13: The Musical

This somewhat follows the original story from the past Broadway musical, the music is good and the cast is super talented. Where it falls short is too much was changed from the musical, the story falls short. It doesn't leave the audience with anything to think about, it's just generic.

Overall, 5/10.

Though the film highlighted many teen issues, the dialogue often felt way too mature. This came across in the musical numbers as well. Granted, many teens today feel as if they know everything, but they're still very immature beings- which makes them intriguing subjects. This film, in its mission to replicate "high school musical" I guess, missed this mark terribly. Other than being cute, these kids lack real depth.

A lot of reviewers on here have commented on how the film is a sanitized version of the stage play. Perhaps this is the overarching issue (I haven't seen the stage play, so can't say for sure).

I do not accept this as a movie adaptation of 13 The Musical. I really love the stage production because it's super funny and has so many great songs. This movie was not funny at all. In some weird effort to make the movie more family friendly than the stage production, the writers of the movie changed a lot of the funny lyrics and lines which provides no jokes and no laughs. The show is called 13, it was originally written to be PG-13, not PG.

Another complaint I have is how the movie changed a lot of the songs and cut all of the really good ones. They changed lyrics and added verses. Like babes, WE DID NOT have to add a rap verse to Opportunity, it's already good on its own. They shortened my favorite song Getting Ready from 4 minutes to 1 minute. And in that 1 minute, they cut all of the amazing harmonies and overlapping parts. Not only did they cut verses, they cut ENTIRE SONGS. To list a few: Becoming A Man, Hey Kendra, Get Me What I Need, WHAT IT MEANS TO BE A FRIEND <3, All Hail The Brain, Terminal Illness, Any Minute, It Can't Be True, and IF THATS WHAT IT IS! I love all of these songs dearly, so please go listen to them instead of watching this movie.

Even worse than cutting these songs, replacing them with the worst songs I've ever heard. The one between Brett and Kendra was right out of the movie Trolls and the duet between Evan and his mom had me almost falling asleep from not caring.

They also changed the music production to try to have a more modern sound, but it just sounded like a cringey video of 8 year olds on youtube trying to sing some olivia rodrigo song. The acoustic guitar and piano of the original music created a coming of age feel, and now there is just too much reverb for me to take the music seriously.

Another thing, they added the mom/dad as actual characters?? And with the most boring storylines ever?? One of the cool things about the stage production is that it's all kids, no adults, so I thought that was weird. But the grandma slayed so I'm not mad about that.

I had been looking forward to this movie since it was announced, and I was so disappointed. I was about to turn it off but then Bad Bad News started playing. That song is the one reason why I gave this movie 2 stars. It was amazing, it did the original justice, and I loved it so much.

And there is your very opinionated review from a theatre loser who loves this show (the staged production) so much.

The acting's pretty good but subpar in some scenes, although the kids do a really good job for their first lead/supporting roles! It portrays high school nowadays pretty well. The soundtrack has some good tunes and the casting is diverse without it being forced.

But these things can't fix the main issues of this movie. The pacing is fast and quite off-putting; songs after songs can be tiring, relationships fluctuate every scene, you name it. The dialogue can be a bit forced and dramatic at times. There are also a bunch of weird cinematography & editing choices within this movie that I can't bother getting into.

Evan's Jewish identity also gets quite undermined in this movie, which was a huge part of the story both in the musical and in the book. Most parts of the movie also say a lot of things about Jewish culture (bar mitzvahs being parties and nothing more) which aren't necessarily true.

All in all, a decent movie that had a lot of potential but failed to meet it.

This was an absolute dumpster fire of a movie. Pacing was terrible, acting was minimalistic, songs were average.

Furthermore, they took away the point of the original musical which was that teenage kids aren't the most PG beings out there.

This film had one redeemble five minute scene and it was the football boys absolutely rocking and slaying the song "Bad Bad News."