Chakrapani described "Missamma" as a "film for kids which should also be watched by adults". In his 2015 book "Madras Studios: Narrative, Genre, and Ideology in Tamil Cinema", Swarnavel Eswaran Pillai wrote that the film interweaves romantic comedy and melodrama to tell Mary's love story, while Aditya Parankusam of "The Hans India" described it as a screwball comedy. "Andhra Patrika" noted in its review that the character of Raju had the shades of Sherlock Holmes, but was portrayed as an amateur detective until the end keeping in view the film's comic tone.