Polarizing conservative commentator Ben Shapiro hated “Barbie,” so much so that he aired his complaints in a 43-minute video review — which included an edit of himself setting fire to Barbie dolls in protest. But the internet has been flaming Shapiro, instead.
Shapiro announced the day the movie premiered that he had watched it and would soon upload a scathing review.
“My producers dragged me to see ‘Barbie’ and it was one of the most woke movies I have ever seen,” Shapiro tweeted Friday. "My full review of this flaming garbage heap of a film will be out on my YouTube channel tomorrow at 10am ET.”
The photo immediately stirred ridicule online, where users were quick to point out that he showed up at the movie dressed in what appears to be an outfit identical to the one Ryan Gosling wears as Ken in a musical performance.
In his video, titled “Ben Shapiro DESTROYS The Barbie Movie For 43 Minutes,” Shapiro kicks off his review by showcasing his thoughts about “Barbie” in “the most Oppenheimer fashion”: tossing a pair of Barbie and Ken dolls into a trash can and lighting them on fire with a matchstick.
Before he dives into the bulk of his criticisms, he waves a notepad full of what he claims to be “pages and pages of notes” about the movie.
“Well, folks, wasting two hours of my precious time, two hours I will never get back, two hours around my deathbed I will wish that I had not spent that time doing,” he says. “It makes me viscerally angry.”
Shapiro, having pegged the movie’s target audience to be “7-year-old girls,” takes issue with several moments he deems too mature for young children, such as a reference to a landmark Supreme Court case, a scene that includes sexual innuendos and Barbie’s existential contemplation of death.
He also expresses his distaste that the movie includes a transgender Barbie and questions its claim that the real world exists under patriarchy.
“I mean, Greta Gerwig is a lady. She’s making a good living off of this,” he says in the video, referring to the movie’s director. “Margot Robbie is playing the lead. In fact, the entire cast aside from basically Ryan Gosling is women, so it seems like women are doing OK.”
Shapiro didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
Many online poked fun at the intensity of his apparent rage, highlighting that he went so far as to buy movie tickets and obtain Barbie dolls to burn before he recorded himself protesting it for more than a third of “Barbie’s” runtime.
“seeing the barbie movie in theaters and shaking my head the entire time so everyone knows I disagree with it,” a user tweeted.
“Ben Shapiro is 40 years old,” another posted, attaching a screenshot of his video thumbnail image.
Others satirically voiced their doubts about Shapiro’s self-proclaimed distaste for the movie.
“You know what? I don’t believe you, Ben. I don’t believe you didn’t like this movie,” a person said in a TikTok video. “I want y’all to look at this outfit here for a second. … Ben, you literally wore a Ken cosplay to the movie.”
YouTuber Connor Franta was also among those who expressed skepticism about whether Shapiro’s producers truly “dragged” him to see “Barbie,” facetiously implying there’s a possibility Shapiro secretly wanted to see it.
“just like my sister ‘forced’ me to watch America’s Next Top Model when i was younger,” Franta tweeted.
“i was at the theatre with ben shapiro and i can confirm he loved it,” another user joked, racking up more than 185,000 likes. “he was blushing and giggling and tapping his toes the whole time.”
