Warning: This article contains spoilers for the new “Mean Girls” movie.
The highly anticipated “Mean Girls” remake brings the original story of “the plastics” back to the big screen with the soundtrack of its Broadway run and some significant changes to its cast and storylines. While queen bee Regina George (Renée Rapp) remains a vicious blonde, the supporting cast around her has notably diversified.
Among the new faces is Auli’i Cravalho, known for her voice role in “Moana,” who plays Janis, a school outcast who befriends new girl Cady (Angourie Rice) as she navigates the social hierarchy of North Shore High. In the original film, Janis (played by Lizzy Caplan) was rumored to be a lesbian and was the target of a homophobic slur, though her sexuality was never clarified.
In the new adaptation, Cravalho revealed, Janis is a “loud and proud” lesbian. Her character’s last name was also changed from Ian to ‘Imi’ike to correspond with Cravalho’s own native Hawaiian identity.
“Previously, in our [2004] version, ‘lesbian’ for Janis was used kind of as a slur, and we’re taking that back,” Cravalho recently told ScreenRant.
While Janis is confident in her identity, her sexuality remains central to her middle school friendship breakup with Regina. Janis’ best friend, Damian (Jaquel Spivey), explains to Cady that she had given Regina a stuffed animal with a Pride pin attached as a way of coming out to her friend. Later, Regina used it to make fun of Janis, who torched the plush over a Bunsen burner during science class, leading to the nickname “pyro-les.” The nickname is used to describe Janis in the infamous “burn book” that Regina and her friends wrote to make fun of other girls at school.
While Regina is not explicitly identified as queer, she is described as having kissed Janis during a game of “Spin the Bottle” and taunting Janis about it later. Rapp, who is a queer woman herself, said in an interview with…
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