MEAN GIRLS

2024’s Mean Girls is, at the same time, something old and something new. 

We’ll touch upon the new first. This is an adaption of the screen musical, and so adds a roster of songs to proceedings. Unfortunately, with the exception of Meet the Plastics & World Burn, they are instantly forgettable. They come and go, often fun in the moment, but without any real substance.

The song Sexy, first heard towards the halfway point of the film, is repeated during the end credits, and by that point - less than an hour later - I had already forgotten that it existed.

The choreography and the set design that exists around them is well done and interesting to watch (the song Apex Predator and excellent example of this), but the songs themselves, both musically and lyrically are… just fine. 

They are, very clearly, songs which were written for the stage, and do not translate particularly well to film.

Another area where Mean Girls 2024 does attempt to update itself is in diversifying it’s casting. People of colour are far more prominent and central here than they ever were in the original, and there seems to have been a conscious commitment here to update the cast to reflect today.

Or, at least, a Hollywood version of today. Considering New Jersey - where Mean Girls is set - is one of the most diverse states in the USA it does feel like - while a commitment to diversifying the cast is appreciated, that more could have been done to reflect its audience, and the wider community.

In contrast to the 2004 Mean Girls, Janis’s (Auli’i Cravalho) sexuality is also something established in the 2024 version, rather than rumoured as it was back then. It’s a small thing, something which isn’t front and centre, but is effectively portrayed and helps establish Regina George (Reneé Rapp) as the movies villain.

The old… the script. Other than the songs, there are large periods of Mean Girls which is just lifted from the 2004 film that inspired it. There are scenes where we have actors who - with the exception of Reneé Rapp who makes a convincing Regina George - struggle to deliver them as well as those who came before them.

It is odd to be watching a film that does make efforts to be culturally relevant in todays world, consistently looking back 20 years and reminding their audiences of what they’re missing from the original.

It’s not as though 2004’s Mean Girls is a forgotten film. It is one that todays teenagers will still be aware of. Will still have seen. Yet 2024’s version fails to fully commit standing on its own legs.

The script does have flashes of sharpness, there are some laugh out loud funny moments, and some clever gags (one that went so far over my head my friend had to explain to me afterwards), but these moments are the exception rather than the rule. 

The more I think about it, the more it just feels lazy. A copy and paste job with the bare minimum effort put in to making it something different. 

Where the 2004 Mean Girls was, and to an extent still remains, a cultural phenomenon, this new version struggles to make such an impression. It is fun in the moment, but almost instantly forgettable, struggling to step out of the shadow of its predecessor and make an impact of its own. 

Mean Girls tries to be something new, and has a sheen of innovation, but if you look any deeper it just feels like filmic inertia. 

Anything new is mainly cosmetic. Surface.

Plastic.

The emotional beats, and the narrative arcs, remain the same, and the 2004 original remains the version that you will go back to for a rewatch.