Social media has strong reactions to Mariah Carey's botched New Year's Eve performance

Millions of jaws dropped on New Year’s Eve as fans watched Mariah Carey struggle to find the words to hit songs “Emotions” and “We Belong Together” during a performance in Times Square in New York City.

“We didn’t have a soundcheck for this New Year’s,” she explained in the midst of experiencing technical difficulties as one of the star headliners of ABC’s “Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin Eve,” .

A visibly annoyed Carey pointed her microphone at the crowd, “Let the audience sing.” Her background dancers danced around as she knelt down on stage after complaining, “We can’t hear.”

But the pop star didn’t let the botched performance bring her down. Afterword, Carey brushed her shoulders off, tweeting, “Sh-- happens. Have a happy and healthy new year everybody! Here’s to making more headlines in 2017” and a GIF of herself shrugging. The tweet went viral with nearly 40,000 retweets.

She was right. Within hours, dozens of headlines appeared, and the internet was loving the drama.

Some fans came to her defense, praising the star for handling the glitch like a “pro”:

Adding it was the perfect way to end a “disastrous” 2016:

Others, however, were less forgiving, claiming her career was the final casualty of 2016 and poking fun at what they called an epic lip sync fail.

Though some responses were more favorable than others, chances are Carey doesn’t care either way. Like she said at the end of her New Year’s show, “I’m trying to be a good sport here.”

In:
• Mariah Carey
• Times Square