A star rating of 2 out of 5.
A good idea for a series will take you a long way, and this is an excellent idea. Reviving the character of Elle Woods, made famous by Reese Witherspoon in the hit 2001 movie Legally Blonde, but in a prequel that moves her back in time to just after her 16th birthday, makes perfect sense.
She was always a character trying to break out of her own stereotype and defeat the surface-obsessed snobbery of her peers, so where better to do that than in a classic American high-school setup?
Elle is now played by Lexi Minetree, because Reese Witherspoon is 50 years old… although Minetree herself is in her mid-20s (this show follows the convention of having its high-school characters played by much older actors, who are more reliable/available but eerily unconvincing as teens).
She is a pampered California rich girl living a just-so life of sunshine and money until her father suffers a professional embarrassment and the Woods family is obliged to move to Seattle, a gritty city beset by grey cloud.
As she did in Legally Blonde, Elle has to deal with a lot of people who see her pink, fluffy optimism and wrongly assume that she has no brain. And this is 1995, so grunge is the main Seattle aesthetic.
Visually the show makes the most of the change, switching its colour palette from popping pinks and yellows to sludgy green and brown the moment that Woods arrive in what Elle refers to as “the city God and Gucci forgot”. At school, Woods is given a guide to the different cliques in the cafeteria, but to her they all look the same – monochrome and sullen.
It should be a lot of peppy fun and in the odd moment it is, but the scripts seem to be deliberately half-baked, as if the show isn’t expecting your full attention: the supporting characters are generic and whenever a scene throws up an opportunity to deliver a killer gag, it habitually chooses something only gently amusing instead.
There are just so many moments here that could sing, yet they barely murmur. Elle’s parents, for example: Dad (Tom Everett Scott) is a bumbling softie with a lemony-beige sweater forever draped over his shoulders, and you can imagine what a hoot he’d be if, say, Tina Fey were scripting this. But she’s not, so imagine it you must.
Mom (June Diane Raphael) is the judgemental, interfering poser (with a heart of gold) from whom Elle gets her love of nice things, and she ought to be a riot of catty sideswipes and precisely weaponised cultural references. But again, there’s almost nothing there. Here she’s updating her husband on the renovation of the new house: “Our floors are perfect now! My rug guy took us on that full texture journey!” What?
As you wait in vain for a character or performance that could lift the whole show beyond talking wallpaper, you may amuse yourself by trying to spot anachronisms in the dialogue. Would teenagers in Seattle in 1995 have used the term “social justice”? Possibly, but perhaps not “victim-blaming” and surely not “kills” to describe an item of clothing that looks stylish.
The latter is there in an attempt to make a misunderstanding concerning seminal riot grrrl band Bikini Kill work, but this is one of many, many lines that should have led to the Elle team being locked in the writers’ room for an extra 15 minutes so they could come up with something good rather than make do with the barely acceptable.
Minetree tries to bring the snap needed to make Elle a pleasant enough distraction, but even her character isn’t right. We see flashes of her fearsome intelligence, but she’s not precociously sharp enough to make the dynamic work.
It’s tempting to conclude that the identikit moody teens who think she’s an airhead are not totally wrong. This was a movie spin-off full of potential but TV this bland should be illegal.
Add Radio Times as a Preferred Source on Google
Keep up to date on what’s worth watching with your favourite entertainment news from Radio Times – see more of our exclusive news and interviews featured prominently in Top Stories when using Google.
Elle arrives on Prime Video on 1 July 2026. Sign up for a 30-day free trial of Prime Video and pay £8.99 a month after that.
Check out more of our Comedy coverage or visit our TV Guide and Streaming Guide to find out what’s on. For more TV recommendations and reviews, listen to The Radio Times Podcast.
