The boys of Supernatural. Both Jensen Ackles and Jared Padalecki have gotten incredible praise for the show (including helping to raise it above the Sci-Fi Ghetto), and for being a couple of members of "Young Hot Hollywood" who can actually act instead of relying on their good looks. However, both of their attempts at film careers after starting Supernatural (Jensen in My Bloody Valentine 3D and Jared in the Friday the 13th (2009) remake) went nowhere. The big test will be when they branch out of the sci-fi/horror genre, and when Supernatural ends they can be choosier about film roles. After the show ended, Ackles voiced Batman in Batman: The Long Halloween and attained a role in the third season of The Boys while Padalecki got the title role in the 2021 reboot of Walker.
Wes Bentley, after attaining his Star-Making Role in American Beauty, initially appeared to be a star on the rise, but immediately following its success, acquired a drug habit which nearly ruined his life. His addiction spiraled to the point he divorced his then-wife and only worked onscreen infrequently, with paychecks going to bills or drugs. His career was unstable for nearly eleven years after American Beauty before he decided to enter rehab and get clean starting in 2010. Bentley slowly, via supporting roles in The Hunger Games, Interstellar, Pete's Dragon, and Mission: Impossible – Fallout, as well as the FX anthology series American Horror Story and the ParamountNew Old West drama series Yellowstone, began rebuilding his career in that decade.
Gerard Butler. After roles in such films as Dracula 2000 and the Lara Croft: Tomb Raider sequel, People magazine predicted he would become a megastar upon the release of the movie version of the musical The Phantom of the Opera (2004). However, not only was that film a modest performer at the box-office, but Butler turned out to be a big reason for the fandom's Broken Base. In early 2006, he finally attracted big-time attention via 300, and since then has alternated between action films (Gamer, Law Abiding Citizen) and Chick Flick/Romantic Comedy fare (The Bounty Hunter, The Ugly Truth). He's getting plenty of work, but The Onion probably had a point when it joked that saying Butler is starring in a film is just false advertising.
Michael Cera came out with a vengeance after Arrested Development, appearing in several films that attained mainstream recognition plus artistic credibility (particularly Juno) and things were looking up. Then Year One put him on a bumpy road in 2009, while both of his films released the following year, Scott Pilgrim vs. The World and Youth in Revolt, despite positive critical reception, weren't as successful financially. His problem? Cera played the exact same nerdy-shy-guy character in every film he's been in so far, right down to specific mannerisms and vocal style. This eventually stuck to him in a big way, and his career took a tumble. He hasn't had a major hit or appearance in years, and now Jesse Eisenberg (who has a similar appearance and acting style) has gone on to become a bigger star. In recent years, he admitted that he deliberately shirked from bigger projects because he felt uneasy about all the publicity he faced. It wasn't until 2023, when Cera played Allan in Barbie, returned as Scott Pilgrim for the animated series Scott Pilgrim Takes Off, starred opposite Nicolas Cage in the critically hailed Dream Scenario, and appeared in the Black Mirror episode "Joan is Awful", that he's begun seeking out high-profile work again.
Bryan Cranston has been acting for over three decades, but 2008 onwards have seen him make his way up to the A-List. Already famous and acclaimed for his role in Malcolm in the Middle, it was his role on Breaking Bad that saw him win enormous acclaim, three Emmys and has since been considered one of the best actors on television. His film career has been shaky with his some flops (Total Recall (2012), Rock of Ages, John Carter) and some big hits (Argo, Godzilla), but he was not the major box-office draw of these films. Like Michael Shannon and Jeremy Renner, he has the advantage of being considerably older and having a more distinctive presence than most other actors and he has a hugely dedicated fanbase, with type casting being a lesser issue as he has already proven he can reinvent himself even late in his career. Time will tell what happens next.
Patrick Dempsey had a serviceable but unremarkable film career for ages. Once Grey's Anatomy became big, Hollywood began trying to promote him as the next big thing. Of the leading-man roles he's starred in since then, only Enchanted was really a critical and/or commercial success, and that one was arguably helped by having the Disney name behind it as well. His other roles haven't really set the world on fire, though he readily admits that his acting on Grey's mainly helps finance his auto racing career and also wouldn't mind pursuing motorsports full-time. Dempsey has still made sporadic returns to Grey's every few seasons, and later reprised his Enchanted role in the Disney+-exclusive sequel Disenchanted (2022). In 2023, he starred in the box office horror hit Thanksgiving and in the critically acclaimed Ferrari.
Colin Farrell, starting with Hart's War, had a big push in the early to mid-00's, starring in or having large supporting roles in blockbusters like Minority Report, Daredevil (2003), S.W.A.T. (2003), The New World (2005) and most infamously, Oliver Stone's Alexander and Michael Mann's Miami Vice. With the exception of Minority Report, all of these films flopped or under-performed, and Colin went under the radar for a few years, starring in smaller budget/indie films. While he's had some small hits like In Bruges and Fright Night (2011), he's still made flops like Total Recall (2012), and regardless his career is nowhere near the A-List status it once was. Then, he's one of the main cast in the second season of True Detective as one of the main leads. He was praised for his performance on the show if it wasn't bogged by the convoluted plot, making the second season a Tough Act to Follow. In the mid-2010's he appeared in the Harry Potter spin-off Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, which did well financially, and in two films by Yorgos Lanthimos, The Lobster and The Killing of a Sacred Deer, which were critically hailed (with The Lobster even winning the Jury Prize at the Cannes Film Festival). He's found more success in a supporting capacity nowadays, with as many highs (Widows, The Gentlemen) as lows (Dumbo, Artemis Fowl). 2022 was in particular a very good year for him, where he had acclaimed performances in four very different movies (After Yang, The Batman, Thirteen Lives, and The Banshees of Inisherin), The Batman being a major box office hit with a sequel and a spin-off focusing on the Penguin in production, while The Banshees of Inisherin earned him a Volpi Cup for Best Actor at the Venice Film Festival and a Golden Globe for Best Actor in a Musical or Comedy, as well as his first Oscar nomination.
