Mean Girls (2004) is a modern classic that shows the high-school experience and its hierarchy. I loved the original so I highly-anticipated the Mean Girls (2024) movie, which released on January 12, 2024.
The film follows the original storyline of the 2004 movie. Cady Heron (Angourie Rice) moves to a new high school after previously being homeschooled in Africa. She meets two friends, Damian and Janis (Jaquel Spivey and Auli’i Cravalho), who have her deceive the “Plastics” or the popular girls and try to ruin Queen Bee Regina’s (Renee Rapp) life. In the attempt to ruin the Plastics, Cady becomes one of the Plastics.
The biggest difference between the two films is the musical aspect. The 2024 Mean Girls is a musical, a rendition of the broadway musical. The songs were okay, a little poorly timed. But, they were catchy. The singing was also just okay. Renee Rapp carried the musical segments and I think her songs were the best throughout the movie. But, besides the songs with Rapp, the singing was mediocre and didn’t strike me as anything special.
I think this film does a good job of recreating some of the most iconic scenes from the original movie. I wouldn’t say anything from the 2004 original was missing in the 2024 movie. The most memorable scenes and quotes were the same. The film accurately explains the hate behind the Plastics and the reasoning for ruining their lives. However, the only scene I would have wanted to see more of is when Regina gets him by the bus towards the end of the movie. This scene seemed to be skimmed over and non-important in the 2024 scene. I thought this was a weird choice because the bus scene is one of the most important in the original 2004 movie.
The film incorporates social media that wasn’t present in the 2004 film, as a way to “modernize” the movie. This could have been done better than it was. The way social media was portrayed in the movie doesn’t accurately show what would happen in real life, making it a little awkward and unrelatable.
I liked seeing the return of some of the original characters from the 2004 movie. Mr. Duvall, Ms, Nobury, and Lindsay Lohan all made an appearance in the 2024 movie. I think this helped tie in the original movie to the new movie without copying the whole original cast.
Overall, the movie wasn’t horrible, but definitely wasn’t great. It did not meet my expectations when I saw that the new movie was coming out. I wished to see a better musical incorporation. I wouldn’t recommend this movie to someone who was genuinely interested in watching a good movie, however, it wasn’t the worst movie I have ever seen.
