Posted in: HBO, Movies, streaming, TV | Tagged: barbie, Bill Maher, opinion, Real Time

Barbie "Manifesto" Nothing More Than Bill Maher Yelling at Pink Cloud

Bill Maher spilled out his thoughts on Barbie this week with a Twitter "manifesto" review that says much more about him than it does the film.

Unlike wine, cheese, and my opinion that It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia was going to end up being the greatest sitcom to ever grace television screens, Bill Maher isn't aging well as far as pop culture characters go. Sure, he has his Friday night fiefdom on HBO, where he's free to give airtime to such "esteemed scholars" as Russell Brand and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. – and make a nice chunk of change from Warner Bros. Discovery in the process. And when he's not screaming about "being canceled" on a show that airs on the biggest cable network going and one he gets paid millions of dollars for, he's branched into podcasting, where he – talks some more. Because why waste your time on ten minutes of Brand babbling when you can get Maher and Brand in a two-man pity party for nearly 90 minutes – right? But Maher just seems angry all of the time – like a comic who blames his audience for no longer finding his shtick funny and gets bitter about it – never thinking for a hot second that maybe it's not us, that it's him. And worse than that, he's becoming… a cliche? A stereotype? He's become the dude who wants everyone to know that he was "liberal" before liberal was cool – and all of you "wacky kids" out there are the reason why everything "sucks" today. And let me tell you, Hell hath no fury like an old white guy who doesn't feel like he's been given enough respect scorned. So were we surprised to read that Maher was back on his front porch, with his fist in the air as he raged at the pink clouds of Barbie swirling around him? No – because Maher's responses to things these days read like they come from an angry "Mad Libs" template.

We'll leave it up to you if you want to read his full "man-ifesto" against the Margot Robbie & Ryan Gosling-starring global blockbuster Barbie – but in a nutshell? Personal takeaways from what I read? Much like the term "fetch" from Mean Girls, Maher's trying to get the phrase "Zombie Lie" to become a thing. Maher thinks that numbers equal equality – not titles and positions of power and responsibility – and that if he attends a screening with a woman who agrees with him, then she represents all women (I wonder if she would've made Maher's "manifesto" if she disagreed it him). And for those of you wondering how an old, white guy in a position of power like Maher could possibly know how others live? Well… you're apparently being "so old and so silly" (it's even funnier if you read it in your head with Maher saying "like" before each "so"). Why? Aside from the questionable numbers game he likes to play? Wait for it…

After making sure we all understand that "none of us can know exactly what others go through" in their lives " Maher doesn't waste a hot second elevating himself above the rest of us mere mortals with this line: "I can see the world around me." Of course, that does beg the question of what world Maher believes he's living in – because in Maher's world, the "patriarchy" doesn't exist – because he doesn't see it, people! Of course, Maher's past is filled with example of things he "just knew" until someone taught him otherwise – like when the late "Rowdy" Roddy Piper schooled Maher on the realities of professional wrestling or when Ice Cube needed to remind Maher that he doesn't have a license to drop the "n-word":

Finally, here's a look at what Maher had to say about the $1B (and growing) blockbuster:

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