The opinions expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not reflect the views of Spoon University.
On January 2, Meghan Markle, the Duchess of Sussex and Suits actress, dropped the trailer for her new Netflix series, With Love, Meghan. Markle’s Netflix show, which now premieres on March 4, is set to feature the Duchess in the kitchen as she offers practical advice on cooking, gardening, and crafting. Throughout the trailer for the eight-episode series, Markle emphasizes the importance of thoughtful touches to “elevate” everyday experiences and bring joy and connection to those around us. Almost immediately after creating her first personal post since she joined the royal family after marrying Prince Harry in 2018, Markle received swift backlash and criticism online for her new show.
Following the trailer’s release, users on the platform X quickly determined Markle’s new series to be “pretentious,” “contrived,” and “narcissistic.” This backlash is, unfortunately, a typical pattern for Markle, who has been subject to harsh criticism from UK and American media alike since marrying into the royal family.
Replying to Netflix’s post on X sharing the series trailer, user @MFTarotCardRdr wrote, “I’d rather pull out my wisdom teeth with a rusty fork than watch this effing grifter.”
I’d rather pull out my wisdom teeth with a rusty fork than watch this effing grifter.
— Mystical Fortunes🍃 (@MFTarotCardRdr) January 2, 2025
“Is all the food served with Meghan’s hair in it?” asked user @HelenaRosemond11. “That’s probably the only original thing in the whole show but no surprise as everything she does is fake.”
The backlash, though, extends far beyond the cyberbullies of social media. Commentators and reporters from major publications, including Eater and The Independent did not mince words when it came to labelling Markle as “boring,” “cheugy,” and a “trad wife.”
“Who knows what the episodes of With Love, Meghan will bring. But, if they’re even slightly similar to the trailer, I will probably do my best to avoid them,” writes Olivia Petter in The Independent, who dubbed the series (which hasn’t been released yet, mind you) a sequel to the 2017 horror film Get Out.
In Petter’s article, titled “Oh, Meghan – we expected more from you than ‘trad wife’,” With Love, Meghan is labelled as “mawkish,” “disappointing,” and “so utterly cringe I almost can’t bear to watch.”
iNews writer Rebecca Reid, who claims that she “always had a soft spot for Meghan,” wrote that Markle’s Instagram relaunch and Netflix show feel “for lack of a kinder word, cringe,” and suggests that Markle should “bypass cool and head straight for cheugy” — aka out of date and trying too hard to the point where it’s basic and boring.
In terms of Markle’s “cheug” factor, Eater writer Amy McCarthy wrote it is “unclear what cooking and entertaining ‘’tips and tricks’ (as she puts it in the trailer) Markle has to offer that have not already been shared by the lifestyle gurus who precede her” in an article recapping the trailer. “What could [Markle] possibly teach us that Ina [Garten] and Martha [Stewart] haven’t already?”
While all three women are successful and influential figures, Markle, Stewart, and Garten represent vastly different fields and have built their careers through distinct paths. While Stewart and Garten are the acclaimed experts, Markle’s public image is heavily influenced by her role as a royal and the media scrutiny that comes with it. Stewart and Martha have cultivated more relaxed, approachable, and cozy personas, which With Love, Meghan emulates to some degree. That said, Markle is from a new generation and brings a unique background that suggests she does actually have something to teach.
Before her royal life began, Meghan Markle had already established herself in the lifestyle space. Her popular blog, The Tig, showcased her Southern California lifestyle and travel adventures, as well as featured interviews with influential figures like Emmy Rossum and Serena Williams. Over the course of its three-year run, The Tig’s posts garnered nearly one million followers on Instagram, and Markle’s page had more than 250,000 followers on Twitter.
While known for its curated joy, Markle’s blog also delved into deeper topics through its “Tig Talk” questionnaires, offering a glimpse into the lives and perspectives of successful individuals. However, her marriage to Prince Harry significantly impacted her career, with the royal family even intervening in her acting work on Suits, and The Tig was ultimately shut down in 2017 following Markle’s engagement to the Duke of Sussex.
