Like most hard-core Jem fans I was a bit disappointed when I saw the first trailer for the live action adaptation. But after finally getting to see the final product, I have to admit Jem and the Holograms could be the biggest surprises of the year for me and one of the best adaptations/updates of an 80s cartoon we have seen yet.

Jem and the Holograms of course is the story of Jerrica Benton (Aubrey Peeples) who along with her sister Kimber (Stefanie Scott) was adopted by their Aunt Bailey (Molly Ringwald) when her parents passed away. Jerrica’s father left her with not only with his greatest invention 51n3rgy (Synergy), a robot that never worked, but also a nickname “his precious Jem”. Aunt Bailey also already had two adopted daughters (Aja and Shana) when she took on Jerrica and her sister, and all 5 live in a household where music is used as both a tool to calm and unite the different personalities. The only problem is that raising four girls isn’t cheap, and with due to an overdue mortgage they are in danger of losing their home.


See, Jerrica invents Jem out of necessity, because while she knows she has a gift that could benefit those she loves, but she is too painfully shy to share it. So one night she decides to use the Jem persona to record a song, but gets cold feet when she goes to post it online and asks Kimber to delete it, who instead posts it to YouTube for the world to see. The video of course goes viral, and everyone wants to know who this mystery singer is. She is then contacted by Erica Raymond (a great gender swap of the original Jem antagonist played by Juliette Lewis) of Starlight Music to do a series of pop up concerts in LA, which she can use the funds to save her home. Starlight’s only clause is that no one can know her identity and Jerrica’s is that she can bring her sisters as her back up band.


Once in LA the girls are under the watchful eye of Erica’s son Rio (Ryan Guzman) until they can be groomed for the public when 51n3rgy is suddenly re-activated. The robot using holograms sends Jerrica and her sisters on a scavenger hunt to complete her father’s work, while they are also trying to complete the gigs needed to raise the funds to save their home.


It’s strange that an adaptation of a campy 80s cartoon can ask some big questions. But Jem and the Holograms is a look at identity, and who exactly is the real you in this world we live in today, where we put our best face forward online. Jerrica doesn’t use a hologram to become Jem in the film, instead she uses social media, which still makes Jerrica have some of the same questions about the importance of identity and being true to yourself she had in the show. Aubrey Peeples does a phenomenal job as Jem bringing this character and her struggles to life while imbuing it with a sense of reality that was missing from the original series.

The script here is a very faithful to the spirit of the show with tons of callbacks to the original series that true fans will have a field day picking out. While the plot feels a bit more normal in the first act, once 51n3rgy is activated in the second, the groundwork is then laid out and we have a very a very familiar situation in the third for fans of the show. We have Jem tasked with breaking into Starlight music while also trying to pull off the big concert at the last minute to save her home so her family can live happily every after, which happened at least in every 5th episode in the series. I also have to say I dug the music here. Like the music from the show, it was catchy and the kind of bubble gum pop that will have you humming along all day long.


I’ve read some reviews saying they got Jem wrong, but I have to disagree. I think Jon M. Chu got it perfect. Jem at the core was about a woman who used her secret identify to give hope to those around her through her music and by continually doing what was right. Jerrica becomes Jem to try and help her family and when she finally realizes that Jem has given so many people a voice, instead of revealing who she really is, she chooses to remain behind the curtain. She does that to let those without a voice to continue to live through hers. I adored Jem and suggest if you’re a real fan watch the film and come to your own informed opinion rather than letting folks who probably caught one episode and who don’t understand the true spirit of the show dictate it for you. After all, this film isn’t meant for thirty something fanboys–its meant to share Jem with a new generation of young girls who can use a  truly outrageous role model like her.

Also make sure you stay for a post-credit stinger that introduces some familiar antagonists to the Jem live action universe.