These days it feels like every show is getting a reboot, and not all of them should. Zoey 102, which is streaming now on Paramount+, reunites Zoey Brooks (Jamie Lynn Spears) and all the rest of her classmates from Pacific Coast Academy, in a reboot of Nickelodeon’s Zoey 101 that manages to keep us up to date on these fan-favorite characters and throw them into the current day. Fortunately, the Zoey 102 team had the good sense to keep things short and sweet, a single movie rather than a full season of a show, a tight hour and forty that’s filled with some well-written gags – anything longer would feel tedious. Just like Quinn Pensky, we give this reboot high marks.
ZOEY 102: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?
Opening Shot: Zoey Brooks is getting proposed to by a 30 1/2 year old man who is the lead singer of a Maroon 5 cover band and doesn’t even know her last name. They have been on two dates. Zoey says no.
The Gist: 15 years out of high school, Zoey’s life isn’t going quite as she’d hoped. She’s unlucky in love, and her job as a reality TV producer is thankless and unrewarding. But things are going great for her bestie Quinn (Erin Sanders) who is a famous tech entrepreneur and just got engaged to her high school boyfriend Logan (Matthew Underwood).
Zoey has been invited to be maid of honor at the wedding and all of her old classmates will be there, but she’s depressed about the fact that everyone she used to hang with is incredibly successful, and they’ve all been hanging out without her. (Well, everyone except her ex, Chase, who’s a teacher in Baltimore and has been out of touch ever since Zoey ghosted him when they were supposed to go to Hawaii after senior year).
Zoey has been so busy with work that she hasn’t seen anyone from her circle in a long time, and the wedding is her chance to reconnect. Only two things stand in her way: 1) The wedding falls on the same day as her reality show’s live finale, and 2) she has lied and told Quinn she has a boyfriend, and Quinn expects him to be at the wedding. So Zoey hires an actor named Todd (Dean Geyer) – who insists on being called Hugo Hemsworth, the fake name Zoey made up and a distant cousin of THE Hemsworths – to join her at the wedding. Hijinks ensue as Zoey finds herself driving back and forth between the wedding weekend in Malibu (in a self-driving Pontiac that has a prominent role in the film) and the set of the finale where her boss, Kelley (an obnoxiously over-the-top Thomas Lennon) has tasked her with wrangling an unruly and high-maintenance contestant. Meanwhile Todd/Hugo Hemsworth charms everyone at the wedding, duping them all into believing he and Zoey are really an item (although classmate Stacey Dillsen (Abby Wilde), now a famous true crime podcaster, believes Hugo to be a serial killer).
All the while, Zoey and Chase, having been estranged for 15 years, find it awkward to reconnect and spend most of the movie either separated, or squabbling. All of Zoey’s plotting results in both the reality show and the wedding ending in disaster, but by the end, everyone comes together and makes amends.
What Shows Will It Remind You Of? While Zoey 102 is a reboot of Zoey 101, the entire premise of Zoey needing to be in two places at once and trying to juggle all of her lies was very Mrs. Doubtfire.
Our Take: Here’s my truth: I wasn’t a Zoey 101 watcher, so I’m coming at this movie with fresh eyes and no loyalty to the characters or ties to the franchise. This review is less about how well the movie honors the original series and more about how it holds up on its own, and I have to say, it was so much better than I thought it would be. While the premise of Zoey needing to be at the wedding and on set at her job was predictable, the movie was filled with jokes and sight gags that were genuinely funny.
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In one scene, where Chase and Hugo sang “I’ve Had The Time Of My Life” at karaoke, a moment that felt like it was going to turn into fisticuffs ended with a supremely satisfying version of “the lift” from Dirty Dancing. (This made up for the fact that the other song we hear at karaoke is a really terrible version of Limp Bizkit’s “Rollin’,” a choice I truly can’t wrap my head around. Sure, the movie is playing up the early aughts nostalgia, but has anyone ever felt nostalgic for that song?) As part of another sub-plot, Stacey, whose podcast is called My Favorite Slaughters (an obvious parody of My Favorite Murder, down to the font choices), leads people to believe that Hugo is a suspect in a Malibu murder case, a subplot with a very fun payoff.
The movie pays homage to the show that fans watched when they were young, and it’s still got that Nickelodeon aesthetic, but it also respects that these characters have grown. Heck, they even swear. A lot! But it also adds some genuinely funny B-stories and charming scenes to the plot to keep things fun.
Sex and Skin: None.
Parting Shot: {SPOILER ALERT] After Stacey and her husband Mark (Jack Salvatore Jr.) spent the movie accusing Hugo of being the Malibu Murderer, they apologize and say goodbye to him. He accepts their apology with a charming wink and smile, and then opens the trunk of his car, where a body is wriggling around in a bodybag.
Sleeper Star: Dean Geyer plays Hugo Hemsworth as a caricature of a too-perfect boyfriend, but he ends up stealing the show in more ways than one.
Most Pilot-y Line: “I just think about all the things I dreamed about it high school, and now I’m here and it’s like, is this it? Is this the dream?” Zoey asks her coworker Archer (Owen Thiele) at the beginning of the movie, who then tells her, “It’s really gross how often you talk about high school.”
Our Call: STREAM IT! Zoey 102 is a predictable reboot and the plot kinda goes exactly where you think it will. That being said, it’s an enjoyable ride that reflects who these characters might be in 2023, and the jokes and writing feel funny and current.
Liz Kocan is a pop culture writer living in Massachusetts. Her biggest claim to fame is the time she won on the game show Chain Reaction.
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