1. The Nickelodeon Factor
Okay, so headlining your own cable series at the age 13 is nothing to sneeze at. And Emma's show Unfabulous was one of TeenNick's big success stories as well. But it's easy -- much too easy -- to stay frozen in amber in peoples' minds as "that girl from that show my kid used to watch." Only a fortunate few have managed to completely escape from the tween Disney/Nickelodeon ghetto (most notably Shia LaBeouf, who has Steven Spielberg to thank for the upward trajectory of his career) and Roberts never quite found the right way out, frequently picking movies like Aquamarine and Hotel For Dogs that reinforced her teen star image instead of defying it.

2. Bad Franchise Choices
One of the surest pathways to stardom is becoming the face of the right franchise -- again, look at Shia mixing it up with the Transformers, Daniel Radcliffe donning Harry Potter's lightning scar for eight movies or Kristin Stewart making kissy-faces at Robert Pattinson. Emma's first franchise attempt was 2007's ill-fated update of Nancy Drew, which came and went from theaters virtually overnight, largely because the younger generation had no idea who the character was while older moviegoers were horrified at the thought of a cell-phone wielding Nancy Drew. On paper, joining an established series like Scream 4 must have sounded like a smart move, but that movie once again fell into the generation gap between horror fans that had long since moved onto Saw and Paranormal Activity and newbies who didn't want all that post-modern irony getting in the way of their scares.

3. Indie Cred Has to be Earned, Not Bought
In between studio projects, Emma has tried to do the indie thing, appearing in low-budget films like Joel Schumacher's Twelve (opposite Chace Crawford and 50 Cent), the coming-of-age-in-an-insane-asylum dramedy It's Kind of a Funny Story from the acclaimed directing team behind Half Nelson and now The Art of Getting By. She never seems entirely comfortable in these gritty, real-world settings though, trying so hard to be natural, she instead comes across as the most artificial thing onscreen.

4. She Was in Valentine's Day
Yes, that all-star romantic comedy made $110 million in theaters and inspired a sequel, New Year's Eve, due out at the end of this year. But do you know anyone that actually likes Valentine's Day? I mean, likes it enough to willingly watch it again without the aid of a powerful hallucinogenic? You can't blame the movie entirely on Emma since she's just one of many actors that apparently just couldn't say no to loony Garry Marshall. Still, much like interning for Anthony Weiner, this is the kind of work experience one would be wise to leave off the resume.

5. She Just Doesn't Have "It"
"It" is one of the hardest things to define, but easy to recognize when "It" appears onscreen. The moment Auntie Julia appeared onscreen in Pretty Woman, you knew she had "It." But whenever the camera cuts to Emma, there's obviously something lacking in her presence that you can't articulate in words. That would be "It."

Look back at the career of Emma's Art of Getting By co-star Freddie Highmore.

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