Emma Roberts bizarrely defends biggest dumpster fire of her career, gets painfully reminded in creative ways why ‘it was just bad’

Emma Roberts has come out in defence of Madame Web, despite the film’s lacklustre reception and the fact that she only appeared in it for all of three minutes.

The actress, who portrayed the character of Mary Parker in the superhero film, blamed online commentary and memes for the movie’s box office and critical failure in a recent interview with Variety. “If it wasn’t for internet culture and everything being made into a joke, I think that the reception would’ve been different,” Roberts said, referring to the deluge of memes spawned by the film’s poor quality.

Among other criticisms, viewers made jokes about the plot of Madame Web and the deadpan line delivery of Dakota Johnson, who took on the lead role as the title character. Mentioning the online chatter that exploded upon the film’s release, Roberts said it “bums [her] out” that people “make such a joke out of everything now.”

The actress went on to say that she “personally really loved” Madame Web and commended her co-stars’ performances, adding that director S.J. Clarkson “did an amazing job.” Roberts also said there’s no way to predict whether a project will be successful. 

Fans have quickly questioned why Roberts feels the need to defend the movie, especially since her co-stars have been critical of the film in various interviews. In March, Johnson said the movie —  which failed to reach $100 million at the global box office and holds an 11 per cent critics score on Rotten Tomatoes — was a flop because audiences are “able to sniff out bulls–t.” 

“You cannot make art based on numbers and algorithms,” Johnson told Bustle. “It’s not nice to be a part of something that’s ripped to shreds, but I can’t say that I don’t understand.” For her part, Sydney Sweeney — who played Julia Cornwall in Madame Web — said the movie was simply a “building block” to build connections with Sony. 

Fans have noted how Roberts’ co-stars are far less interested in supporting Madame Web than she seems to be, with one X user asking why she is “doing more work to defend this movie than the people who were actually in [it].” Elsewhere, fans took umbrage with Roberts’ comments about internet culture affecting the movie’s failure, pointing to last year’s Barbenheimer trend as evidence of how meme-ifying movies can lead to their success. 

Others questioned Roberts’ comments purely because of Madame Web’s poor quality, saying its failure had less to do with internet culture and more to do with the fact that “it was just bad.” One user responded by simply saying they “fell asleep watching the movie.”

In any case, you could consider the online chatter around Madame Web as a form of success in itself, since other projects might wish for that level of buzz, regardless of whether its complimentary.