2024 is the year of the celebrity PR crisis.

It is just us, or does it feel like there's something in the water over in Hollywood at the moment? It seems like there's an abnormal amount of celebrities who are navigating some truly hectic PR crises right now, no?

This week, news broke that Jennifer Lopez had filed for divorce from Ben Affleck after two years of marriage. But this is just one of the many, many headlines JLo has been at the centre of in recent months.

The downward spiral of JLo's public perception kicked off with the release of her Prime Video... project (?), This Is Me... Now: A Love Story. Was it a documentary? Was it a film? Was it visuals for her This Is Me... Now album? Maybe JLo is the only one who truly knows. 

But what we do know is that the self-funded project — which reportedly cost around $20 million US, by the way — was widely mocked by critics and viewers alike.

Then, there was the tour. In February 2024, Lopez announced This Is Me... Live, a 30-show North American tour that was slated to kick off in June 2024. Set to be the singer's first tour in five years, it was originally meant to support her This Is Me... Now album, but was rebranded as a 'greatest hits' tour in April, amid speculation of low ticket sales. 

At the end of May, Lopez announced that she was cancelling the tour altogether. In a statement, Lopez's spokesperson said it was so the singer could spend time with her family, amid rumours that there was trouble brewing between her and Affleck.

In her own statement released on her website, Lopez added: "I am completely heartsick and devastated about letting you down. Please know that I wouldn't do this if I didn't feel that it was absolutely necessary."

Somewhere in the middle of all of these headlines, Netflix released Lopez's latest film Atlas, which was panned, and a TikTok of JLo at the 2024 Met Gala went viral, as viewers slammed her for being "rude" to the interviewer.

The news of Lopez and Affleck's divorce seems to confirm what we've all known to be true: 2024 is just not JLo's year. But she isn't the only celebrity who seems to be going through it in the press at the moment.

Here are some other celebs who have been facing PR messes in 2024.

Blake Lively (and Ryan Reynolds).

Where to begin? There's a lot to get through, so buckle up.

Blake Lively has been absolutely inescapable online in recent weeks. In part, this is because she's starring in It Ends With Us, a box office hit in a year where films have been struggling to make money at the cinema. And of course, the film was adapted from the mega-viral Colleen Hoover novel of the same name, which only added to its buzz.

But that's not really why people are talking about her, is it?

First, there were the rumours that something was amiss when it came to the dynamic between the cast of It Ends With Us, who seemed to be distancing themselves from their director and co-star Justin Baldoni.

Then, people took issue with the way Lively was handling the sensitive content in the film. For the unfamiliar, It Ends With Us deals with issues of domestic violence, a topic people felt Lively was avoiding and minimising in promotional interviews for the film. 

More specifically, they felt she was marketing the film as though it was a romantic comedy, and felt it was misaligned and inappropriate for Lively to be saying things like, "grab your friends, wear your florals" while promoting a film that navigates domestic abuse.

Some also took issue with the cross-promotional efforts between It Ends With Us and Deadpool & Wolverine, which stars Lively's husband, Ryan Reynolds. People felt that Lively and Reynolds had been hoping to recreate the box office magic similar to last year's Barbenheimer phenomenon, and that by promoting the films together, they would get people wanting to see both films in the cinema. They cited Lively and Hugh Jackman's September Vogue cover, joint photo opportunities between Lively and the Deadpool & Wolverine cast, and Lively's quotes about Reynolds' behind-the-scenes involvement in the making of It Ends With Us as "proof" that the Hollywood couple had been hoping for their own Barbenheimer moment, which again, they felt was inappropriate given the themes of It Ends With Us.

That's a top line overview of Lively's publicity crisis as it relates directly to the promotion of It Ends With Us, but unfortunately, the bad press doesn't actually end there. You see, in the midst of all of that, Norwegian entertainment reporter Kjersti Flaa posted an interview she did with Lively and Parker Posey for the Woody Allen film Café Society back in 2016.

The video, titled The Blake Lively interview that made me want to quit my job, begins with Flaa congratulating Lively on her "little bump". 

"Congrats on your little bump!" Lively shot back.

A few things of note, here: Lively had confirmed her second pregnancy in April 2016. The Café Society interview took place in July 2016, and Lively welcomed her second daughter, Inez, in September 2016. Also? Flaa was not pregnant at the time, and has said that Lively's comment was especially hurtful because she's infertile.

"To be honest, it hurts because I obviously wasn't pregnant and I could never get pregnant," Flaa told the Daily Mail recently, adding that it "took her awhile" to get over the jab.