After the double whammy of Shakespeare in Love and Elizabeth, Joseph Fiennes got hyped up by the press and made it onto People's list of the sexiest men alive in 1999. However, he turned down a lot of roles in order to focus on stage work – most notably The Pianist – and declined the offer to sign a five picture deal with Miramax. He continues to have a strong acting career – particularly getting praise and an Emmy Award nomination for his role in The Handmaid's Tale – and could've been an A-lister if he wished, but it just seems he doesn't.
Andrew Garfield had a string of indie successes (Lions for Lambs, The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus) before hitting it big with The Amazing Spider-Man. Even critics who didn't care much for it praised him in the title role, favorably comparing him to Tobey Maguire (who also found the right balance between making big budget films and small dramatic films). While the Amazing Spider-Man franchise was prematurely ended, he became a critical darling with acclaimed roles in such fare as The Social Network (which many felt he was overlooked for at the Oscars), Hacksaw Ridge (which did earn him his very first Oscar nomination for Best Actor), and tick, tick... BOOM! (which netted him another Oscar nomination for Best Actor). His surprise appearance in Spider-Man: No Way Home received a lot of acclaim from critics and audiences, even causing the TASM movies to be re-evaluated by those who were more critical of them, with a current social media campaign to make a third one. As such, it's looking hopeful he'll stay big for a while.
Domhnall Gleeson had some hits with Harry Potter and a supporting role in Dredd and was known in his native Ireland for being the son of Brendan Gleeson but it was About Time that really launched his career. Since then, he's been on a major critical and commercial hot streak with Ex Machina, Brooklyn, The Revenant, American Made and, most notably, a major role in the Star Wars sequel trilogy among other films. If he can continue his ability to choose good projects and mix respected smaller films and major commercial hits, he will have a very successful career ahead.
Jon Hamm has had an odd relationship with this trope. After a few years of doing bit work and supporting roles, He burst onto the scene with Mad Men and won huge acclaim for his role and he has made a few forays into film such as The Town and Bridesmaids, the latter of which allowed him a chance to prove his comedy skills. But he hasn't fully made the leap to film success yet. This is partially due to his admitted aversion to franchises that require long contracts, ruling him out of superhero films even though many had been and still are pushing for him to play Batman in the DC Extended Universe, something which Hamm has said he'd be up for if the script were good enough. Like some other actors on here, his older age gives him a degree of protection from being replaced and his acclaimed work on TV means he'll be around for a good while. He also had a huge hit with Baby Driver so the possibility of him breaking out as a film star is definitely still there.
Tom Hardy was once considered the next big star with a role in Star Trek: Nemesis. However the film flopped badly and nearly killed his career before it got started. This resulted in Hardy falling into an addiction to alcohol and crack which he eventually overcame. His role in Bronson helped revive his fortunes but it was his role in Inception that made him big again. He followed it up with Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy, Warrior, This Means War (2012), Lawless and, most notably, his role as Bane in The Dark Knight Rises which was a colossal hit and earned him huge acclaim. 2015's Mad Max: Fury Road opened to rave reviews and became the most critically acclaimed film of the year while that same year's The Revenant nabbed him an Oscar nomination, so don't expect Hardy to fade into obscurity anytime soon. Even the maligned Venom (2018) and its better-received sequel Let There Be Carnage made a lot of money. Critics and audiences alike conceded that regardless of how good or bad the movies were, Hardy made them watchable at least.
Kevin Hart is climbing up this ladder as we speak, in large part thanks to his highly respected stand up career. While the films he's starred in, like Ride Along and Grudge Match, haven't been well-received by critics, audiences have enjoyed them more thanks to box office gross. Forbes even named him the top-paid comedian of 2016 with $87.5 million, surpassing long-time record holder Jerry Seinfeld. More recently, he has had a couple of commercially and critical successful films that costarred Dwayne Johnson: Central Intelligence and Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle as well as having a role in the highly successful animated film The Secret Life of Pets. He was supposed to host for the Oscars 2019 but after two days since the announcement, he dropped out after a series of his old homophobic tweets resurfaced which he apologized on the next day.
Josh Hartnett rocketed to super-stardom in the late 90's and early 00's with roles in teen films like The Virgin Suicides and The Faculty, and was voted several times by People Magazine as one of their top teen stars of the year. His momentum died down gradually, however. In spite of a starring turn in the critically acclaimed Black Hawk Down, Hartnett was in a long list of duds (including Pearl Harbor, Hollywood Homicide, and the critically panned and controversial 40 Days and 40 Nights). His last work of note, 2007's 30 Days of Night, barely recouped its production budget, and he's spent the late '00s and early '10s working on small indie projects. He's started to make a small comeback in the Showtime horror series Penny Dreadful, but time will tell if he'll be able to return to mainstream success. This seems to have been at least partially a choice on Hartnett's part, as he admits he struggled greatly with the level of fame he had. It got to the point he turned down numerous major roles (including Batman and Superman), and took a step back from Hollywood as a whole. He later moved to the UK, where he started a family.
Guy Henry, better known as Henrik Hanssen in Holby City has become critically acclaimed, and has avoided things such as Small Name, Big Ego etc. Unlike Justin Bieber, he isn't criticised or the subject of jokes, and is considered attractive by a lot of women - as much as the aforementioned individual.
Tom Hiddleston has been gradually climbing to the top ever since he first gained mainstream exposure as the villainous Loki in Thor, with subsequent reprisals as the villain in the Marvel Cinematic Universe adding to his stardom while finding consistent, critically-acclaimed work in between his MCU work like The Night Manager – which netted him a Golden Globe award. His biggest hit that he headlined outside of the MCU was Kong: Skull Island, which received good reviews and grossed over $550 million worldwide, although some felt his otherwise solid performance was overshadowed by the All-Star Cast. What helps Hiddleston stand out from other MCU cast members is how he stars in smaller budget productions that garner much critical goodwill while avoiding big flops. For the time being, Hiddleston seems to be doing well and may be on his way to securing A-list stardom if he can continue his consistent track record. His perseverance was rewarded when a Loki series was greenlit in 2019 and premiered on Disney+ in 2021 to rave reviews and peak streaming numbers.
