28th Feb 202530th Oct 2025 by The Disney Purist

Go Figure (2005)

BACKGROUND

My childhood television watching can be split into three stages. The first was Cartoon Network; the second was Nickelodeon, where I watched mostly re-runs of Saved by the Bell (1989-93), and Sabrina the Teenage Witch (1996-2003); and the third was Disney Channel, which I started watching when I was about 11 or 12, and then watched pretty much exclusively from the age of 13.

I was there for some of Disney Channel’s best programming, like Lizzie McGuire (2001-04); That’s So Raven (2003-07); and The Suite Life of Zack & Cody (2005-08). From this point, I also found Disney Channel Original Movies. I know I watched a few in the early 2000s, but not many. I’m not actually convinced I watched them on their premiere either. The earliest one I’m fairly sure I watched “live” was Go Figure in 2005.

Go Figure was part of the pre-High School Musical era of Disney Channel. It’s a well-known fact that after High School Musical was released in 2006, Disney Channel began to really focus on their movies, making them higher budget, bigger productions, but that doesn’t mean that the ones that came before weren’t worth seeing.

I loved Go Figure, and I think I can credit it with my love of figure skating. Not actually skating myself, but watching it. Since Go Figure, I’ve seen many films all about figure skating, with Ice Princess (2005); I, Tonya (2017); and Blades of Glory (2007) being my favourites. In another life, I’d like to think I could’ve been a figure skater, or a ballet dancer, or a gymnast. But in this life, I’m too old, not flexible enough, and much too worried about breaking all the bones in my body, or breaking my face.

But Go Figure isn’t just about pretty, little figure skaters. It’s also about a girls’ ice hockey team. Disney had previously made movies like Miracle (2004) and The Mighty Ducks trilogy about hockey teams, but these were not solely for women, with ice hockey primarily being seen as a “man’s sport”. Go Figure explores sexism in sport, showing that just because you’re a girl doesn’t mean you have to “skate around in frilly dresses”. You can compete in a different kind of sport, that requires physical strength as well as intelligence.

I’m not a fan of ice hockey, and wasn’t a sporty person at school, however, I have always liked Go Figure, having seen it many times. Although I like the scenes of figure skating the most, I have always enjoyed the overall message, about teamwork, resilience, and determination in achieving your dreams, whatever they may be.

PLOT

Go Figure begins at a figure skating competition where Katelin Kingsford is competing. She tells the audience she has dreams of being one of the best, with a gold medal and her face on a cereal box. Although Katelin loves her current coaching team, Bob and Ginger, she knows they can’t make her a star. For that, she’ll need a Russian: Natasha Goberman.

In this competition, which Natasha happens to be watching, Katelin does not win and actually falls during her routine. Katelin had hoped for some karma points by giving her “lucky” scrunchie to a younger competitor, choosing to tie her hair up with a rubber band in place of the scrunchie, but the rubber band snaps during one of Katelin’s tricks and that is what caused her to lose balance. But it doesn’t matter, because Natasha saw enough potential in Katelin to talk to her, telling her she wants to train her, to make her a star.

To do that though, Katelin has to go to Buckston Academy, where Natasha trains figure skaters. This is an expensive boarding school, and despite Katelin’s begging and pleading, her parents tell her they cannot afford to send her there. Katelin then asks her brother, Bradley, for his signed hockey puck collection so she can sell them to pay for her tuition, but he angrily tells her to get out, having no respect for Katelin’s dream of being a professional “twirl girl”, the name ice hockey players apparently give to figure skaters.

Katelin tells Natasha she can’t afford to train at Buckston, which is disappointing to Natasha who really wants to coach Katelin, but without a scholarship, there is no chance – and Buckston doesn’t have a scholarship for figure skating. No problem, because Natasha has an idea. She goes to the girls’ hockey team coach, Coach Reynolds, and says if he lets Katelin take his final scholarship spot, then he can take Natasha out on a date. Coach Reynolds doesn’t think it’s a good idea since Katelin doesn’t have any experience of playing ice hockey, but he agrees anyway. The man is weak to Natasha’s charms…Katelin is ecstatic to be going to Buckston Academy, but Bradley, a real hockey player, is furious that Katelin can get a scholarship for “his” sport without even knowing how to play. Bradley then gives up hockey and instead starts building robots with one of his friends.

Meanwhile, at school, Katelin is immediately thrown into hockey training and it’s quite clear to the other coaching staff, and the rest of the team, that something is not right here. Katelin is small, weak, and lacks any balance or speed on the ice; she’ll make this team a disaster. Coach Reynolds tries to convince the others that Katelin is their “secret weapon”. Yeah, they’re not buying it! Katelin finds her new roommate is one of her fellow hockey players, Amy Henderson, but everyone calls her Hollywood. The team captain, Ronnie, and another player, Mojo, come in to their room, saying how the team is unlikely to be winning anything this season yet again. Katelin starts to unpack her stuff, but soon learns that the hockey girls hate “twirl girls”, so she hides her figure skating gear in the janitor’s closet and pretends to be somewhere else when she is out at figure skating training. Katelin finds her new school schedule of regular classes, hockey training, and figure skating coaching to be a difficult balance. She isn’t doing well in her classes; the hockey girls don’t like her; and the figure skating girls see her as major competition since it’s obvious to them she is Natasha’s new favourite, this season’s “Sputnik” as Natasha likes to call her.

During the first hockey game of the season, Katelin hopes she’ll remain on the bench because she’s not very good so there’s no point making her play, something Coach Reynolds agrees with. Natasha also doesn’t want her to get injured. However, one of the other coaches, Spencer, reminds Coach Reynolds that Katelin is a scholarship student so she has to play. Spencer does this in the hopes that Katelin will quit the team. Sure enough, Katelin does not do well on the ice, letting Captain Ronnie get pulled to the ground by the opposition team. Ronnie is fuming and goes to fight her. The rest of the team pull her off Katelin, however, Hollywood storms into their room later, telling Katelin she got off easy, considering what Ronnie should’ve done to her would’ve been a lot worse. Hollywood then knocks over a cup of juice on the floor and says she needs to get a mop. Knowing all her figure skating stuff is in the janitor’s closet, Katelin quickly says she’ll go instead. But she must’ve taken too long because Hollywood comes into the closet and sees all of Katelin’s figure skating gear. Hollywood says she knew it all along, but promises to keep it secret.

The hockey girls, apart from Hollywood, continue to view Katelin with scepticism. The only good thing to come from hockey is that Spencer has stopped bothering her after Katelin made a deal with him whilst doing solo training that if she can get the puck past him, he won’t talk to her again. She manages to do so by using one of figure skating tricks to jump over him. Spencer is impressed. However, the figure skating girls are still an issue. Pamela, seeing Katelin getting private coaching with Natasha, wants to ruin all Katelin’s chances of being better than her, so Pamela invites Katelin to a party. Katelin has training at 9pm on Saturday nights but she turns up for a little while. On her arrival, Katelin is asked to go to the supply closet to get more cups. When she gets in there, Katelin picks up the cups, only for purple paint to spill all over her. Pamela then locks her in the closet. At 9:45pm, the janitor opens up the closet, freeing Katelin. Knowing she’s late, Katelin rushes over to see Natasha and is devastated to find Pamela has taken her spot – and what’s worse is that gold medallist figure skater Kristi Yamaguchi is there. Natasha tells Katelin she brought Kristi here as a reward for Katelin’s hard work, but tells Katelin she obviously doesn’t care enough about skating to show up on time, and sends her away. Katelin sadly sits in the stands watching over Pamela’s session with Kristi as she tries to get the paint off her. Just before Kristi leaves, she has a conversation with Katelin, telling her that Natasha thinks she will go far, something that Natasha doesn’t just say about anyone, but that Katelin needs to decide if she wants to put the extra effort in to make it.

After all this, plus her failing school grades, and her struggles with hockey, one night Katelin gets on a bus and goes home, telling her parents she has quit. At home, Katelin is horrified to find that her mother expected her to quit and that her bed has even been moved out of her room while her mother starts up an online business. Katelin then sees a box with her plushies in there labelled as junk. Katelin carries the box outside and sits on a street bench. Inside, Katelin discovers old medals and photos of her mother, showing that her mother was a brilliant figure skater years ago. Katelin’s mother sits beside her and says how her weak ankles stopped her going far, and that she decided having a family was more important than figure skating. This gives Katelin a renewed energy to achieve the dream her mother couldn’t. She decides she’s going back to Buckston.

Back at school, Katelin puts all her effort in to every aspect of her school experience: classes, hockey, and figure skating. She starts to excel in all areas, and even manages to help the hockey team win their first game of the season. Apparently, the girls’ hockey team hadn’t won a game in three years… That’s a terrible statistic. Katelin motivates the others to aim for the championship win, and starts to help them, by giving them ballet lessons to improve their balance and agility; coming up with tactical ideas using geometry, something Bradley told her about before even getting to Buckston; and by using “colourology”, finding the girls’ power colours, to help them mentally. The team keep on winning.

Within figure skating, Katelin still struggles with competitive girls, but one of them, Shelby, is having a hard time trying to keep up with the younger girls. Katelin goes for a walk with Shelby and tells her that there’s more to life than figure skating, so if she no longer loves doing it, then perhaps it’s time to find something else.

The girls’ hockey team wins their next game and gets to the Championship game; however, Katelin finds that it is on the exact same day as the Senior Nationals for her skating. Hollywood and Natasha try to convince Katelin to choose the Nationals over the Championships, since the team could win without her, but it’s up to her and her alone to compete in Nationals. Katelin doesn’t know what to do, and her parents won’t decide for her. As she ponders what to do, Katelin sees one of her mother’s old skating costumes online and decides to buy it.

On the day of the Championships, Spencer, who has remained fascinated by Katelin’s skills on the ice, is shocked to find Katelin at the hockey game, having worked out that she is a figure skater a few weeks ago and wanting her to go to the Nationals competition instead, because that is where they select the Olympic Team. Katelin ignores everyone trying to tell her she shouldn’t be there and focuses on winning this game. It’s not looking good though as the team are already three goals behind. Katelin gives the team a pep talk during half-time and the team go back out with some motivation to win. They try their best but unfortunately, they do not win. Great, Katelin gave up Nationals for nothing.

Except Spencer answered Katelin’s phone during the game. It was a call from Bradley saying he was going to delay the competition. After hearing his mother say that both him and his sister can be good hockey players, he realises he was being silly giving up hockey and choosing robotics instead. So, Bradley uses his robot to delay the competition, letting the stewards run all over the ice trying to stop it. Eventually, the Zamboni is brought out and it crushes it. But the delay was enough, because Spencer has packed all Katelin’s figure skating belongings and told Katelin they can make it if they go right now.

The hockey girls discover Katelin is a “twirl girl” after her stuff spills out in the hurry to leave, but she rushes off without explaining. In the car, Katelin gets herself together, with Spencer telling her that Pamela destroyed all Katelin’s costumes so he had to grab the one that was in the box. This turns out to be a good move because that costume is her mother’s old one that she ordered. Disaster strikes soon after though as Katelin realises she only has one of her skates. Katelin tells Natasha, who plans to steal a pair from another girl, but Katelin tells her not to do that. Katelin chooses to skate in her hockey boots – which are apparently very different to figure skates, as hockey ones do not have a toe pick.

Katelin begins her routine – and promptly falls down since those skates were not suitable. The hockey girls rush to the ice at that point with her other skate, but it’s too late. The competition has ended and the judges are tallying their final scores. Natasha tries to convince the judges to let her skate again, but they will not. Ronnie then begins a chant of “Let her skate”, which is picked up by the hockey team, then Katelin’s parents, then Natasha, and then the crowd. The noise is overwhelming and the judges allow Katelin another try.

Katelin changes into her proper skates and begins. Her routine is amazing, almost flawless, and the girls rush onto the ice to lift her up in celebration. The judges then name the skaters who made it into the Olympic Team… Katelin’s name is there! All that hard work paid off. Katelin is on her way to getting her face on that cereal box. What a dream…

CHARACTERS & CAST

Katelin Kingsford is a hard worker, wanting to be the best figure skater in the world. She dreams of winning a gold medal. Thankfully, Katelin is spotted by a great coach who wants to get her to the Olympics and hopefully to winning that medal. But the only way to do that is to play ice hockey, something Katelin has never played and isn’t exactly a sport she’s built for. Although Katelin has her struggles at Buckston, finding it wasn’t as easy as she’d hoped, she pushes herself to be the best in all areas. In the end, Katelin finds that she likes the camaraderie of being in a team, whereas with her skating, Katelin has only herself to rely on and has to do that with all the bitchiness of the jealous competitors. Having friends is a new concept for Katelin. Katelin does get the opportunity to fight for that gold medal and the best part is she gets to have her team around her, supporting her all the way.

Jordan Hinson was cast as Katelin. Hinson went on to be cast as Zoe Carter in Eureka (2006-12) and appear as Roxy Daly in the ABC series Kevin from Work (2015). She also wrote and starred in Breaking & Exiting (2018). Apparently, Hinson could not skate prior to her casting in Go Figure, so she had to spend time training. However, Hinson did not do all the skating in the film herself and had skating doubles, which are very obvious at times. One of these was Stephanie Rosenthal, who went on to have a breakout competition at the 2006 Nationals. Another was BreAnn Brown who went on to portray Tinker Bell in Disney on Ice around 2010, with Brown crediting her performance in Go Figure as being a factor in getting her an audition with Disney on Ice[1].

Katelin is pushed hard by her coach, Natasha Goberman. Natasha comes across as being very strict and harsh, coaching Katelin late into that night because her schedule is so full with all that hockey training. Natasha is disappointed with Katelin after she doesn’t show up to her 9pm training because, you know, she was trapped in a closet, so missed the opportunity to train with Kristi Yamaguchi. Natasha did tell Kristi that Katelin was going to be one of the best though, so she has seen the drive and talent in Katelin to believe she’ll achieve. It’s clear from the moment when Katelin gets on to the Olympic team that Natasha is incredibly proud and glad to be on this journey with Katelin.

