People go into the field of criticism, typically, so they can be a thoughtful and intelligent part of the conversation – to urge people to look harder at something they think they already know, or to look outside of the work the marketers are throwing at them to find something deeper and richer. But what does a critic do when confronted with something (a film, say) where only a tiny sliver of the audience cares – or even hears — what they think? What does a movie critic do in the case of a movie designed to be critic-proof?

Critics can adopt a poptimist strategy and buy in, or stick to their intellectual guns