Return of Dragon

Professional ratings

Aggregate scores
Source	Rating
Metacritic	61/100[1]
Review scores
Source	Rating
AllMusic	[2]
Entertainment Weekly	B[3]
NME	[4]
Q	[5]
Robert Christgau	C+[6]
Rolling Stone	[7]
Vibe	[8]

Return of Dragon garnered generally positive reviews from music critics. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the album received an average rating of 61, based on 9 reviews.[1]

David Crowley of Vibe praised the more romantic songs off the album for showcasing Sisqó's vocal abilities, concluding that, "Return of the Dragon largely shows Sisqó's growth as a musician and a man. And you don't even need a thong to enjoy it."[8] AllMusic's Jason Birchmeier commended the record's songwriters and producers for crafting a lean track list that offers catchy singles, calling it "an energetic, slick, and stylish album with plenty of subtle sex and overt gloss — everything early-2000s pop listeners demand in their superstars." He concluded that "In short, Sisqó gives you exactly what you want — assuming you liked his debut album — offering a can't-miss collection of should-be hits and even more of his ceaseless crooning."[2] Tom Sinclair of Entertainment Weekly praised the album's mixture of raunchy sex anthems and sensitive love ballads, calling it "a vast improvement over a debut that felt as artistically flimsy as the subject matter of 'Thong Song'."[3] Barry Walters, writing for Rolling Stone, said that despite the commendable efforts of the producers to experiment with R&B instrumentations, they fall under the weight of studio mixing and Sisqó's shortcomings as a lyricist, calling it "a messy album, one that's instrumentally inventive, melodically underdeveloped, vocally overcooked and lyrically just plain lazy."[7] Victoria Segal of NME was critical of the glossy production and so-called romantic lyrics throughout the record.[4]

• Return of Dragon at Discogs (list of releases)