Natasha Goberman was played by Cristine Rose. Rose is perhaps best known for her role as Angela Petrelli in Heroes (2006-10) and its spin-offs, as well as for her recurring role as Virginia Mosby in How I Met Your Mother (2005-14).

Then, there is Katelin’s primary competition in the figure skating team at Buckston Academy, Pamela. She wants nothing more than to either get Katelin to leave the school, or get her to fall out of favour with Natasha. Pamela’s dirtiest trick is to lock Katelin in a closet and take her place at training with Natasha that evening. Pamela doesn’t actually do all that much after that. I guess she realises that Katelin’s newfound positive attitude after she almost quit is too difficult to try and break down. Pamela appears at the Nationals competition and tries to get the judges to not let Katelin skate, but she is thwarted by Katelin’s hockey teammate, Mojo, who spills marbles all over the floor, tripping Pamela and embarrassing her so much that she leaves. Pamela did not get a place on the Olympic team either, just to make it even worse for her.

Brittany Curran was cast as Pamela. Around the same time as Go Figure, Curran appeared in the recurring role of Chelsea in the Disney Channel series The Suite Life of Zack & Cody (2005-08). She went on to be cast as Lucy Tranelli in the series Men of a Certain Age (2009-11). Curran later was cast as Fen in the Syfy series The Magicians (2015-20), and as Katie Nolan in Chicago Fire (2012-present).

For Katelin’s hockey teammates, three of them are the most important to the story. One is Hollywood, Katelin’s roommate as well as teammate. Hollywood is the first one to discover that Katelin is a figure skater, and, although she finds it funny, she isn’t overly surprised and doesn’t decide to tell any of the other hockey players, who wouldn’t have been as understanding. Ronnie, for example, wouldn’t have been very understanding, at least not at the start of Katelin’s time on their team. Ronnie doesn’t think much of Katelin as a hockey player, and, when she tries to give Katelin a chance to prove herself during a game, Katelin doesn’t do what was asked of her and causes Ronnie to be blocked and fall on the ice. This makes Ronnie angry and it takes a while for Katelin to win her trust again. She eventually does so when Katelin helps the team get to the Championships and she thanks Katelin for all her hard work in getting them that far. Then, there is Mary Johnson, also known as Mojo, because she believes in magic, holistic treatments, that sort of thing, and thinks they can help the team win. I’m not sure Mojo’s lucky powder had much to do with it.

Whitney Sloan was cast as Hollywood. Sloan went on to star in stage musicals like West Side Story and Fiddler on the Roof. Ronnie was played by Amy Halloran, who went on to star as Heather Posen in the series Unleashed (2011). Mojo was played by Tania Gunadi, who was cast as Cindy in the DCOM Pixel Perfect (2004) prior to Go Figure. Gunadi went on to be cast as Emma Lau in Aaron Stone (2009-10) and voiced Miko Nakadai in the animated series Transformers: Prime (2010-13).

Then there is Spencer, a member of the hockey team’s coaching staff, but also a student at Buckston Academy. Spencer is very sceptical of Katelin’s scholarship to the hockey team and he suspects there is something not right there. Spencer learns that Coach Reynolds agreed to Katelin being on the team only because Natasha agreed to go to dinner with him if he did. Spencer then uses this to, surprisingly, blackmail Coach Reynolds in to letting Katelin play in one of their games. This is after Spencer has been impressed with Katelin’s dedication to the hockey team and seen her incredible improvement in the sport. Spencer seems to be obsessed with Katelin and how she is managing to balance her busy schedule because he follows her – not creepy at all – and sees her skating at one point, so he knows all about her figure skating. This means that Katelin has someone else on her side for when she has to make the quick exit from the Hockey Championships to the Nationals. There is also a blossoming romance between Katelin and Spencer, but it’s a bit awkward with their age gap and lack of chemistry, to be honest…

Jake Abel was cast as Spencer. He went on to be cast as Luke Castella in Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief (2010), reprising the role in Percy Jackson: Sea of Monsters (2013). More recently, Abel appeared as Sasha Harrison in Season 1 of Netflix’s Another Life (2019-21), and as Kevin Golden in Season 3 of Walker (2021-24).

Finally, we have Katelin’s family. Her brother, Bradley, is having a difficult time adjusting to the fact that his sister is, all of a sudden, a brilliant hockey player, making his success in hockey pale in comparison. Because of that, he feels he has to quit hockey and find something else. His father, Ed, doesn’t seem to notice any of this, choosing to spend much of the movie either watching TV or betting on his daughter about whether she’ll quit school or go to the Hockey Championships, but his mother, Linda, does. She tells Bradley that he doesn’t need to give up hockey just because Katelin is playing it.

Katelyn’s parents, Ed and Linda, were played by Jodi Russell and Curt Doussett. Bradley was played by Ryan Malgarini who was cast as Harry Coleman in Disney’s Freaky Friday (2003) alongside Lindsey Lohan and Jamie Lee Curtis. He is set to reprise this role in the upcoming sequel Freakier Friday (2025). Malgarini also appeared in a couple of television series, including as Tom Brooks in the sitcom Gary Unmarried (2008-10), for which he won a Young Artist Award in the Supporting Young Actor category.

MUSIC

There is a mix of music within Go Figure, with these being mostly either pop music or classical music, with the classical music featuring during the figure skating scenes, and the pop numbers being used during montages or as background music.

I’ll start with the music that is used for the montages as these were the most obvious and recognisable. Two of these come during the “emotional peak” of Katelin’s journey at Buckston Academy. The first is “Crash Goes My World”, performed by Cadence Grace, which is played at the point that Katelin is feeling really low, failing her classes, still struggling with hockey, and trying to regain Natasha’s trust. Katelin quits school and goes home.

But whilst at home, she has a conversation with her mother which motivates her to be successful at Buckston Academy, so she does just that. Katelin focuses on her classes, figures out how to be a great hockey player, and proves to Natasha that she will be one of the best figure skaters she’s ever coached. During this montage, “I Want Everything”, written by Antonina Armato and Tim James, and performed by Hope 7, is played. This is my favourite song in the movie.

Just a little bit later, there is another montage of Katelin helping the hockey team do well and progress through their matches. Here, “Greatest Day”, written by Jaret Reddick and performed by Bowling for Soup, is used.

The only other piece of prominent pop music within Go Figure is the song “Go Figure”. It was written by Andy Dodd and Adam Watts, and is performed by Everlife. The song first appears as background music just before the first hockey game of the season, but it is used as the End Credits song and as the title song of the movie. This is the only piece of music that is credited.

Outside of that, the other songs to appear in Go Figure are mostly just used as background music. For example, you can hear “She Said” at the point that Katelin is in the school cafeteria and Pamela invites her to a party. This song was written by David Frank, Lindy Robbins, and Pam Sheyne, and performed by Brie Larson – yes, as in the Brie Larson who is Captain Marvel; I didn’t know she was a singer. The first and only song we hear at this party is “Anthem” by Superchick. Following on from that, there is the music playing at the hockey team’s victory party. A sort of techno instrumental piece is heard first, before “Life is Beautiful”, performed by Raven-Symoné, is requested by Ronnie as the next song.

Then, there are two songs that you probably wouldn’t be able to hear unless you were looking for them, because these are both played during conversations between the characters. When Katelin asks her brother to give her his signed hockey puck collection to sell for her school tuition, “Life is Good” by Junk can be heard. Later, as Hollywood confronts Katelin about her failure during the hockey match that day, where Ronnie ended up being tackled to the ground because Katelin didn’t do what was asked for her, “I Can Do Anything” is played. This song was written by Bridget Benenate and Matthew Gerrard, and was performed by Caleigh Peters.

All nine of these tracks appear on the Go Figure official soundtrack, which was released in June 2005.

Outside of this soundtrack, I am less confident about the rest of the music that is used in Go Figure. After the first training session for Katelin with the hockey team, Ronnie turns on the stereo and a rap song is playing. Despite numerous attempts to find this song, I can’t figure out what it is. As Katelin meets Hollywood and moves into her new room, some background music is playing, but I can’t hear any lyrics, and again, can’t work out if this is part of the score for Go Figure or is a specific track. I had a similar problem with the other song that I haven’t been able to place. This song comes as Katelin walks past Spencer and his band performing one night. I can hear the song and its lyrics clearly, but I haven’t been able to work out if this is a real track or whether this song was created for the film.

I had more success with the classical music pieces that are played during some of the figure skating scenes. For example, the music that is used for Katelin’s first Skate Club, as the group warm up, seems to be an extract from Mozart’s Symphony No. 40 in G Minor, K. 550. Then, during the scene of Kristi Yamaguchi coaching Pamela, Scherzo from Mendelssohn’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream seems to have been used. Finally, for Katelin’s final routine which she performs at the Senior Nationals, she begins her routine to a section of Summer from Vivaldi’s The Four Seasons. Her music then turns more contemporary but I don’t know what the other two pieces of music are, unfortunately, or whether they were part of the overall score.

The score for Go Figure was composed by Kenneth Burgomaster, who has composed the score for other Disney Channel projects, including the movies Halloweentown High (2004), Cow Belles (2006) and Return to Halloweentown (2006), and Season 2 of the series Phil of the Future (2004-06).

PRODUCTION

Disney Channel has always liked to make movies based on sports because it is a shared experience. Everyone has had to play sports at some point in their life. Even if they absolutely despised it. Schools seem to think it’s a good idea to enforce it as part of their curriculum. Mean.

Go Figure is just one in a list of sports-themed DCOMs, but here, they decided to showcase two sports, both of which were popular back in the 2000s. Ice hockey has continued to be listed in the Top 5 sports in the United States in terms of viewership, reportedly being the fourth most popular sport in the world too[2].

Figure skating used to be incredibly popular in the US, especially in the 1990s, but something changed in the early 2000s. Back in the day, the names Tonya Harding, Michelle Kwan, and Kristi Yamaguchi were easily recognised. Let’s also not forget the infamous “incident” between Tonya Harding and Nancy Kerrigan in January 1994 – further immortalised in the movie I, Tonya (2017) starring Margot Robbie – which led to many viewers worldwide tuning in to watch the two go head-to-head at the 1994 Winter Olympics in Lillehammer, Norway, to the point where it became one of the most-watched sports events of 1994, reaching 48.5 million viewers on just the one day of the women’s figure skating short program. Two decades later, the total 11 days of the Olympics figure skating competition in Sochi got less than half of that, reaching 21.4 million viewers[3].

Some speculate that the reason for this is that advancement in skates have led to even quadruple jumps, not just triples, being more common in competition, making nothing seem particularly difficult anymore. There was also the judging scandal of 2002 at the Olympics in Salt Lake City that led to a new, some say complicated, scoring system[4].

Scores used to be awarded in two categories: technical merit and artistic presentation, with both being given a maximum 6.0 score. However, when skaters are close in scores, the judges would rank these skaters against each other, with little to no criteria needing to be met to reach this decision, so it was very subjective. In the case of 2002, the competition was between the Russian pairs team and the Canadian pairs team. Although Russia is well-known for their figure skating history, winning numerous gold medals over the decades, the Canadian pairs team of Jamie Salé and David Pelletier were confident. It was almost a home Olympics for them, and they were going to be skating to the theme from the movie Love Story (1970), an American favourite.

During the free skate competition, the Russian team made a few errors, whereas the Canadians responded with a practically flawless routine, although it was less technically difficult than that of the Russians. Still, many in the Canadian camp believed they’d done enough to seal the gold medal. In actual fact, they had not, with the majority of the judges ranking Canada behind Russia, handing the gold to them, and the silver to Canada. This led to claims that the judging was rigged, specifically that one judge had been pressured to vote a certain way. An investigation into the judging panel was launched and a media frenzy erupted. There was a supposed quid pro quo between France and Russia, stating that if the French judge voted in favour of Russia in the pairs figure skating, then the Russian judge would do the same for France in the ice dancing competition. In the end, the French judge was suspended, and Salé and Pelletier were given the gold medal, shared with the Russian pairs team of Anton Sikharulidze and Elena Berezhnaya. Those at the centre of the scandal deny involvement in the fixing[5].

The claims of rigged voting are believed to have tarnished the sport of figure skating forever, in North America in particular. Even with the overhaul of the scoring system, figure skating’s popularity has not bounced back. This might explain why there are fewer screen stories about figure skating nowadays. There was that Netflix series Spinning Out (2020) but that was cancelled after only one series, and obviously we had I, Tonya (2017) but that was a fictionalised account of a well-known figure skating incident from the 1990s. Sadly, in the UK, figure skating has not been incredibly popular since the 1980s when we had Olympics success with Torvill and Dean. We have a competition show with celebrities called Dancing on Ice (2006-present), with Torvill and Dean as coaches and now judges, but that’s got very samey in the last few years. It’s not even close to figure skating either. You mostly just wonder how long it’ll be until someone gets injured, slices their partner’s skin with their blade, or smashes their face on the ice. Not exactly carefree Sunday night entertainment.

Anyway, back to Disney Channel’s Go Figure. The movie was written by Patrick J. Clifton and Beth Rigazio. They had initially tried to sell their Go Figure script to be made as a feature film, however, this was around the same time that Ice Princess was being developed by Disney, so Go Figure as it was didn’t go ahead. Instead, the writers turned it into a kids’ movie and met with Sheri Singer, the producer of Disney Channel’s Halloweentown movies. Singer said she wanted to produce Go Figure for Disney Channel. Francine McDougall came on as the director. McDougall went on to direct the DCOM Cow Belles (2006). Clifton and Rigazio had such a happy time working on Go Figure that when Singer approached them with the novel How My Private, Personal Journal Become A Bestseller, written by Julia DeVillers, they went ahead and adapted it to become the DCOM Read It and Weep (2006)[6].

Go Figure was filmed in Salt Lake City in Utah, as so many other DCOMs have been, such as Read It and Weep; Minutemen (2008); and the High School Musical trilogy. Much like these other DCOMs, a school was used as the filming location for the fictional school within these films. In the case of Go Figure, Westminster College is the real-life school that became Buckston Academy in the movie[7].

