Metacritic reviews

What’s terrific about The Duff is that Casey and Jessica may not have intentionally befriended the less attractive Bianca as a way to make themselves look better, but they don’t exactly deny that she serves that purpose.

As misspent of an opportunity as The DUFF may be, it’s hard to completely dismiss a film that gives someone as talented as Whitman her long-overdue spotlight.

A snappy, sweet-spirited teen comedy about a smart girl who tries to fight high school labeling with wit and words. And the occasional punch.

Slightly radical in portraying high schoolers as human beings of normal niceness and intelligence. That means this winsome comedy is a little low in the stakes department, not to mention predictable, but it gets an “A” for charm.

More a middle-of-the-road rom-com than a teen-spirit sendup, the pic weaves its lighthearted mix of silly and serious with increasingly heavy-handed spiels on self-esteem.

Fortunately, the cast — featuring Allison Janney as Bianca’s scattered mom and Ken Jeong as her sympathetic mentor — is savvy and silly. Really, though, most of the credit goes to Whitman, who stands in, and stands up, for the DUFF in all of us.

For all its potential pitfalls, The DUFF manages to keep its head above water, thanks to Whitman, Amell, and a willingness to engage with teen-movie clichés in a relatively thoughtful way.

There's freedom in facing the truth. There would be even more freedom in a heroine finishing the film in her favorite ugly overalls, but we haven't gotten there yet.

Director Ari Sandel, working with a script by Josh A. Cagan, doesn't have the deftness to really convey how Bianca's personality turns conventional wisdom into her own unique, attractive qualities.

An adaptation of Kody Keplinger’s YA novel, The DUFF is exponentially dumb.