Agatha All Along attracted such a passionate audience that it’s not out of the realm of possibility that the miniseries could get a season 2, or at the very least, carry a number of its characters elsewhere into the MCU. That may or may not include Aubrey Plaza’s Rio Vidal who (spoilers follow), turned out to be Death herself, and Plaza was a big draw for the series ahead of its release.
Now, coming off the finale of Agatha, Aubrey Plaza has landed another critic and fan favorite in the form of her new movie, My Old Ass. It has a 90% critic score with a full 175 reviews in, and a near-identical 89% audience score. Yes, the film was released in some theaters back in September, but as an Amazon Original, it has now arrived on Amazon Prime Video, where you can stream it for free (“free”) if you’re a subscriber. The movie only made $5.7 million worldwide but its widest release was 1,390 theaters. It feels more like something that people would wait to see on a streaming service and well, here we are.
Here’s the synopsis of the film, a unique concept:
“In this fresh coming-of-age story, an 18th birthday mushroom trip brings free-spirited Elliott (Maisy Stella) face-to-face with her wisecracking 39-year-old self (Aubrey Plaza). But when Elliott’s “old ass” starts handing out warnings about what her younger self should and shouldn’t do, Elliott realizes she has to rethink everything about family, love, and what’s becoming a transformative summer.”
I’ve been seeing trailers like this for a while, but something wasn’t computing in my head. Aubrey Plaza is supposed to be this 18 year old girl’s older self far into the future? Isn’t Aubrey Plaza like 25? I guess I am always picturing her in my head as April from Parks and Rec, but Plaza, despite appearing ageless, is now 40. And oops, I’m almost there myself. Time flies, I guess. Here’s some of the top praise for the film:
- Financial Times: “It takes all of Plaza’s weird chanting inflections and Stella’s exuberantly twitchy enthusiasm to make it pay off — but it does, with sly charm.”
- Empire: “Smart, and sharp enough to balance the sweetness of its simple yet profound message. All we have is time, and this film reminds us, movingly, that it matters how we spend it.”
- Chicago Sun-Times: “One of things I love about writer-director Megan Park’s funny and smart and heart-tugging sci-fi comedy/drama/romance is there’s no attempt to explain how it’s possible…it simply happens.”
Megan Park, the writer and director, has mostly been an actress in her career, but this marks her second big film, where her first was The Fallout, an exceptional movie starring Jenna Ortega and Maddie Ziegler about the impact of a school shooting on two young teens. That was really excellent film (91% critic scored if you want to quantify it), and between that and My Old Ass here (a wildly different genre), clearly Park is a huge talent and one to watch as she keeps directing more projects. Watch My Old Ass on Amazon now.
Follow me on Twitter, YouTube, Bluesky and Instagram.
Pick up my sci-fi novels the Herokiller series and The Earthborn Trilogy.
