Move Over 'MEAN GIRLS', There's a New High School Musical in Town

A new movie adaptation of the Broadway smash musical version of the original 2004 hit movie, which in turn was adapted from Rosalind Wiseman‘s 2002 book Queen Bees and Wannabes, 2024’s Mean Girls is a redux with pizzaz. Updating the impressively not-dated Lindsay Lohan/Rachel McAdams early-aughts teen comedy classic to the modern era while adding in a number of catchy tunes, the musical from co-directors Samantha Jayne and Arturo Perez Jr. is an accomplishment in IP recycling that doesn’t feel, well, recycled. In fact, the whole thing is pretty fetch.

Working off a script from Tina Fey, returning to the property once more as its principal screenwriter and symbolic forbearer, this new cut of Mean Girls is fundamentally the same story, with fundamentally the same script. A lot of the film’s most memorable dialogue remains unchanged. The characters are pretty much exactly the same, though the cast is notably more diverse. Even some of the actors (Fey and Tim Meadows) reprise their original roles. Not taking the songs into account, it’s basically the same ole Mean Girls. And yet, somehow, it still feels mostly fresh. Like a solid remix of a classic banger, Mean Girls is the kind of surprisingly pleasing thing that no one ever asked for, even if it’s a bit more plastic than its predecessor.

You already know the story but unless you’re the one person who’s just checking out Mean Girls for the first time without having seen any other version, here’s a quick recap: Angourie Rice (Spider-Man: No Way Home) is Cady Heron, a previously-homeschooled new girl at North Shore High School. Cady is quickly taken under the wing of the resident popular girls: the peppy but insecure Gretchen Wieners (Bebe Wood), the terminally-dimwitted Karen Shetty (Avantika), and “queen bee” Regina George (Reneé Rapp, reprising her role from her turn on Broadway). Auliʻi Cravalho and Jaquel Spivey star as Janis and Damian, respectively, each with expanded roles from the original version – and carrying a bulk of the film’s musical numbers. The dynamics between the cast of high schoolers, each clinging desperately to be someone – hopefully someone popular – isn’t as well-drawn as it is in the original version though the various songs help to make up for some of this forfeit character entanglements.

Composer Jeff Richmond and lyricist Nell Benjamin partner to rework their songs from the Broadway stage musical to mostly impressive results – the numbers are engaging and toe-tapping, adding dimension to the inner-workings of the characters that gets a bit stripped away to make room for the music – while directors Jayne and Perez Jr. frame the sequences with giddy aplomb. The resulting film is overflowing with enthusiasm and zeal; there is passion from pretty much everyone involved here and that passion quickly becomes infectious. Even though this version is a healthy 15-minutes longer than the original, there’s rarely a dull moment. Between the upbeat songs and dance choreography that shifts from traditional big ensemble-driven musical numbers to moody, social-media-ready selfie videos depending on the occasion, Mean Girls just knows how to have a good time.

The cast is pretty much excellent all around. Though the overwhelming star power of the original seems to be missing, this feels very much like the passing of a torch: a handoff to a new generation of would-be stars in-the-making. While the 2004 Mean Girls is as close to a generational comedy classic as you’ll get from that period, this critic could see returning to this new version with almost as much frequency and enthusiasm. Somehow, this colorful cast of newbies actually make fetch happen.

CONCLUSION: An impressively staged, skillfully performed remix of the original popular girl comedy satire, 2024’s ‘Mean Girls’ adds a number of infectious musical tracks to make its story relevant again, without sacrificing what make its predecessor so limitlessly enjoyable for a generation of youngsters: good laughs, memorable characters, and petty teen melodrama.