Go Figure is not an action-packed movie; however, it is not a normal school drama either, with shots of mostly sitting in class, walking through the halls, or going to a school dance. Here, although doubles were used in some instances, the actors did have to train in ice hockey and figure skating. I’ve already mentioned that Jordan Hinson, who played Katelin, didn’t know how to figure skate prior to her casting in the movie, and since Katelin spends much of her time on the ice in this movie, she had to train. But the hockey players also had train. Before filming, the actors spent two weeks practising with a real girls’ hockey team, being taught the basics of skating, shooting, and stopping to make the hockey matches seem as realistic as possible[8].

RECEPTION

In March 2005, Walt Disney Pictures theatrically released a new live-action movie, Ice Princess, which was about a physics whizz using figure skating to help her college application, before deciding to become a full-time, professional figure skater, going against the wishes of her mother. Ice Princess received mixed reviews and was a box-office flop, however, in the years since, it still has its fans.

So, it is curious that Disney Channel would be competing with the main Disney theatrical division by creating Go Figure, another movie about a young figure skater, and releasing it just three months later. Go Figure premiered on Disney Channel in the US on 10^th June 2005. Like Ice Princess, Go Figure received mixed reviews, but it escaped financial scrutiny due to its television movie status.

However, it did not escape all criticism. In Go Figure, the biggest inaccuracy is around the fact that the audience is told Katelin Kingsford is one of few competitors her age who can successfully execute and land triple jumps. Viewers who have knowledge of figure skating claim there are no triple jumps in any of Katelin’s routines in the movie. I’m not one of these people with knowledge so I’ve had to take their word for it. I do know that a figure skating competition consists of a long program and a short program though. Go Figure instead tells us that the Nationals consist of a single program. Nationals would’ve been a multi-day event, not just the one day. But had it been more than one day, then the whole dilemma over whether Katelin should attend the Hockey Championships or the Nationals would not have as much jeopardy attached to it.

Go Figure might’ve gone some way in inspiring would-be figure skaters to come into the sport, however, it seems to have just annoyed any actual figure skaters. Further negative comments for Go Figure surround the character of Katelin. She isn’t the most likeable main character of a DCOM, being quite bratty and selfish at times, especially when it comes to conversations with her brother and her parents, wanting them to always go along with what she thinks is best for her life. Katelin is also quite pouty when she doesn’t get her way in the early parts of the movie. I should also mention that some of Katelin’s more dramatic moments in Go Figure are not well acted. If you’ve seen the movie, you’ll know what I’m talking about. But to give Katelin some credit, she becomes more likeable by the end of the film, as she realises that she has to work hard to get where she wants in life; she can’t just have it handed to her on a plate. There are also apparently incorrect portrayals of the rules of ice hockey in Go Figure, but I wouldn’t know anything about that either.

On the more positive side, other viewers said this was an enjoyable movie, especially for kids and fans of figure skating, probably more fans like me that enjoy watching the grace and elegance of figure skating rather than the skaters themselves who’d be able to pick out inaccuracies. Some also said they liked the fact Katelin had to make a choice between whether to go to her figure skating competition, or go to the hockey final. To further comment on this point, I think Go Figure goes some way in showing that women don’t have to just do the “girly” sports; they can be tough on the ice rink instead of dancing around it in dresses with sunshine smiles frozen on their faces.

Although Disney Channel Original Movies, in their most known form, have been developed since 1997, with the first “official” DCOM Under Wraps, they would not properly come into their own until High School Musical premiered in January 2006. The DCOMs that came before have struggled to become part of mainstream popularity, with few exceptions. Go Figure was not one of these exceptions, reportedly reaching around 3.5 million viewers on its premiere date. This is fairly standard for the DCOMs of this decade. DCOMs were not as high budget, or high value, productions at this time, so needed something big to really market them, like an established actor fronting the project. That did not happen with Go Figure, so it has mostly faded into the background.

One accolade Go Figure does have, though, is that it was nominated in the Best Family Television Movie or Special category at the Young Artist Awards in 2006. It did, however, lose out to Hallmark’s Christmas movie Silver Bells (2005).

LEGACY

What happened next for Go Figure? It was set up for us to see how Katelin got on at the Olympics. I for one would’ve quite liked to see this as a sequel.

And yet, no sequel was ever made. Although Disney Channel have made a few sequels to certain movies, these are normally sequels to already popular movies. Go Figure didn’t have extraordinary viewing figures, so spending further time and money on a sequel wouldn’t have made good business sense. I just would’ve quite liked to see it.

However, Go Figure has since been included on lists of good skating movies to watch[9]. Although the heyday of figure skating seems to have been and gone – at least for now – ice hockey continues to be a popular sport in North America, making this a feature within other Disney Channel movies. Two of these include Den Brother (2010) and The Swap (2016). But these are both male characters playing ice hockey, not girls, so Go Figure has them beat in that respect.

FINAL THOUGHTS

Go Figure is a sports-themed DCOM that managed to showcase two entirely different sports: figure skating and ice hockey, with the first primarily being seen as more fitting for girls, and the latter only for boys. Go Figure tries to change all that, in the same way that Eddie’s Million Dollar Cook-Off (2003) told viewers that girls can play baseball and boys can cook. Go Figure shows girls there are no limitations on what you can or should do.

Although I have always liked Go Figure, I should admit that if I could only ever watch one figure skating movie ever again, I’ll choose Blades of Glory (2007) every time. Both have their merits, but only one can make me laugh out loud.

REFERENCES

[1] Credit: Amanda Mears, ‘Fairy tale: Utahn BreAnn Brown portrays Tinker Bell in Disney on Ice’, Deseret.com, 9^th March 2010.

[2] Credit: Rowan Bissett, ‘The puck drops on the 2025 NHL hockey season on October 8’, AthensOracle.com, 17^th October 2024.

[3] Credit: Ahiza Garcia, ‘U.S. figure skating used to be wildly popular. What happened?’, Money.CNN.com, 13^th February 2018.

[4] Credit: Gitanjali Poonia, ‘America were obsessed with figure skating in the ‘90s. Why aren’t we as enthralled anymore?’, Deseret.com, 4^th February 2022.

[5] Credit: Netflix, Bad Sport (2021) Episode 4: “Gold War”.

[6] Credit: Jean Bentley, ‘What’s It Like to Write a Disney Channel Original Movie? The Duo Behind Read It and Weep Reveals All’, EOnline.com, 23^rd June 2016.

[7] Credit: Jennifer Guzman, ‘Got Disney+? Keep an eye out for these movies filmed in Utah’, KSL.com, 12^th November 2019.

[8] Credit: Disney, ‘Go Figure DCOM Extras Commercial’, Promo Central YouTube Channel, 5^th June 2020.

[9] Credit: Amanda Bruce & Danielle Bruncati, ’10 Best Skating Movies’, ScreenRant.com, 13^th January 2024.

21st Feb 202530th Oct 2025 by The Disney Purist

Minutemen (2008)

BACKGROUND

Disney Channel Original Movies cover all manner of themes and topics.

Some of their most popular, and most relatable, are those that focus on life as a teenager or troubles at high school. Everyone has been through difficult experiences at that age, so making a DCOM based on that is an easy way of engaging an audience. These types of movies were the ones I watched more of on Disney Channel.

However, Disney Channel has also been known to stray into other areas, such as delving into the genres of fantasy and science-fiction, although many of these are still grounded in school and teenage life, such as Twitches (2005); Halloweentown (1998); How to Build a Better Boy (2014) – and the 2008 DCOM Minutemen.

You can probably be forgiven for not having heard of or watched Minutemen whilst it was on Disney Channel. I will admit that I was not the first one to it, because the most exciting new DCOM to come to the channel in 2008 for me was Camp Rock. After the success of High School Musical (2006), Disney Channel had upped their game in all areas of their programming, but none more so than in their musical DCOMs. I also enjoyed watching the third instalment of the Cheetah Girls franchise, The Cheetah Girls: One World, that year. Disney Channel is known for its musical movies, with these tending to be the highest rated. Minutemen was the only other DCOM released in 2008, but it passed me by. I remember it being advertised, but it just didn’t appeal to me like the musicals did.

I don’t actually know when I found Minutemen, but it was at least a couple of years later. I was more interested in watching it after its premiere because it meant that I was more familiar with some of its leading actors by the time I found it, just randomly one day. Jason Dolley and Chelsea Staub, now known as Chelsea Kane, were frequently seen on Disney Channel in the 2000s and early 2010s, so it helped me like it, despite not being too interested in the concept of time travel, a major part of the storyline of Minutemen.

I believe I had only seen Minutemen once in full before this week, so that obviously means that it didn’t become an instant favourite for me. I took me a while to appreciate any type of science fiction film, even Back to the Future (1985), which is referenced numerous times in Minutemen, so I’m not surprised my teenage self wasn’t bothered by it. But re-watching this week, I was impressed with the storyline and the level of acting by the young stars. I did enjoy it, but not as much as other DCOMs.

PLOT

Minutemen begins on the first day of high school at Summerton High School for three friends, Virgil, Derek, and Stephanie. Stephanie worries that high school might change them, as she is going to try out to be a cheerleader, and Derek is planning on joining the school’s football team. During try-outs for football and cheerleading, with Virgil watching nearby, a kid on a jet-propelled kart comes onto the field. This is Charlie, a kid genius who has skipped grades because of his intellect. Because of Charlie ruining football try-outs, the football players circle Charlie and start to bully him. Virgil tries to diffuse the situation, but it makes everything worse: they end up dressed as cheerleaders and tied to the school’s ram statue.

Three years later, everything has changed for the trio of friends. Derek is now a jock, and his girlfriend is Stephanie, who did become a cheerleader. Virgil has remained friends with Charlie – the joint bullying experience must’ve bonded them – though he is resentful that, in his Senior Year, he still hangs out with “nerds”. Although Virgil and Stephanie continue to talk on occasion, things between Virgil and Derek are different.

During class, Charlie bursts into Virgil’s class and tells him there is an “AV Club emergency”. Virgil follows Charlie to the computer lab, where Charlie shows Virgil a simulation of practical time travel. Virgil doesn’t believe it’ll work, but Charlie manages to convince him to go along with the crazy scheme of becoming time travellers. Charlie says they need another person to help them. Virgil approaches new kid, Zeke, who comes across as the bad-boy-loner type. The three meet to discuss the project and Zeke agrees to it.

The group begin to build their time machine, having managed to convince Vice Principal Tolkan to let them set up a new club and base it in Room 77 after giving him change for the vending machine. Room 77 was Charlie’s pick for their “club” as it is a huge basement, originally set to be the school’s fallout shelter. Over time, they clean up the basement, and start to get – or steal, I can’t really tell – parts for their machine. Once it is fully built, all three of them are too scared to try it out, so Virgil and Zeke pick up Charlie’s cat, Albert Felinestein, put goggles on it, and throw it into the machine’s vortex. Charlie is furious, but the cat comes out alive, just a bit frosty. They look at the watch they strapped to the cat and it is one minute behind, proving that the cat went back in time.

The next day, all three of them are brave enough to go into the time travel vortex themselves, wrapping up warm to avoid frostbite. Charlie warns them that they only have ten minutes to go back in time and come back, or else they may explode. Nice. The trio arrive in the past and realise it is yesterday. They quickly go to a shop to buy a lottery ticket with the correct numbers so they can win the jackpot the next day, however, they are refused the sale as they are not old enough to purchase the ticket. The three go to the “living statue” outside and ask him to buy the ticket, giving him the list of numbers and telling him to keep the ticket to give to them the next day as they need to get back to the present. On their return, they rush over to the shop to find the man did buy the lottery ticket – but kept the winning ticket for himself! Can we trust no-one these days?!

Virgil, Charlie, and Zeke then discuss a different purpose for their time travel machine, as Charlie didn’t like the idea of buying a lottery ticket anyway because it is cheating. Good for you, Charlie; you stick to your morals. They then see Chester, one of Charlie and Virgil’s less-than-popular friends. Football players have stolen Chester’s clothes, leaving him to run through the school halls naked. This gives the boys an idea. They’ll use their time travel ability to help embarrassed high school kids!

Just as the three are about to go back in time, Charlie realises that they really ought to have someone stay back to monitor the machine and make sure there are no problems. The boys argue about who will have to stay and miss all the fun, when a girl called Jeanette comes into the room, wanting to be a part of the “Back to the Future Fan Club”, the cover name for the time travelling. This gives Zeke and Virgil an idea; Jeanette can be the one to stay back. Charlie isn’t so sure he wants anyone else to be let in on the secret, but he eventually agrees – and Jeanette has a crush on Charlie so she’s happy to be a part of their gang, regardless of what it means. Though she does want to do something about their time travel outfits. Luckily, her dad owns a ski shop so she equips them with white ski suits and goggles to give them an air of mystery and legitimacy to their time travelling. They name themselves “The Minutemen”.

The three go back in time and help Chester by giving him clothes to wear. As their outfits conceal their faces and identities, the mystery group soon become popular at school as they continue to help other kids. Vice Principal Tolkan, however, is not impressed by these “Snowsuit Guys”, who he keeps seeing running about the school without permission. Tolkan vows to find and punish them.

Meanwhile, employees at Pacific Tech have been monitoring high readings and power surges that seem to be coming specifically from Summerton High School. It turns out the FBI is also investigating, covertly following Zeke, Charlie, and Virgil. This leads Charlie to admit to having hacked NASA, stealing some files they had from the 1960s related to time travel. Zeke and Virgil are furious with Charlie for getting them mixed up in something illegal, but Charlie assures them that if they just lay low for a while and don’t time travel, everything should be fine. Virgil isn’t too bothered by this anyway, because he’s annoyed at not getting proper credit for the good work they’re doing. Plus, the students all call them the “Snowsuit Guys”, even though that isn’t their name. AND the kids they have helped have all become kind of obnoxious…However, Virgil soon finds an important reason for them to time travel again. He is told by Stephanie that she has got accepted to her preferred college, but on a cheerleading scholarship. The next day, Virgil comes into school to discover that Stephanie has broken her leg after falling from a cheerleading pyramid. A broken leg will most definitely cost Stephanie her scholarship, so Virgil convinces Zeke and Charlie to go back in time to help her. The three agree to do that, and Virgil manages to catch Stephanie as she falls, saving her leg, but also giving himself away in the process.

