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'Mean Girls 2' arrives, but is the world prepared for more plastics?
The first "Mean Girls" was a perfect storm of pop culture goodness. Writer Tina Fey was transitioning from that woman on "Saturday Night Live" to the national icon she is today, and star Lindsay Lohan was riding a wave of "It" girl status that has since washed back out to sea. (2004 was a much simpler time, on many levels.)
It can certainly never be duplicated. But that's not going to stop anyone from trying.
ABC Family airs the long-delayed sequel, "Mean Girls 2," on Jan. 23, no doubt hoping that its predecessor's box office success and cult status will translate to the made-for-TV arena.
That's impossible. "2," for all it's teen cattiness and unrealistically dressed high school students, cannot transcend guilty pleasure territory. Frankly, it's hard to even enjoy it for that, given the expectations accompanying the title.
And the network seems to be inviting these unfavorable comparisons, airing the premiere after a broadcast of the original. A good lead-in, yes, but it raises the bar impossibly high. The intelligence, relevance and excitement of "Mean Girls" are conspicuously absent here.
If you do hunker down for a screening of "2" -- and we really wouldn't blame you -- just make sure your expectations are adequately adjusted and you'll probably enjoy yourself.
Better yet, put the original out of your mind completely, and give the sequel a personalized title, like "Eerily Familiar Way to Kill Two Hours" or "Children Who Wear Whore Makeup: A Cautionary Tale."
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Photo/Video credit: ABC Family
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I'm recording this when it comes on tonight JUST to see how bad it will be.
Because the horribleness is inevitable.
Geez, you talk about the first Mean Girls as if it were freakin' Gone with the Wind or something. It was a simple, popcorn, teenage, coming of age flick and little more than that. Nothing that hadn't been done many times before and nothing even that memorable about it six years later except there were some hot girls in it... Lohan being the least of which. She's little more than a media creation who became famous for being a celebrity screw up. A second installment of Mean Girls really doesn't have much to live up to and, quite frankly, they could have just jumped straight to making a tv series based on it like Buffy. Missed an opportunity there, but maybe that's all this is really about anyway.
I actually kinda hope it'll be decent. I miss the preppy/bitchy/betrayal of the first one.
trying to make mean girls 2 irs ridiculous. and obviously be an epic fail. But, (of course) i'm goING to watch it anyway to see how bad it really is
Haha I love you man. Mean Girls was epic.
Tina Fey a national Icon????? In what universe
HAHAHAHA who wears sunglasses indoors??!?! gosh damn it, a bunch of ******* cliche **** is gonna go down in this movie. Just because the title says "Mean Girls 2" doesn't mean you have to dress up a bunch of disney sluts in skirts and tell them to act mean. AT LEAST REGINA GEORGE KNOWS SHE'S MEAN! haha I'm not watching this.
Jerky, seriously? Mean Girls is one of the best teen movies ever and definitely the best in the past decade. It's not like the writer is saying it's one of the greatest movies of all time, he's saying it's a beloved movie with a big following. Which it is. It's one of the most quotable movies and Lindsay Lohan was famous for her movies first, not her personal problems. Making a second one is just a marketing ploy to make money off of a successful title.
You know what they say about "Mean Girls"
Mean Girls suck
Nice girls swallow
ha aha ha...
This version is definatly going to be a watered down version of the first. The first had sexual references, alcohol, language, and actual fist fights; this one will have none of that. Thats one of the reasons i wont like it. its not "real". in REAL life, girls are mean girls and straight up *******, something this movie will lack.