Teenage Fanatic: Inaccurate Depictions of Teens in Movies

Greetings readers! Welcome back to my weird and cray blog. Sorry for my recent absence. As you can probably tell by the title, today I will be pin-pointing what I think are the terrible depictions of teens that I have found in movies. Again, before you proceed, I just have to warn you that some members of certain fandoms may once again be offended, so be sure to stand clear. Anyway, here's the list:

Mean Girls
I know, I know! Don't hate me! 'Mean Girls' may be an awesome movie (however over-exposed it seems to be at the moment), but does it really accurately depict teens? I don't think so. Have you ever seen anyone get hit by a bus, suffer from major spinal chord injury, yet still attend the school formal?

Let's get real- do you really think someone as smart as Cady would ever, ever, be allowed anywhere near Regina and her pack of wannabes? No, the answer is no (no matter how much us nerds wish it weren't).

But let's look on the bright side, we now have so many more tumblr gifs and quotes to use!

High School Musical
I guess this sort of applies to the entire Disney franchise, but I thought HSM was the number one culprit. The random singing and dancing (and not in a 'Glee' way), the over dramatized facial expressions, the 'squeaky clean' image every character promotes . . . not going to happen. Ever. I don't think any teenager would respond to Sharpay's constant attacks with a frown and an over emotional, melancholy ballad (except maybe me on a good day). Accurately depicting the life of teens isn't exactly Disney's strong suit, so I'm not surprised (because sheltering kids from the real world is apparently the way to go about making multi million dollar movie franchises). When I watch it, I feel as if a bunch of cartoon animals are just going to come and attack me in the my sleep, while singing 'We're All In This Together'. That is not how teens should feel! Or anyone, ever! I think I'm going to stop before it gets weird . . . (to late)

She's the Man
Although this is a movie we all know and love (made pre cray Amanda Bynes), it doesn't exactly provide us with a realistic portrayal of teens. No matter how much some people may love sport, I highly doubt they'd transfer to an all boys school in order to join the soccer team. Newsflash- join an extra curricular club outside school! Problem solved! Saying this, I myself am not exactly the most sport oriented person (pretty much the opposite). Any exercise outside the confines of a dance studio is completely foreign to me. So, I guess it may be conceivable for someone's love of sport to go that far, but to actually get away with it for that long? No, I'm pretty sure someone would notice. Also, if you're friend pretended to be a male and snuck into an all boys school for a few months, would you just push it to the side and forgive them straight away? My guess is probably not. But we can still watch it, and reminisce on the Amanda Bynes that used to be *sigh*.

A Cinderella Story
We all love 'A Cinderella Story' (despite it's overwhelming cliches), but does it accurately reflect what teen life is like? I don't think so. Ostracised smart girl falls for popular athletic guy, they meet and are instantly drawn to one another at a masquerade ball, popular guy tries to find out girl's identity, finally succeeds and they push past their labels and live happily ever after. We've all heard the story before, but unfortunately that's all it'll ever be, a story. The way it would all go down in real life is ostracised smart girl falls for popular athletic guy, they meet at a masquerade ball and he has no idea what she's talking about all night, girl ends up alone, boy ends up with cheerleader. The end.

John Tucker Must Die
It's one of the most popular teen movies (according to IMDb), yet ironically is not even close to representing what teens are actually like. If one guy was playing three girls (which happens, a lot), I highly doubt they'd set up an elaborate, implausible scheme to get back at him, and complete countless, lame acts of revenge. No, not at all. The girls would just go down there, knee him in the crotch and be done with it. A more effective and time efficient method if you ask me. Considering that's basically what the entire movie's about, there was really no hope for it to be realistic in the first place.

Sleepover
Ugh. This movie reminds me of my youth (aka, 4 years ago), when I used to pick random teen movies out from the video store (it was still called a video store!), and hope for the best. Admittedly this isn't one of my favourites, but it wasn't totally horrendous. But in terms of depicting what teens are actually like? It doesn't poll so well. In real life, I highly doubt anyone, teen or not, would go to that much trouble over a spot near the fountain. Who really cares? As long as you're not next to the trash cans (for hygiene reasons), does it really matter where you are? Sit down, eat food, try and stop yourself from killing any of your teachers or peers, and go back inside when the bell rings. That's pretty much how lunch works. Also, the 'popular group' wouldn't even bother doing all those competitions over who sits where, they'd just put the others in their place and be done with it. No matter how much we want it to be, no teen hierarchy is that diplomatic (nor will it ever be).

Twilight
Okay, we all know that I've expressed my intense hatred for this movie series in the past, and am therefore jumping at any chance to put it on another list of criticism. But there is absolutely no way I could pass up this opportunity, all bias aside (well most of it anyway). Not only do its supernatural elements make it unrealistic (understandably), but the wooden emotion (if that's what you can call it) shown by the characters is totally unbelievable. For starters, Bella sees an extremely pale boy who doesn't like the sun at her school. First thought? VAMPIRE!?! Sure, when we were watching it, that was our first thought, but if you were just casually sitting next to your lab partner, would you start accusing them of being random supernatural creatures? NO! NO YOU WOULDN'T! It's weird and completely implausible! Not to mention that she's totally fine with it. What the hell? I'd pretty freaked out if I found out the person I'd been hanging around with WANTED TO EAT ME!!!!! Safe to say, everything in Twilight is completely and utterly wrong.