Stephanie confronts Virgil the next day, saying she knows he is one of the “Snowsuit Guys”. As Virgil believes they have been rumbled, he admits to Stephanie that him, Zeke, and Charlie are time travellers. Stephanie is in awe of this; she was just going to say they must be psychic! Charlie continues to feel uneasy about their use of the time machine, feeling that it is having repercussions in the real world. But Virgil continues to find reasons to use it. Stephanie comes to Virgil with Derek, asking for his help as Derek was distracted during a football game, and cost the team the win. Derek begs Virgil for his help, saying that he’s sorry for everything that happened between them, reiterating that he tried to get the football players to stop during that incident on their first day of high school. Virgil wants to be popular so he agrees to help Derek. Derek is grateful to Virgil and starts inviting him to parties, but this leads to Virgil ignoring Zeke and Charlie. Soon after, Virgil gets a call from Stephanie in tears, saying she saw Derek cheating on her with mean girl Jocelyn. Virgil goes to comfort her. Derek then calls Stephanie, wanting to talk but she won’t take him back. Derek begs Virgil to go back in time to stop that event from happening.

As Virgil wonders what to do – help Derek get Stephanie back, or let things run their course and hope that him and Stephanie can finally be together – he is thrown in a van and taken to a warehouse. There, the FBI confront the boys, telling them they know that the boys stole information from NASA and have been using it to time travel. The boys refuse to admit anything and are free to go. The FBI will continue to monitor their activities. The three go their separate ways, their friendship and hopes of time travel destroyed.

But Virgil goes on alone, telling Derek he will take him back in time to stop Stephanie seeing him with Jocelyn on the day of the school dance. Virgil goes to the dance with Stephanie, but he is pulled away by Derek, wanting to go back in time now. The students all follow them, believing there will be a fight. In the meantime, Charlie has discovered that their time travelling led to the creation of a black hole on the school field. He confesses to the FBI, telling them they have about four hours to save the world. The FBI and Charlie storm the school to get Zeke, Virgil, and Charlie together to stop the black hole from consuming everything. There is only an hour left at this point so the guys suit up and walk to the black hole, ready to jump in, students clapping and cheering them, as their identities are revealed.

The ”Minutemen” jump into the black hole, and fall into the local park. Using a remote machine that Charlie whipped up, they begin to reverse the polarity. Charlie believes they have about twenty minutes until they can return. They then go to the school to try and stop past Charlie accessing the component he used to make his time travel machine, something to do with that kart, because they’ve found they are back at their first day of high school. At the same time, Virgil wants to change what happened that day, so he never became “a nerd”. Charlie is hurt by this, telling Virgil that day was also the day that Charlie finally found a real friend. Charlie and Zeke walk away, leaving Virgil to do whatever he plans to do. Virgil watches over the scene below, and discovers that Derek never tried to stop the bullying, like he claimed, but was actually a part of it.

Charlie and Zeke discover that the portal is collapsing and don’t have enough time to get back through it. Suddenly, Virgil rides up in Charlie’s old kart, having changed nothing about the bullying incident. He drives the three of them to the portal – but accidentally goes the wrong way. They’ll never make it in time! Oh, but wait. Zeke has that grappling hook he takes with him on every time travel escapade. He uses the hook and sends the kart in the right direction. The kart destroys the town on the way but they get through the portal in time.

They land, in their ski suits, back at school, on what was the day they first time travelled. As they walk through the school, they see that nobody knows anything about them or the “Snowsuit Guys”. Their mission was a success. Virgil goes to the library where he spoke to Stephanie that day, and tells Derek that he knows what he did that first day of high school and that he knows Derek is cheating on Stephanie with Jocelyn. Virgil then tells Stephanie he likes her; she says she feels the same. Charlie also kisses Jeanette, just before Zeke and Virgil can remind him that Jeanette hasn’t kissed him yet, as she had done before they went into the black hole…She doesn’t mind though. Charlie then starts to talk to Virgil and Zeke about a new idea around teleportation. The two quickly carry him away, not wanting to get mixed up in any more of Charlie’s “experiments”.

CHARACTERS & CAST

Virgil Fox initially seems hopeful about his first day of high school. He’s got his two best friends with him, what more does he need? But one event can change everything, and from that point, although Virgil has made new friends, he has become frustrated that he has become associated with “nerds”. Although Virgil talks and listens to Charlie, for most of the movie it seems like he merely tolerates him. Virgil seems to blame Charlie specifically for his problems. I hate to break it to him, but if Stephanie and Derek were going to be a cheerleader and a jock respectively, then the chances are their friendship wouldn’t have lasted anyway. Popularity does strange things to people. And in that scenario, Virgil would’ve been all alone, even without Charlie to call his friend. When Charlie comes up with the idea of time travel, suddenly, Virgil thinks this is quite cool – but once again, Virgil uses it as an opportunity to become popular and more liked amongst other students. It doesn’t really work that way until Stephanie learns about it and she tells Derek. But when Virgil gets the chance to go back and change his first day of high school so he never met Charlie and became unpopular, he doesn’t do it. I never thought Virgil was going to go and do that, because, although I’ve made him sound like a bad guy, he’s not.

Virgil does have some unresolved issues, there’s no doubt about that, and he forgets who his real friends are at times, yet he’s still a likeable character. This is all down to the actor, because Virgil could’ve ended up as a terrible main character if the wrong person was cast. Jason Dolley was cast as Virgil. Dolley had a long career with Disney Channel, beginning with the DCOM Read It and Weep (2006), where he played Connor. Dolley went on to star as Newt in the series Cory in the House (2007-08), and then as Pete in the DCOM Hatching Pete (2009). Dolley later was cast as PJ Duncan in Good Luck Charlie (2010-14) and its DCOM, Good Luck Charlie, It’s Christmas! (2011). After this, he appeared as Kevin in the ABC series American Housewife (2016-21). Most recently, Dolley wrote and starred in the short film The Unicorn That Never Lies (2024).

Charlie Tuttle hasn’t had an easy time at high school, because he is so much younger – and smarter – than everyone else. He’s an easy target for bullying and thanks to Virgil coming to his rescue on that first day, Charlie finds he does have a friend, someone he can talk to and who might stick up for him. Charlie is a genius; however, his high-achieving personality leads to him getting himself into trouble. Just because the possibility of time travel is waiting to be discovered doesn’t mean you should hack into NASA and steal their old research on the subject. Charlie is ecstatic to have figured out how to time travel, but he soon discovers that his, Virgil, and Zeke’s actions have caused damage to the world, culminating in a black hole. Charlie admits that he made a mistake and finds a way to resolve it. He just wanted to advance the world of science; he never meant to destroy it!

Charlie Tuttle was played by Luke Benward, who had already starred in the film How to Eat Fried Worms (2006) as Billy Forrester prior to his role in Minutemen. Benward went on to appear as Alan Wheddon in Dear John (2010); and came back to Disney Channel to star in the DCOMs Girl vs. Monster (2012) as Ryan, and Cloud 9 (2014) as Will Cloud. Benward also appeared as Beau, Teddy’s boyfriend, in the final season of Good Luck Charlie (2010-14). After Disney, he went on to be cast as Dillon Sanders in the Pretty Little Liars spin-off series Ravenswood (2013-14) and as Bo Larson in the Netflix movie Dumplin’ (2018).

Zeke Thompson is a new student at Summerton High School, first seen as he arrives to school on a motorbike. He seems like the silent, loner type, but Charlie and Virgil notice that he has engineering skills which may be useful to their time travel project. Although it might seem that Zeke doesn’t have time to hang out with science geeks, he is intrigued by this plan and agrees to help them; Zeke thinks the idea of time travel is cool. Much of the plot resolves around Virgil and Charlie’s friendship, and the dynamic between Virgil, Stephanie, and Derek, so Zeke doesn’t get all that focus, however, he helps find students who might need their time travel experience to avoid embarrassment and he is loyal to the cause, sticking firmly with Charlie on points, such as not betraying each other to the FBI, and not continuing to time travel when things start to look tricky.

Nicholas Braun also had a bit of history with Disney. Prior to his casting as Zeke, he was cast as Zach in the Disney movie Sky High (2005). After Minutemen, he went on to appear as Ed in the DCOM Princess Protection Program (2009), and then as Lloyd in Disney’s Prom (2011), which was not a DCOM, though it does feel like one. Since his “Disney days”, Braun has become an incredibly successful actor, appearing as Michael in Date and Switch (2014), alongside Dakota Johnson and Sarah Hyland, and as Josh in How to Be Single (2016), which also featured Dakota Johnson, and Rebel Wilson. He is perhaps most known for his role as Greg Hirsch in the critically-acclaimed series Succession (2018-23). Recently, Braun portrayed both Jim Henson and Andy Kaufman in the movie Saturday Night (2024) and is set to star in the movie Famous alongside fellow Disney alumni Zac Efron and Debby Ryan.

Moving on, Stephanie Jameson was one of Virgil’s closest friends before high school. At high school, though, things are a little bit different. Stephanie is a cheerleader, but she does make time to speak to Virgil. She’s not like one of those awful cheerleaders you see in movies who drop all their friends when they finally become popular. Stephanie isn’t actually all that happy about being popular. She thinks Virgil and his friends look much happier than any of the popular kids ever do. Virgil is smitten with Stephanie, and for once, I was actually rooting for the “nerd” to win the heart of the popular girl, because she was just so nice!

Chelsea Staub, now known as Chelsea Kane, was cast as Stephanie. Like the three actors I’ve just talked about, Kane also had a history with Disney Channel. After Minutemen, she went on to star as Stella Malone, alongside the Jonas Brothers, in the Disney series Jonas (2009-10), before being cast as Alexis Bender in StarStruck (2010), alongside Sterling Knight. Also for Disney, Kane voiced the character of Bea Goldfishberg in Fish Hooks (2010-14). Outside of Disney, Kane placed third in Season 12 of Dancing with the Stars and played the part of Riley in the ABC series Baby Daddy (2012-17). She returned to voice acting again in 2019 to voice the character of Loy for the series Archibald’s Next Big Thing (2019-21).

Then there is Virgil’s ex-best friend Derek Beaugard. For most of Minutemen, Derek is also Stephanie’s boyfriend, but he turns out to be a cheater – big surprise there – so Stephanie dumps him. Derek then asks Virgil to take him back in time to avoid the moment that Stephanie saw him with another girl. Derek convinces Virgil to do this because he claims that during that bullying incident on their first day of high school he tried to get the other football players to stop doing what they were doing. Well, it’s a good thing that big, black hole stopped Virgil from helping Derek because it turns out Derek is a liar as well as cheat, actually contributing to the football players’ bullying of Charlie and Virgil, and not stopping it, as Virgil sees when they go back in time to save the world. Derek is just awful.

Steven R. McQueen was cast as Derek. He went on to be cast as Jeremy Gilbert in The Vampire Diaries (2009-17), and then as Jimmy Borrelli in Seasons 4 and 5 of Chicago Fire (2012-present). Oh, and that girl Derek was caught with was, Jocelyn, was played by Kellie Cockrell, who might look familiar to Halloweentown fans, as she played Sapphire Sinister in Return to Halloweentown (2006).

Then there are a couple of Virgil and Charlie’s friends to mention. One is Chester, who is frequently bullied by the jocks, but once Virgil, Charlie, and Zeke go back in time to help him one day, Chester becomes a real jerk, ignoring Virgil and Charlie, who only risked their lives to stop him being humiliated, and even starts to bully the jocks. All returns to normal, though, once the Minutemen go back and sort out that black hole. Then, there is Jeanette. Jeanette is a bit weird and hyper, coming on a little bit too strong for the socially awkward Charlie when she’s trying to show she has feelings for him. Eventually, Charlie learns to love Jeanette’s quirks and they become an oddly cute couple.

Chester was played by Dexter Darden. Darden went on to be cast as Frypan in The Maze Runner trilogy (2014-18) and appeared as DeVante in the reboot series of Saved by the Bell (2020-21). Most recently, he portrayed Muhammad Ali in the Peacock miniseries Fight Night: The Million Dollar Heist (2024), which starred Kevin Hart. Jeanette was played by Kara Crane, who went on to guest star in episodes of series like The Suite Life on Deck (2008-11); The Mindy Project (2012-17); and Baby Daddy (2012-17).

Finally, there is Vice Principal Tolkan. Tolkan isn’t bothered by the bullying epidemic he clearly has going on at his school, not even batting an eyelid when he sees a student trapped in a vending machine. Instead, he’s bothered about getting the right coins to get the snack he wants. Tolkan is happy to let “the normal order” take precedent over basic human rights, but that does mean that when Chester becomes a bully to the jocks, Tolkan suddenly wants to discipline because that goes against the status quo. What is it with DCOMs and corrupt teachers. We have Tolkan here; we had Brenigan in Lemonade Mouth (2011); where does it end? Vice Principal Tolkan was played J.P. Manoux, who should be familiar to Disney Channel fans for playing Vice Principal Hackett in the Disney Channel series Phil of the Future (2004-06). He also replaced David Spade from The Emperor’s New Groove (2000) as the voice Kuzco in The Emperor’s New School (2006-08), and voiced the character of Mr. Fraley in the Disney Channel animated series The Replacements (2006-09).

MUSIC

Minutemen isn’t a movie packed with songs, but one in particular was familiar to me.

This song was “Like Whoa”, performed by Aly & AJ, which played during Virgil, Zeke, and Charlie’s building of their time machine. It was written by Aly and AJ Michalka – who themselves starred in the DCOM Cow Belles (2006) – Antonina Armato, and Tim James. “Like Whoa” was part of Aly & AJ’s second album Insomniatic, released in 2007.