Tom Holland started out in the stage adaptation of Billy Elliot and the film The Impossible, but his mainstream break-out performance came when he played Spider-Man in the MCU starting with Captain America: Civil War. Holland's performance was highly praised for balancing both the wisecracking action hero and nerdy everyman aspects of Spider-Man. Although his role was primarily comedic, many fans and critics noted how Holland was also surprisingly adept at dramatic performances with Holland improvising the much lauded death of Peter Parker in Infinity War. Even his tendency to accidentally spoil film details and leak production secrets hasn't damaged his popularity since he goes out of his way to show utmost humility and avoid burning bridges. Even at his young age, he holds much clout in the film industry as Holland personally convinced Disney CEO Bob Iger and Sony Pictures Chairman Tom Rothman to form a new deal to keep Spider-Man in the MCU after negotiations initially broke down. Recently, he has voiced a desire to step away from the role of Spider-Man (and acting in general) to start a family. Sony and Disney, however, are both keen on Holland returning for a second MCU Spider-Man trilogy after Spider-Man: No Way Home grossed over $1 billion dollars in the box office. It became the first film since the beginning of the COVID-19 Pandemic to do so, while also becoming the highest-grossing film of 2021. Outside of Spider-Man, Holland further proved he could draw in audiences with the video game adaptation Uncharted. While it got mixed reviews in contrast to his Spider-Man films, Uncharted did astoundingly well at the box office. The film made over $50 million in its opening weekend and later $150 million in two weeks, proving moviegoers would see Holland just for the sake of seeing Holland.
Barry Keoghan became a household name in his home country of Ireland with a starring role in Love/Hate and was given the opportunity to star in high profile films such as Dunkirk, The Killing of a Sacred Deer and Eternals. He made a short appearance in The Batman (2022) where in the deleted scene, he's revealed to be the Joker. His performance in The Banshees of Inisherin earned him a BAFTA for Best Supporting Actor and got him nominated at Golden Globes and Oscars in 2022.
Dev Patel first came to the public's attention with his role in Skins, before his career exploded with the success of Slumdog Millionaire. He was nominated for many awards, and looked to be a star in the making. Unfortunately, his next role was as Zuko in The Last Airbender, a critically-derided Box Office Bomb that nearly put a stop to his rising international career. He managed to repair his reputation somewhat in Britain with The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel and landed a good supporting role in Aaron Sorkin's The Newsroom, so he's not completely gone, but his chance at superstardom seems to be long past. However, he was nominated for an Oscar in 2017 for Lion, so things may be looking up for him. The further critical successes of The Personal History of David Copperfield, The Green Knight, and Monkey Man (the last of which additionally served as his directorial debut) have also been very good for his career.
Pedro Pascal played a lot of minor and supporting TV roles in the past until he played the dashing Prince Oberyn Martell in Game of Thrones, which earned unanimous acclaim from critics and audiences. Pascal was later given one of the starring roles in the Netflix series Narcos and was cast in The Great Wall, Kingsman: The Golden Circle and The Equalizer 2. This boosted his star power further, which led him to getting the role of Big Bad Maxwell Lord in Wonder Woman 1984 and playing the titular character for Disney+'s The Mandalorian. The Mandalorian proved wildly successful during its first two seasons, resulting in him reprising the role in its spin-offs. When WW84 ended up premiering one week after the second season finalenote and on the same day as two of Pascal's less-hyped projects that year, We Can Be Heroes (2020) and a documentary about The Mandalorian Season 2, Pascal was praised for his ability to deliver boisterous and subdued performances with equal pathos. Afterwards, he got the role of Joel Miller in The Last of Us (2023) which earned him his first nomination for Best Actor in a Drama Series at the Emmys 2023.
Bryan Cranston's costar from Breaking Bad, Aaron Paul is less lucky. He won three Emmy Awards for his role as Jesse Pinkman. However, the films he starred after his breakthrough, Need for Speed and A Long Way Down, were all critical or commercial flops. However, Paul had some success with his involvement in Bojack Horseman and was cast in the third season of Westworld. His most prolific work since was reprising his role as Jesse Pinkman in the Breaking Bad sequel film El Camino.
The entire cast of Star Trek (2009) got huge hype from their roles but arguably none more so than Chris Pine, playing the role of Captain Kirk. While he had some hits and critical acclaim before, it was his role in the 2009 reboot that put him firmly on the A-List. Since then, he's accumulated greater success with roles in Unstoppable, This Means War (2012) and Rise of the Guardians. He was also cast as Jack Ryan in the film of the same name, taking over a role previously held by Harrison Ford, Alec Baldwin and Ben Affleck. His latest major role as Steve Trevor in Wonder Woman has done much favors for him as the film was not only a critical and commercial smash, but many praised his performance and chemistry with lead Gal Gadot.
Jeremy Renner initially did well with this trope, helped by the fact that he is much older than most of the stars usually being hyped. While he'd been working pretty consistently since 1995 and got attention for his roles in Dahmer and The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, it was The Hurt Locker in 2008 that brought him huge acclaim and an Oscar nomination. He's since followed it up with critical acclaim and another Oscar nomination for The Town, a supporting role in Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol and a central role in The Avengers (2012) as Hawkeye. While Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters and The Bourne Legacy did well at the box-office but not so well with critics, the Marvel Cinematic Universe helped keep him working consistently. Unfortunately, in 2019 a snowballing series of embarrassments and worse seriously damaged his reputation: his musical side-career and a failed app became subjects of mockerynote An entire podcast, "The Renner Files" dedicated to mocking the APP and Renner's douchbaggery was a hit in 2020. , and his ex-wife accused him of Domestic Abuse. Combined with ongoing fandom snark about Hawkeye being the lamest hero in a series featuring numerous characters, and his future in the franchise uncertain with the aforementioned allegations, the end may or may not be in sight — especially as the Hawkeye solo project was not focused solely on Renner, but also the introduction of the second, female, Hawkeye, played by the up-and-coming and much more marketable Hailee Steinfeld.
