No-one was impressed by the first Jem and The Holograms trailer, as fans complained about the liberties taken with their beloved animated series. The trouble all stems from adapting an ’80s cartoon into a 2015 live-action movie, as any variation from the source material was bound to ruffle feathers. With the arrival of a new trailer though, could those preconceptions finally be smashed?
Jem revolves around a teenage girl who picks up a guitar, writes a few tunes and ropes in her pals to join her band. Footage is uploaded to the web and before you can say “YouTube advertisement deal,” the group’s video becomes a viral hit. Global superstardom beckons.
The newest preview zeroes in the young girl, real-life name Jerrika, whose lofty rise to fame is a sugar-coated story of sentimentality. Along the way she’s plagued by a money hungry manager-type played by Juliette Lewis, and a kind-hearted mentor played by Molly Ringwald. The overriding feeling when watching the trailer is that there’s no point in forking out for a ticket for the finished film. You already know what’s going to happen. Jerrika will ‘do the right thing’, ‘follow her heart’ and ‘learn a valuable lesson’ by the film’s finale. Which will no doubt lump all of its emotional heft onto a live performance finale.
Directed by Jon M. Chu, Jem and The Holograms opens on October 23.
As a small-town girl catapults from underground video sensation to global superstar, she and her three sisters begin a one-in-a-million journey of discovering that some talents are too special to keep hidden. In Universal Pictures’ Jem and the Holograms, four aspiring musicians will take the world by storm when they see that the key to creating your own destiny lies in finding your own voice.
Directed by Jon M. Chu (Step Up series, G.I. Joe: Retaliation), the musical adventure stars Aubrey Peeples, Stefanie Scott, Aurora Perrineau, Hayley Kiyoko, Ryan Guzman, Molly Ringwald and Juliette Lewis. Jem and the Holograms, based on the iconic Hasbro animated TV series, is written by Ryan Landels and produced by Chu, Jason Blum for Blumhouse Productions, Scooter Braun for SB Projects, Bennett Schneir, and Brian Goldner and Stephen Davis of Hasbro Studios.
