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57 Celebrities Who Went From Being Fan Favorites To Major Disappointments
We probably shouldn’t put celebrities on a pedestal. After all, they’re only human, and fame doesn’t make anyone perfect. Still, being in the public eye comes with a certain amount of influence, and many famous faces become role models for their fans.
When you’ve admired someone for years, followed their career, and supported their work, it’s natural to feel a little attached. So when they do something that goes against everything you believed about them, it can hit surprisingly hard.
One Redditor asked people to share which celebrity fall from grace disappointed them the most, and plenty had something to say. We’ve rounded up their answers below. Scroll down to read them, and don’t forget to share your thoughts in the comments.
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#1
Elon musk. I used to love Elon musk, and I used to believe that his companies would create a better future for all of us. As someone who plans on starting companies myself, I was really influenced by my perception of him, but eventually I started to realize that he was a lot more corrupt than I first imagined, supports things that I don't agree with, and is only pretending to patch the problem of car dependency, and seems to take all the credit for what people under him do.
Sven Horlemann 3 hours ago
Egocentric egomaniac. One of the greatest dangers to humanity. No sinle person should have that kind od money and power.
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#2
Even as a kid I recognized the talent RDJ (Robert Downey Jr.) had and was certain he was going to lose his life before he got to shine.
Then Kiss Kiss Bang Bang came out and you could tell he wasn't going to mess up his eighth chance.
So, him. But he turned it around.
#3
I would say JK Rowling. The woman goes from homeless to creating one of the greatest fantasy series of all time, and then ruins it by being a complete TERF and transphobic.
#4
Mel Gibson
He made such great movies as both an actor and a director. It's sad knowing he could of made more great films if he didn't lose his mind and blow up his career.
#5
Bill Cosby. My generation never got over that.
Also Daniel Masterson hurt simply because I wanted him to continue The Ranch and That 70's Show reboot and I am pissed because he ruined that.
#6
Will Smith, I really liked the guy in the films that I grew up with him in. While I might not have liked is most recent work, I still liked him for what I did. Just with what happened at the Oscars, totally changed how I saw him. That's just something I never thought he would do. I don't follow celeb news that much, and have heard that his wife sleeping with one of his son's friends. Along with how his wife seems to be, I can sort of see how that might change him. I would have thought most of what he would have done is pull Chris Rock aside later. Not make a jerk of himself in front of so many people.
#7
Ellen DeGeneres. Never got into her show, but she meant so much to me when I was a terrified closeted kid. I cried when she got her Presidential Medal of Freedom and still get weepy thinking about it. It really breaks my heart that she turned out to be an awful person.
#8
I wanted to believe that Lance Armstrong was 100% clean. His story was so good: He beat cancer, he swept the Tour de France 4 or five times, he was a hero.
#9
Madonna. She totally freaked out about aging, after being such a rebel her whole life. Way to fall in line, you are just like all the rest, should have known, material girl lol.
#11
Maybe not the most, but comedian Brett Butler's spiral was sad. After working her way up from being a poor, teenage alcoholic who hung out in bars to being the star of one of the most successful sitcoms of the 90s, she just couldn't hold it together.
#12
Edward Furlong. Such a talent wasted to substances. I hear he is doing better these days but it's sad to think of all the great performances we missed out on and the years of his life he lost.
Giraffe Sitter 57 minutes ago
I talked to people who went to Jr. High with him after T2 came out and he was apparently a massive entitled jerk.
#13
Chris Pratt. Loved him in Parks and Rec, was never that big on his big shot movie stuff but good for him right?
Then came all those murky rumors about his politics and religion... but it was the healthy baby post that was the nail in the coffin for me. Now when he gets roles I just think of all the other great actors who deserve a chance.
#15
Rolf Harris. Growing up as an art loving kid and an animal lover, he was always in the limelight of the programs i watched and he seemed like such a good, cheery man.
#16
Kevin Spacey, because they weren’t finished with house of cards and its always really hard to get into something again after you’ve invested so much time with a certain character only for them to be removed.
#17
Eric Clapton.
I grew up listening to his music and was sad to discover his views on vaccines and his racism.
#18
Ben Carson. He was an inspiration to Detroit and growing up, I and many people in my school district read his autobiography as an assigned reading book. Then for him to do a 180 and forsake the people he grew up with to curry favor. The classism he espoused when he ran for president though his mother couldn’t read and he grew up poor…
#19
My first few choices already mentioned, so …
Jan-Michael Vincent
Actor from a while back, had a hit tv show called Airwolf. Career decimated by substance usage (mainly alcohol).
#20
Kanye's fall has been very disappointing to me. His music got me through a lot during my formative years.
#21
Off the top of my head, Danny? Masterson. He was my favorite character from That 70’s Show and I just always assumed that coolness came from within. Turns out he wasn’t so cool after all
Marilyn Manson as well now that I think about it.
#22
Tom Brady unraveling in real time right now is rough. Poetic perhaps, but still excruciating to watch.
Johnnynatfan 1 minute ago
What is this poster talking about? Tom Brady is doing just fiine. He has a broadcasting careeer that pays him well, he is a part owner of the Raiders and recently started dating another super model. Id say he is doing fine.
#23
I don't know if either counts as a celebrity per se, but 1) Markus Persson (Notch, Minecraft creator) and 2) Elon Musk.
As a Minecraft-crazed kid in the first 2010-2014 wave, Notch was the architect of it all, basically a god, yet would still drop in and play with friends and YouTubers. He was a god, but just a guy, and represented the idea that anyone could program the next big thing.
And for Musk, I'm sure there were early warning signs but again I was a kid awed by the prospect of a real-life Tony Stark. Maybe someone with resources could actually make a meaningful impact on the world instead of just hoarding it all.
