Brenna and Joe put on a puffy prom dress and rent a tux for their first dip into male protagonist realist YA romance. Unfortunately they selected Steve Bloom's 2016 novel The Stand-In and Chris Nelson's 2019 Netflix adaptation The Perfect Date which not even current It-Boy Noah Centineo can save.

The pair marvel at how badly written and problematic the book is, while acknowledging that it is one of the few texts to actually address wealth & income inequality. They then contrast it with the film, which has removed 95% of the book's problematic aspects, but in the process, has also been scrubbed clean of any and all interesting aspects, leaving behind only a bland and dull text. Also up for discussion is the hilariously bad father/son casting, the ineptness of Bloom's narrative plotting and the legitimate question of who is the target audience?

In homework: Brenna is uncertain about whether The Fosters' spin-off, Good Trouble is worth pursuing, while Joe begrudgingly acknowledges the new KJ Apa YA film on Netflix, The Last Summer.

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