Irish actor Jack Reynor was given a lot of hype thanks to his breakout role in What Richard Did, but afterwards Hype Backlash set in pretty quickly. Notably, his turn in Transformers: Age of Extinction had viewers questioning if his success was just a fluke. He did earn some critical acclaim for his parts in smaller films like A Royal Night Out, the 2015 adaptation of Macbeth, Detroit, and Midsommar, so time will tell.
Seth Rogen has been dancing around this trope for a while. He's been acting since the late nineties but he got his biggest push from Knocked Up in 2007. Like Michael Cera, he was then on the receiving end of criticism for playing the same character (the vulgar but loveable slacker) too many times in films that weren't successful or were despite his presence. The biggest exception was Observe and Report, in which he played against type as a delusional, sinister mall cop, but it received mixed reviews. He did, however, earn back quite a bit of cred with his surprising dramatic performance in 50/50 (2011), which have made people view him in a better light; This Is the End, which he co-wrote and starred in, was a commercial success, as was his follow-up Neighbors, its sequel Neighbors 2: Sorority Rising, and the R-rated animated film Sausage Party. He would further expand his dramatic credentials with supporting roles in the Danny Boyle-directed biopic Steve Jobs and Pam & Tommy, with his performance in the latter netting him an Emmy nomination.
Although prominent since Clueless, character actor Paul Rudd's stint as a Hollywood leading man has been built upon the popularity of the Judd Apatow films he has appeared in. He had a promising start with Role Models and I Love You, Man, but practically every film since then have been either box-office flops or disappointments. This Is 40 has gotten a lot of praise though and he's guaranteed a career in prominent supporting roles. His performance as Scott Lang/Ant-Man in the Marvel Cinematic Universe boosted his career a bit.
Michael Shannon had been kicking around for years in prominent supporting roles in films such as 8 Mile and Bad Boys II but it was his scene-stealing role in Revolutionary Road in which he just about stole the film from Leonardo DiCaprio, Kate Winslet and Kathy Bates with ten minutes of screen time, that earned him huge praise and an Oscar nomination. Since then, he has gone from one success to another with acclaimed starring roles in films like The Iceman and Take Shelter, rave reviews for supporting roles in Premium Rush and The Runaways and most notably his role in HBO's Boardwalk Empire and his role as Zod in blockbuster Man of Steel. He later received another Oscar nomination for Nocturnal Animals and was praised for his performance in The Shape of Water. While he may not exactly be anyone's idea of a leading man, it's likely he'll stick around for some time. He later reprised his role as Zod in The Flash (2023).
Alexander Skarsgård got a lot of attention for True Blood and for dating former starlets, but what his fans perceive as famewhoring and paparazzi baiting seems to be turning them off. He's on the fence until future efforts succeed in replenishing the ranks. Solid and Ho Yay-riffic work on Generation Kill seems to be doing the trick. He has won acclaim for his turn in Big Little Lies, while also getting the lead roles in Godzilla vs. Kong and The Northman.
Channing Tatum broke out into the mainstream with Step Up and G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra. This had the effect of typecasting him as either a bland meathead or a Mr. Fanservice. Although he attracted a swarm of Estrogen Brigade, critics didn't think too highly of him, nicknaming him 'The Charming Potato' - though he had proved that he did have some acting prowess in his earlier roles in A Guide to Recognizing Your Saints and Stop-Loss. The year 2012 was very successful for him - with both 21 Jump Street and Magic Mike proving to be critical and commercial successes. Both were followed up with successful sequels, and he won lots of acclaim for a dramatic turn in Foxcatcher as well as a wildly against type role in The Hateful Eight. The box office failure of Jupiter Ascending and his Gambit movie dying Development Hell, seems to be throwing a bit of a wrench into things however, though a reunion with Magic Mike director Steven Soderbergh in Logan Lucky was acclaimed if underperforming, and he had a supporting role in the successful Kingsman: The Golden Circle.
Justin Timberlake has been a very successful singer since his days in *NSYNC, but his movie career has had a lot of ups and downs. His entrance into Hollywood was rough: Alpha Dog had mixed reviews, but his performance was mostly praised. Then Southland Tales, Shrek the Third, and The Love Guru ruined the careers of everyone involved, including him. Nobody cared for The Open Road, but then The Social Network gave him a massive career boost. From then on it was bumpy again: voicing another CGI character, picking the wrong sci-fi thriller to star in, and being hit or miss with the rom-com genre. A supporting role in Inside Llewyn Davis may keep him afloat acting-wise in the short term; to work with both David Fincher and The Coen Brothers illustrate that some big-name directors still have a lot of faith in him.
Aaron Tveit has kicked around Broadway for a few years with the occasional recurring part, but the Powers That Be have been actively looking for a vehicle to introduce him to the mainstream. It finally happened with a turn in the film adaptation of Les Misérables (2012) and the new show Graceland. However, as seen under Amanda Seyfried's entry, much of the attention of Les Mis was directed toward Anne Hathaway and Hugh Jackman, and while he's getting great praise for Graceland, its status as a darker show on the normally bright and optimistic USA Network has made its reception a little lukewarm.
Beth Behrs, from 2 Broke Girls has also received critical acclaim as well, and time will tell if this lasts or not. However, her Germans Love David Hasselhoff status - in the United Kingdom - probably counts for this too.