They were two of the biggest role models to my precise demographic, and to have both of them go off around the same time was a real gut punch that changed a lot of my outlook on the world. It's a sentiment I've heard echoed by others almost too precisely.
In conclusion, check out Rät by Penelope Scott.
#25
Oscar Pistorius
Due to the fact that he was the first double-amputee to participate in the Summer Olympics, he was expected to become the next "feel good tale" of recent history (2012).
#26
This may sound crazy, but there was a time when Steven Seagal was actually respected by adolescents for his cool demeanor, wise ways, and temperance in movies… and for marrying the babe from Weird Science IRL. To watch him reveal himself as a louse caused many an 80’s kid to reassess whom to admire.
#27
Brett Favre - breaks my heart to find he is such a horrible, really horrible excuse for a human.
#28
Scott Baio. He had all the makings of a shift manager at Subway, but kept dropping sandwiches on the floor.
#29
Mark McGuire. As soon as the first time he said "I'm not here to talk about the past" to the Congressional committee, it was like watching his reputation instantaneously hitting a wall head-on at 200 mph. I completely believed he hit all those homers with no help from PEDs. To see him indirectly admit that wasn't true made adult me feel like the kid who told Shoeless Joe Jackson, "Say it ain't so, Joe."
EDIT: I know the story about a kid going up to Jackson and saying that likely isn't true. Just using the legend as a simile.
Daniel Atkins 1 hour ago
I remember all the hype there was when him and Sammy Sosa were gong back and forth on in the home run race. Fans were excited even casual fans, Then it was revealed they were both doing it and then we fell for it again with Barry Bonds.
#30
Not quite the topic but anytime I find out a celeb is a Scientologist I am disappointed
Particularly, Elizabeth Moss.
#31
Amanda Bynes. Really thought she would be a romantic comedy powerhouse into adulthood. She wasn't necessarily a great actress, but she almost gives Jim Carrey vibes with her expressive nature.
#32
Ryan Haywood from Achievement Hunter. He was my favorite from the group and the one I identified with the most. He seemed like such a good guy. A family man. Then you find out hes actually a monster.
#33
Armie Hammer. I always thought he was very sympathetic.
#34
Joss Whedon. Broke my heart that he ended up being such a bad person. Buffy literally shaped so much of my life, being part of that fandom had me meet people who are still my best friends to this day, move cities to live closer to them, leading to me meeting my husband. We loved him so much.
#35
John Lasseter, I know i'm being selfish but I really admired him, and in the end his behavior lost us Pixar and, in a way, 3D animation as an art.
#36
Ryan Adams.
I mean, I was wearing one of his shirts on the day that NYTimes article dropped.
#38
Garrison Keillor. Projected an empathetic upstanding guy but was a creep. I miss Prairie Home Companion reruns on the radio.
#39
Not the biggest name, but Marion Zimmer Bradley. "Mists of Avalon" was one of my favorite books of all time until all that terrible stuff came out about her.
#40
Not sure he has technically fallen from grace quite yet but the Bill Murray stories are bumming me out.
#41
John Mulaney is a pretty tough one. Loved his acts. Related to him a lot. We're all human and his dirty laundry was of the standard-human-indiscretion variety but it's still bad.
#42
Louis CK, after all the time he spent talking about his daughters and his ex-wife and how hard it is for women I really thought he'd be a better person. Second place goes to Joss Whedon for similar reasons, when I was a teenage girl I actually looked up to him and believed he was a feminist.
#43
Bill Maher. His jokes nowadays just sound like a clueless, angry, old man screaming at the clouds.
#44
Horatio Sanz. Grew up loving him on SNL. Saw him from a distance once in real life and thought it was the coolest thing ever. I think everything’s still being litigated, so it’s just some accusations at this point, but it’s a bummer to think he could be a POS.
#46
Mark Wahlberg. I really like him in movies. Then I found out about his past. Now I can’t see him the same.
#47
Jackie Chan, loved him growing up, and I'd rent his movies constantly to watch. Now after what I've leaned about the way he's treated his family and him deciding to be a CCP shill to the detriment of his fellow HKers and democracy at large in the region, I can't go back to his movies anymore.
He was such aт inspiration to me, too.
#48
Adam Levine cheating on his wife.
#49
Roseanne. I still love her show.
#50
Chris Benoit was one of my favorite wrestlers. Turns out he is a jerk.
Slapdash1 11 hours ago
No. Chris Benoit was not a jerk. All the accounts portray him as a generally nice guy. He did end the lives of his wife, his kid and himself. BUT when they checked out his brain afterwards it had all the appearance of someone with advanced alzheimers. All the concussions literally turned it into mud. And he snapped after Eddie Guerrero left the world. He was chewed, swallowed and shąt out by the industry, and while he IS to blame, he should be considered a victim too.
#52
John Kricfalusi.
Can't watch Ren and Stimpy now.
Plentyofoomph 11 hours ago
Him being awful shouldn't diminish from all the amazing work everyone else on the show did.
#53
These are not disgraced, but I am disappointed in how they turned out.
Joe Rogan & Dave Chapelle
Money changes people.
#54
Stephen Collins. What is wrong with people? Do they get ‘conscience bypasses’?
#55
Morrissey, as a weird working class left wing outsider seeing him support for britain hurts the nme were right!
#56
Al Franken. Not because what he did was even that bad, but because he let it take him out of congress where he was doing such good things.
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What do you think ?
Elspeth 7 hours ago
His whole entire act was "s*x a****t who makes degrading jokes about women." It didn't really come as a shock.
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Elspeth 7 hours ago
His whole entire act was "s*x a****t who makes degrading jokes about women." It didn't really come as a shock.
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