Another song I instantly recognised as being performed by Corbin Bleu, although I had not heard the song before, was “Run It Back Again”, which can be heard during the montage of the Minutemen helping students and being investigated by the FBI. “Run It Back Again” was written by Matthew Gerrard and Robbie Nevil. The music video features clips from Minutemen. It is also a track on Radio Disney Jams, Vol. 10, released in January 2008.

At the party that Virgil attends with Derek and Stephanie, I believe the song “Thinking About It…Baby” is playing, which was written and performed by Salme Dahlstrom. At the school dance, there is also a song that sounds a bit like “Johnny B. Goode” being played by the school band. When Stephanie and Virgil dance later, there is a different song playing. These seem to just be riffs on 1950s songs, since that is the theme of the school dance, and it’s a small reference to Back to the Future, and its setting of 1955. There is no information on these songs and they are not credited.

One final song to mention that is also not credited is the music that is playing during the End Credits. This is a mini-blooper scene that turns into a dance party with all the cast and crew. All I know is that the song goes “put your hands up, put your hands up, put your ha-ha-ha-ha-hands up”. I tried to search for it, tried Shazam, but it doesn’t exist apparently.

Nathan Wang is credited as the composer for Minutemen. Wang has composed the music for other DCOMs including Hatching Pete (2009); Wendy Wu: Homecoming Warrior (2006); and Christmas…Again? (2021), amongst many other non-Disney projects.

PRODUCTION

Science fiction is a common genre in entertainment, both on-screen and off.

On-screen, some of the most popular science fiction franchises have involved space travel, such as Star Wars and Star Trek. Although space travel is advancing, we are not yet living in a world that looks anything like those in science fiction films. However, others in this genre have become less science fiction and more “science fact”.

Some science fiction movies that have been focused on getting the science right include Christopher Nolan’s Interstellar (2014), whose plot has a basis in theoretical physics, and Ridley Scott’s The Martian (2015), which follows an astronaut’s attempts to survive on Mars[1]. A movie that comes somewhere in between science fiction and “science fact” is Back to the Future, one of the most popular science fiction franchises ever, in itself an inspiration to other science fiction films. Minutemen takes some ideas from this movie in its own exploration into time travel.

For fans of Back to the Future, there are many subtle references within Minutemen, aside from the time travelling storyline. One is that Charlie has named his pet, in this case a cat, after Einstein, and Doc Brown did the same with his dog in Back to the Future. Jeanette can also be seen at one point looking at the school newspaper, which changes its headlines as soon as the Minutemen have changed the past; this is something that happens in Back to the Future. You might also notice that Virgil’s last name, “Fox”, the same as that of Marty McFly actor Michael J. Fox, and that Vice Principal Tolkan is named after actor James Tolkan, who played Principal Strickland in the movie. A big mention of the movie comes in the fact that the boys named their club, the “Back to the Future Fan Club”. Obviously, they knew that they were re-enacting the movie in real-life.

I could go into detail about the never-ending problems with the scientific inaccuracies and plot holes that exist within Minutemen and Back to the Future that others have somehow had time to find. I’m not going to do that, because I don’t really care about accuracy in movies like this, because there is too much still to be discovered in the world of science. I will instead mention just one.

Time travel is not currently physically possible, however, theoretically, it has been discussed with many possible outcomes. For example, one theory that neither Back to the Future nor Minutemen manage to follow is the “grandfather paradox”. The example used to explain it says that if a time traveller went back in time and killed his grandfather before he could have children, then this would mean the time traveller never existed, so couldn’t actually go back in time to do that. In Minutemen, the boys go back in time to fix issues and return to the present to find that it’s like they never happened. This goes against the grandfather paradox. This theory led to the belief that travelling backwards in time was not possible, and has caused many viewers of movies like this to comment on inaccuracy.

But there have since been discussions, including theories from Stephen Hawking, that debate whether it is possible to travel back in time, at least to an earlier point in time that you’ve already been to. This would mean that Minutemen could work, however, this relies on the fact that things would be unalterable in that past timeline – which Minutemen does not stick to. Alternatively, there is a lot of discussion about quantum physics and parallel timelines, which are too complicated for me to understand[2]. All I know is that parallel timelines are explored in Back to the Future, specifically Back to the Future Part II.

My point here is that Minutemen took a lot of influence from Back to the Future, and in doing so, it took some of Back to the Future’s scientific inaccuracies and made them their own. However, that does not mean that Minutemen doesn’t have a good story, because it does, and it was good for Disney Channel to create a science fiction-based movie. Science fiction isn’t a particularly common genre for Disney, with their Zenon trilogy ending in 2004. Minutemen was their first science fiction movie since then, but Zenon takes place in space in the future, not in present day with some elements of science within it, like Minutemen. There wouldn’t be another science fiction-themed DCOM until The Suite Life Movie in 2011.

Minutemen was directed by Lev L. Spiro. After Minutemen, Spiro went on to direct the DCOM Wizards of Waverly Place: The Movie (2009) and some episodes of the Disney Channel series Jonas (2009-10). More recently, he has directed some episodes of UnReal (2015-18) and Insatiable (2018-19). The screenplay for Minutemen was written by John Killoran, with David Diamond and David Weissman being credited for the story.

The actors enjoyed working with Spiro during filming on Minutemen, and Spiro in turn enjoyed working with them. It seemed like a fun, creative atmosphere on set. One area where this was clear was in the stunts. Minutemen is not a high action thriller, however, there were still moments of stunt work, and the actors got to do quite a lot of it. Jason Dolley, Luke Benward, and Nicholas Braun ended up doing lots of jumps and dives to film the shots of them going into and coming out of the time travel vortex. They also did some work on wires for their characters spinning through the vortex. Although the vortex doesn’t look particularly realistic, it is worth remembering this is a TV movie from 2008. Benward was also able to drive the “runaway” kart in Charlie’s first scene in the movie.

There is also another actor that should be mentioned here and that is Tennessee the cat, who played Albert Felinestein. Although the cat is not seen all that much in Minutemen, Albert Felinestein was part of a key moment in the movie: the first test of the time travel machine. The cat actually had to be sprayed with something to make it look like it had been frosted up during the time travelling. But don’t worry; the cat was not thrown into the air when the boys throw it into the vortex in the film. A toy cat was used as a “stunt double”.

The coldness aspect of time travelling, which saw the DeLorean freeze during the time travel sequences of Back to the Future, did mean that the boys had to wear big, thick snowsuits. This may’ve been easy to do had this shoot been entirely inside, or shot during winter, but it was not; it was filmed in summer. Dolley, Benward, and Braun had to do a lot of activity in those costumes and did struggle at times in the hot weather[3]!

Minutemen was filmed in August 2007 in Utah, with two schools being used as filming locations: Murray High School, based in Salt Lake Valley; and Highland High School in Salt Lake City. It seems that Murray High School was used as the exterior of Summerton High School, with a giant bronze ram statue being placed outside the school entrance, with “Summerton High School” and “Rams” wording being added to the building. It supposedly confused some registering students; however, the props were removed before school started. Highland High seems to have been the setting for Summerton’s playing field[4].

Utah has been a fairly common filming location for Disney Channel, with others being filmed in Utah including Cloud 9 (2014) and Good Luck Charlie, It’s Christmas! (2011). Murray High School is not even a stranger to Disney Channel, as it was used as the filming location for Read It and Weep (2006) and the High School Musical trilogy (2006-08)[5].

RECEPTION

Minutemen premiered on Disney Channel on 25^th January 2008 in the US.

It reportedly reached around 6.5 million viewers on its premiere. This is about average for a Disney Channel Original Movie release for the time, potentially slightly above average. The DCOMs with the best viewing figures tended to be the musicals, or the ones with the biggest Disney Channel stars. Although Minutemen features a lot of Disney stars as we now know them, at the time, none of the main actors had been in many Disney projects before, so Disney Channel didn’t have that to market the movie fully. Although I’m from the UK and not the US, I don’t remember Minutemen being heavily advertised on the channel, however, the other two releases of 2008, Camp Rock, and The Cheetah Girls: One World, were. It is worth noting though that in the US, Minutemen actually had slightly more viewers than the third Cheetah Girls movie, which had viewership of around 6.2. million. I also think Minutemen fared quite well for a January movie release. DCOMs released over the summer or towards Halloween I always felt were the most exciting ones.

Looking at audience reviews, I was surprised to find so many positive ones for Minutemen. That’s not to say I think it deserves more negative reviews, because it doesn’t, but just that many reviews of DCOMs tend to be overly critical. In Minutemen’s case, many felt that the storyline was fun and smart, with better-than-expected acting. I would definitely agree with this statement. Many liked the references to Back to the Future that are peppered throughout Minutemen. It was also appreciated that this is a DCOM that is centred on three teenage boys, and outcasts at that. Many other DCOMs do not do this, although Disney Channel were clearly trying to appeal to this demographic during the 2000s, as you can see with movies like Jump In! (2007) and Hatching Pete (2009).

However, Minutemen did not escape any negative reviews, as no film ever can. Some said that Minutemen was “forgettable”. To be fair, in amongst all the other DCOMs that have been released, I would say that Minutemen has been forgotten by many Disney Channel fans, unless they happened to have watched it enough times at a younger age to make it a favourite. But the reason it may have been forgotten isn’t because the movie is low-quality; it’s because the DCOM world has been saturated with musicals. Others were quick to point out the inaccuracy of the time travelling within Minutemen, and there were some comments about how the black hole and “end of the world” scenario was a little bit overdone, especially with the four-hour time limit to fix everything. Four hours is a random amount of time for something as cataclysmic as a black hole consuming the world – or was it just the US? – but I didn’t think it was excessively dramatic.

Personally, I think Minutemen is a better-than-average DCOM, with a different type of story and pretty good acting. It’s certainly not anywhere close to being one of the worst DCOMs I’ve seen.

LEGACY

Unlike Back to the Future, which spanned two sequels, merchandise, a TV series, and a fandom that are extraordinarily loyal, Minutemen didn’t get that.

Minutemen instead may even get confused with The Minutemen characters from the DC comic book series Watchmen. Minutemen are also the name of characters in other comic books, including those from Marvel. Minutemen, or Minuteman, has also been used as the name of different organisations or groups in the US over the years, including in the American Revolutionary War. This term generally refers to rapid deployment of people.

One good thing to come out of Minutemen was the careers of its stars, with the four main actors having multiple Disney credits. Jason Dolley mentioned during a 2020 video he appeared in on Christy Carlson Romano’s YouTube Channel – the voice of Kim Possible for anyone unfamiliar, as well as Ren Stevens in The Even Stevens (2000-03) – that he was one of the few actors to have been in the most DCOMs with four, joint with Brenda Song. Song has in fact been in five. Although some were quick to point out the inaccuracy in his statement, many actors who have been in more than four DCOMs were in series, such as Raven-Symoné in The Cheetah Girls and Zenon films, and Ashley Tisdale, in the High School Musical and Phineas and Ferb movies. Dolley was in four completely unrelated, standalone DCOMs, as well as two Disney Channel series, which is still impressive. If nothing else, Minutemen was a stepping stone to success for its Disney Channel stars.

Minutemen also went some way in breaking Disney Channel’s reliance on musicals after its High School Musical hype, and finding a way of appealing to boys, instead of only on pre-teen and teenage girls.

FINAL THOUGHTS

Minutemen is not my favourite DCOM, and I didn’t even see it until after its release. I’ve always liked musicals, so I was always excited for those, and I’d also choose to watch DCOMs with actors I already knew. Minutemen wouldn’t be able to meet that second requirement for a few years, but when it did, I went ahead and saw it.

It wasn’t a particularly memorable movie experience to be honest, but re-watching this week, I was impressed with it. The storyline covered the scientific background of time travel, as well as the potential homeland security issues that may come with this sort of endeavour, making Minutemen more complex a movie than others that are generally about high school. Minutemen managed to combine the time travel with this aspect.

Minutemen is a movie for the outcasts, once again proving that it’s the ones who no-one imagines anything of who do the things that no-one can imagine.

Alan Turing reportedly said that; I can’t take credit for it.

REFERENCES

[1] Credit: BBC Bitesize, ‘Five times the movies got their science right’, BBC.co.uk/bitesize, October 2022.

[2] Credit: Andrew May, ‘What is the grandfather paradox?’, LiveScience.com, 31^st January 2022.

[3] Credit: Disney Channel, ‘Minutemen 2008 DVD Overview’, Diamond Boy’s Disney DVD Overviews YouTube Channel, 12^th January 2024.

[4] Credit: Jennifer Toomer-Cook, ‘Disney moment for Murray, Highland’, Deseret.com, 3^rd September 2007.

[5] Credit: Jennifer Guzman, ‘Got Disney+? Keep an eye out for these movies filmed in Utah’, KSL.com, 12^th November 2019.

14th Feb 202516th Nov 2025 by The Disney Purist

Big Time Movie (2012)

BACKGROUND

In 2006, Disney Channel premiered a new series: Hannah Montana (2006-11). But this wasn’t just a TV show, because Hannah Montana became a pop sensation amongst kids, tweens, and teens, releasing CDs and putting on concerts, like any other singer would. So why should Disney have all the fun? In come Nickelodeon – the “other channel” that Disney would rather you didn’t know about – with their own show, Big Time Rush (2009-13), which launched a band along with its series, who released CDs and put on concerts.

This was never anything new, because The Monkees (1966-68) was very similar, i.e., four guys form a band in a television series and then become a real band off the back of it. In fact, when I was watching Big Time Rush, my mum mentioned that the show was basically The Monkees, but I wouldn’t know; I haven’t seen it.

I found Big Time Rush in an odd way. I was in Florida on a family holiday and whilst there, I always liked to buy the tween magazines, like J-14, so I could read about my favourite Disney stars. This time, I was about 18 and I was starting to drift away from Disney Channel as my favourite series ended and stars departed, but I still bought the magazine anyway. Whilst flipping through, I came across poster-after-poster of this band: Big Time Rush. They were cute, so of course, I was instantly fascinated with who these guys were and what show they were on.

I got home, found the show on Nickelodeon and became a fan of them over the summer. I even took those magazine posters to put up on my wall when I went to university that September, not thinking it was particularly weird. After all, I wasn’t much younger than these guys so naturally I thought, if I ever met them, they’d be much more likely to fall in love with me than any of their younger fans. I know, delusional, right?

