Idiocracy was not screened for critics, but the film received generally favorable reviews. Praise focused on concept, casting, and humor; the bulk of the criticism was directed at the film's release issues or at special effects and plot problems. Los Angeles Times reviewer Carina Chocano described it as "spot on" satire and a "pitch-black, bleakly hilarious vision of an American future", although the "plot, naturally, is silly and not exactly bound by logic. But it's Judge's gimlet-eyed knack for nightmarish extrapolation that makes Idiocracy a cathartic delight."[22] In a review only 87 words long[10] in Entertainment Weekly, Joshua Rich gave the film an "EW Grade" of "D" stating that "Mike Judge implores us to reflect on a future in which Britney and K-Fed are like the new Adam and Eve."[23] The AV Club's Nathan Rabin found Luke Wilson "perfectly cast [...] as a quintessential everyman"; and wrote of the film: "Like so much superior science fiction, Idiocracy uses a fantastical future to comment on a present [...] . There's a good chance that Judge's smartly lowbrow Idiocracy will be mistaken for what it's satirizing."[14]
In other countries the film was reviewed positively. John Patterson, critic for The Guardian (U.K.), wrote, "Idiocracy isn't a masterpiece — Fox seems to have stiffed Judge on money at every stage — but it's endlessly funny", and of the film's popularity, described seeing the film "in a half-empty house. Two days later, same place, same show — packed-out."[24] Brazilian news magazine Veja called the film "politically incorrect", recommended that readers see the DVD, and wrote "the film went flying through [American] theaters and did not open in Brazil. Proof that the future contemplated by Judge is not that far away."[25]