Review Roundup: MEAN GIRLS Returns With New Movie Musical - Find Out What Critics Think!

Get in, loser! Mean Girls is back in theaters.

The first public screenings of Mean Girls are here and the critics are revealing what they thought of the new movie musical adaptation. The film hits theaters everywhere on Friday, January 12.

The film stars Angourie Rice as Cady Heron, Auli'i Cravalho as Janis, Jaquel Spivey as Damian, Avantika as Karen Shetty, Bebe Wood as Gretchen Wieners, Christopher Briney as Aaron Samuels, Mahi Alam as Mathlete Kevin Ganatra, and Reneé Rapp reprising her Broadway role as Regina George. Tina Fey and Tim Meadows will reprise their roles from the original film,

Directed by Arturo Perez Jr. and Samantha Jayne, the film also features Busy Philipps as Mrs. George, Jenna Fischer as Ms. Heron, Jon Hamm as Coach Carr, and Ashley Park.

Mean Girls is produced by Lorne Michaels and Tina Fey with the musical's writing team, including Fey's book and music by Richmond and lyrics by Nell Benjamin, returning for the screen adaption.

The teen comedy follows Cady Heron, who may have grown up on an African savanna, but nothing prepared her for the wild and vicious ways of The Plastics, a trio of lionized frenemies led by the charming but ruthless Regina George. But when Cady devises a plan to end Regina's reign, she learns the hard way that you can't cross a Queen Bee without getting stung.

Ahead of the film's debut in theaters, find out what critics thought of the new movie musical. Read the reviews below and check back we continue to update this roundup with more reviews.

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Valerie Complex, Deadline: "The songs primarily serve as tools for exposition rather than as organic elements of the story. Each musical number, often internal monologues, interrupts the narrative flow instead of integrating seamlessly into it. This disjointedness in storytelling is further exacerbated by the film’s inconsistent adherence to its musical format. When the songs do appear, they often feel like fillers rather than elements that enhance the narrative, contributing to a growing sense of disengagement, particularly noticeable by the third act."

Maureen Lee Lenker, Entertainment Weekly: "Even if the score is just okay, the numbers themselves are a delight. Jayne and Perez create a clear visual language for the world, with a garage jam session expanding out into a broader world and granting the audience a useful lens to understand the context of why characters break into song. Not since Rob Marshall and Chicago has a feature film debut shown such a confident, innate understanding of the musical genre and how to make it cinematic for a modern audience."

Owen Gleiberman, Variety: "2004 version will always be sacred; for others, it’s their mom’s “Mean Girls.”) I’ll just say that after you’ve seen the pop singer Renée Rapp, as the head mean girl Regina (Rapp also played the role on stage), make her grand entrance in a black vinyl bodysuit, singing “My name is Regina George, and I am a massive deal…,” as if she were Anita Ekberg crossed with Mata Hari, the scene carries a jolt, and you may wonder for a moment how Rachel McAdams, in the original film, made the impact she did without that song."

David Rooney, Hollywood Reporter: "But all the effervescence and fun have been drained out of the material in this labored reincarnation, a movie musical made by people who appear to have zero understanding of movie-musical vernacular. Debuting co-directors Samantha Jayne and Arturo Perez Jr. are best known as collaborators on the FX short-form series Quarter Life Poetry, but their choppy work here seems firmly entrenched in Perez’s music-video background. The same goes for choreographer Kyle Hanagami."

Coleman Spilde, The Daily Beast: "A sanitized version of one of the 21st century’s greatest movies should be insufferable. But some respectably catchy music and a couple of breakout stars do wonders for lifting the 2024 Mean Girls onto its own two feet, just tall enough to stand confidently next to its progenitor. While it still has no decent reason to exist other than to make a few bucks off of nostalgic millennials and curious newcomers, Mean Girls prevails by leaning hard into its own pointlessness and letting its stars live out their catty dreams—even if their claws don’t scratch hard enough."

Brian Truitt, USA Today: "The ultra-peppy tune “Revenge Party” is the most joyous thing ever to reference putting someone’s head on a spike yet also nicely moves the plot along as Cady and Janis’ montage-y plan against the Plastics takes form. And songs like Regina’s 'World Burn' and Janis’ 'I’d Rather Be Me' bring both entertaining zest and key character moments courtesy of strong turns from Rapp, who reprises her Broadway role, and Cravalho, the powerhouse voice of Disney’s 'Moana.'"

Tom Gliatto, People: "Shallowness isn't always a bad thing, either — not, at any rate, when it's embodied by the utterly fabulous Reneé Rapp as Regina. Rapp, who was also in the show’s stage production, plays Regina with a combination of lethal sexual command and — briefly, anyway — winning vulnerability. Ripely delicious and rather preposterous, Rapp suggests a combination of Smash’s Megan Hilty and Sharon Stone."

Kristy Puchko, Mashable: "And while the movie musical gives the Broadway show's song a more pop spin, Rapp makes all of hers a marvel. From the moment her smirking lips appear in close-up, sultry-singing, 'My name is Regina George, and I am a massive deal,' she has us hooked. Curiously, Jayne and Perez reflect Cady's captivation with a wide-eyed reaction shot that reads as lusty."

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Watch the trailer for Mean Girls here:

Photo: Jojo Whilden/Paramount © 2023 Paramount Pictures.

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