Movie reviews: Hollywood and Indie, specializing in independent comedies, dramas, thrillers and romance.
Thursday, November 27, 2025
Sidelined 2: Intercepted: Movie Review
Relationship growth: More simplicity, less predictability.
Good relationships deserve sequels. There is certainly a simplicity and predictability to the first Sidelined: The QB and Me, but there’s also strong chemistry so it’s easy to see why the movie and Dallas and Drayton are so well liked. The plot of Sidelined 2: Intercepted sounds eerily similar to The Kissing Booth 2 in all the wrong ways, but it sidestepped so many easy mistakes that it’s surprisingly better even though its simplicity is more of a downfall this time.
Year
Directed by: Justin Wu
Screenplay by: Crystal Ferreiro
Based on the story by Tay Marley
Starring: Siena Agudong, Noah Beck, and Charlie Gillespie
When we left Drayton (Noah Beck) and Dallas (Siena Agudong) they were happily in love attending different colleges in the same city. And that’s exactly where we pick up, confident that the distance really isn’t that far and that they are destined to be together so they can get through anything. Meanwhile Drayton has football practice and Dallas has to get a job and time becomes more complicated, eventually leading to Drayton getting injured and meeting a hot new personal trainer and Dallas’s boss is a hot musician who shares her artistic dreams.
The first major sidestep is that there is no cheating, no accusations or even suspicions of cheating. I don’t know if this generation is just that cool and mature or if it’s just these characters, but that is refreshing. Of course that’s not to say the new potential flames don’t cause their own problems. Drayton is bizarrely misogynistic towards his new PT assistant who works for the football team – it’s good that they stopped that cold pretty early, but that’s also partly because Drayton is a terrible patient during his injury recovery. It’s not surprising, but it does bear repeating how terrible of a patient he is. One example of why the film’s simplicity does not work in its favour.
Dallas’s new potential beau is more interesting than Drayton’s. Skyler is played by Charlie Gillespie and has all of the boyish charm the actor is famous for. Charming enough for some audience members to switch allegiances, not charming enough for Dallas. It’s obvious Skyler likes her, she mostly ignores it. It’s easy to see Dallas’s appeal – Siena Agudong is ridiculously hot and she’s a cute and confidant woman. Drayton, on the other hand, after he rudely and misogynistically insults his PT, Charlotte, she then dresses up like a slutty chef and throws herself at him. This is supposed to be a professional woman who works for USC’s football team, the good news is that she gets rejected and hopefully gets fired.
The main theme of the movie is chasing your dreams, but that’s too simplistic; the strength of the movie is how it handles Dallas and Drayton’s relationship. It’s not one thing or two things but a whole bunch of things that gradually tears them apart. I’m not going to say too much more other than their relationship isn’t nearly as predictable as the first one and there is plenty of room for growth or at least different plot directions for Sidelined 3 (which presumably, hopefully, is already in the works).
