YMMV / Tragedy Girls

• Alternative Character Interpretation: While most of the fanbase agrees Sadie and McKayla are queer and into one another, whether the girls are bisexual or lesbians is up for debate. Both do express interest in men, but for rather shallow or self-serving reasons. (Jordan's useful to Sadie because he helps with their website, while McKayla's interest in Toby is mostly because he's famous and his interest in her pumps up her ego. While she does think he's cute, it could be compulsory heterosexuality, mistaking aesthetic appreciation for sexual attraction.) Whatever relationships they have with boys definitely take a backseat to their own Pseudo-Romantic Friendship. Is that because their connection supersedes all others, regardless of gender, or because one or both of them isn't into men at all?
• Angst Aversion: Probably part of the reason this movie got limited release in spite of positive reviews. The story is incredibly cynical, with two serial killers as our Villain Protagonists, and almost no one to root for in a straightforward way. When you consider what does happen to the few good people present... yeah, it ain't for everyone.
• Crosses the Line Twice:
  • The theme for the prom is "A Night to Remember." The banner features a painting of the RMS Titanic sinking.
    • Doubles as a Genius Bonus; A Night To Remember is the name of a well-respected 1955 book and 1958 film about the sinking.
  • Toby's utterly ridiculous demise, with McKayla criticizing Sadie's technique, and then flirting with Toby and making out with him. As he's dying. And then McKayla has blood smeared all over her mouth. Sadie's deadpan reaction says it all.
    Sadie: ...What the fuck?
  • The ending. Jordan's father tries to rush into the burning school, screaming "is my son in there?" Of course, we know Jordan is already dead, as his father screams, "no, no!" It's legitimately sad and almost kills the comedy for a moment. Then the girls turn to each other and say, "best night ever," and you can't help but laugh.
• Friendly Fandoms: With Jennifer's Body, due to both movies being niche horror-comedies with very dark and sardonic senses of humor, and a Pseudo-Romantic Friendship between the leads.
• Harsher in Hindsight: The premise of two deranged true crime fanatics committing murders themselves gets a lot more disturbing after something similar occurred in real life in 2023; a 23-year-old South Korean woman was arrested for murdering and dismembering a woman she lured to her apartment, with it being reported she was obsessed with true crime and was partly motivated to commit the murder out of "curiosity".
• Ho Yay: YES. Sadie/McKayla is practically canon, to the extent that their friendship is presented as a love story. They frequently hold hands, share Held Gazes, and would do anything for one another. They also don't appear to talk to anyone else besides Jordan... who McKayla doesn't like, because he makes Sadie "soft." Their temporary falling-out is treated like a nasty breakup, and both girls are utterly miserable when they're apart. Then there's McKayla suggestively asking if Sadie remembers their "first time"... killing someone, that is.
• One True Pairing: Pretty much the entire fanbase ships Sadie and McKayla together.
• Tear Jerker: Jordan's father realizing Jordan was killed in the massacre at prom. He simply screams and cries, begging for it not to be true as his coworkers pull him away from the scene.
• Unintentional Period Piece: Much of the film's humor is rooted in satirizing the True Crime fandom of the 2010s, portraying it as obsessed with murderers in a manner that recalls the real-life "Columbiner" communities of that era. After the Parkland shooting and the March for Our Lives in 2018, a year after this film came out, the online true crime community took a very notable shift away from that sort of attitude, and nowadays, the idolization of serial killers and spree killers of the sort that Sadie and McKayla engage in is regarded as tasteless, at least in the more mainstream communities.
• The Woobie:
  • Jordan. His mother's dead, and he's hopelessly in love with Sadie, whose best friend hates him. And, unknown to him, she's a Serial Killer. Whose first kill was his mother. Oh, and he ends up dead.
  • On that note, Jordan's father, whose wife's death was never explained. And then he loses his son. The last we see him, he's decided to resign from his job and focus on charity work in Jordan's name, and he has no clue that the real killers are still out there.

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