13 Going on 30
the rom com lied to us
The romantic comedy reboot is upon us. 13 Going on 30 is back, but this time, Emily Bader of People We Meet on Vacation fame and demigod Logan Lerman will take the reins from Jennifer Garner and Mark Ruffalo. Twenty three years have passed since the original film premiered. Things have changed. I can drive now. I no longer wear diapers. In fact, as of Saturday, I’m as old as Jennifer Garner in the original movie. I’m thirty years old. 13 Going On 30’s magical hook is not so magical at this age. I no longer have braces, Strawberry Shortcake pajamas, nor a romantic obsession with wondering how things will turn out.
As an “adult woman,” the cliché question “Who Will I Be When I Grow Up?” has become more of a Sliding Doors fantasy exercise with depreciating returns. Like, if I’d stuck with tap dance for longer than a year, would I be an ex Dallas Cowboys cheerleader married to a celebrity magician with a ranch outside of Houston? If I’d taken my dad’s advice and studied engineering, would I have bangs and a Roth IRA?
Who’s to say?
At thirteen, I was reading Twilight in secret, drinking chocolate milk over ice, and crushing on Flynn Rider. Yes, the animated character from Tangled. By my romantic logic, this choice made me Rapunzel. I was short a chameleon confidant, yes, but my pet rats counted for something, even if they were giving less Disney Princess and more Corpse Bride.
Mh hm, yes, I had pet rats. Adds up, no? Sit on it. Take it up with my parents. Let’s move on.
At thirteen, I believed that by thirty, I’d move to New York City to… do something VERY big! Like run a bakery and wear expensive clothes! I’d probably be married to Nico from Spanish class who didn’t / doesn’t know I exist. I’d have a big house that I’d pay a lot of people to take care of because that’s what the movies taught me to want; and by my biological clock’s wish, I’d be considering motherhood, if not already a mother. The only thing I got right? New York City.
In hindsight, my New York dream wasn’t original. It could be argued that I stole it right from the plot of 13 Going on 30. But I’m no minority in the Manhattan matter. Moving to New York City to live in a rundown apartment and clomp around in mules (but get blisters) is / was the dream of every woman with an iced coffee walking around my neighborhood at this very second, all of us following in the heeled footsteps of romantic comedy protagonists since the beginning of time. Just like Jennifer Garner’s Jenna Rink and Anne Hathaway’s Andy Sachs, many of us aspired to work at fake Cosmo or fake Vogue in a tall glass building in midtown.
But with the rise of the internet and the fall of attention spans, hardly any of us work in magazines, or for that matter, write for a living wage. In 2026 America, it is nearly impossible to write and pay for the Upper West Side Meg Ryan life without a lawyer partner subsidizing your income, a trust fund, or a second job. Depending on the apartment, you may need all three!
But when I was a teenager, these beloved romantic comedies told me exactly who I would be at thirty and I had no questions! At thirteen, I had it all figured out. I would be a woman that wears heels to work. A woman with a hot British husband who cooks and makes a lot of money doing something very boring that requires very little time. I would be a woman who goes to Paris over the weekend just because. Maybe even a woman with gorgeous hair that never looks bad no matter how cheap my shampoo, no matter how often I fall asleep with it wet.
And if I had kids? It would be an after credits blip! I’d never have to deal with pregnancy, nor childbirth. They’d pop out like little fairies and I’d name them something whimsical like Raphaella and Oliver Twist. I’d never need to worry about childcare and I’d always be hot! By thirty, I’d definitely have a Martha-Stewart-Living-worthy house, a spectacular, creative, high-paying career, a family, and framed black & white photos plastered all over my walls of my wedding to a Hugh Grant lookalike at The Plaza Hotel.
Well, as you may have surmised given my almost weekly presence here on Substack, I have taken a few wrong turns. Today, I am thirty. I’m the youngest thirty I’ll ever be: thirty and two days. And guess what? My life looks nothing like any of the protagonists’ lives in the romantic comedies I loved. I have yet to discover that distinct sanitized sparkle, nor that clumsy-but-lands-on-her-feet splendor I found in the The Devil Wears Prada, Notting Hill, 50 First Dates, When Harry Met Sally, How to Lose A Guy In Ten Days, High Fidelity, The Proposal, You’ve Got Mail- the list goes on!
I have no Hugh Grant, no Fifth Avenue apartment, no magazine salary, no publishing pantsuit, and no 90’s wicker furniture! There isn’t even an office where I do prestigious things like yell at people and be misunderstood while I walk on my treadmill desk! Instead, there is my couch. There are edibles. There are too many emails. And there is a lot of time spent staring out a window.
My thirteen-year-old self would be shocked to know I’ve gotten very good at writing under the influence of mild THC. That I love my bed. That I live across the East River from Manhattan in an apartment with a broken toilet and a lot of dust. That I own one pair of heels and can’t walk in them. That I’m as far from starting a family as one could physically be. That I’m paid to write, but not necessarily the way I imagined, nor the amount I imagined (far from it, Venmo me if you please). And maybe most upsettingly, that I don’t have the closet from Clueless!
I’ve only had two mini menty b’s about how and where I’ve landed at this glorified thirty years of age. This feels par for the course according to those that have come before me. I know many wonderful women living all kinds of fabulous lives that look nothing like their teenage plans. Isn’t that the point? I wanted to marry Nico from Spanish class. Where is he now!? I think spear fishing! Bullet dodged!
