Bama Rush Influencer Criticized For Not Liking The Barbie Movie — 'It Was Not The Barbie I Grew Up Loving & Dreaming About'
Barbie is for everyone. Barbie is all of us.
rblfmr / Shutterstock; @kylan_darnell / TikTok The Barbie movie is taking the world by storm, one hot pink wave at a time. The movie has had its fair share of critics, mostly composed of conservative men sharing their opinions on how Barbie upholds an anti-man narrative.
One woman, a Bama Rush influencer and Miss Ohio Teen USA winner, Kylan Darnell, shared her views of the movie on TikTok, only to experience intense backlash for her personal opinion.
Kylan Darnell was criticized for not liking the Barbie movie, believing it didn’t represent ‘the Barbie I grew with and loved and dreamed about.’
Darnell posted a TikTok of herself wearing a hot pink outfit, exclaiming, “Barbie was terrible... It just was not the Barbie that I grew up with and loved and dreamed about and played with. I feel like the plot was way too much; it didn’t really make that much sense. I feel like it didn’t, like, appeal to kids like it was supposed to.”
“I just feel like it was kinda, like, gloomy and depressing. And like, Barbie’s not like that. Barbie’s happy. Barbie’s cheery. It just was not the Barbie I wanted it to be.”
Darnell’s viral movie review received major criticism from other people on TikTok. The conversation critiquing Darnell’s point-of-view mostly hinged on the belief that she missed the message of the movie, while also attacking her appearance.
One person named Han posted a TikTok speaking directly to Darnell, stating, “You are stereotypical Barbie... and the whole basis of the movie is that there is no stereotypical Barbie.”
“Barbie is not just beauty,” Han explained. “Barbie is career-driven. You can be stereotypical Barbie while also being president Barbie, while also being weird Barbie, while also being pregnant Barbie, while also being any other Barbie that you can be. Because being a woman is not centered around your beauty. It’s centered around you as a person, because you are a human.”
Someone else took on Darnell’s negative review of Barbie by commenting on the weight women are forced to carry by virtue of living in a patriarchal society. In her TikTok critique, Maame explained, “Stereotypical Barbie has the existential crisis for a reason... Whether or not you meet all the criteria of, like, being a perfect woman, you will ultimately fail because of time.”
“The idea that, like, we are all in pursuit of something that we know is necessarily unattainable, we will all, at some point, as women, fail at womanhood,” she continued. “That’s the reality that Barbie is trying to portray, and that reality, for women, regardless of whether you are stereotypical Barbie, weird Barbie, video Barbie, that weighs on you. As a woman, it is a weight that you genuinely cannot shake, so long as we exist in a patriarchal society.”
A crucial message in the Barbie movie is that all women, in all forms, are enough, as is — for Darnell to get dragged for her opinion undercuts that very idea.
Amidst the backlash, Darnell posted a follow-up TikTok clarifying her stance and sharing a vulnerable detail about her own life.
She explained, “I didn’t like it, because it wasn’t the Barbie that I knew growing up and played with. I said that because Barbie, for me, growing up, was like my escape from reality.”
“Whenever I was in trouble at home, or having a tough time at school, I would just run home and play with my Barbies, like the world didn’t exist, Darnell said. “Me and my sister created our own, like, little safe space with Barbie, where it was like all of our problems didn’t exist.”
Darnell’s desire to see Barbie onscreen, representing the exact character she imagined as a child, shows a certain kind of earnestness. While it may have been a misguided wish, it's still one she's permitted to have.
“My favorite part of the movie was actually, like, the breaking of the stereotypical Barbie,” she continued. “And I gotta say, the insecurity Barbie really hit home.”
Darnell shared photos of herself wearing hearing aids, which goes to show how strangers on the internet don’t know the full picture of anyone’s private world. She said, “I’ve never opened up about this, because I’m extremely insecure about it, and I don’t film videos with them. I used to get made fun of for wearing them, and it’s hard for me to open up about it. But, I wear hearing aids, whenever I’m in school, or in anything really important.”
“I’m really good at reading lips, and I don’t like filming in them because I didn’t want anybody to open up that conversation. But I feel like it’s time to, now... I would just sometimes get comments about, like, whenever I post videos of me lip-synching, or dancing, how my lips are off. I’m trying the best I can.”
“So, I’m upset that people assume I’ve never had an insecurity or problem just because they thought I looked like a stereotypical Barbie,” she stated. “We’ve all had problems, silent battles. It’s just, growing up, Barbie helped me cope with mine.”
“So with this, I hope we can all learn, before running to the comments, belittling someone, judging them, and basically insulting their intelligence, because of their opinion on a movie, let’s remember, it’s just a movie, and Barbie wouldn’t want us to do that,” Darnell concluded.
We live in a world that isn't made of technicolor plastic, one that's full of shadows, along with light. The Barbie movie amplifies the idea that women hold inherent worth, despite our myriad of differences, solely because we're still here.
Alexandra Blogier is a writer on YourTango's news and entertainment team. She covers celebrity gossip, pop culture analysis and all things to do with the entertainment industry.