Jessica Biel gained a lot of hype early on from 7th Heaven, but struggled to maintain a successful career afterwards. She has, among many other things in her favor, an amazing fitness-girl body that still frequently shows up in magazines, a high-profile marriage to Justin Timberlake, and several potential break-out roles, but also suffered from a string of critically trashed Box Office Bombs like Blade: Trinity and Stealth. When she finally got naked in a "serious" movie (hoping for the extra career boost that it usually provides hot, young, fading actresses), it was for a stripper role in a straight-to-video film (Powder Blue) that earned her zero legit cred – and sadly for all concerned, is more likely to be remembered as Patrick Swayze's final film. The bombing of the Total Recall (2012) remake, which reportedly cost Sony over $200 million in losses, seems to cement her even further into this, especially as her generation of actresses include megastars like Scarlett Johansson and Kirsten Dunst; there is in fact a 1998 Teen Peoplepictorial of the three◊, ostensibly pushing them as future stars, but whereas Dunst and Johansson were nominated for an Academy Award in 2020 and 2022 respectively, Biel, so far, has zero.note Johansson in fact received two simultaneous nominations — Best Actress and Best Supporting Actress — in the same year, one of the few actors to achieve this feat. To date, Biel, despite being on tons of magazine covers, is still just a minor star, and at this point is best known as "Justin Timberlake's Wife". However, in 2017, she returned to the small screen with her critically hailed role in The Sinner, receiving Golden Globe and Emmy Award nominations.
Emily Blunt became known outside of the UK in 2006 with her performance in The Devil Wears Prada and a Golden Globe win for the drama Gideon's Daughter. After starring in a few indie films, her role as Queen Victoria in The Young Victoria proved that she could handle a leading role and got her her third Golden Globe nomination. While much was expected of her, her career in the years following that was a rollercoaster of critical hits (The Adjustment Bureau, Sunshine Cleaning, Salmon Fishing in the Yemen) and major misfires (The Wolfman (2010), The Five-Year Engagement). She actually had to decline the role of Black Widow in Iron Man 2 (and the subsequent appearances in films like the box-office juggernaut The Avengers) because of a scheduling conflict with Gulliver's Travels, which was a box office bomb during the 2010 holiday season. However the year 2014 was very good to her with hits like Edge of Tomorrow and Into the Woods and the repeated commercial success of Sicario and The Girl on the Train, plus a one-two punch in 2018 with A Quiet Place and Mary Poppins Returns seems to have kept the ball rolling. In 2021, she had another double-whammy with A Quiet Place Part II and Jungle Cruise, which were both successful at the box office, and the latter has a sequel in development.
Emilia Clarke has been slowly rising to the top since she was cast as Daenerys Targaryen in Game of Thrones, which earned her many Emmy Award nominations. But then, she landed the role of Sarah Connor in Terminator Genisys, which received negative critical reviews, most of which panned her performance. Although she quickly recovered with her starring role in Me Before You, her film career was hampered by the commercial failure of the Star Wars spin-off Solo. With the poorly-received finale of Game of Thrones in 2019 – which her character was at the crux of – only time will tell if she will stay on top or be remembered as a One-Hit Wonder. Since that debacle, she has moved from Westeros to Marvel, making her debut in Secret Invasion (2023).
Around The New '10s, Hollywood was clearly looking to give Lily Collins a Star-Making Role. As the daughter of famous musician Phil Collins, she garnered much attention from guest spots on the revival of Beverly Hills, 90210 and a supporting role in the Academy Award-nominated The Blind Side. However, her first shots at leading roles – as the Love Interest in the 2011 Taylor Lautner action flick Abduction and as Snow White in 2012's Mirror, Mirror – didn't turn out so well. The former was trashed by critics and became a Box Office Bomb, while the latter ended up overshadowed by the other Snow White film Snow White & the Huntsman. The Hype Machine really got behind Collins when it was announced that she was cast as Clary Fray in the film adaptation of The Mortal Instruments. The film ended up becoming a flop with audiences and critics, a planned sequel was cancelled, and the franchise rebooted as the Netflix series Shadowhunters with an all-new cast. Lily was however praised for her performances in these and other films, with some even comparing her screen presence to Audrey Hepburn. She would later earn a Golden Globe nomination for 2016's Rules Don't Apply and praise for her roles in Netflix films like To The Bone, Okja, and Mank, so time will tell. In October 2020, she played the titular role of Emily in Paris. Although the Netflix series received mixed reviews, Lily's performance got her nominated for another Golden Globe. A second season premiered in December 2021, and a month later it was renewed for two more seasons.
Viola Davis has had a string of very well-received roles over the past few years starting with the acclaimed Doubt. However, she hasn't done anything really big since then. This doesn't speak to lack of talent, but more about what kind of roles Hollywood offers black actresses. Davis' later films included small supporting parts in Ender's Game, Beautiful Creatures, and Prisoners; something she's not very happy about, calling these roles "mammy-ish" and "down-trodden". For similar reasons, she also doesn't like The Help that much despite it being Academy Award-nominated, criticizing how the black maids were reduced to Supporting Protagonists to the white characters (which already attracted criticisms of a "white savior" narrative) and thus didn't give the audience enough of an idea about how her character and the other maids dealt with racism in the Jim Crow South. But Davis landed her own series with How to Get Away with Murder on ABC which got renewed for a fourth season, and resulted in her winning an Emmy Award for Best Actress in a Drama Series. She later won a well-deserved Oscar for her performance in the 2016 film adaptation of Fencesnote a role for which she had previously won a Tony in 2010, which showed that her career is going steady so far. In addition to building critical respect with serious roles, she also branched out into franchise work when she joined the DC Extended Universe as Amanda Waller. She portrayed Waller in Suicide Squad (2016) (despite being negatively reviewed, her performance was unanimously deemed one of the film's best elements) and its sequel The Suicide Squad (which was an Acclaimed Flop due to its release amidst the COVID-19 Pandemic, being widely considered an Even Better Sequel despite making less money than the first). In 2023, she became the third Black woman and 18th person to attain EGOT status when she won a Grammy Award for Best Audio Book, Narration & Storytelling Recording for Finding Me.
Michelle Dockery came to national attention for her role as Lady Mary in the worldwide hit Downton Abbey and much was expected of her. She didn't do much work outside of Downton so it remains to be seen if she'll remain prominent now the show has ended. She got her own series in America, Good Behavior, where she went against type to critical acclaim. This led to starring roles in more series like Godless and Defending Jacob.
