'Fun Size' Is Still Nickelodeon's Best Movie

Nickelodeon's Fun Size may have failed as an experiment to expand into adult-rated content, but it still remains their best and funniest movie to date 

'Fun Size' (CREDIT: Nickelodeon)

by Jack Linsdell

Nickelodeon has always been a popular destination for family-friendly, kid-targeted content, with a vast array of hit TV shows and toons entertaining children for decades. However, during the late 1990s, after watching rival Disney thrive with a series of animated big-screen hits like The Lion King and Aladdin, Nickelodeon expanded their production reach into movies. Nickelodeon Movies have since been responsible for a series of well-liked hit movies (nothing as big as anything Disney has produced, natch), including Charlotte's Web, The Spiderwick Chronicles and Angus Thongs and Perfect Snogging. They've made themselves somewhat of a reputation as a destination for distinctly "fun" and harmless kid-friendly movies and TV shows. 

However, back in 2012, Nickelodeon tried to break free of their perceived "safe" reputation when they backed a PG-13 rated (12 in the UK) coming-of-age comedy. Josh Schwartz's Fun Size was an interesting test case for Nickelodeon, as it was far more adult (in terms of content) than anything they'd ever made before, yet it still retained the childish sense of "fun" that has become a hallmark of their brand. They were clearly targeting an older teenage demographic (Nickelodeon's content usually targets children between the ages of 2-12 years), and believed (or hoped) that a higher age rating and more "adult" content may appealed more to parents. Most parents probably don't sit and watch Nickelodeon's movies or shows with their kids, probably cherishing a few hours of rest bite from childcare duties instead (that's not a criticism by the way), so actually making something parents themselves may be interested in watching too was a smart play. 

Anyway, the result (commercially speaking) wasn't as great as they'd hoped, as Fun Size earned just $11 million worldwide on a $14 million budget, which is makes it their second-lowest grossing movie to date, and it was a world away from the $70-100 million worldwide totals of Charlotte's Web, The Last Airbender and SpongeBob SquarePants. However, artistically speaking, Fun Size was a superb and hilarious teenage comedy, and so good that it's still Nickelodeon's best movie (give or take Middle School) 8 years later. It's best described as "Booksmart set at Halloween", working as an extremely funny and heartwarming comedy and character-driven, poignant drama too. When confused teenager Wren (Victoria Justice) has her Halloween plans of partying ruined by her domineering mother, she's forced to babysit her younger brother as he does trickle-treating. However, when he goes missing, Wren, along with her best friend April and admirer Roosevelt try to locate him before her mother gets home. 

Fun Size is far funnier and emotionally fulfilling than most of Nickelodeon's kid-friendly movies/shows because it fully embraces it's adult content (some sexually-themed humour and mild language mainly) to become a sophisticated comedy. It also boasts a very game cast, including an early role for one of my favourite actors Thomas Mann whose made his name playing the "normal guy love interest" to perfection (tip, watch Brain on Fire, Barely Lethal and Me and Earl and the Dying Girl). Justice is also very good, and there is one scene in Max Werner's entertaining script (pictured above) involving a restaurant sign and a car that is one of the funniest moments in a movie I've seen for a while. 

Anyway, Fun Size showed that Nickelodeon could most definitely break free of it's "safe, kid-friendly content" reputation and make hilarious, relatable and high-quality comedies for an older teenage/adult demographic. However, due to poor box office, we never got anymore PG-13 rated movies from the studio thereafter, which is a shame. Although, it did pave the way for Nickelodeon to co-produce Paramount's PG-13 Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles reboot in 2014 and it's 2016 sequel, although they don't really count because they aren't Nickelodeon films per say. 

And, we're back to PG rated movies like last years Dora and the Lost City of Gold which was only bareable because it had Isabela Moner in the lead role. So, the one off experiment that was Fun Size may not have led to a permanent expansion for Nickelodeon into the teenage comedy and more adult content, but it still remains an utter delight to this day, and holds the distinction of being their best movie.