Featured Image Credit: Universal Pictures
Topics: Gen Z, TV And Film, Social Media
Rhiannon Ingle
It's clear that not everything we watched as teenagers has aged all that well when looking back at it through a more modern lens.
And the hit American Pie film franchise, which spanned four movies between 1999 and 2012, seems to be a perfect example of exactly that after Gen Z viewers branded it 'deeply problematic' after watching it for the very first time.
Vice interviewed a bunch of people from that generation, which covers anyone born between 1997 and 2012, and they were quick to take issue with some of the film's more X-rated scenes and certain controversial tropes that played out.
Taylor, 16, slammed: "This whole movie is completely ridiculous, especially how the only thing the male characters care about is having sex. They’re willing to say and do whatever just to convince the girls to have sex with them.
Advert
"I don’t know if that was realistic when the film came out, but I think men treat women with a lot more respect and equality now."
Meanwhile, 17-year-old Hannah outlined: "The part where Jim and the other male characters film the foreign exchange student in his room is deeply problematic.
"The film doesn’t even question the morality of doing this; it makes it seem like a joke and that the dudes are all 'legends' for getting the plan to work. It’s a huge violation of privacy and definitely a sexual offence for Jim to film her, let alone to then share that with his friends.
"There’s no way a teen film made now would allow it."
And Olivia, 18, echoed: "It’s bordering on incel attitudes the way the guys in this film think that they deserve sex, and how they seem to think that’s all women are good for, rather than wanting a loving relationship with somebody they respect.
"I think if you were a teenage boy watching this, you’d basically feel entitled to behave however you wanted to towards women."
And it's not just Gen Z who took understandable issue with some of the film's more questionable content, as Shannon Elizabeth, who played Nadia, AKA the student whom Jim secretly filmed himself getting naked with before broadcasting it to the entire school, admitted that the film would 'be a problem' if it were made after the #MeToo movement.
"If this had come out after the #MeToo movement, there would definitely be a problem," she said on Inside of You with Michael Rosenbaum back in 2023.
Directly referring to the stream which saw her character being livestreamed while undressing, the actress added: "I think that it would have gone down differently."