Anyway, I did not find other people my age to be too forgiving of my interests. I was teased for the posters, as well as for my love of Disney. It wasn’t meant to be bullying, but it felt like it, and I was hurt, to be honest. But I got through the year and, by the summer, Big Time Movie had come out in the UK. I loved both the movie and the music – though I first watched it with a friend of mine who fell asleep through most of it, so not exactly a glowing review from her…Not that she was a fan, so who cares?

After that summer though, I started to feel like a kid for still liking Big Time Rush, knowing that I wasn’t their target demographic and that other people my age might be looking down on me for it. So, I vowed not to talk about “kid stuff” at university again. By doing this, I moved away from Big Time Rush, only listening to their music in secret, and I never finished watching the full series.

Recently, I decided to expand my movie reviews by venturing beyond the “Disney bubble”, and what should spring to mind as one of these non-Disney movies to write about but Big Time Movie. I had to give it a try again. I expected to find Big Time Movie quite cringey after not watching it for years, but I actually found it fun. Super cheesy but not taking itself seriously. Big Time Movie was just a good piece of light entertainment that extended the show’s overarching storyline.

PLOT

Big Time Movie begins in a huge castle where a James Bond-style villain has captured a princess. As the princess cries for help, we see the four members of boy band Big Time Rush assemble to come to her rescue. They are dressed up like spies in tuxedos and each finds their way to the castle: Kendall via a souped-up Aston Martin; Logan has a jet ski; Carlos is riding a quad bike; and James has parachuted out of an aeroplane. The villain is ultimately defeated by James falling onto the villain as he crashes through the ceiling. The princess is eternally grateful to the boys….

But then we don’t see anything else, because this was all just a dream. Carlos’ dream, in fact, which he has been woken from by a flight attendant, telling him that they are soon to be landing in London. Yes, Big Time Rush are going to London, the first stop of their world tour. The boys are very excited by this, however, Gustavo Rocque, music producer and Big Time Rush’s founder, is worried that the boys will get the tour cancelled with their usual chaos and antics. Kendall’s mother and sister, Katie, are also along for the ride. Katie is looking forward to somehow becoming a princess during her time in London, by meeting a member of the British Royal Family – because they’re so easy to find…

Once in the airport, Big Time Rush are told by Gustavo and his assistant Kelly not to get into any trouble. And yet, trouble just seems to find them, as they are rudely shoved by policemen chasing after someone in a suit holding a backpack. The man manages to swap out the backpack for an identical one on a nearby luggage carousel, but is caught by some scary-looking henchmen, including a man who has a hammer for an arm. This man is apparently a spy who is taken to a castle owned by entrepreneur Sir Atticus Moon. Moon wants whatever is in that backpack badly. He orders his henchmen to track it down once he discovers the bags were swapped.

Big Time Rush, meanwhile, have gotten to their hotel, the Queen’s Hotel, and we see that Kendall has the swapped-out backpack, unknowingly holding some sort of device wanted by a crazed billionaire. The boys are also unaware of the fact that members of MI6 are watching them, attempting to surreptitiously retrieve the backpack, but they are clearly very inept spies and they fail in their mission. Once inside their hotel room, the boys are told to remain in the room until soundcheck that afternoon, in preparation for their performance that night. Kendall then opens up his backpack to find a strange device inside. He presses the button on it and the room loses all gravity, sticking the guys to the ceiling. Kendall manages to push the button again and they fall to the ground. Suddenly, a spy enters the room aiming a gun at them. Logan is shot in the leg with a dart that knocks him unconscious. As Kendall, Carlos, and James stand there not knowing what to do, a girl comes in through the window, knocks the spy out, and takes the backpack. Two men from “room service” then burst in trying to get the bag, but Carlos catches it as it is thrown out of the girl’s hand. The boys rush out of their room through the fire escape, carrying Logan with them.

At the same time, Katie has overheard the Duke of Bath checking into the same hotel as them. Hearing that he’s single and royalty, Katie plans to set her mother up with him. They are taken out for afternoon tea and shown around the city by the duke. Meanwhile, Gustavo and Kelly are horrified to find that Big Time Rush have gone missing, with their tour promoter threatening to cancel the whole tour if they’re late for soundcheck.

Big Time Rush are now in Chinatown and search for the device online, via the “London Information Kiosk”, an interactive screen that is handily situated on the street. They find that billionaire Moon was trying to make an anti-gravity device but denied it was possible to make. Carlos then sees the guy with the hammer arm, who he’d seen at the airport, coming towards them. The guys run away again and come face-to-face with that girl who knocked out the spy in their room. She tells them to get in her talking spy van if they want to live – so they do just that. The van is being pursued by the “room service” men, who are actually Swedish spies also wanting the device. The girl introduces herself as Penny Lane, explaining that her father is a spy for MI6, and, although MI6 want the device, they are less bothered about rescuing her father from Moon. So, Penny asks the guys to help her save him. Big Time Rush aren’t sure about this but then find they are wanted by the police and MI6 so don’t have much choice! Kendall reminds everyone that they need to get to soundcheck in Hyde Park, so they make a deal: if Penny can get them to Hyde Park in time, then they will help her. Penny arranges a meeting with Moon in Hyde Park for the exchange.

MI6 have discovered that the device they believe Agent Simon Lane, Penny’s father, had was part of Moon’s Project Beetle, having discovered a report all about it. The head of MI6, however, thinks that Big Time Rush has taken this “Beetle” so that they can take over the world, especially as they have found footage from the hotel of Gustavo saying just that, but in reference to the band’s world tour. It’s clear he’s barking up the wrong tree, but there’s no persuading him that Big Time Rush have accidentally got mixed up in this!

Near to Hyde Park, Penny gives the boys disguises and tells them that the park is just across the street. They need to split up and get to their soundcheck, ensuring they avoid fans, police, and the Swedish spies on their way to it. As Gustavo and Kelly nervously await the boys’ arrival at soundcheck, they themselves are captured by MI6 and taken to be interrogated. They don’t have a clue what MI6 are talking about, but they are subjected to torture anyway – in the form of someone singing Big Time Rush songs to them!

Back at Hyde Park, just as the tour promoter is about to angrily cancel the tour, Big Time Rush turn up on stage to complete their soundcheck at the Hyde Park Amphitheatre. They then rush off to meet with Moon. Moon is waiting for them with Agent Lane in tow. However, he has more henchmen with him than expected and the boys are surrounded by guns. Even Penny, who was waiting nearby to shoot at them, is caught by Hammer-Arm. But Carlos starts a fight and they manage to escape from Moon and his henchmen – having to carry Logan who has been shot with a dart once again! They run into an unusually clean public toilet which actually takes them to a secret MI6 base. Agent Lane tells them that Moon is going to use the anti-gravity device, the Beetle, to take over the world but before they can come up with a plan to fix anything, Logan accidentally shoots Agent Lane with a laser which knocks him out – and will last for twelve hours. But Logan’s having a bad day, ok?! So, it’s up to them and Penny to decide what to do next. To make it worse, the boys soon learn that Katie, Kendall’s sister, has been captured by Moon, after him and Hammer-Arm take her from their hotel. Moon tells the boys to bring him the device in an hour, or else.

They come out of the lair back onto the London streets not knowing what to do, but happy that, because they have the backpack still, they have leverage. The Swedish spies then zoom past them and steal the backpack. Great, no more leverage… Logan wants to go to the police but they can’t really do that. Carlos wants to re-enact his spy dream from earlier and, having no other ideas, the boys and Penny agree to it. Penny’s van then arrives, despite having gotten annoyed with Big Time Rush earlier and banned them from accessing it, to come and help them, complete with tuxedos for the guys and Penny’s signature spy outfit. They also equip themselves with spy gadgets.

Having received the device after capturing the Swedish spies, Moon can set about enacting his plan. He explains to Katie that his plan is to use the Beetle and a laser to push the Moon out of its orbit, and, since it’s the day of the supermoon, it’s the perfect time to do so. This will cause worldwide chaos and allow Moon to force his way into power and become ruler of the world. MI6 figure out the plan and try to stop it, however, all their systems and communications become jammed, thanks to Moon using his big “Jam” button. He also protects himself with a force field so nobody can get to him. Smart.

Big Time Rush and Penny soon burst onto the grounds and into the castle, fighting all the henchmen. Kendall rescues Katie, and they even free the Swedish spies. The laser then hits the Moon and starts to be pushed out of orbit, disrupting the oceans and causing volcanoes to erupt. Penny and James go to the top of the stairs to defeat Moon, because in Carlos’ dream, James defeated the villain by falling on him. But once at the top of the stairs, James isn’t so sure about falling, so Penny kisses him and in his post-kiss reverie, he falls from the stairs on top of Moon, disabling the force field, which obviously didn’t cover Moon from above. What a rubbish force field… The boys shut down the laser by removing the Beetle and the Moon returns to its orbit. But in a twist, Katie is taken by Moon. Big Time Rush follow them and Kendall says he’ll give Moon the device. In the swap, Kendall turns on and throws the Beetle which sticks onto Moon’s back, lifting him into space.

MI6 arrive and thank Big Time Rush for their help, saying they’ll deal with Moon later as he flies higher and higher into the atmosphere…They are given a lift to their concert, via helicopter, almost late again. But they arrive just in time and launch into the first song of their set. At the concert, Katie tells her mother that the Duke of Bath is not a member of the Royal Family, having learnt he actually sells toilets after seeing an advert for his company on television – though she probably already suspected something was up after the duke gave her a bouquet of plungers instead of roses! When they meet the Earl of Sandwich backstage later, Kendall’s mother quickly leads Katie away, saying she’s not interested, despite this guy actually being royalty, and “third in line to the throne”.

At the end of their show, the boys are told by Gustavo and Kelly they can go sightseeing now, but find themselves face-to-face with the Swedish spies, who actually only want to return Kendall’s backpack and threaten the boys with a promise to make one of their tour stops in Sweden. They promise – and then agree to never being secret agents again! Penny and her dad, who’s awake now, then arrive, ready with their van to take them out sightseeing together. The boys do a quick-change into their tuxedos and get in the van.

CHARACTERS & CAST

For anyone unfamiliar with the concept of Big Time Rush, although the members of the real band use their actual names, the series and also the movie did not do so. Because the series came before the band, the series features fictional characters, though their first names are the same as the actors/singers, and only the surnames are different.

For example, Kendall Knight was played by Kendall Schmidt. Kendall Knight is Big Time Rush’s leader on screen and is the most level-headed one in the group. Kendall tends to be the one who is the most focused on the band and its success, not because Kendall is fame-hungry, but because he really loves being in a band with his best friends and doesn’t want it to end. This means that during Big Time Movie, when Carlos is distracted by spies, Logan just wants to see Parliament, and James is distracted by Penny, Kendall is the one making sure they get to soundcheck and their concert on time.

After the Big Time Rush series ended in 2013, Kendall Schmidt went on to have a recurring role in the Nickelodeon series School of Rock (2016-18), which was based on the 2003 movie starring Jack Black, playing the character Justin of Night Lizard. Schmidt is also known for the group Heffron Drive that he formed in 2008 with Dustin Belt. During his time on the show, Heffron Drive was on a break, but restarted again after the series ended.

James Diamond in the show is the ladies’ man and pretty boy of the band. When he isn’t singing, because he was the one most motivated to be a singer, he’s thinking about girls. During Big Time Movie, he doesn’t spend much time thinking about Sir Atticus Moon and his devious plans. He’s thinking about Penny Lane. Penny initially seems irritated by James’ advances, but eventually, she falls for his charming personality.

James Maslow played James Diamond on screen. After the show ended, Maslow was part of the line-up for Season 18 of Dancing with the Stars in 2014, where he finished in fourth place. On screen, he appeared in a few movies including Room for Murder (2018), where he played Jake; Holiday Twist (2023), playing Sam; and starred as Kevin Mohr in the Crackle series Sequestered (2014). In 2018, Maslow was one of the celebrity housemates in the US version of Celebrity Big Brother, where he finished sixth. Maslow pursued a solo singing career shortly after Big Time Rush, releasing his first album How I Like It in 2017.

Carlos Garcia is the troublemaker in the group, though he doesn’t mean to be. It’s just his light-hearted nature and excitability that get the band into all sorts of scrapes. In Big Time Movie, Carlos is in a dreamy state, thinking about how great it would be to be a spy, so when the moment comes for the boys to get involved in their own spy adventure, Carlos immediately wants to jump into it. Carlos’ spy dream actually comes in useful because he tells the boys and Penny how they should proceed on their mission to stop Moon, since Penny’s father, an actual spy, is “indisposed” – and it works.

Carlos Garcia was played by Carlos PenaVega. Since the end of Big Time Rush, PenaVega has voiced the character Bobby Santiago in the Nickelodeon animated series The Loud House (2016-present). PenaVega also starred in the Hallmark movie series the Picture Perfect Mysteries (2019-20) as Detective Sam Acosta, alongside his wife, Alexa PenaVega. They later both starred together in the Hallmark movie Love in the Limelight (2022). Following in Maslow’s footsteps, PenaVega came fourth in Season 21 of Dancing with the Stars back in 2015. He has also recently started a new band alongside friend Alex Marshall called Angels + Kings. Their first single “Lightning” was released in October 2024.

Rounding out the Big Time Rush band members is Logan Mitchell. Logan is the smartest one in the group, even aiming to become a doctor. This means he is quite analytical, logical, and serious, at times anyway. In Big Time Movie, Logan is nervous about getting involved in a spy operation, believing the best thing to do is to report it to the police, a perfectly normal response. He just wants to go and see Parliament in the city. But Logan is dragged into the action reluctantly, getting shot with tranquiliser darts on more than one occasion during the film, so he doesn’t have all that many opportunities to voice his dismay at being forced into this potentially deadly situation.

Logan Henderson was cast as Logan Mitchell. After Big Time Rush ended in 2014, Henderson took a break from the spotlight, returning to the music scene in 2017 with his debut solo single “Sleepwalker”. He later released his debut album Echoes of Departure and the Endless Street of Dreams – Pt. 1 in May 2018. It seems that Part 2 of the album is yet to be released.

