Red, White, And Royal Blue: Movie Review

As some of you may already know (if you didn't, you do now--I won't judge you if you call off work tomorrow), the movie adaptation of Casey McQuinston's "Red, White, and Royal Blue" just debuted on Amazon Prime. Time zones are fun and magical things. RWRB debuted August 11th at midnight, UK time. Which makes that 8pm EST. Which makes me an all-too-happy fangirl. ;) 

Spoilers ahead. Some of the below thoughts were caught on the fly, some where instant reactions, some where after movie thoughts:

• No June, merged June’s character with Nora 
• Opened with cake scene and Bad Reputation, so fucking badass.
• Love Zahra and Amy. And Shaan.
• No divorce, stepfather.
• Miguel = Alex’s other bisexual past. Also a political reporter. And the new Rafael, sans redemption arc.
• Henry’s Bitmoji!!!
• Alex’s wardrobe and personality were changed. More relaxed and flowy (and chinos). But I kinda love it. And Henry definitely worked the stiff and awkward and scared well (though I hated his suits).
• New and fun way to portray texts, having them both in the shot but in different places but as if they’re in the same place (because they’re getting closer emotionally). 
• No Star Wars, but Disney is expensive, and it might not have been worth the fees.
• “He grabbed my hair in a way that made me understand the difference between rugby and football.”
• Fucking. Red. Room. Fucking Alexander Hamilton. Need I say more. 
• Then I got lost for a bit in the whirlwind romance and the sexy rendezvous and the flirty emails and the chaos gays (aka Alex and Henry—in that order).
• The Texas binder turned into the Texas memo.
• Texas vaca weekend was everything, including karaoke and falling in love and obscenely hot swim trunks and confesses and lack of confessions and my tears. 
• No Bea backstory.
• No yelling outside of Kensington palace, but Alex did storm it.
• Slow dancing to Can’t Help Falling In Love in the museum PLUS “History, huh? Maybe we could make some” in the same scene. I’m not okay.
• And when Henry gives Alex his signet ring, Alex gave Henry his necklace key?!?!? Really not okay over here! 
• “I will break the sound barrier for you.”
• No badass queen-to-be getting her redemption arc by standing up for Henry. 
• No “history, huh?” shirts (or Star Wars fan art murals). But they did see the crowds of support, all over the world.
• No election night speech from Alex. Kinda upset about that. It was good.
• No Liam.
• No Our Song. :( Really upset about that. Maybe Elton Johns fees are high, too.
• Also, the emails really show how nerds and dorky these two are. Such fucking history nerds. Not translated well into the movie.

Overall, the book was better. Obviously. But the movie was still so good!!! Sooooooo good! Really very, very good!! I can't wait to see what everyone else thought (book fans, new to RWRB fans, and everyone in between).

Okay, these are my thoughts thus far. But as I rewatch the movie, I'll have more (just like I plan on eventually sharing my fangirl-ness of Barbie with y'all--maybe after the third time I see it ;) ).

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