Movie review by Greg Carlson
Made in part to capitalize on nostalgia for its source material, “Jem and the Holograms” is considerably less entertaining than many of the animated episodes of the original series that aired in first-run syndication from 1985 to 1988. Directed by Jon Chu, the live action “musical fantasy” borrows a number of familiar elements from the toy-based program that marketed Barbie-like fashion dolls and accessories, but the effort is wayward and misguided. Original series creator Christy Marx was left out of the project, and the resulting flop has already been pegged as one of the biggest wide-release box office failures of the year.
Marx’s “Jem” stories were hardly sophisticated, but they did present a female-centric universe in which smart and determined young women routinely faced ethical dilemmas and discovered opportunities to solve problems through cooperation and collaboration. The central premise, that the late father of Jerrica Benton has invented a pair of technologically advanced earrings allowing his daughter to cloak her identity and appear as either Jerrica or the “outrageous” frontwoman of Jem and the Holograms, is tweaked for the film. Additionally, the artificially intelligent Synergy is altered from a fairy godmother-esque computer console to S1N3RGY, a cutesy relative of EVE from “WALL-E.”
On the show, Jem and her bandmates spent as much time being threatened, imprisoned, sabotaged, cheated, and manipulated by the evil music producer Eric Raymond as they did climbing on stage in the nick of time to perform at fundraisers and charity benefit concerts. In the movie, Eric becomes Erica (Juliette Lewis), and Jerrica’s boyfriend Rio (Ryan Guzman) is clumsily reimagined as Erica’s son. Now it is Rio and not Jem to whom controlling interest in Starlight Music is bequeathed, a stupid move since it erases one of the most appealing aspects of the original series: Jem’s agency outside of her role as a pop star.
While the movie’s tunes and the game performance of star Aubrey Peeples in the title role combine for fleeting moments of entertainment, Chu’s flimsy alternate reality functions in a constant state of collapse. The idea that the identity of Jerrica/Jem would be so hard to keep secret – especially in the YouTube and Internet-saturated world depicted throughout the movie – doesn’t work at all. In the cartoon, it was Rio’s “love triangle” with Jerrica/Jem that triggered the privileged viewer satisfaction enjoyed by the pre-teens consuming the show, but that piece of the puzzle is omitted.
In an essay for Jezebel’s blog “The Muse,” Hillary Crosley Coker writes, “…‘Jem’ fans are so pissed that Scooter Braun, along with other bros Jason Blum, Bennett Schneir, Brian Goldner, Stephen Davis of Hasbro Studios and director John [sic] Chu are producing the film – it’s like a congressional hearing on birth control over there. Even the script’s writer is a dude, Ryan Landels.” If the boys accidentally got one thing right, it might be the absence of the mean girl versus good girl competition provided on the series by the Misfits (not to be confused with Glenn Danzig’s outfit). Jem’s shrill enemies do appear briefly in a post-credits sequence, possibly as a reminder for us to be grateful they weren’t a bigger part of the film.