Ok. Mystery solved.
No amount of “Plex dance” will fix this, it is not a local issue.
Same example as above:
Movie “Shaft (2019)” not getting imdb ratings. Found this line in com.plexapp.agents.imdb.log:
2019-09-26 18:26:23,144 (70000bc85000) : DEBUG (networking:166) - Requesting 'https://meta.plex.tv/m/4463894?lang=en&ratings=1&reviews=1&extras=1'
Almost wish I hadn’t found it..
Loaded in the browser the request returns this:
Plex (the company, not the locally installed app) store the ratings on their own servers.
- When the ratings are wrong, it is because Plex does not update them.
- When the ratings are empty, it is because Plex does not set them.
Nothing can be done on end user side. The agent gets it’s (near useless) ratings from Plex servers.
I am aware that Imdb ratings are not free. But that is not actually the point anymore. People have been debugging this for years, sending log files, screenshots, doing “Plex dance”, tried to help each other out, repeatedly asking for answers. See the below list for a taste.
Plex has not documented this online. No staff has given a clear reply to users about how this works in any ticket I can find.
I do not know how to interpret this in any other way than utter disrespect and lack of care for their paying customer base, these people’s time and investment in Plex’ product.
What the heck, Plex? Seriously? I expected more from you 
The below are the tickets I found in the first 5 minutes. Then I stopped.
There are mountains of them.
https://forums.plex.tv/t/not-getting-imdb-ratings-for-popular-movies/182989
https://forums.plex.tv/t/imdb-ratings-no-longer-used/226920
https://forums.plex.tv/t/server-stopped-getting-imdb-ratings-why/190583
https://forums.plex.tv/t/not-getting-imdb-ratings/152760
https://forums.plex.tv/t/imdb-ratings-missing/221562
https://forums.plex.tv/t/issues-with-ratings-imdb-and-rotten-tomatoes/210412
https://forums.plex.tv/t/imdb-ratings/195778
https://forums.plex.tv/t/weirdness-with-plex-agents-and-imdb-ratings/235915
https://forums.plex.tv/t/no-imdb-rating-at-suicide-squad-and-the-beacht-all-other-movies-work/176060
https://forums.plex.tv/t/small-percentage-of-files-will-not-pull-imdb-metadata/177150
https://forums.plex.tv/t/imdb-ratings/176222
https://forums.plex.tv/t/imdb-ratings-out-of-date/303567
https://forums.plex.tv/t/bug-plex-movie-scanner-and-imdb-ratings/329825
https://forums.plex.tv/t/plex-movie-agent-imdb-ratings-wrong-cached/161747
https://forums.plex.tv/t/why-are-fetched-ratings-inconsistent-rt-imdb-star-rating-shown-at-movies/192190
https://forums.plex.tv/t/periodically-update-imdb-ratings/2324
https://forums.plex.tv/t/plex-agent-not-downloading-imdb-rt-ratings-with-metadata/213395
https://forums.plex.tv/t/incorrect-ratings-from-imdb/314764
https://forums.plex.tv/t/problem-with-ratings-from-imdb/189973
https://forums.plex.tv/t/missing-ratings-for-some-movies-plex-movie-agent/465621
https://forums.plex.tv/t/where-have-all-the-ratings-gone/460584
https://forums.plex.tv/t/metadata-rocketman-2019-not-downloading-critic-rating-imdb/450350
https://forums.plex.tv/t/persistent-bug-metadata-being-scraped-all-wrong-help/463720
https://forums.plex.tv/t/incorrect-imdb-ratings-on-plex/428228
