The Perfect Date Review: Brooks Rattigan is No Peter Kavinsky
The Perfect Date’s Brooks Rattigan is definitely not Peter Kavinsky.
Netflix’s latest romantic comedy entry, The Perfect Date, tells the story of Brooks Rattigan (Noah Centineo), a high school senior who has his mind set on Yale and later, the perfect girl. However, when it’s all within his reach, he comes to the startling realization that he doesn’t really know what to do next.
Cue Celia Lieberman (Laura Marano), basically the first person to test out Brooks and Murph’s Stand-In app business model turned no-nonsense friend (and eventually more).
Laura Morano’s Celia is a fantastically fun character and incredibly refreshing throughout, always sure about who she is, what she stands for, and her unwillingness to change who she is.
Celia: I just want to be whatever I am, and I’m proud of that.
I love that she never consistently changes herself for anyone throughout The Perfect Date and even becomes a model of the kind of self-acceptance Brooks should strive for.
Their dynamic ebbs and flows in a way that makes some of their conversations fun, light, and quippy. However, there are moments like the fake break-up scene that goes just a bit further than I would expect, making me wonder if I should be rooting for them at all.
Brooks isn’t perfect and struggles to find his way, getting lost in his search for status symbols, which is at times relatable. On the flip side, some of his careless disregard for the feelings of people around him makes it more difficult to root for him.
A solid example of this is his conversation with his father, played by Veep’s Matt Walsh, after coming home. He rails into his father, and it just highlights the terrible aspects of his goals. His father may eventually actually thank him for the rough conversation, but it still rubs me the wrong way.
That aside, Brooks and Celia’s banter and dynamic is fun to watch in the moments when he’s not obsessed with the Stand-In app (and those cringeworthy personas) or trying to get Shelby to notice him.
Celia’s honesty and willingness to call Brooks out on his actions is excellent to watch and pairs nicely with his best friend, Murph (Odiseas Georgiadis), necessarily confronting him about how he treats him during the Stand-In app days.
While The Perfect Date utilizes its leads well, the supporting cast flits in and out of scenes, except Murph, not offering enough time to gain some insight into them, be it character or quirks.
There’s really not much to Shelby (Riverdale’s Camila Mendes) beyond the very little we are given, which feels like such a shame. Just when we get insight into her character, the movie’s pretty much over.
The Perfect Date is a perfectly fine romantic comedy, with quite a few fun tropes thrown into a story that centers on the importance of finding yourself, but it’s not one I see myself re-watching over and again like last summer’s To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before and Set It Up.
Random Thoughts:
- The bad dancing is one of those endearing rom-com clichés I’ll never tire of.
- I love Murph. He is adorable, and it’s a shame there aren’t more scenes with him in it.
- Ben & Jerry’s in the middle of a house party feels unrealistic, but I 100% support that scene choice.
What did you think of this episode of The Perfect Date? Share your thoughts in the comments below!
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Brianna Martinez
Brianna spends her time away from briefs, legal research, and pleadings, watching TV and writing about it. She generally has a lot of feelings about TV, which you can read about here and on Twitter.