My older, wiser friends promise that this age means very little, but they assure me that it’s the start of one of the best decades. The thirties are great according to the millennials and my mom and I believe them. But society wants me to worry. I can feel it. Just this year, my OB transformed into the foreboding older lady in the first act of a horror film when she darkened her tone and told me to “prepare,” because soon, “it’s all downhill hormonally.” Sends a chill down my spine even now…!
Yes, some friends from high school already have three kids. Yes, some friends from college are married to wonderful people, live in beautiful cities, and make lots of money doing consulting. Yes, I’m over here heating up old pizza I stole from a film set for dinner. BUT I have concluded that the problem of Who Will I Be At Thirty? doesn’t lie with me or you. No. We must blame the romantic comedies of yesteryear. I am not thirty and the head of a publishing company. I don’t have access to a helicopter at a moment’s notice and Tom Hanks isn’t coming to save me from myself! Who are these women?! I don’t know them!
Now that I’m a thirty-year-old childless spinster with very little savings, I want a new romantic comedy. No reboots. I want something fresh. I want a romantic comedy where everybody has boundaries and a rent-controlled apartment.
One where your best friend dates a total asshole and then marries him and now he’s at every dinner and every holiday for the rest of time and our protagonist just has to deal with it. He’s vaping and dishing out hot takes but because she loves her friend (his wife), she learns to accept him. And before credits roll, they announce that yes, now they’re pregnant! It’s twins!
We need the romantic comedy where two strangers meet while traveling abroad on a budget. They have a pretty good time but face logistical warfare after multiple flights are canceled. Luckily, all the time together in an airport terminal blossoms into long-lasting love!!
Or maybe a romantic comedy where everybody works on their physical mobility because they work at a desk all day. No neck tension in this one! Everybody’s giving massages. It’s very horny. But helpful! Do the stretches they do! Get a standing desk and your own sexy massage partner!
I want a two lead romantic comedy where one’s an emergency room doctor and it actually affects their relationship. Doctors are fucking busy. And tired! No ambushing one another at work because she’s busy saving lives and tying off sutures. No spontaneous “you were in the neighborhood” sex in the empty exam room because she just performed CPR on a dying man and it didn’t work, so he croaked, and now she needs to emotionally recover, and also, why aren’t you at your own job?! Why is everybody always around to have sex in these movies?! Have you no chores?!
I want to see the romantic comedy where the girl meets the divorced guy on Hinge but he is as good as his pictures promise, and maybe, even better! He’s also been to therapy (for real) and explains that he’s divorced because he married young but has respect for his ex and blames childhood religious trauma for the early marriage. He’s since left the church but acknowledges that his ex-wife helped him get to where he is today, both spiritually and emotionally, and without her, who would he be? But it’s not creepy or upsetting to his new girl. No! It’s sweet and proof that he’s grown! It makes his new girl love him even more because we are all a sum of our experiences, aren’t we?!
I want to see the romantic comedy where everybody has affordable health insurance and makes really good dinner for each other. Alison Roman’s in this one.
How about the romantic comedy where everybody’s house is ugly, their families are freaks, and nobody’s that hot! That’s true love, no?!
Hell, I’d love a Christmas romantic comedy where everybody’s doing fine! Sure, they all decorate the tree together and that’s chaotic, but nobody’s stressed about gifts. Maybe somebody’s Celiac and that’s tough on the group, but in this one, Santa Clause does all the work! But Santa Clause is sexy because it’s Santa’s son who’s filling in for his dad because his dad hasn’t had a Christmas off in a hundred years. Santa’s son is played by Glenn Powell. Santa Glenn falls in love with the sassy, anti-Christmas youngest daughter who will have to choose between moving to the North Pole for love or staying with her cuckoo banana family back in Iowa. Why not both? I can see it now!
All to say, my gears are turning. Here are some other titles to consider. Let me know if any hit for you. I’ll let you guess my favs.
THE NEW ROM COM LIST
13 Going on 35
Zoloft Or Bounce
I Fell For The Beekeeper
The Young Divorce
Ten Ways to Meet IRL
Hopelessly Lactose Intolerant
Landed Our Dream Apartment & It Was Easy!
Found Love in AA
He’s No Ted Bundy
Who Cleaned The House?
The Devil Meets Our Landlord
Francesca & The Frozen Eggs
How Much Sex Is Everybody Having?
In Bed by Ten
One Discounted Weekend at The Palm Springs Ramada
He Looks Like His Pictures
Single But No Mingle
Thirty and Living at Home But Not In A Sundance Movie Way
Real People with Real Jobs
The Sleep Apnea Chronicles
Your Ex Got Married, Now What?
Salvation After Saturn Return
No Children, No Thanks
The One Where Nobody Yells
But He Plays Video Games
Gaga in The Gig Economy
Love at First Doordash
Do Our Taxes & Chill
She Gets to Date The Younger Guy and Nobody Comments On It
Two Drinks, Just Kissing, and a Nap
Thirty, Flirty and Unemployed Because AI
I personally can’t wait for In Bed By Ten. What a week it’s been! If you know somebody else suffering at the hands of the romantic comedy, please feel free to send it their way. Thirty, like any age, is nothing but a number. I think sixty is going to be a total riot!
xx
Em
Unfortunately, it's "I fell for the beekeeper" for me because I simply must know the plot. I was cackling the whole time! Loved this one!
and you need to bring us these scripts! be the working girl's Nora Ephron!