‘A Star is Born’ Fans Accused Of Being Bots Trying To Tank ‘Venom’

The Stans are at it again.

On Friday, October 5th, both A Star is Born starring Lady Gaga and Bradley Cooper and Venom starring Tom Hardy will premiere in theaters. The discourse around both of these films has been a journey all its own. While Venom has always been expected to be varying levels of terrible, the response to A Star is Born‘s existence has gone from confusion to ironic excitement and then to genuine excitement when critics at Toronto International Film Festival saw the completed film for the first time.

That being said, there’s always been one group of people who were probably planning to see A Star is Born over and over again: Gaga’s dedicated fans, her “Little Monsters.” Some fans are accused of going overboard by posting fake reviews of Venom online in order to boost the opening weekend box office for A Star is Born.

To be fair, this is totally something that could happen. Stan Twitter (accounts that basically exist to talk about a specific celebrity) is known to send a lot of hate to anyone who talks badly about their favorite celebrity. For some fans, this obsession is tied to the performance or financial success of their fave’s projects. It’s become kind of a self-referential meme at this point, but Stans will take every opportunity to promote their fave’s work.

It would not be remotely surprising if someone on Stan Twitter replied to a tweet related to the Kavanaugh hearing with “Stream QUEEN on Spotify!” The problem is that some straight people on Twitter genuinely can’t tell the difference between Stan Twitter trying intentionally to sabotage Venom and a joke.

The following tweet, from a literal parody account, was reported as genuine fact by sites who covered this story. The Anne Harrison account’s cover picture is two muscular men showing their feet and flexing — I’m not sure how much clearer it could be that Ms. Harrison isn’t actually a Christian mother. In fact, according to BuzzFeed News, many Gaga fans have accounts posing as Midwestern mothers from a time where they tried to get radio stations to play “Perfect Illusion” back in 2016.

https://twitter.com/MDDNAA/status/1047175312927285248?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw

Although the Gaga fans were clearly joking, the retaliation from Venom fans seems to be genuine. They feel obligated to go see the movie that others were bashing. What started as a joke among gays on Twitter has now become a little feud.

Outside the bubble of Gay Twitter, Venom is still expected to win the box office on opening weekend with $65 million while A Star is Born is looking for something in the area of $20 million. Marvel still has a name recognition and a fan base that stretches a lot wider than Little Monsters. That being said, never doubt the power of Stans to support their stars.