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stina-is-a-punk-rocker · 3 years

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to all the boys i’ve loved before: the good, the bad & the ugly

THE GOOD

I live my life with the belief, not in any religion, but in several other truths: pineapple topping on pizza is a crime against humanity. FOUR is the superior One Direction album. The book will always be superior to the movie based off of it.

Actually, maybe we have to reconsider that last one.

I first watched To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before expecting a slightly polished version of a Disney channel original. I was- to my surprise, and delight- proven wrong. Sure, the premise is a bit flimsy (why, in god’s name, would Lara Jean put her letters in envelopes and address them if she had no intention of mailing them?); there’s a multitude of cliché YA tropes (naïve, introverted MC meets floppy-haired white boy ft. some reincarnation of Regina George who happens to be his ex with a vendetta against the poor, innocent MC; the GBF); I’ve got several concerns about the casting (the Covey girls are supposed to half-Korean. The actors playing them don’t even have the same ethnicity? Nor do they look like they could pass for siblings?); and the soundtrack is- well. They could’ve done better.

BUT. And that’s a big ‘but’, which is why it’s in all caps. There were so many things I loved about the movie, so much more than the ones that bothered me. My little Asian heart always bursts in joy whenever I see a positive representation of someone like me in media- I don’t care if they’re South Asian or East Asian or SEA or Middle Eastern or anywhere else from the Asian continent. For so long, the only representation in Western media- if any; having Asian characters is a rarity- were perpetuating stereotypes; Lara Jean and her sisters are such a breath of fresh air. Noah Centineo’s… well, a lot of people find him cute, and he’s got a charming smile. Kitty is my spirit animal. And the aesthetics are so cute- Lara Jean’s wardrobe is a dream, and her room even more so. I loved the To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before movie, and I will go to my grave defending it.

Since I loved the movie so much, surely, the book would be better! Right?

… Sigh.

THE BAD

The cover’s very cute, I’ll give it that. Arty font, reminiscent of something you’d find in a love letter, good call. The color scheme’s adorable. The girl on the cover is very pretty. And, um… that’s about it.

Right off the bat, Lara Jean’s monologue made me go, oh. It’s that kind of protagonist. The one who spends way too much time telling and not enough showing (blame all the writing advice videos I watched on YouTube. It never used to bother me before, but it’s all I can see now).

(Also, “After I write my letter, I’m no longer consumed by my all-consuming love.” You’re proud of that, aren’t you, Miss Jenny Han?)

And, see, I wouldn’t mind (I probably would) if Lara Jean’s thoughts were particularly riveting. Mildly entertaining, at the very least- that’s all I’m asking for.

Lara Jean is uninteresting; almost painfully so. Film-LJ’s quirkiness barely translates to the pages. Sure, Lara Jean likes romance… and baking… and antiques… and writing letters to boys who are supposedly out of her league and who could never fall for little old her. And she’s a bad driver. She idolizes her older sister. Decent character traits for a YA protagonist. And, as far as I recall, no internalized misogyny that comes in the form of slut-shaming, which is a rarity for the genre of YA. Great.

And yet there’s something about book-LJ that feels so… contrived. A little Mary Sue-ish, if you will. Papery.

Which can be said about almost every other character (except Chris and Kitty. Margot, to an extent, but I don’t like her).

There are loads of useless info-dumps strewn throughout the story, which makes me wonder if it wasn’t edited. The writing’s just… bad. It’s more like a Wattpad story (when did ‘Wattpad story’ become the paragon of bad YA? Honestly speaking, though, all the popular Wattpad books give the website a bad name. There are some incredibly well-written works on it- yes, even Harry Styles fanfiction. Not every Wattpad story is going to be *bleh* After or The Kissing Booth. But I digress). Lara Jean goes into too much detail about her outfits and the trivial details of… everything, really. And, well, no one gives a fuck.

