Boo, Bitch review: Ghost this Lana Candor's Mean Girls-style Netflix limited series!

2.5/5

One night, a high school senior who has spent her life quietly seizes the opportunity to change her narrative and begin living an epic life, only to discover the next morning... She's a ghost!

When Lana Condor made a splash onscreen as Lara Jean Covey in To All the Boys I've Loved Before back in 2018, her cuteness and performance bowled over everyone who loved the rom-com franchise. The Condor has returned in a similar vein to To All the Boys: Always and Forever, this time with a limited Netflix series titled Boo, Bitch. Going by the title, it gives an idea of the life and drama of a teenager and what it will turn out to be eventually.

Well, the series doesn't leave any stone unturned to not leave any surprises in the plot. An invisible girl named Erika Wu (Candor) is mistaken as Helen Who throughout her high school life, and she doesn't want to make any effort to change that until graduation strikes. However, on the day of her new decision to be visible in high school, she is declared dead due to a moose attack. The only person who has witnessed her death is her best friend, Gia (Zoe Colletti), who helps her in every way to be seen amongst her classmates and eventually the whole school.

The happy-go-lucky Erika is seen basking in all the attention, and it gives an immense sense of déjà vu with Mean Girls (2004). The series can be called a befitting ode to the hit film starring Lindsay Lohan and Rachel McAdams in the lead roles. 

Erika begins dating Riley (Aparna Brielle) and Jake C (Mason Versaw) in the same way Cady Heron (Lohan) begins dating Regina George's (McAdams) ex-Aaron Samuels (Jonathan Bennett). The whole episode is dedicated to the epic sequence of Mean Girls, where Erika is at the top of her game by becoming an influencer and a TikTok Queen. But here, the purpose of living a life in such a way is that she wants to finish her unfinished business before descending to the other world.

Despite having a symmetrical storyline to Mean Girls, there's hardly any sequence that makes the series increase its non-existing entertainment quotient. But it seems like keeping the hit film as a reference point was the crux of the limited series.

All eight episodes, which are nearly 25 minutes long, have the word "bitch" in the title. It is a deliberate move but fails to keep up the charm that the show was intended to be.

Meanwhile, there's a major plot twist in the series which I don't think I need to spoil, but you might figure it out as you watch the series. However, it creates a little impact as it is stamped right in the middle of the show with a new turn created in the second half. However, the plot keeps on looping at one angle, and new surprises are formed there.

Speaking of the performances, Candor, who is also the executive producer of the series, has shone beautifully in the series. The actor's transformation from being an invisible girl to a mean girl is amazing and a treat to watch.

So is Colletti as Erika's best friend, Gia. She almost has an equal screen presence to Candor in the series. Their best friends' chemistry and camaraderie is a visual delight. And to be honest, most of the series is fun to watch when only both of them are present in the frame. Whether it's their planning and plotting to be visible or their cat fights, it makes me laugh or at least smile.

The other supporting actors, namely Mason Versaw as Jake C, Aparna Brielle as Riley, Tenzing Norgay Trainor as Gavin, among others, are good in their parts but hardly play a catalyst to the screenplay.

Boo, Bitch is directed by Tim Schauer and Kuba Soltysiak with Erin Ehrlich and Lauren Iungerich. Ehrlich and Iungerich are the people behind teenage dramas, namely Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, On My Block and others. Thus, having to see Boo, Bitch in the same league is not a surprise.

The bottom line is that Boo, Bitch is not something which might urge you to binge-watch or invest a lot of time in. However, the attempts can be appreciated in terms of casting, mainly for Candor and Colleti.

Like how we say many movies could have worked better if they had been a series, here, Boo, Bitch would have worked decently if it had been a film rather than an eight-episode long sitcom series.