The inevitable sequel to the 2004 hit “Mean Girls” should’ve been called “Meaner Girls.” One of the smart things about the original film is that the Plastics aren’t all that mean, they are just self-centered, obsessed with popularity and willing to step on anyone to maintain their popularity. However, it’s rarely personal or petty.
“Mean Girls 2” (2011) is regressive, going back to plain ole hate-based rivalries as it unspools a plot of uncreative pranks and frame-jobs that are unbelievable even by movie standards. Its predictability makes it cringe-worthy at times.
One thing I hate about her resume
For example, main good girl Jo (Meaghan Martin) is paid to befriend Abby (Jennifer Stone) by Abby’s father. It’s just a matter of time till the inevitable scene no one wants to see of Abby finding out and dramatically ending the friendship.
“Mean Girls 2” (2011)
Director: Melanie Mayron
Writers: Cliff Ruby, Elana Lesser, Allison Schroeder
Stars: Meaghan Martin, Maiara Walsh, Tim Meadows
Martin starred in TV’s excellent “10 Things I Hate About You” in 2009-10, showing comic timing with sharp material that should’ve made her into a star. She comes out of “Mean Girls 2” unscathed – and indeed, the only valid reason to watch it — but no doubt Martin was aware that every line and scene in this film is worse than everything she did on “10 Things.”
Tim Meadows, as the school principal and only returning cast member, finds a bemused tone that leaves him unsullied. Stone is well cast as Jo’s bestie, a little too quirky to be popular, since – like the lead in “She’s All That” — she likes art. Diego Boneta is decent as Jo’s boyfriend.
The Plastics were amusing parodies of popular girls in the original, but the sequel casts three actresses who earn the name in a different sense of the word. Maiara Walsh plays a one-note mean streak as leader Mandi, while the only trait of Hope (Nicole Gale Anderson) is that she’s a germaphobe.
Particularly off-point is “H2O: Just Add Water’s” Claire Holt, playing promiscuous Chastity. She’s the equivalent of the original’s Amanda Seyfried, but notice for example the flatness of her reading of this halfway decent line: “I don’t have to play dumb.”
A plastic production
Later in the 2010s, we’d start to get a sense that meanness of the old-school blatant variety was fading from high school in favor of more subtle types of backstabbing, in works such as TV’s “Chilling Adventures of Sabrina.” Even 2004’s “Mean Girls” hinted at this gradual course correction.
“Mean Girls 2” goes back to blatant meanness, but without any Hughesian innocence to at least make us care on a melodramatic level. The stakes for the good girls aren’t all that extreme. Abby’s family is absurdly rich, and only lip service is paid to the struggles of Jo’s family. The dad’s NASCAR crew job is teetering, but Jo could easily get $50K from Abby’s dad and then pay for Carnegie Mellon.
So we’re told; don’t look up the actual cost of CMU. Likewise, don’t think too hard about how her dad’s NASCAR job means they have to regularly move all over the country. A NASCAR job would be like truck driver or professional athlete – you’d be constantly on the road, but there’d be no need to move your home base.
When “Mean Girls 2” gears up for a climactic flag football game between Mandi’s girls and Jo’s girls, I thought maybe it would go out with its big set piece since none of the previous humor set-ups had been inspired. Nope. This sequence – purposely framed to hide the fact that no actual athletes are present — would’ve set flag football back a decade, if this film was popular.
Although it was an ABC Family hit for one week, the film faded from memory. As the original “Mean Girls” celebrates 20 years with a musical remake, “Mean Girls 2” is a footnote. For once, the hierarchy of popularity is on point.