Few things have nourished us over the past year like the reemergence of Megan Fox.
Maligned and mocked for years by film critics and tabloid reporters alike, Fox and her body of work, most notably the beloved queer cult classic Jennifer’s Body, are undergoing a massive shift in public opinion. Now Fox herself seems ready to conquer her haters and reenter the spotlight, telling InStyle in a new feature interview, “If you ain’t killed me yet, you’re not going to kill me.”
Fox spilled entire pots of tea over the course of the feature, which looked back on her time in the spotlight after breaking out in Michael Bay’s Transformers nearly 15 years ago. She became an industry pariah after pointing out the sexist, male gazey treatment of her character, Mikayla, who is presented not as a human woman but as a life-size Barbie doll. She referred to Bay as “Hitler” and a “nightmare to work for” and was subsequently dropped from the next installment of the franchise, Dark of the Moon. Fox has largely stayed out of the spotlight since, raising three children with her now ex-husband Brian Austin Green.
During the pandemic, viewers rediscovered Fox’s work in Jennifer’s Body, a 2008 horror-comedy originally panned by critics and audiences alike. Contemporaneous reviews pointed to scenes like Fox’s passionate kiss with co-star Amanda Seyfried as evidence that the film was crude schlock intended to appeal to the lowest common denominator. A Slate review at the time condemned it as “a naked display of opportunism and exploitation.” But the Karyn Kusama directed-film has developed a reputation as a hidden gem, particularly in queer communities.
Modern appraisals of the film, including one right here on them., noted that the complex relationship between Jennifer and Needy was heavily resonant for queer women. Many of its viewers, like the film’s leads, were reckoning with their own youthful traumas and awakening sexuality.
Unsurprisingly, the openly bisexual actress says she understood the assignment from the very start. “That [kiss] was a real thing that goes on with teenage girls that are discovering their sexuality, and sometimes that's discovering that they love other girls,” she told InStyle. “It's not like that scene was even particularly sexual for men. It was more so for any woman who's ever thought, ‘I really love my best friend, and I don’t necessarily know what that means, but I'm going to figure it out.’”
But for Fox, such misunderstandings have been par over the course of a career that has seen her talent brushed aside by the commentariat, who have dedicatedly pushed a narrative that the actor is vapid eye candy onscreen and off.
Fox recalled that she decided to leave that image of herself behind when she watched Jonah Hex, a critically derided 2010 box-office bomb. “I got crucified for that movie, just brutalized in the reviews,” Fox said. She mustered up the courage to watch it anyway and was surprised by what she saw: “I had this incredible breakthrough, and I realized that I had been living in a self-imposed prison for so long because I let other people tell me who I was or what I wasn’t. I hid because I was hurt.”
Now that she’s back to work with the 2020 indie release Rogue, Fox isn’t taking any more of that treatment lying down — nor is she letting it affect her kids. Fox has been outspoken for years about allowing her child Noah to wear dresses to his heart’s content and opened up to InStyle about protecting him from online hate. “I don't want him to ever have to read that shit because he hears it from little kids at his own school who are like, ‘Boys don't wear dresses,’” she said.
The star also marked Pride Month with characteristic style. Last week, she took to Instagram to remind us that she’d been “putting the B in LGBTQIA+ for over two decades,” all while sporting a flashy rainbow manicure and linking her followers to progressive nonprofits.
Through all the misogynistic double standards and biphobia, Megan Fox really is back, stronger than ever, and with some strong words for anyone who is still criticizing her personal life: “Go fuck yourself.”
When she puts it like that, we have no choice but to stan.
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