The Outcasts (2017)
5/10
not quite Tina Fey level
5 May 2017
Mindy (Eden Sher) is aiming for MIT. Band geek Jodi (Victoria Justice) has been her best friend since 3rd grade. The two outsiders have been targets for Queen Bee Whitney (Claudia Lee). Mindy tries to make peace but Whitney humiliates Jodi. The girls set to overturn the high school power structure by uniting the disenfranchised.

The basic plot structure is well done and the young cast is solid. I really like Eden on her TV show. Many of the girls playing teens are in their 20s. This is not that different from other high school dramedies and should work well. Eden Sher is playing her wacky nerd character and Justice has good friend chemistry with her. Claudia Lee is a fine mean girl but this is no Mean Girls.

There are two main problems. First, the release seems to have run into some delays. I'm guessing that this was filmed around 2015 but the two years delay does mean that Victoria Justice is no longer the Nickelodeon It girl. She should be playing a college kid by now. It also leaves this movie out of time which is related to the second problem. The references in the movie are scattered all over the place. With the old computers and old early 2000s TV references, I wondered if the world is set at an earlier time. The modern cell phones and # place the movie in the present day. The competing time periods ultimately leave me unsatisfied. I want to like this movie for the young cast but the writing is not quite Tina Fey level. It has the potential but none of it is quite sharp enough.
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