Katrina, whose head is about to explode as she watches Ava be better than her.
The Secret Lives of Cheerleaders is a 2019 Lifetime Movie of the Week Teen Drama Thriller, written by Anna White and directed by Peter Sullivan. It was part of the network's Cheer! Rally! Kill! event, with five original cheerleader-themed thrillers.
Ava (Savannah May) has moved to California with her mother Candice (Denise Richards). Learning that Roosevelt High doesn't have a dance squad, Ava decides to try out for the award-winning Lioness cheer squad. It turns out she's a natural for cheer, but the squad is dominated by narcissistic, borderline psychopathic Alpha Bitch Katrina (Allie DeBerry), who views Ava as her first serious competition. Ava soon learns that Katrina subjects the squad to cruel hazing stunts, and Ava's chemistry lab partner Allyson (Lauryn Speights), a former Lioness herself, spills the beans on Katrina's cruelty. But Katrina isn't finished with Ava yet.
The Secret Lives of Cheerleaders contains examples of:
- Accomplice by Inaction: Cheer coach Ms. Sinclair (played by veteran Lifetime movie villainess Josie Davis) claims to have no knowledge of Katrina's hazing schemes, but is shown to be completely in cahoots with Katrina and her domination of the squad, and at the very least turns a blind eye toward them.
- The Alcoholic:
- It turns out that Katrina framed Allyson for this in a hazing incident where she made Allyson drink vodka and strip on the football field, only to have security show up.
- But Katrina's a hypocrite when it comes to this, since we learn that her BFF Shay is the one who has trouble with alcohol.
- Alpha Bitch: Katrina takes the Alpha and the Bitch portions of the trope up to eleven, utterly holding the school under her thumb and subjecting the new cheerleaders to horrific hazing.
- Bathroom Stall of Overheard Insults: At a crucial moment, Ava sees Shay and another cheerleader enter the girl's room, so she hides in a stall and overhears Shay admit to setting her up on Katrina's orders.
- Beauty Is Bad: Stunning Katrina becomes violently jealous of humble Ava.
- Beta Bitch: Shay is one for Katrina, ready to do her bidding at a moment's notice.
- Big Damn Heroes: At the climax, Ava arrives to expose Katrina's latest hazing stunt, and Patrick livestreams it for the whole school.
- Black Cloak: In the flashback at the beginning, Allyson's tormenters wear black hoodies and animal masks. They're later revealed to be Katrina and her bitch squad.
- Bland-Name Product: Surprisingly averted, with Twitter mentioned by name and shown on screen, but later played straight with My Media Link, some kind of Facebook—Instagram stand-in.
- Clear My Name: After Katrina plants Oxycodone in Ava's locker and Ava gets suspended, she hatches a plan to expose Katrina.
- Dance-Off: Ava and Katrina get into an informal one during cheer practice, and everyone seems to think Ava won.
- Dark and Troubled Past: Ava's dad died suddenly the previous year, and Ava started to adopt Troubled Teen behavior, even getting sent to a therapy camp (which she hated).
- Devil in Plain Sight: Katrina is so Obviously Evil, but no one at the school is willing to call her out on it.
- Eating Lunch Alone: Allyson, who's an outcast at the school after getting kicked off the cheer squad, does this until Ava befriends her.
- Evil Is Hammy: Allie DeBerry plays Katrina as a sadistic Drama Queen who chews the scenery at every opportunity.
- Extreme Doormat: Mr. Bailey the chemistry teacher gets pushed around by Katrina and the other cheerleaders and gives them preferential treatment.
- Fanservice: The Lionesses get lots of scenes to shake around in their uniforms, with a few Panty Shots along the way.
- Fully-Clothed Nudity: In the two scenes where Katrina orders the new cheerleaders to take their clothes off, they never get past a bra and panties, since this is basic cable. It's especially odd in Allyson's scene on the football field, since she was arrested for indecent exposure on top of public drunkenness, which would imply that she really was naked when the cops showed up.
- Hidden Depths: Patrick knows how to write code and set up web platforms, but plays football to please his dad.
- Initiation Ceremony: The new Lionesses have to undergo a series of hazing stunts set up by Katrina, which involve very illegal things like burglarizing buildings and underage drinking, and they get kicked off the team if they don't comply.
- Karma Houdini: Katrina's boyfriend Ryan and some of his football team friends receive no onscreen punishment for knowing about Katrina's cruel hazing stunts and doing nothing about it.
- Lighter and Softer: The only one of the Cheer! Rally! Kill! movies in which no one actually gets killed (well, besides the car accident that killed Ava's dad before the movie starts).
- Make Way for the Princess: A slow motion Team Power Walk introduces us to Katrina and the other cheerleaders.
- Meaningful Name: As a powerful force who destroys all who get in her way, it's fitting that Katrina shares a name with a historically destructive hurricane.
- Meet Cute: Ava meets her eventual boyfriend Patrick when he nearly runs her over in the parking lot.
- My Beloved Smother: While it's justified given Ava's past behavioral issues, Candice still keeps a tight grip on Ava, right down to setting up a curfew for her.
- Narcissist: Katrina literally has a breakdown if people pay more attention to another cheerleader (which eventually happens with Ava).
- New Transfer Student: Ava has just moved to the school from Massachusetts and is trying to fit in.
- Nice Guy: Ava's eventual boyfriend Patrick, who treats Ava well and who (unlike the other members of the football team) isn't cool with Katrina's bullying ways.
- Not What It Looks Like: Used almost word-for-word by Patrick when Katrina talks a drunken Shay into kissing him in full view of Ava.
- The Precarious Ledge: At the climax Katrina makes Haley walk blindfolded along the edge of the roof of a tall building, then Ava shows up and volunteers to do it instead, then, after it appears she's out of danger, she slips and it turns into a Literal Cliffhanger.
- Precision F-Strike: Ava quietly but clearly mouths "shit!" when she learns that she inadvertently broke her mom's curfew on homecoming night.
- Shrinking Violet: Allyson, because of her past emotional abuse at the hands of the Lionesses, behaves like this.
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Spiritual Successor: The 2021 Lifetime Fear the Cheer movie Cheer for Your Life is essentially this movie Played for Horror, with an Alpha Bitch high school head cheerleader subjecting new recruits to ghastly hazing, while hiding a dark secret, with some murders along the way. - Teens Are Monsters: Katrina is self-centered to the max and gleefully tortures her fellow cheerleaders.
- This Is for Emphasis, Bitch!: Katrina has a couple examples of this.We'll see who's cheerleader of the year, bitch!
- We Used to Be Friends: Allyson was a cheerleader, but she pushed back against Katrina's hazing cruelties, so she was kicked off the squad and became an Unperson in the school.
- Weight Woe: Julie, another new cheerleader, lost a lot of weight over the summer, but it still a bit heftier than the other cheerleaders, and is subtly implied to be on the way to developing an eating disorder.