Lily James has received a lot of good press, coming from Downton as well. She was at one point touted as "the next Keira Knightley" and was brought to national attention with her widely praised role as the title character in Disney's live-action remake of Cinderella. Her first follow-up to that - Pride and Prejudice and Zombies - playing with her 'English Rose' typecasting, was a Box Office Bomb. But she already had Downton and another well-received role in the BBC adaptation of War and Peace to fall back on, so time will tell. Starring in Edgar Wright's hit Baby Driver is certainly promising. She also had a prominent role in Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again, which was a commercial and critical hit. She later starred as Pamela Anderson in the Hulu miniseries Pam & Tommy. Her wildly against type performance is noted as a standout among the rest of the cast, and she would later get an Emmy nomination for it.
Felicity Jones had a slow climb to the top, starting out as a child actress in The Worst Witch. She had a series of respectable roles in well-received films, before netting a lot of acclaim for Like Crazy. Her attempt at joining a big franchise - namely as Felicia Hardy in The Amazing Spider-Man 2 - didn't go so well when Sony sold the Spider-Man rights back to Marvel. But an Oscar nomination for The Theory of Everything gave her a real boost and she headlined three films in 2016 - Inferno, A Monster Calls and the Star Wars spin-off Rogue One. Time will tell if this translates into superstardom.
Anya Taylor-Joy hovers around this. While her performance in Split was praised, she was not the main draw of that film, and its sequel, Glass (2019) failed to satisfyingly conclude its story. However, she received praise for the smaller scale thriller Thoroughbreds and the horror movie The VVitch. This focus on smaller scale projects would continue to earn her acclaim, from Emma to Peaky Blinders. However, attempted franchises with Taylor-Joy such as The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance, Playmobil: The Movie and The New Mutants did not pan out. Her true breakout hit was as Beth Harmon in The Queen's Gambit, which really brought her a lot of attention from critics and audiences (and even led to a chess boom in real life). Since then, Taylor-Joy has juggled dramatic and horror roles, but the box-office returns usually aren't there, even if her performances are consistently praised. She's since been cast as the eponymous character Mad Max spinoff Furiosa and as the voice of Princess Peach in Illumination’s The Super Mario Bros. Movie, so time will tell if critical acclaim will translate into box-office success.
Jennifer Lawrence had a huge boom throughout the first half of the 2010s but failed to keep up that momentum through the rest of the decade, leaving her career in a bit of a flux. She first came to critical notice with Winter's Bone which earned her an Oscar nomination and then won one for Silver Linings Playbook at only 22. She then had huge financial success with The Hunger Games from 2012-2015 and some of her earlier X-Men movies (including 2011's X-Men: First Class) but struggled to pick the right projects post-Hunger Games which lead to commercial and critical troubles, especially being seen as phoning it in the latter X-Men movies. Her first big budget outing after the former franchise ended, Passengers (2016), was a critical and commercial flop. Her next two films: mother! (2017) and Red Sparrow, both were financial and critical misfires. Her performance in her last X-Men outing, 2019's Dark Phoenix, was lambasted and the film was poorly received and one of the costliest flops of all time and the franchise was then rebooter under the Marvel Cinematic Universe banner when Disney purchased Fox. She then decided to take a break and figure out where to go next - she only returned late in 2021 with Don't Look Up and then took another break to have a baby who was born in early 2022. She’s still only in her early 30s and a very talented actor in the right role and shouldn’t be counted out just yet.
Adrianne Palicki, after a long string of appearances in failed pilots and short-lived series, finally broke into the mainstream when she accepted the role of Tyra Collette in Friday Night Lights, which received significant critical and commercial acclaim. However, her roles after the series ended have been weak at best. She most infamously played the title role in the Wonder Woman (2011 pilot), which wasn't picked up and was reviled by fans and critics. The Red Dawn (2012) remake was also torn apart by critics and tanked in theaters ($32.5 million box office gross against a $65 million budget), with her presence in the film barely getting a mention from most critics and viewers. G.I. Joe: Retaliation, however, did fine at the box office ($122.5 million domestically and over twice that overseas), while John Wick was critically acclaimed as well as being financially successful. Palicki has transferred since then from the Joes to S.H.I.E.L.D., and later The Orville.
Florence Pugh first got attention in her native Britain for her work in Lady Macbeth and The Little Drummer Girl. However, her three films in 2019, Fighting with My Family, Midsommar, and Little Women, were what catapulted her into international fame, including an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress for the last one. She's kept the ball rolling since then with her role as Yelena Belova in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, starting with Black Widow and Hawkeye. 2022 was the first major rough patch for Pugh with the release of Don't Worry Darling. Although it did fine at the box office and her performance was considered good, it got mixed reviews and the film's behind-the-scenes controversy quickly overshadowed everything else about it. But she made a quick rebound with The Wonder, a voice role in Puss in Boots: The Last Wish, Oppenheimer, and Dune: Part Two, so her career looks to be a very promising one.
Emma Roberts was heavily hyped as being the next big thing due to being the niece of Julia Roberts and roles in a few high-profile movies. After an adaptation of Nancy Drew in 2007 (among other flops like Wild Child and 4.3.2.1, which both went Direct-to-DVD in North America), it looked that she was never going to break out. Despite the obvious fact that no-one was biting, Hollywood continued to push her, which led to lackluster performances of Scream 4 and The Art Of Getting By. Emma's still around, but it will take a major hit film to turn things around for her. On the brighter side, hooking up with Ryan Murphy helped - she got positive reviews for her role on American Horror Story: Coven, returned for American Horror Story: Freak Show and American Horror Story: Cult, and starred on Scream Queens (2015).
