Bottoms Review: The Teen Comedy Genre Gets A Much-Needed Kick In The Ass

The teen comedy has long felt like a dying art since its heyday in the early 2000s. There have been gems since then, of course — think the heartfelt Edge of Seventeen or the raunchy Blockers. Still, Hollywood has struggled to find a place for the genre as the mid-budget movie disappears in favor of mega-budget franchises. Now, Bottoms is here to save us all. A Fight Club meets Superbad riff, director Emma Seligman’s R-rated romp is violent and riotous, proving once more that Rachel Sennott and Ayo Edebiri are stars. Bottoms may not lean into the full absurdity of its premise, but the film is unafraid to be mean, its acerbic wit and go-for-broke premise creating an “anything goes” feeling that is sorely missing from not just the high school comedy, but from movies as a whole.