Mean Girls at 20: Here are five similar films to binge-watch

When it comes to teen comedy films, Mean Girls has set the standard with iconic lines, hilarious moments, a relatable plot, and memorable characters. The film was such a big commercial success that it got turned into a Broadway musical, which was released in January 2024. Director Tina Fey's film stars Lindsay Lohan, Rachel McAdams, Amanda Seyfried, and Lacey Chabert in the lead roles.

The film revolves around this iconic dialogue: "So you're breaking up with me because I'm too.. BLONDE!?". The story starts when Elle Woods (Reese Witherspoon), a peppy, rich sorority house president, assumes that her boyfriend Warner Huntington III (Matthew Davis) is going to propose, but he wants to break up with her. He wants to be a senator before turning 30, a career path that would require him to marry a "Jackie, not a Marilyn." Determined to win him back, Elle joins Harvard, but she ends up taking her studies seriously to take up a court case, prove her role model Brooke Windham's innocence, and change the stereotypes about her and all her fellow blondes.

While Legally Blonde, one of the most iconic romantic comedies of its era, does not directly portray similarities with Mean Girls, it still has a connection with the latter through shared defiance of social conformity and the importance placed on women's empowerment.

Star athlete Troy Bolton and nerdy beauty Gabriella Montez, teens who are worlds apart, fall for each other as they are forced to participate in a karaoke contest during their vacation. They discover their love for singing as they team up. After vacation, Gabriella turns out to be the new girl in Troy's high school. Their wish to audition for the school musical together throws both their social groups into chaos. Ashley Tisdale, the high school queen bee, who is also auditioning for the school musical, grows insanely jealous. Now, the only common goal they all have is to sabotage the audition.

High School Musical may be a sweeter, goofier version of Mean Girls, but it has all the teen drama, romance, social order, and popularity reminiscent of the Tina Fey film.

Cher Horowitz, a rich, stylish and good-natured student at Beverly Hills High School, is at the top of the social scale. Considering herself a matchmaker, she orchestrates a romance between her two teachers. Excited by her success and new profound happiness in doing good deeds, Cher decides to turn Tai Frasier, a new "clueless" transfer student at her school, into her new project by providing her with a makeover. Consequently, Tai starts to become more popular than Cher, leaving the latter with the realisation that her ex-stepbrother was right about her wayward behaviour. An adaptation of Jane Austen's novel Emma, the film shares a DNA with Mean Girls when it comes to rich girls with misguided behaviour.

Poopy Moore is a spoiled and wealthy girl. There is nothing her credit cards can't buy. Her father Gerry ships her off to her mother's former English boarding school after she pulls a mean prank on his new girlfriend, hoping she would change for the better. On her first day at school, she befriends everyone from the lacrosse school captain Harriet to the school principal Mrs Kingsley. Unwilling to accept her fate, she does everything in order to get herself expelled, but when she meets her dream prince, Kingsley's dashing son Freddie, everything changes.

Poopy Moore is a 2008 reincarnation of Regina George. Both films are similarly based on bratty, rebellious girls with impropriety, as their basic characters learn valuable lessons. The only difference is that Wild Child is solely about Poopy Moore and her character development, whereas Mean Girls is about all of high school.

Mindy and Jodi, two nerdy best friends, have always been the victims of torment by their school's mean girls, Whitney and Mackenzie. After a humiliating prank, they are done being bullied. The two decide to fight back by spearheading a social revolution with the help of other outcasts in the school. They plan to change the social hierarchy once and for all with their newly assembled band.

Like Mean Girls, this 2017 American teen comedy deals with revenge and questionable means of gaining popularity.