Amanda Seyfried, after well-received early appearances in Veronica Mars and Mean Girls, was seemingly on a streak of success after becoming a major box-office draw (with hits such as the aforementioned Mean Girls and Mamma Mia!). But in an eleven-month period from 2011 to 2012, she had three major flops in a row – Red Riding Hood, In Time, and Gone (2012) – with some reviews for the third one questioning if she even had appeal or talent in the first place (though others reviewers contended she was better than the material). Les Misérables (2012), in which she played Cosette, was successful critically and commercially, but most of the acclaim was directed at Anne Hathaway and Hugh Jackman. Her role as the title character in Lovelace has gotten her a lot of praise, but the movie made only half a million at the box office. Hollywood has long-since given up on an A-List role for her, but she can probably maintain a solid career as long as she doesn't overreach. Her attempt at becoming part of a franchise to boost her success crashed and burned with the critical and commercial failure that was 2015's Pan. She reprised her role in Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again in 2018, which was a moderate success. Then in 2020, she played Marion Davies in Mank, which received critical acclaim. Seyfried's performance in this film is deemed her finest yet, such so that she got an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress. She later played disgraced medical entrepreneur Elizabeth Holmes in the Hulu series The Dropout, based on the titular podcast. Her performance netted her rave reviews once again and an eventual Emmy Award.
Octavia Spencer got major acclaim and won an Academy Award for her role in The Help. However, like her co-star Viola Davis, she hasn't done anything noteworthy since. This doesn't speak to lack of talent, but more about what kind of roles Hollywood offers black actresses. She got her own series, Red Band Society, on Fox, and a major role as Johanna in the Divergent movies at least. Spencer has since returned to being a character actress, with two more Oscar nominations for Hidden Figures and The Shape of Water. At most, she has had a hit playing the titular antagonist of Ma, as well as an Emmy Award-nominated performance as Madam C.J. Walker in the Netflix miniseries Self Made.
Emma Stone also fits, with Spider-Man crowning a rise after a series of well-received movies (Zombieland, Easy A, The Help). She later earned an Oscar nomination for Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance). Then in 2016, she earned a lot of praise for her performance in the musical film, La La Land, for which she won a Golden Globe for Best Actress in a Comedy/Musical and an Oscar for Best Actress. She later got nominated again at the Oscars in the supporting actress category for her role in The Favourite, before winning her second Best Actress award for Poor Things.
Olivia Thirlby made her film debut in the 9/11 drama United 93 and soon garnered more roles, frequently as a supporting type like in Juno. Those films led her to be billed as one of Hollywood's "New Wave" by Vanity Fair in 2008, though she has had a pretty modest career since then. Still, "modest" doesn't mean "failed" at all. She starred in the co-lead role of Judge Anderson opposite Karl Urban as the eponymous Judge in Dredd, which got mostly positive reviews and overcame poor box office returns to become a Cult Classic on home media. She later was part of the main cast in Season 1 of the Prime Video series Goliath, and had a role in Oppenheimer.
Olivia Wilde appeared in a number of supporting roles on film and TV before she was cast as Thirteen on House. That show's ratings success brought her onto the radar of a larger audience. She received a big push afterwards: via starring roles in such blockbuster films as Year One, The Next Three Days, TRON: Legacy, Cowboys & Aliens, and The Incredible Burt Wonderstone. Unfortunately, they often underperformed. Hence, Wilde, in 2019, branched into directing instead, which proved to be a far more fruitful endeavor when her debut feature Booksmart garnered extensive critical praise. However, her next directorial effort Don't Worry Darling starring Florence Pugh and Harry Styles (whom Wilde started dating) became Overshadowed by Controversy ranging from Shia Labeouf being cast in the film initially (Wilde herself claimed she fired him, but LaBeouf himself says he chose to leave the production) to her allegedly clashing with Pugh on-set (which reportedly motivated Pugh to limit her involvement in promotion). The film premiered at the 2022 Venice Film Festival, where it received negative to mixed reviews.
Since Divergent is considered by several in terms of hype to be "The New Hunger Games," being a film adaptation of a popular Young Adult book series (and every new such franchise launched between the two has bombed), there are already some press that are hyping up Divergent star Shailene Woodley as "The New Jennifer Lawrence." Adding to this comparison is the fact that both got their first break on low-budget cable series (The Bill Engvall Show for Lawrence, The Secret Life of the American Teenager for Woodley.) The box office success of The Fault in Our Stars is certainly a step in the right direction but after Allegiant bombed so badly, a conclusion for the series wound up cancelled (partly because Woodley refused to return if the studio repurposed it as a TV film). Fortunately, her performance in Snowden and Big Little Lies was praised which means there's hope for her.
Ensembles and Other Group Examples:
Jake Gyllenhaal and Maggie Gyllenhaal. Hollywood seems entranced by the both of them, despite their continued failure to gain traction with audiences. The action-adventure film led by Jake, Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time, performed under expectations, and even Maggie's presence in The Dark Knight hasn't been enough to bolster her career, with most of the praise she received only being in comparison to Katie Holmes, the woman she replaced. Her unconventional facial appearance (big jowls and looking much older than the current crop of young starlets) is part of it as well. But the suits seem undeterred, so who knows? Chances have luckily turned for the better in recent years, when Jake appeared as Mysterio in the $1B-dollar grossing Spider-Man: Far From Home (which became his highest-grossing film), though he was far from the main draw. Maggie, meanwhile, made her directorial debut with The Lost Daughter, which premiered in Venice 2021 to widespread critical praise.
Fictional Examples:
The fictional character Batwoman. When the character was announced as appearing in the weekly comic series 52 in 2007 there was a massive media response, even branching into non-comic related formats. The character was a recreation of the classic character from the 1950s, but was written as a lesbian involved with one of the primary characters for the series. Most of the media focus was on her sexuality, and she became regarded as the highest profile gay superhero in The DCU. Dan DiDio, Chief Editor of DC Comics, has said that even he was completely unprepared for the massive news fixation on the character, and did not know how to properly respond. Though unconfirmed, rumors circulate that the Batgirl series being published at the time of her introduction was canceled in order to make room for her character. However, the amount of coverage on the character was completely out of proportion to her role in the series, which was a supporting role spread out over a year, and she spent the following two years as a minor and unused character, only appearing in guest spots in other series. However, in 2009 she became the headline character in Detective Comics and received a well-received title-series by Greg Rucka that effectively delved into her backstory. 2019 even had a further mainstream push with her own TV show, albeit only the first season will star the character of Kate Kane, with the next putting a Suspiciously Similar Substitute.