Despite her prior successes in the lifestyle space, Markle continues to face relentless criticism even before her projects are fully launched — and With Love, Meghan is no exception. The pattern was evident with the 2024 launch of Markle’s home and lifestyle brand “American Riviera Orchard,” when the creation of an enigmatic Instagram page for the brand immediately sparked online backlash. Now, With Love, Meghan, is inciting the same swift responses on social media with only a 90-second trailer to go on.
the embodiment of female entitlement. true scum of the earth.
— crumulus (@ummcrum) January 6, 2025
While people love to hate “The Duchess of Flops,” the premise of the Markle’s Netflix show has its merits. Markle’s new series shares a showrunner with Selena Gomez’s popular reality TV show, “Selena + Chef,” where the singer and actress learns to cook from celebrity chefs in her own home. Like “Selena + Chef,” Markle’s series boasts impressive production value despite its intimate, “filmed at home” setting, and the trailer suggests that Markle’s series will emulate the engaging and successful format of Gomez’s HBO show.
The Duchess of Flops strikes again🤡
— Kate Austin (@KateAus1976) January 2, 2025
Moreover, With Love, Meghan also has excellent production value – which is to be expected from director Michael Steed, who also directed and produced the beloved Anthony Bourdain: Parts Unknown docuseries. Celebrity guests and professional chefs on Markle’s show also add value in their own right: Alice Waters pioneered the farm-to-table movement for restauranteurs in the 1970s, and Roy Choi is a Korean-American chef who is credited as a founder of the gourmet food truck business. Given Markle’s expertise in the lifestyle space alongside acclaimed culinary guests, the show seems poised to be a sophisticated and well-produced series, and showcases the hallmarks of an elevated lifestyle series.
With Love, Meghan begs the question: do people hate the show, or do they love to hate Markle? If you subbed out Markle in the same exact trailer for any other beloved food and lifestyle influencer — whether it be Joanna Gaines, Meredith Hayden of Wishbone Kitchen, or Tieghan Gerard of @halfbakedharvest — would the reviews be as harsh? Hell, you could even throw Ina Garten or Martha Stewart in there, and American viewers would likely be perfectly content with another cheug-y, trad-wife, lifestyle show.
On Eater’s social media post sharing McCarthy’s review of the trailer with the headline “Meghan Markle Has a New Netflix Cooking Series and We’re Already Bored,” many people in the comments came to Markle’s defense. Instagram user @KianoMoju commented that the publication “could have sparked a meaningful conversation about how much people miss cooking shows and whether this series might inspire a renaissance for the genre.”
Emme Ribeiro Collins, or @chefemme_ on Instagram, urged Eater to “do better.” “As a chef and a Black woman,” this article “comes off as bullying, and assumes people will bandwagon on the negativity before the show even airs.”
Media critiques of Markle since her engagement to Prince Harry have largely been understood as a consequence of the racial bias Black women often encounter when navigating spaces traditionally dominated by white people — an idea that Ribeiro Collins emphasized when countering Eater.
“What’s worse is the glaring double standard — praising white creatives Ina Garten and Martha Stewart but Meghan Markle gets torn down by the assumption of ‘what could she possibly teach us that Ina and Martha haven’t already?’,” writes Ribeiro Collins. “This kind of dismissive rhetoric is exactly why Black women face so much unnecessary scrutiny.”
And although the positive responses on X were few and far between, there are several users who are excited about With Love, Meghan, including X user @JustJaneDoe5.
I’m the target audience the target audience is me.💅💅💅
— JANE. DOE. (@JustJaneDoe5) January 3, 2025
“I’m the target audience the target audience is me.💅💅💅,” she wrote in a reply post to Netflix. Doe also responded to comments on her own post, saying “Do you need to be rich to be able to access Netflix? The food is not that expensive too.”
“The people canceling their Netflix [subscriptions] don’t need to announce it (screams freudenschade),” writes @Mwikali_Mutune on X. “Let the rest of us be excited and watch it in peace.”
If you want to form your own opinion, you can watch With Love, Meghan when it premieres on Netflix on March 4. I, for one, will be watching — and I won’t be trolling Markle on socials after.