Sydney Sweeney’s latest power move has once again opened her up to vile criticism of her body and career.

Following US Weekly’s reports that the actress is starting a lingerie line with the support and backing of Amazon boss Jeff Bezos, this has caused fans and critics alike to surmise that this was the reason for her surprise status as a guest at Bezos and Lauren Sánchez’s wedding in Venice. The nuptials had a rather star-studded guest list, including Kim and Khloe Kardashian, Kris Jenner, Orlando Bloom, Oprah Winfrey, Bill Gates and Leonardo DiCaprio.

Sweeney’s newfound relationship with Bezos and Sánchez’s has led to speculation that the Anyone But You and Euphoria star might be the next Bond girl, seeing as back in 2022 Amazon acquired creative control over the James Bond film franchise when the business Amazon purchased MGM, which distributes the Bond films. Amazon has now entered into a joint venture with Eon Productions to manage the franchise’s creative direction, so Sweeney’s name could easily be thrown around by Amazon and Bond bosses.

But even though the actress hasn’t confirmed either of these claims, around her next movie role or business venture, she has been subjected to vitriol online at these reports.

One critic has referred to her as ‘overrated. One trick pony at best. Not in the Bond league of women.’ Others horrifically criticised her looks, comments so vile we wouldn’t dare to repeat.

Even if you’re not planning on buying any potential Sydney Sweeney lingerie, or watching her in the latest Bond movie if she’s cast, there’s no excuse for attacking her acting skills and her figure, and suggesting that she only has her career because of her looks. To reduce a woman’s worth down to whether or not she’s attractive and whether she therefore deserves to be successful just stinks of misogyny.

Sweeney has been a successful businesswoman for years, with her latest collaboration with Dr Squatch seeing bars of soap sold with a sample of her bath water in it.

‘I thrive in chaos,” she told Empire magazine in an interview earlier this year. ‘I love working. I love having to juggle multiple things at the same time. I don’t really sleep much, but I do best when I don’t sleep much.’

Sweeney’s entrepreneurial spirit is built on a feeling that she can’t fail, after the financial and personal issues that occurred within her family while she was growing up, including her parents’ split.

‘I knew that I could never actually fail because, I mean, on a very broad scale, my family did lose everything,” she told Glamour last year. “They did get a divorce. Whether or not that was because of coming [to Los Angeles], it definitely was a catalyst for it. So I knew I had to succeed in some capacity so that it wasn’t for nothing.’

‘It doesn’t feel like that because there’s so much more I want to accomplish and achieve,’ she added. ‘I feel like I’ve barely scratched the surface of what I’d like to do in my life.’

The fact that these critics’ first response to a potential business venture for a young businesswoman is to tear down her looks and ambitions says so much about how society views successful women. That they don’t deserve it, and that all focus must be on how good looking they are or aren’t, their bodies, their faces, instead of their contribution to the world.

This isn’t the first time, by any stretch, that Sweeney has faced criticism of her body in the face of a career choice. When pictures of her ‘bulked up’ figure from playing Christy Martin in the professional boxer’s biopic were posted, critics called her an ‘Ozempic candidate’.

After hitting back at critics at the time with an Instagram montage of her training regimen as well as some of the worst online criticisms, Sweeney recently spoke out about what it meant to her to play Martin, and how much she enjoyed training her body.

‘Over the past few months, I’ve been immersed in training to bring to life the story of an incredible woman,” she wrote in an Instagram post. ‘Her journey is a testament to resilience, strength, and hope, and I’m honoured to step into her shoes to share her powerful story with you all.’

Once again, a career move that could mean success, prosperity and happiness for Sweeney has been dissected by toxic critics, focusing only on misogynistic comments. She and her work ethic both better.