Tom Hardy’s Venom attacked by Lady Gaga fans with fake negative reviews: report
Several negative Twitter reactions to Tom Hardy’s Venom have been attributed to bot accounts opened by Lady Gaga fans to promote her upcoming film, A Star is Born.
Several Twitter ‘reviews’ of the upcoming superhero film, Venom, are reportedly fake. According to Variety, Lady Gaga fans have taken it upon themselves to post negative reactions to the Tom Hardy film in an effort to boost the box office potential of Gaga’s A Star is Born. Both films are scheduled to release on the same day in the US.
While proper critical reviews of Venom have also been poor - the film sits at a ‘rotten’ 28% on review aggregator site Rotten Tomatoes - A Star is Born has been building consistent buzz since its festival screenings. The musical, directed by Bradley Cooper, has a stellar 95% rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
And yet, people on Twitter noticed how several reactions to Venom were using the same wording. “Okay, something is up. The negativity around the Venom movie is looking very artificial,” one person tweeted, attaching screenshots of tweets saying the exact same thing: “Just got out of a Venom preview. Thankfully it was free. Worst two hours of my life. I will be taking my wife to see Lady Gaga’s new movie with Bradley Cooper A Star is Born on Friday.”
Gaga’s fans, known online as Little Monsters, were also thought to be responsible for driving Ed Sheeran off Twitter.
Buzzfeed contacted one of the accounts who posted the tweet and they confirmed, “It’s us Gaga fans creating fake IDs to trash the Venom premiere.They both are getting released on the same day, so we want more audience for A Star Is Born.”
Variety says tracking for Venom puts its opening weekend tally at $65 million while A Star is Born could open to around $25 million in the US.
Venom is out in India on Friday, while A Star is Born has been scheduled for an October 12 release.
