Bill Maher Blasts ‘Barbie,’ Calls Movie “Preachy, Man-Hating, And A Zombie Lie”

Tom Tapp
·4-min read

Bill Maher took to Twitter (or X) on Monday to tell his followers that he had seen Barbie and promised a “review” to follow. On Tuesday, Maher delivered…sort of. His post reads less like a review than one of his biting closing soliloquies on Real Time — which it’s worth noting, airs on HBO, a corporate sibling to the studio behind Barbie, Warner Bros.

While admitting the film is fun, Maher begins by called it “preachy, man-hating, and a #ZombieLie.”

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What, you ask, is a “Zombie Lie?”

Maher defines it as, “Something that never was true, but certain people refuse to stop saying it (tax cuts for the rich increase revenues, e.g.); OR something that USED to be true but no longer is, but certain people pretend it’s still true.”

In any case, Maher’s gist is that Barbie, with a main character who fights the patriarchy, is actually a few years out of date because the power structure of the world we live in is “not really any longer deserving of the word ‘patriarchy.'”

For proof, he offers the fact that the Mattel board is actually made up of 5 women and 7 men, not all men, as the film posits.

“Truth is, I’m not the one who’s out of step – I’m living in the year we’re living in,” writes Maher. “Barbie is fun, I enjoyed it – but it IS a #ZombieLie. And people who don’t go along with zombie lies did not take some red pill – just staying true to CURRENT reality. Let’s live in the year we’re living in!”

Barely three weeks into its run, Barbie has raked in more than $1 billion at the global box office.

Read Maher’s full “review” below.

OK, “Barbie”: I was hoping it wouldn’t be preachy, man-hating, and a #ZombieLie – alas, it was all three. What is a Zombie Lie? Something that never was true, but certain people refuse to stop saying it (tax cuts for the rich increase revenues, e.g.); OR something that USED to be true but no longer is, but certain people pretend it’s still true. “Barbie” is this kind of #ZombieLie.

Spoiler alert, Barbie fights the Patriarchy. Right up to the Mattel board who created her, consisting of 12 white men! The Patriarchy! Except there’s a Mattel board in real life, and it’s 7 men and 5 women. OK, not perfect even-steven, but not the way the board IN THE MOVIE – which takes place in 2023 – is portrayed. And not really any longer deserving of the word “patriarchy.” Yes, there was one, and remnants of it remain – but this movie is so 2000-LATE.

At one point the Barbies have to win over the Kens, and they are told to do it by pretending to act helpless and not know how to do stuff. Helen Gurley Brown called, she wants her premise back. Yes, that WAS a thing. I saw “Barbie” with a woman in her 30s who said, “I don’t know a single woman of any age who would act like that today.”

I know, I know, ‘How could I know about the patriarchy, I AM a man!’ That argument is so old and so silly. Of course, none of us can know exactly what others go through life, but I can see the world around me, and I can read data. The real Mattel board is a pretty close mirror of the country, where 45% of the 449 board seats filled last year in Fortune 500 companies were women. Truth is, I’m not the one who’s out of step – I’m living in the year we’re living in. Barbie is fun, I enjoyed it – but it IS a #ZombieLie. And people who don’t go along with zombie lies did not take some red pill – just staying true to CURRENT reality. Let’s live in the year we’re living in! Hi Ken!!!

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