrelson. However, his television work has been more widely beloved. This includes True Detective, which has had major ups and downs, but has an average score of 78% and earned a Certified Fresh 91% for the season starring McConaughey. Below, see a breakdown of the average scores earned by every series featuring Matthew McConaughey, either as a lead or a recurring cast member: Title Average RT Score Eastbound & Down (2009-2013) 91% True Detective (2014-) 78% Sex and the City (1998-2004) 70% Agent Elvis (2023) 64% Brothers (2026) 55% Just like the overall Rotten Tomatoes score for the Apple TV show, critics' individual ratings for the show drift toward the middle, generally ranging between 5 out of 10 and 6 out of 10. Its current high is an 8 out of 10 score from CBR's Katie Doll, while its low is a 3 out of 10 from ScreenRant's own Sean Morrison. In his Brothers review, Morrison praised the two leads but says that the series as a whole is full of "tired tropes that have been done before and better." This captures the tenor of the majority of the reviews that have been aggregated, which largely point to the dynamic between the two longtime collaborators as the show's best quality. It remains to be seen if this lukewarm Rotten Tomatoes score affects viewership for Brothers as it continues to air. At the time of writing, there aren't enough user reviews for the show to receive an official audience score on the Popcornmeter. However, if it ends up being much higher than the Tomatometer score, that could indicate that the new comedy series will build to become a word-of-mouth success for Apple TV. Brothers airs on Apple TV on Wednesdays through November 4. Release Date September 23, 2026 Network Apple TV Directors Trent O'Donnell, Jason Winer Writers David West Read, Lee Eisenberg, Woody Harrelson, Mike Jones, Matthew McConaughey, Nick Sherman Cast Woody Harrelson Woody Harrelson