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Definitions

hatchet job

NOUN
malicious verbal attack
Synonyms
WEAK
ax job calumniation defamation dismantlement poison-pen letter unmaking

Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

The groundbreaking first film - Ricky Gervais's favourite - focused on Tap's disastrous US tour, and the band still brand DiBergi's treatment as "a hatchet job".

From BBC • Sep. 11, 2025

Which doesn’t mean “Crumb: A Cartoonist’s Life,” is a hatchet job.

From Los Angeles Times • Apr. 11, 2025

Though she was fully aware of the potential controversy of her charges, she never intended for her book to be the hatchet job that many reviewers believed it to be.

From New York Times • Nov. 4, 2022

Roth then flirted with the notion of appointing writer and publisher James Atlas for the project but veered away when he read what he considered to be Atlas’s hatchet job on Saul Bellow.

From Washington Post • Apr. 5, 2021

Also, unlike my Pathfinder hatchet job, I had the full schematics of the drill.

From "The Martian" by Andy Weir