Penny Lane – this being a not-so-subtle reference to The Beatles song of the same name – is the teenage spy who comes into Big Time Rush’s life like a whirlwind. Her father has been captured by Moon after smuggling an anti-gravity device out of a lab. Knowing he was at risk of capture, he swapped the backpack hiding the device with an identical one to stop Moon accessing it. Penny then attempts to retrieve the device so she can exchange it for her father’s release. She claims she doesn’t want to simply hand it over to MI6 because she fears her father’s return is not their priority, so she enlists the boys to help her with her plan. As usual with Big Time Rush, the plan does not go smoothly, however, they do save Penny’s father, Simon, quite easily. If it weren’t for a poor use of a spy laser by Logan, they might have been able to defeat Moon without so much trouble! Instead, Penny has to rely on Carlos’ dream to come up with plan. Luckily, it does work, with some clunky moments, and Penny also realises her feelings for James at the same time. What a time for romance, when the world is about to be destroyed by a power-hungry billionaire…

Penny was played by Emma Lahana. And don’t let that British accent fool you, because Lahana is in fact from New Zealand. Prior to Big Time Movie, Lahana was cast as Fiona in the Disney Channel Original Movie You Wish! (2003), and had performed the recurring role of Charlotte Monroe in The CW series Hellcats (2010-11). After Big Time Movie, she went on to play Brigid O’Reilly / Mayhem in the Freeform series Marvel’s Cloak & Dagger (2018-19). Her father, Agent Lane, was played by Christopher Shyer, also not British, who most recently landed the recurring role of the Vice President of the USA in Netflix’s The Night Agent (2023-present). He also previously portrayed Richard Nixon in J. Edgar (2011), the movie about J. Edgar Hoover, which starred Leonardo DiCaprio in the main role.

Then there is Sir Atticus Moon, the villain of Big Time Movie, who plans to move the Moon out of its orbit so he can rule the world. He is clearly meant to resemble a Bond villain with his grand plans, his suit, and his love of holding cats, frequently asking henchmen to get him a cat that he can hold. The cats don’t look very happy about this most of the time… This is reminiscent of the Bond villain Blofeld who held a white Persian. However, this being a movie for Nickelodeon, the villain here is not a criminal mastermind. He seems quite scared of fights and confrontation, getting his henchmen to do his dirty work for him, and doesn’t know what to do when things go wrong. When Big Time Rush ruin his plan, he simply grabs Katie and runs outside with her, telling the boys to give him the device. Moon then hands Katie over before he gets the device – rookie error. So, this gives the boys the opportunity to trick Moon by attaching the device to him, and, since it is an anti-gravity device, Moon gets launched into the air. We don’t actually know if he ever made his way back down to Earth….

Sir Atticus Moon was played by Trevor Devall, who has a history of voice acting, having voiced Rocket Raccoon in the animated series Guardians of the Galaxy (2015-19) for DisneyXD, as well as Hobbie in Star Wars Rebels (2014-18), also for Disney XD. Devall also “played” the character of Hermiod in Stargate: Atlantis (2004-09).

There are also other characters from the Big Time Rush series who appear in Big Time Movie. Two of these are Katie, Kendall’s sister, and Kendall and Katie’s mother, Mrs. Knight. Mrs. Knight has been the boys’ chaperone during their time in LA so she would need to accompany them on the tour. Katie, meanwhile, is excited to be in London because she dreams of marrying Prince Harry and becoming a princess. This leads her to trying to set up her mother with the Duke of Bath. Although Mrs. Knight has no desire to go along with her daughter’s scheme, when she hears that the duke has seventeen castles and hundreds of staff, she’s a little more interested. But, alas, he sells toilets for a living and the relationship ends before it really begins! It’s quite a silly side plot, but quite entertaining as well.

Katie was played by Ciara Bravo. After Big Time Rush, Bravo went on to appear as Emma Chato in the FOX series Red Band Society (2014-15) and was cast as Mary Smith in the FX series A Teacher (2020). Most recently, Bravo appeared as Tina in Season 2 of the Roku series Most Dangerous Game (2020-23), and was cast alongside Tom Holland, playing the character Emily, in the film Cherry (2021). Mrs. Knight was played by Challen Cates, who currently seems to be running a winery, Challen Winery.

Then there are Gustavo Rocque, the band’s music producer, and Kelly Wainwright, his assistant. Gustavo is quite a highly strung person, and unfortunately because Big Time Rush seem to attract chaos, they do not make Gustavo any calmer! Kelly is the more level-headed one, generally taking Big Time Rush’s trouble-making ways in her stride, although the events of Big Time Movie test both of them. Gustavo and Kelly specifically tell the boys not to leave their hotel room so they don’t get involved in any mess, so they are completely shocked to find the boys are nowhere to be seen, risking the cancellation of the whole world tour. To make things worse for Gustavo and Kelly, they are directly pulled in to the havoc, as they are interrogated and “tortured” by MI6, as MI6 believe that Gustavo and the boys are planning to really take over the world, after hearing footage of Gustavo saying that they will conquer Europe. This was all metaphorical, of course, in relation to hopes their tour will be a success, but instead of getting an apology from MI6, Gustavo and Kelly are simply dumped in a field and have to make their own way to the concert. What a bad day for them…

Stephen Kramer Glickman was cast as Gustavo Rocque. After the series ended, he went on to co-host the comedic podcast series The Night Time Show (2015-present). He also voiced Ned in the animated movie White Fang (2018). Kelly was played by Tanya Chisholm, who recently was cast as Jenna in Season 4 of Tyler Perry’s series Sistas (2019-present). She also recently appeared as Holly in the Hallmark movie Dial S for Santa (2023). Chisholm might look familiar to Disney fans as she played Jackie, one of Sharpay’s entourage in High School Musical 2 (2007).

MUSIC

Th majority of the music that can be heard in Big Time Movie should sound familiar to fans of The Beatles because the songs on the official Big Time Movie soundtrack are covers of famous Beatles songs, all written by John Lennon and Paul McCartney.

I’m going to be honest and say that I am not a fan of The Beatles. I understand that they are a huge part of the music industry as a whole and that they are massively important specifically to the British music scene, but I don’t actively seek out their music to listen to, and have only heard their songs randomly, like on screen or on the radio. It’s nothing personal; I just wasn’t born at the right time.

Because of this, I like Big Time Rush’s versions of these songs and prefer them to the originals. I’m sure many fans of The Beatles, though, would not enjoy these covers. Big Time Rush admitted themselves that they were nervous about doing the covers, but wanted to pay homage to the legendary band. The Big Time Movie soundtrack was released on 6^th March 2012, ahead of the movie’s premiere on 10^th March[1]. The movie also features some songs from the band’s second album Elevate which was released in November 2011, and some from their first album BTR, released in October 2010.

The first song to be heard in Big Time Movie is “Help!”, which plays during the opening spy sequence. It begins immediately as the captured princess is about to cry “help”. Funny about that, it’s like it was planned. This sequence and song set up the audience to get ready to watch a spy-inspired movie. “Help!” was first released in 1965, this being the title song of The Beatles’ film of the same name. “Can’t Buy Me Love” is the next Beatles song to be heard, as it is used for the scene when Big Time Rush are escaping from Hammer-Arm and Moon’s other henchmen who have followed them into the city. This song was released in 1964 and was part of the album A Hard Day’s Night.

Following on from that is my favourite song in the soundtrack, “We Can Work It Out”. This is played as the band are trying to get through Hyde Park to their soundcheck without being spotted by the police, screaming fans, or Moon’s men, so obviously, they are in weird disguises to do that, with mixed results. But they also appear in all black outfits at one point, which I believe is referencing a performance of this song by The Beatles. I can’t work out what the umbrellas and bicycles the band play about with during this scene mean though, other than I’ve seen images of The Beatles holding umbrellas and riding bicycles for photoshoots. Big Time Rush begin this song by stepping onto the “Abbey Road” crossing – except it’s not the real one – in that iconic pose. “We Can Work It Out” was originally released by The Beatles in 1965. Then there is “Revolution” which can be heard during the fight scene at Moon’s castle, when Big Time Rush and Penny Lane manage to foil his plan. This song is “foreshadowed” as Moon says a few times just before it about being ready for a revolution. This song was originally released in 1968.

The final Beatles song to appear in the movie is “A Hard Day’s Night”, this being Big Time Rush’s first song in their concert set at Hyde Park that evening, referencing the difficult day they’ve just had. This song was recorded in 1964 for The Beatles album of the same name. The other song on the official Big Time Movie soundtrack is “I Wanna Hold Your Hand”, which does not appear in the movie, although the band did perform this at some tour shows. The Beatles recorded this song in 1963.

But The Beatles covers aren’t the only songs to appear in Big Time Movie; they had to use some of their own music. During the Hyde Park concert, Big Time Rush follow “A Hard Day’s Night” with the song “Elevate”, which is from the band’s second album of the same name. This song was written by Damon Sharpe, Johnny Powers Severin, James Maslow, and Eric Sanicola. You can also hear “Big Time Rush”, from the band’s first album BTR, and “Music Sounds Better With U”, from their second album, performed as part of Gustavo and Kelly’s torture scene. “Big Time Rush” is played towards the end of the film. It was written by Matthew Gerrard, Charlie Midnight, and Jay Landers. I thought I heard “Music Sounds Better With U” in the background near the end of the movie as the guys are told by Gustavo they can finally go sightseeing after their concert too. “Music Sounds Better With U” had many contributors including Ryan Tedder, Noel Zancanella, and Big Time Rush.

Finally, within the credited songs, you can hear “Any Kind of Guy” from the album BTR, and “Famous”, which is also on the same album, although not in some countries. It was not on the UK CD of BTR that I bought anyway. These songs were written by Matthew Gerrard, Charlie Midnight, and Jay Landers; and Desmond Child and Andreas Michael Carlsson, respectively. An instrumental clip of “Any Kind of Guy” is used when Gustavo and Kelly go to Big Time Rush’s hotel room with the tour promoter and find them gone. A small snippet of “Famous” is heard just as Big Time Rush get the idea to have MI6 take them to their concert via helicopter. It is then followed by an instrumental version of “Big Time Rush” as they actually get on stage.

There are also two snippets of uncredited songs that can be found in Big Time Movie. One is “Rule Britannia”, composed by Thomas Arne and James Thomson, which can be heard as the band are about to land in London and their plane flies over sights of the city. The second is “Brandenburg Concerto #3 1^st Movement” by Bach, which is played during Katie and her mother’s afternoon tea. It may also be the classical music playing in the background whilst they are in the hotel lobby, but I’m not sure.

Finally, Guy Moon is credited as the composer on Big Time Movie. Moon was also the composer on other Nickelodeon programming, such as Danny Phantom (2004-07); the Fairly Odd movie trilogy (2011-14); and, of course, the Big Time Rush series.

Just as a warning, I watched Big Time Movie on DVD, however, I also watched parts of the movie on Paramount Plus, where I noticed that not all of the songs within the movie are played in full. This is probably a licensing issue and I’m unsure if this affects every country where Paramount Plus is available.

PRODUCTION

Big Time Rush, as a television show for Nickelodeon, officially began with its first season on 18^th January 2010, having been created by Scott Fellows, who had previously created the series Ned’s Declassified School Survival Guide (2004-07), also for Nickelodeon. The official series debut on the evening of 18^th January set a new record for a Nickelodeon series, becoming the highest-rated and most-watched live-action premiere of a series for the channel with 6.8 million viewers[2]. It seems that this record has not been beaten in the years since. The first season ran until 20^th August 2010 and consisted of twenty episodes.

A two-part pilot episode, “Big Time Audition”, first aired on 28^th November 2009. This pilot introduced audiences to the four members of Big Time Rush and saw them get the opportunity to go to Los Angeles to start a band, having originally just been four guys from Minnesota. This set up the premise of the show, which followed the band through their time adjusting to new lives in California, and took viewers through the band’s journey from unknowns to international fame.

Supposedly, the four characters within Big Time Rush were written to be similar to the actual personalities of the actors and singers. However, I never really saw that, and interviews with the band, both then and now, only add to my feeling about that. Of the four of them, I think Kendall was the most like his character, but that’s really only because Kendall in the show was the steady, sensible one. Obviously, I don’t know them so I can’t actually comment, but it was quite clear to me that they were playing characters in a show after watching interviews with them as a real band. That’s probably a good thing really!

Speaking of Kendall, did you know that in an unaired pilot for a series to be called Brand New Day Kendall was replaced with a different actor? Big Time Rush could’ve been a very different series if this pilot had been greenlit. Instead, although Brand New Day was set to feature James, Carlos, and Logan, there was no Kendall, because the actor playing the fourth member of Big Time Rush was Curt Hansen; his character was called Curt Knight.

Based on the few clips and snippets of information I have found about this unaired pilot, it would seem that the plot of the pilot was more or less the same as “Big Time Audition”, with Gustavo Rocque plucking the boys out of Minnesota to take them to California to make them stars. But, outside of Curt not being Kendall, there were a couple of other differences. One was that Curt’s sister was not little Katie, but was actually a teenager. Another was that, at the end of the episode, Big Time Rush had to perform to Griffin, Gustavo’s boss, to convince him that the band could continue. In the aired pilot, they perform “Big Time Rush”, the series’ theme song, however, in the unaired pilot, they sang “This is Our Someday”[3]. That would’ve been the only thing from the unaired pilot that I would’ve liked kept because that’s my favourite Big Time Rush song, but even just from watching clips of the unaired pilot that surfaced online, it didn’t feel right without Kendall.

Since this version of the pilot was never released to the public, there hasn’t been anything publicly stated by the band or the creators of the show about why Curt was replaced with Kendall. Just because fans want to know why doesn’t mean they ever need to, or will, find out. It has been said that the reason was simply that Curt looked too much older than the other three and he sounded too much like James, so a lack of talent was not the issue here, especially as Curt Hansen went on to perform the role of Fiyero in the Broadway musical Wicked, both on Broadway and in touring productions. Hansen’s story with Big Time Rush also did not end with the unaired pilot as he appeared as the character Dak Zevon, a clear parody of Zac Efron, in two episodes of Season 1 of Big Time Rush.