Which brings me to: the love triangle. Beloved of all YA clichés, pretty much a staple in the genre at this point. Always with the female main character choosing between two men, both conventionally attractive in a very Eurocentric way. Usually, it’s painfully obvious who gets the girl; “Emma Notlikeothergirls has to choose between the handsome, confident, gorgeous, athletic, strapping Ashton Dreamboat and that rando who lives next door, Billy Whatsisname. Whoever will she choose?”

I’ll give credit where credit is due. The book makes both Peter and Josh (unrelated, but why are the boys’ names so standard Hoosier boy-ish? You’ve got girls named Genevieve and Margot, and the boys are pretty much the twelve apostles) pretty evenly matched. Josh has the whole boy-next-door, childhood friends, I-have-always-loved-you cliché going for him, while Peter’s the popular boy, the jock, the guy every girl wants to be with and every guy wants to be.

And yet they’re both complete dicks.

I’m supposed to be rooting for one of them. Team Peter or Team Josh; either Peter-Jane or Lara-Josh. Either the guy who’s got nothing but his looks going for him, or the guy who slept with her sister and kissed her without her consent. hOwEvEr WiLL sHe ChOOsE???

And I was never really convinced that Peter actually developed feelings for Lara Jean, ever. Maybe I’m just oblivious, but they seemed more like friends instead of lovers. I was lowkey shipping Lara Jean x Chris, even though I knew that was plain wishful thinking; I already got my Asian MC, this won’t be getting too diverse.

Other clichés I’m tired of seeing but were unfortunately present: Lucas, the token Gay Best Friend (I was annoyed with the movie for making him the Rafiki to Lara Jean’s Simba and nothing else, but rereading the book made me realize that they didn’t have much to work with in the first place); Margot, the Bitchy Sister (I never forgave her for lying to their dad about Lara Jean having sex. Seriously, how low can you get? JOSH kissed LARA JEAN, not the other way around! Margot’s supposed to be the same age I am, I think, so I believe I have the ability to call her out on her bullshit); Genevieve, the Bitch Queen Extraordinaire; Kitty, the Annoying Younger Sibling (but I love and cherish her so I don’t mind it).

“The sibling dynamic was surprisingly better written than a solid 75% of the book,” says me, an only child.

Also, a final complaint: is having sex that big of a deal? I get Lara Jean being (rightfully) horrified at the accusations, and Peter Kavinskydick deserves a decent roundhouse kick (the movie did a better job of making Peter’s actions forgivable), but why does everyone else care? Seriously, do you have that little fodder for gossip?

THE UGLY

Am I going to complain about the sequel to the movie based off of the sequel to the book that I can’t remember anything of besides the fact that John Ambrose was ten times the man Peter Kavinsky was? You bet I am.

In all honesty, I can’t remember much of the book version of P.S. I Still Love You. Rest assured that I was Team John Ambrose all the way, both while reading the book and watching the movie. I don’t want to make myself suffer through the book again, so I’ll resort to bashing the movie sequel.

This movie sucked balls. Not on the level of Sierra Burgess is a Loser or Swiped or The Kissing Booth or- yikes- The Kissing Booth 2, but it was still pretty bad. It’s pretty obvious that the two movies weren’t directed by the same person. For all its plot-related shortcomings, the first film was charming and pretty widely well-received. The second film takes all that charm and cuteness and fluff and flushes it down the toilet, along with the tiniest bit of affection I had for the character of Peter Kavinsky. Lara Jean, too, to an extent.

At least Peter and Josh were evenly matched. John Ambrose is lightyears ahead of Peter. And yet Lara Jean chooses Peter because… the first dick is the best dick? Make it make sense!

She’s leading John Ambrose on during the entire film, and I normally hate using that term because it’s such an incel way of putting things. But she doesn’t tell John Ambrose about Peter and her dating, even though she’s had the opportunity to do so countless times. She gets mad at Peter for being close to Genevieve, and yet? Hypocrite much? Not to mention she kisses John Ambrose, right before she’s like, “whoops haha guess I don’t like you that much after all :/ lol my bad”.

John Ambrose deserved better, and that is the hill I will die on.

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