When CBM featured Amy Nicholson's review of The Avengers it was to highlight the fact that it was (or at least seemed to be) one negative review in a sea of positive ones. She actually gave the movie 3 out of 5 stars, but it showed up as bad, or "rotten" over at Rotten Tomatoes. Also, if you read the review it does come across a lot more negative than anything else. We only posted some excerpts to show that not everyone loved the movie, and elements of it were coming in for some criticism.
Unfortunately this was met with quite a few comments - actually, attacks is more accurate - focusing on the fact that Nicholson happens to be female. Now, obviously if you didn't agree with the content of the review that's one thing, and a few comments were just good natured (ish!) jibes and banter. But others contained genuine bile and anger, and by bringing gender into it on top of that you really let the side down. It's completely irrelevant, as I'm sure any decent minded individual reading this will already know. This went further than our comments section, and Nicholson received hate mail directly on the subject. If our article on the review contributed to that in any way we apologize, obviously that was never our intention.
Here is Nicholson's response..
When I realized what I'd stumbled into, I made myself vow I'd never read the comments for my own sanity. And, honestly, I didn't have to. I've seen this pile-on happen before to my critic friends -- male and female -- and it's always the same, though men get more death threats while women get more poetry like, "Whose $%#@ did you suck to get your job?" It's telling that among all the hatemail, I've only gotten one email that actually wanted to argue the substance of my review. Many more self-described comic book guys have taken the time to write and apologize on behalf of their fellow fans, which was a nice surprise. No worries, guys -- I still love nerds.
Try not to take these things so seriously in future guys, it IS only a movie after all.
About The Author:
Mark Cassidy is a writer, photographer, amateur filmmaker, and Rotten Tomatoes-approved critic from Dublin, Ireland.