The rest of Flaa's Café Society interview didn't fare much better. In the video, Flaa tries to refocus on the film, but when she asks about the costume design, Lively goes on a tangent that ices Flaa out of the conversation completely, filibustering until the interview is over.

Then, in the wake of Flaa's interview going viral, several people have resurfaced clips of Lively repeatedly using transphobic slurs in old interviews. Oh, and author and journalist Cat Marnell also claimed on X (formerly Twitter) that Lively and Reynolds first hooked up while they were in other relationships. She's since deleted the post.

Essentially, it's probably not a great time to be on Blake Lively's PR team.

Katy Perry.

In 2010, Katy Perry was on top of the world — professionally, at least. Her album, Teenage Dream, was a chart-topping smash hit, and soon enough, it became the second album in history to spawn five number one singles, tying with Michael Jackson's 1987 album Bad.

The frothy, upbeat, dance pop sound was a hit, and Teenage Dream became one of the defining albums of the era.

In the following years, however, Perry failed to reach the heights of success that she did during her Teenage Dream era. In fact, considering Perry's success was at one point on par with Taylor Swift's, it's remarkable how different their career trajectories have been since the early-to-mid-2010s.

All of this lays the groundwork for Perry's current PR crisis, because there's an elephant in the room when it comes to her success, and his name is Dr Luke. Well, technically his name is Łukasz Sebastian Gottwald, but he goes by Dr Luke.

Dr Luke was one of the main producers Perry worked with while recording Teenage Dream, and his signature sound was everywhere in the 2010s. But in October 2014, Dr Luke was sued by Kesha, who accused him of sexual assault, sexual harassment, gender violence, emotional abuse, and for violating Californian business practices in relation to her recording contract. 

Gottwald denied the allegations and counter-sued Kesha for defamation. 

Notably, Perry also became involved in the lawsuit after Kesha alleged that Gottwald had also assaulted Perry — a claim Perry denied.

Perry avoided working with Dr Luke on her 2017 album Witness and 2020 album Smile. However, the albums also failed to make much of an impact on the music scene, and fans declared Perry to be in a "flop era".

This brings us to 2024, and to the release of 'Woman's World', the source of Perry's current PR crisis.

Putting aside the fact that when a clip of the song (which has been widely panned) leaked online before the official release, people speculated that it was AI-generated, Perry also teamed with alleged rapist Dr Luke — a collaboration with which many took issue, particularly in light of the song's so-called "female empowerment" lyrics.

When Perry released the music video for 'Woman's World', many slammed what was intended to be a feminist anthem for playing to the male gaze, and for being so over-the-top that some said it seemed like a parody. Perry, for what it's worth, said that it was "satire".

It may be a woman's world, but it's doubtful Katy Perry feels very lucky to be living in it right now.

Prince Harry and Meghan Markle.

When it comes to Prince Harry and Meghan Markle, it's perhaps less of a current flurry of negative PR based on a few recent missteps, and more of a consistent undercurrent of negative press that has been chipping away at the couple's public goodwill for years.

The latest of these blips is the news that the pair's chief of staff, Josh Kettler, resigned from the position after just three months in the role. A report from PEOPLE stated that Kettler had been hired on a "trial basis", and that the decision for him to move on from the role was "mutual, with both sides agreeing it wasn’t the right fit".

Like Katy Perry, Rolling Stone declared the royal couple to be in their "flop era" back in July 2023, and it seems they're still struggling to find their way out of it. In fact, the couple seems to have struggled to find their way since they announced that they were stepping down from their duties as senior royals back in 2020.

It's not for lack of interest — the release of Netflix docuseries Harry and Meghan was a record-breaking success when it came to viewership. But critics gave the series middling reviews, and while viewers were tuning in, they didn't love the show. In fact, it currently holds a 19 percent audience score on Rotten Tomatoes, but it's also important to consider that this may be the result of Markle speaking out about her experience dealing with racism as a biracial woman in the British royal family.

Then, there are the deals. Prince Harry and Meghan Markle have made a LOT of business deals in the last few years, and if you're wondering where the products are, you're probably not alone. Case in point: one Spotify executive called the couple "f**king grifters" last year, after Harry and Meghan cut a $29.7 million (USD $20m) deal with Spotify which eventuated into a total of 12 Archetype podcast episodes.

By December 2023, The Hollywood Reporter had labelled the couple one of the "biggest losers" of the year, citing the podcast, their "whiny" Netflix series and Prince Harry's "whiny" memoir Spare as evidence. And this year hasn't been much better. In July, The Guardian named Prince Harry "the divisive duke" in an article that detailed the couple's struggle to build their brand amidst the ongoing negative press.

But, hey. There's always next year, right?

Feature Image: Canva.