Netflix’s new Rebel Wilson-led comedy Senior Year has potential in its comedy and premise, but often doesn’t care to take advantage of it.
The film initially brings viewers back into the late-’90s/early 2000s to tell the story of Stephanie (Angourie Rice), a young high-schooler who wants to become popular and devotes her life to being crowned prom queen. Senior Year’s opening is actually pretty solid, taking a good amount of time to develop its characters and showcasing some welcomed nostalgia. The film’s soundtrack is a treat, as it’s filled with some ’90s/2000s classics and that is thankfully kept when the film transitions to modern day. Some of the early story beats, including a rivalry that Stephanie has with another cheerleader Tiffany (Ana Yi Puig), are equally nostalgic and provide some good laughs. It actually feels like a modern take on a classic high school flick, kind of in the same vein as the 2020 remake of Valley Girl, but it’s a bummer that that doesn’t end up being the entire film.
Senior Year eventually moves out its opening era after Stephanie falls into a coma from a cheerleading accident during her senior year and doesn’t wake up until 20 years later, when Stephanie (Wilson) is 37 years old. Now, wanting to pick up where she left off, Stephanie jumps back into high school with the hopes of regaining her popularity and finally becoming prom queen. Where the opening parts of the film felt like a nice modern take on a nostalgic era of movies, the present-day parts struggle to feel like anything more than just a standard Wilson-led comedy. While Wilson has shown repeatedly that she’s more than capable of confidently leading a comedy by providing some good laughs here, the film completely relies on her to carry everything and the load is just too much.
Frankly, the whole idea of Stephanie not understanding how times have changed is totally played out by this point and Senior Year doesn’t do anything new with this idea. It simply goes for cheap laughs and often ends up undercutting itself because of how bland its character depictions are. Most of the very liberal-minded students and faculty she meets, including an older version of her childhood friend Martha (Mary Holland), end up coming off like buzzkills and it never feels like any mindset is challenged in a meaningful way. Most of the time, Stephanie just throws a hissy fit or her hands in the air in confusion when someone tells her that times have changed and there’s no real takeaway from any confrontation to the overly “safe” mindset of the modern era.
The film doesn’t even want to talk much about the contradictions in society that are shown, like the “popular kids” being replaced by social influencers or how passive aggressive and superficial people still are. Honestly, Senior Year, in general, feels pretty superficial with its glitzy dance moments and lack of follow-through on its emotional beats and that’s pretty bad considering part of Stephanie’s lesson is to not have such a superficial view of life. It doesn’t even make its strong emotional moments last, as it likes to queue up lessons and then do nothing with them. For instance, there’s this very surprising and real moment where Martha talks about how high school sucked for her because of how secluded she felt for being gay and the film doesn’t really let this message or idea stick. It’s like Stephanie and the film completely forget about it.
The film also doesn’t do enough to offer strong support for Wilson in the comedy department as it wastes some great supporting talent. It would’ve been great to have more interactions between Stephanie and her dad (Chris Parnell), as their relationship is thin and mostly wastes Parnell’s ability, a real shame since it’s rare to see him outside of voice roles. Senior Year also heavily undervalues Sam Richardson, since he provides some of the funnier parts to the film as Stephanie’s friend Seth and adds a sense of wholesomeness that’s otherwise lacking. Stephanie’s new high school friends are also just treated like bland sidekicks and it’s a bummer because they provide some good laughs early on. Instead of giving Wilson a strong cast to work with, Senior Year relies on Wilson’s strange and outlandish comedy style that doesn’t really stand out compared to other roles she’s had.
Senior Year might have some potential and occasional laughs, but it barely capitalizes on any of its opportunities and ends up being a bland comedy flick that struggles to remain memorable.
