Word.ws English Dictionary

good-bad

good-bad adjective: enjoyably schlocky, poor in quality but nonetheless compelling.

Adjective

good-bad (comparative more good-bad, superlative most good-bad)

  1. Enjoyably schlocky, poor in quality but nonetheless compelling.
    • The existence of good bad literature—the fact that one can be amused or excited or even moved by a book that one's intellect simply refuses to take seriously—is a reminder that art is not the same thing as cerebration.1945 November 2, George Orwell, “Good Bad Books”, in Tribune
    • “Road House” exists right on the edge between the “good-bad movie” and the merely bad. I hesitate to recommend it, because so much depends on the ironic vision of the viewer. This is not a good movie.1989 May 19, Roger Ebert, “Road House”, in RogerEbert.com

Forms of good-bad

comparativemore good-bad
superlativemost good-bad

Origin of good-bad

Attributed to G. K. Chesterton.

Questions about good-bad

What does good-bad mean?
Good-bad means enjoyably schlocky, poor in quality but nonetheless compelling.
What part of speech is good-bad?
Good-bad is an adjective.

Words near good-bad in the dictionary

  1. good work
  2. good work ain't cheap, cheap work ain't good
  3. good works
  4. Good's syndrome
  5. good-ass
  6. good-bad
  7. good-brother
  8. good-brothers
  9. good-by
  10. good-bye
  11. good-byer

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: good-bad (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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