Musical Examples:
Justin Bieber rode an immense wave of success in the early years of his career (despite releasing the same album three times note a two-part album released in halves four months apart, a compilation of the aforementioned two-parter, and an acoustic re-release with mostly identical content, but focused on vocals and instrumentals, rather than synthetic production and a Christmas album), with his third album (and second album of all original music) going platinum in several countries. He was a major sensation to pre-teen girls, but like most people with that target fanbase, their careers are prone to flaming out quickly. The biggest threat to Bieber's career as a mature performer was initially people getting completely sick of him, as he saturated every form of media out there, even appearing on shows and in magazines that have nothing to do with his target demographic of young children and teens. Hype Backlash was thus a major concern.
The early '10s were not so kind to him — in 2012, a certain British boy band started to cannibalize his fanbase. He did manage another successful album (Believe, considered to have grown the beard) and another successful world tour... but his next concert film flopped and his subsequent album was withdrawn from iTunes. He soon got an arrest and a DUI under his belt, adding to the likeliness that he would burn out.
The tables finally turned in 2015. After spending the first half of 2015 on an apology tour and doing his best to undo the damage of his 2014 scandals, along with the surprise hit with Skrillex and Diplo "Where Are Ü Now", his highly-promoted comeback single "What Do You Mean?" debuted at #1 on the Hot 100, something that One Direction never achieved; his subsequent album Purpose was released on the same day as 1D's, and went on to trounce it, debuting at number one (subsequently ending 1D's perfect #1 album streak at 4) and having two enormously successful followup singles ("Sorry" and "Love Yourself"), which were the two biggest hits of 2016. Two more tracks featuring Bieber, Major Lazer's "Cold Water" and DJ Snake's "Let Me Love You", were also smash hits in the summer of 2016. While he's still on shaky ground (and 1D arguably still has a bigger "hardcore" following), he gained a larger casual following than he or 1D ever had. It's certainly a positive turning point and the future looks bright.
5 Seconds of Summer are an Australian pop rock boy band who got their big break opening for One Direction, and the success they experienced was enormous, becoming the only boy-band able to stand toe-to-toe with them. Groups like The Wanted and Big Time Rush had their careers flushed down the toilet by their rivals, whereas upcoming groups like Emblem3, Midnight Red, and Union J were unable to take off, so 5 Seconds of Summer was expected to suffer the same fate. But instead, the group debuted at number-one with their first album, outsold One Direction's opening, got 5 top 40 hits in only three months, and are apparently next in line for the teen idol throne.
Boy BandOne Direction took America practically overnight. While they had a slower rise in Europe, they were relatively unheard of in the United States—and then they started appearing everywhere. Although initially pegged as rivals to fellow rising boy band The Wanted, One Direction made short work of them, and The Wanted's career fizzled after one big hit. Then, the band's eyes were set on Justin Bieber. One Direction shocked the world when they defeated Justin Bieber at the 2012 Video Music Awards, which was a sign that Bieber's reign atop the teen world was coming to an end. One Direction proved that the victory was no fluke by continuing to dwarf his accomplishments and sales. Not only were the Brits' popularity skyrocketing past the Canadian's and closing in on his peak, but it was also obvious that Bieber's popularity was starting to fall (his own behavior would hurt it even worse). It's quite clear that One Direction are the biggest teen phenomenon since *NSYNC. Though after the group broke up, the musicians are trying not to be like NSYNC in that only one member remained successful - and it might be the case with Harry Styles, who released two acclaimed albums and scored three top 10 hits on both sides of the Pond, and rose at the same time Zayn Malik began faltering in the charts, while Niall Horan has mostly retreated to his native Ireland, and the other two only charted well with their debut singles. Harry has since branched out into acting, making his film debut in Christopher Nolan's Dunkirk and later cameoing as Eros/Starfox in the MCU-set superhero film Eternals. However, his roles in 2022's Don't Worry Darling (directed by his girlfriend Olivia Wilde – see below) and My Policeman were widely criticized and shed some doubt on his acting potential. Zayn, meanwhile, became mired in controversy after he was accused of striking his girlfriend Gigi Hadid's mother Yolanda, which led to the end of his relationship with Gigi and him being put on probation.
Ever since the Pussycat Dolls split up, Hollywood has been trying their absolute damnedest to make Nicole Scherzinger a pop superstar. She had one album, long stuck in Development Hell, released in 2010, to mild success. She's also won a season of Dancing with the Stars, had multiple TV spots, including judging spots on the UK and US versions of The X Factor and her own episode of Behind The Music. It's still up in the air if all of it will finally pay off.
Television Hosts and Presenters:
Sarah Rogers, ITV news reporter has had critical acclaim and her Twitter feed is popular - although it's very much a dry type of Twitter, with no controversial tweets. She was believed to be in Strictly Come Dancingbut that never got anywhere, and she's covered many dark and edgy news topics, sometimes news stories with An Aesop in them, and she is considered a good up-and-coming reporter who deserves national attention. Time will tell if she becomes as big a star as Scarlett from Gogglebox.
Carolin Roth from CNBC is well-known to the fanbase who watch Street Signs on CNBC weekday mornings 9am-11am UK time, but recently, she's become very popular and has been well-received for her appearances with Louisa Bojesen on Street Signs and her ability to present, with an interesting mixture of Technician vs. Performer. Although it's too early to call, she is still getting a cult following from viewers, and people are expecting her to be on reality shows by 2017 (although the probability of that is anyone's guess).
in Holby City has become critically acclaimed, and has avoided things such as Small Name, Big Ego etc. Unlike Justin Bieber, he isn't criticised or the subject of jokes, and is considered attractive by a lot of women - as much as the aforementioned individual.
