Warning: Spoilers for 2024's Mean Girls!

Summary

• The Mean Girls movie musical released in 2024 exists in a "multiverse" alongside the original Mean Girls, with all versions of the characters and events coexisting without affecting each other.
• Tina Fey views her and Tim Meadows' reprisals of their original characters as older versions of themselves in the new Mean Girls, but virtually every other aspect of the 2024 film contradicts the possibility of a shared universe.
• Lindsay Lohan's cameo in Mean Girls 2024 complicates the idea of a shared universe, as she plays a different character and references events from the original movie, preventing both films from existing in either an isolated or shared universe.

2024's Mean Girls movie musical is essentially a modern-day version of 2004's Mean Girls, but whether the new and original Mean Girls movies exist in the same universe is not so simple. Inspired by Rosalind Wiseman's 2002 book Queen Bees and Wannabees, the 2004 teen comedy Mean Girls was the first iteration of the iconic tale of Cady Heron, the Plastics, and the unique cruelty of teen girl bullying. Years later, original Mean Girls writer and star Tina Fey decided to adapt the 2004 movie into a stage musical, which premiered in 2017.

In early January 2024, the film adaptation of the Mean Girls stage musical was released, with Angourie Rice starring as Cady Heron and Reneé Rapp as Regina George. The Mean Girls movie musical makes changes to the original Mean Girls in order to set it in the present-day, but overall, it's a pretty close remake, just with musical numbers. With all these versions of Mean Girls now in existence, it's hard to tell if 2024's Mean Girls is meant to take place in the same universe as 2004's Mean Girls.

Mean Girls 2024 Connection To The First Movie Is More Like A Multiverse

According to Fey (via Entertainment Weekly), Mean Girls 2024 exists alongside 2004's Mean Girls in a sort of Mean Girls "multiverse."​​ Rather than occurring in a fully shared universe or a completely separate one, all versions of the same characters and events exist simultaneously without interfering with the canonicity of any other story world. Fey compares the Mean Girls multiverse to the Spider-Man multiverse, aka the Spider-Verse, in which every version of the Marvel superhero exists simultaneously and is connected through their shared property.

Fey's multiverse perspective aligns with her and Tim Meadows' role reprisals as North Shore High math teacher Ms. Norbury and Principal Duvall, respectively, in Mean Girls 2024. Fey views these now-married characters as merely older versions of the same characters from the original Mean Girls, who are still working at the same school 20 years later. This could still be feasible if the two movies existed in the same universe, but virtually every other aspect of 2024's Mean Girls derails the possibility of a shared Mean Girls universe.

As Fey notes, Ms. Norbury and Principal Duvall could still be working at the school "without breaking the universe" because they're the only original characters played by the same actors. However, despite its Gen Z-related updates, Mean Girls 2024 still has the same core story premise and characters as the original Mean Girls. If Ms. Norbury and Principal Duvall did experience the events of both Mean Girls movies, this particular multiverse somehow features the same versions of Fey and Meadows' characters from 2024 in a separate universe.

How Lindsay Lohan's Mean Girls 2024 Cameo Complicates A Shared Universe

Lindsay Lohan's surprise cameo in Mean Girls 2024 is another major detail that complicates both Mean Girls movies existing in the same universe. Toward the end of the new Mean Girls, Lohan appears as the for the Mathletes competition. She is not reprising her original role as an older Cady here because it would conflict with the already existing Cady in this movie. However, the same actor from 2004's Mean Girls playing a different character in the Mean Girls musical would conflict with both movies' canons in a shared universe.

Clearly, a shared Mean Girls universe is impossible, but a completely separate one isn't entirely plausible either. Lohan simply playing a different character in the new Mean Girls would make sense in a separate universe, but her appearance is just one of many nods to the original Mean Girls. Other Mean Girls references and Easter eggs in 2024's Mean Girls complicate rather than the prospect of two separate Mean Girls universes.

For instance, Lohan's new character notes that only one other tie has ever occurred in the history of the Mathletes competition, insinuating that the events of the first movie took place in the new movie's past. Even though they're meant to serve as winks to the audience more than anything, these intentional callbacks to the original Mean Girls still prevent both movies from wholly existing in either an isolated or shared universe. Ultimately, a Mean Girls multiverse is the only way 2024's Mean Girls can reconcile with the existence of the Mean Girls movie.

Source: Entertainment Weekly