After the success of Season 1, a second season began shortly after the first one finished. Season 2 consisted of 29 episodes, starting on 25^th September 2010 and ending on 28^th January 2012. This was my favourite season of the show, though I did only watch the first two in full. They’d sorted out James’ hair in this season; I appreciated it.

Just under two months after Season 2 ended, Big Time Movie was set to premiere. This movie would continue the storyline of the series which had ended with discussions about Big Time Rush going on a world tour. London was their first stop on this tour.

Big Time Movie was written by Scott Fellows, the creator of the series, which makes sense for continuity. It was directed by Savage Steve Holland, who had directed multiple episodes of Big Time Rush, including the pilot “Big Time Audition”. For Nickelodeon, Holland had directed episodes of other series including Zoey 101 (2005-08) and Fellows’ Ned’s Declassified School Survival Guide; as well as Nickelodeon movies such as A Fairly Odd Movie: Grow Up, Timmy Turner! (2011), a live-action/animated continuation of The Fairly OddParents (2001-17), co-written by Scott Fellows and Butch Hartman. Holland had also previously directed for Disney, with the Disney Channel Original Movie Stuck in the Suburbs (2004) and several episodes of Lizzie McGuire (2001-04) and Phil of the Future (2004-06).

I don’t want to ruin anyone’s illusions about Big Time Movie, but I should say that, despite being set in London, it was not filmed there. Gasp! Like many television movies, especially those meant to be set in the UK, Big Time Movie was filmed in British Columbia, Canada. Production tried their best to make Big Time Movie look like London, but some might’ve noticed a few misrepresentations and misunderstandings of the city, such as Kendall continuously referring to the London Eye as “the giant Ferris wheel”, which I would’ve expected Logan to have corrected him on, and how I have never seen a “London Information Kiosk” interactive screen on the streets of London. There are others but the real thing to bother me, because I’m a bit of a royalist, is that the Earl of Sandwich claimed to be third in line to the throne. In 2012, Prince Harry was actually third in line to the throne, as Prince George was not born until 2013. The Earl of Sandwich, an actual title currently held by Luke Montagu, the 12^th Earl of Sandwich, is way down the line of succession. These were obviously not meant to be factual, more for comedy or story purposes, but it’s always good to correct misconceptions, just in case. I don’t want anyone going to London and being disappointed that there are no information kiosks for them to Google stuff – because we don’t have phones that can do that now or anything…

Anyway, one of the locations used to film Big Time Movie was Hatley Castle, which was the setting for Moon’s castle, and the evil villain’s castle at the start of the film. It has been used for various other productions. For example, Hatley Castle was the setting for Auradon Prep, the school in Disney Channel’s Descendants film series. It is also the home to X-Mansion in some movies within the X-Men and Deadpool film franchises[4].

Since Big Time Movie was being promoted as “Austin Powers meets James Bond with Beatles songs”, some level of stunts was needed in the movie. In some cases, the stuntmen had to do the work for the actors or other methods were used, such as a dummy being thrown from the top of the stairs in Moon’s mansion at the point that James is meant to be crashing down onto him. Kendall also did not actually drive the Aston Martin his character is driving at the beginning as he couldn’t drive “stick shift”. However, in others, Big Time Rush got to do their own stunts. For instance, Carlos was allowed to drive the dirt bike that his character is riding at the start of the movie, at least for some shots, and James, whose character jumps out of a plane during that opening sequence, did perform his own stunt here, jumping around ten feet down onto crash mats.

Big Time Rush got to work with some big names whilst filming Big Time Movie. For example, their stunt coordinator was Garvin Cross, who had just worked in the stunt department on Inception (2010) at the time, and their costume designer was Angus Guthrie, who won the Oscar for Best Costume Design on Moulin Rouge! (2001)[5].

RECEPTION

Big Time Movie premiered on 10^th March 2012 on Nickelodeon in the US. It was later released on Nickelodeon in other countries over the next few months. It premiered in the UK on 26^th May 2012, for example. During its first weekend, Big Time Movie reached around 13 million total viewers in the US, with the primetime premiere averaging 4.1 million viewers[6].

Big Time Movie and its director Savage Steve Holland were nominated at the 65^th Directors Guild of America Awards for outstanding directorial achievement in the Children’s Program category, but lost out to Paul Hoen who directed Disney Channel’s Let It Shine (2012). That’s just a tad bit awkward for Nickelodeon to lose out to its biggest rival channel!

In terms of reviews for Big Time Movie, these were mostly positive from fans of the television series, who were the target audience for the movie. It was a good extension of the storyline, since having a band go on to do a world tour is a natural progression in their career, and it involved the same silly humour that the programme was known for. Many appreciated the references to James Bond movies as well as The Beatles. The covers of Beatles songs were also considered to be good, according to fans of Big Time Rush. The movie also only has a runtime of just over an hour, so it’s perfect for children to focus on However, a movie cannot limit who sees it only to those who should like it, so, there are negative comments online about Big Time Movie too. The majority of these state that the acting and plot of the movie are awkward and cringey, likely because the viewer was not part of the target demographic at the time of watching. When I was nineteen, I didn’t find Big Time Movie cringey at any point, but watching it as an adult, I did at times, so it’s a fair comment to make, but Big Time Movie was never aiming to be Oscar-worthy material.

Unsurprisingly, other reviews focused on the fact that Big Time Movie was seen to be ripping off The Beatles, both through their covers of popular Beatles songs, as well as through the plot of Big Time Movie. Although there is nothing overly similar in the plots of Big Time Movie and The Beatles films like A Hard Day’s Night (1964) and Help! (1965), the silly humour and antics that happen during everyday band life did feature in those Beatles movies. These movies did, however, inspire the series The Monkees (1966-68), which, in turn, inspired the making of Big Time Rush. So, to say “rip-off” is harsh, and “influenced by” is more appropriate.

I also read a few comments saying that the movie was “offensive”. I’m not quite sure who would be offended by Big Time Movie. Perhaps British people because it used some stereotypical characters and misunderstanding of British life, although I’m British and didn’t find it at all offensive. Inaccurate, yes, but offensive, no. The only thing that perhaps could be deemed offensive is the Japanese “torture” scene, where Kelly and Gustavo are tortured by a Japanese man singing Big Time Rush songs at MI6. Torture methods shouldn’t be made light of, so this was a slightly awkward attempt at humour, but I can see the intent behind it, to actually mock Big Time Rush themselves and not Japan. Some accents in this movie might also be classed as “offensive”, but mostly bad accents are just funny.

LEGACY

After Big Time Movie was released, Season 3 of Big Time Rush premiered on Nickelodeon shortly afterwards, on 12^th May 2012. This ran across twelve episodes ending on 9^th November 2012, and used many of the songs from Big Time Rush’s second album, Elevate. Season 4 of Big Time Rush then aired from 2^nd May 2013 to 25^th July 2013 and consisted of thirteen episodes. This time, music from the band’s third album 24/Seven, released in June 2013, was used throughout the season.

It would appear that the cast of the Big Time Rush series knew that Season 4 would be their last, probably because the main four were in their mid-twenties by this point and no doubt wanted to get on with their own careers. The band breaking up after releasing their third album was even a plot point in Season 4 Episode 11 “Big Time Break Out”, so that’s even more evidence that the show was coming to a conscious end. Season 4 ended with a two-part special called “Big Time Dreams”. In this episode, Big Time Rush were nominated for five awards at the Tween Choice Awards – an obvious nod to Nickelodeon’s own Kids’ Choice Awards, complete with slime, or, in this case “goop”. However, they couldn’t enjoy the ceremony as they were pulled into an evil plot whereby the award ceremony’s sponsor was trying to hypnotise the world into wanting to eat his mac and cheese product all the time. With help from Alexa PenaVega, playing a fictionalised version of herself as an actual “spy kid”, Big Time Rush foil the plan and make it on stage just in time to perform and receive their award for “Awesomest Song”. The episode ends with all the boys achieving their dreams: Logan to find the “goop” room at the awards show; James to become “official” with his girlfriend, Lucy; Kendall to have the band be a success, together; and Carlos to finally get a girlfriend, this being Alexa PenaVega, his real-life girlfriend at the time.

Although “Big Time Dreams” was quite a cute episode, it didn’t feel like a fitting ending to the whole show. Some comments online found this to be a disappointing finale, feeling that it basically took the plot of Big Time Movie, the events of which the boys didn’t even mention during the episode. Many did like the last few moments of the episode though, with the band’s performance “We Are”, as well as seeing clips from the best moments of the show playing on a screen behind them.

After Big Time Rush the show ended, the band completed a final tour, their Live World Tour, in February 2014. The band then broke up, seemingly forever. Throughout their time on television and in the music industry, the show and the band had won multiple awards at the Kids’ Choice Awards. Big Time Rush won Favorite International TV Show at the Kids’ Choice Awards in Mexico in 2011; Argentina in 2013; and Colombia in 2014. The band won Favorite Music Group at the US Kids’ Choice Awards in 2012 and the Fan Army award in 2013. The band also won Favorite International Group in Argentina in 2012, Mexico in 2013, and Colombia in 2014. The show was even nominated for Best International TV Show at the BAFTA Children’s Awards in 2010.

But Big Time Rush were over, giving the guys the freedom to do whatever they wanted in their lives in the meantime. However, in 2020, with the COVID-19 pandemic stressing out much of the world, Big Time Rush reunited momentarily to release an acoustic version of their popular song “Worldwide”.

That could’ve been where the band left their reunion, crushing the dreams of many fans, but they did not stop there because in 2021 Big Time Rush officially announced that they were reuniting, by going on tour. This was the Forever Tour which began in Washington D.C. on 23^rd June 2022 and spanned many areas of the US, as well as some cities in South America, becoming their first headline tour in nearly a decade. It ended in Rio de Janeiro on 5^th March 2023. And that was not all. In June 2023, Big Time Rush released their fourth album Another Life and went on tour again, the Can’t Get Enough Tour, visiting areas of the US, Canada, and Mexico during the summer of 2023.

This was then followed by a UK and Europe Tour which took place in June 2024. They went to cities like Berlin, Paris, Madrid, London, and Manchester. In October of that year, the band went to Australia and Asia for another mini-tour, heading to places like Sydney, Melbourne, Singapore, and Manila. The band’s most recent fan event was Big Time Rush on Ice which was their Christmas 2024 event, held in Bridgeport, Connecticut.

2025 is going to be just as exciting for fans, as the band announced a new world tour on 20^th February 2025, named the In Real Life Worldwide tour, with dates starting in cities across the US from July 2025, going until the end of August, before the band head off to Europe in November 2025, visiting cities across the continent, like Berlin, Milan, Barcelona, Paris, London, and Athens, until the tour ends in December. It was also announced that Katelyn Tarver and Stephen Kramer Glickman, both of whom starred in the Big Time Rush series as Jo and Gustavo respectively, will be joining the band on their tour.

There has also been some discussion around a new Big Time Rush movie being in the early stages of development, which potentially could feel similar to Zoey 102 (2023), the reunion movie for Zoey 101, though hopefully a Big Time Rush reunion will be more accomplished than Zoey 102…

FINAL THOUGHTS

In all honestly, the, for want of a better word, bullying that I experienced during my first year at university around my love for Big Time Rush did somewhat taint the show and the band for me. I only watched a few episodes of Big Time Rush Season 3 before giving up and moving on with my life.

Over the years, I have felt somewhat cheated out of experiences that real Rushers – their fandom name – got to experience. I missed out on Big Time Rush’s third album; I never got to see the finale episode of the television series live; and I didn’t get to see Big Time Rush reunite around 2021. I wasn’t even aware that the band had got back together until a few months ago. Obviously, I can go back and find these moments online now, but it might’ve been nice to live through them with everyone else.

But I really need to move past that, and this week, by researching Big Time Movie, I’ve managed to get closure on that chapter in my life because I got to go back and look at old interviews, clips of past episodes, old songs, and new music. It was a lot of fun.

Big Time Rush will always have a special place in my heart and, although I can’t count myself as an official Rusher, I wish the guys nothing but the best for the future, either with the band or in their solo projects. I look forward to seeing what they do next.

REFERENCES

[1] Credit: Jason Lipshutz, ‘Exclusive: Listen To Big Time Rush’s ‘Big Time Movie’ Soundtrack’, Billboard.com, 29^th February 2012.

[2] Credit: Nickelodeon, ‘Nickelodeon Scores Record-Breaking Night with Brand-New iCarly and Big Time Rush Debut’, PRNewsWire.com, 19^th January 2010.

[3] Credit: Author Unknown, ‘Brand New Day (partially found pitch pilot of “Big Time Rush” Nickelodeon musical comedy series; 2007)’, LostMediaWiki.com, date unknown.

[4] Credit: Hatley Park, ‘Over 80 years of filming’, HatleyPark.ca, date unknown.

[5] Credit: Nickelodeon, ‘Behind the Scenes – Big Time Movie – Photoshoot’, MafeHD YouTube Channel, 5^th March 2012.

[6] Credit: Nickelodeon, ‘Nickelodeons “Big Time Movie” Scores Top Spot for the Week With Kids and Tweens and Reaches 13 Million Total Viewers’, TheFutonCritic.com, 13^th March 2012.

The Disney Purist

Film Review Site

Month / Feb 2025

Go Figure (2005)

BACKGROUND

PLOT

CHARACTERS & CAST

MUSIC

PRODUCTION

RECEPTION

LEGACY

FINAL THOUGHTS

REFERENCES

Minutemen (2008)

BACKGROUND

PLOT

CHARACTERS & CAST

MUSIC

PRODUCTION

RECEPTION

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Big Time Movie (2012)

BACKGROUND

PLOT

CHARACTERS & CAST

MUSIC

PRODUCTION

RECEPTION

LEGACY

FINAL THOUGHTS

REFERENCES