Bring It On – A Cheertastic Recap of All the 2000s Drama and Spirit
If you’re anything like me, Bring It On is pure cinematic comfort food. One look at those peppy cheer routines, the sassy banter, and the colorful cheer uniforms, and I’m instantly transported back to simpler times, a world of frosted lip gloss, butterfly clips, and portable DVD players.
Released in 2000, this movie perfectly captures the cultural quirks of the early 2000s, and honestly, it’s one of those films that just feels like home. I'm not even exaggerating when I say I probably watched this movie at least 100 times on the tiny portable DVD player in my childhood bedroom. Until the disc inevitably got scratched and I could no longer sit through the movie without having to tolerate the glitching.
From the Toros' now infamous red cheerleading uniform to the highly quotable “This is not a democracy; it’s a cheerocracy,” Bring It On has all the essential ingredients of a nostalgic classic. It’s loud, it’s flashy, and the stakes feel high—even if they’re just about making it to nationals with a routine that isn’t stolen.
One of the best parts about Bring It On is how it made cheerleading look both fun and intense at the same time. It's clear that the filmmakers respected cheerleading as a serious sport and wanted to show just how hard these teenagers work to perform on a national level. The movie brought us into a world where cheer isn’t just about smiling and waving pom-poms but about serious athleticism.
Seeing this as a kid, I was convinced I needed my own cheer squad and spent many afternoons in the cul-de-sac attempting routines with friends. I was of course the self proclaimed cheer captain and would spend my afternoons bossing around the little kids in the street while we practiced tricks and made up dance routines. Were they any good? Absolutely not. But we believed we were national contenders.
Bring It On (2000) follows Torrance Shipman, the newly elected cheer captain of the Toros, who’s about to have her whole world turned upside down. During her first practice session as captain of the squad, one of the cheerleaders falls and breaks her leg. Desperate to find a replacement, they host the most iconic auditions in cinema history. Seriously, this audition scene is the blueprint and has been spoofed and recreated by so many films since its release. We have the classical ballerina, the chick who raps, the Broadway guy with a turtleneck who thinks he’s at the Poppins audition, and most memorably: the Sweet Cherry Pie girl.
In walks a grunge girl. Cargo pants. Key chain. Pencil eyeliner. Missy Pantone.
One of the cheerleaders snarkily tells her, “tattoos are strictly forboden,” and Missy rubs it off with her middle finger. She drew it on when she was bored during fourth period. SLAY QUEEN. This scene is ingrained in my brain. The amount of times I tried to draw on a similar pen tattoo to create this scene is in the double digits for sure.
Missy absolutely blows them away with her gymnastic prowess but the girls on the team are nasty towards her so she walks out. Thankfully Torrance manages to convince Missy to join the team but during a practice session and an extremely white-washed version of "brr, it's cold in here," Missy once again storms out of practice.
Torrance follows her and demands to know what her problem is when Missy shows her that the squad’s award-winning routines were stolen. Torrance, unaware of this, is horrified but faces resistance from her team when she suggests creating original routines. They prefer to stick with the routine they've spent months learning, believing it’s their best shot at winning.
The Toros use their stolen routine at a football game, but the Clovers show up and mock them by performing the same routine, but even better. Out of options, the squad needs to change their routine but they only have limited time until regionals.
Torrance is sleeping over at Missy’s house after the game. While she’s brushing her teeth, Missy's brother Cliff walks in and begins brushing his teeth and we get another infamous scene. The toothbrush spit scene. I was so confused watching this scene as a kid because this is not how I brushed my teeth? I didn’t understand why they would brush for 5 seconds and then spit out a massive glob of toothpaste, then brush for 5 seconds and spit out more globs of toothpaste? Who does that? Is it just me or is that weird? Anyway, the sexual tension is building in this scene as the two of them take turns spitting toothpaste into the sink.
The next morning, Torrance calls her douchebag college boyfriend, Aaron, who dismisses her concerns about the stolen routines and suggests hiring choreographer Sparky Polastri. The choreographer is going to cost them $2,000 so they decide to do a carwash.
This scene... This scene!!!
If aliens came down to Earth and asked what the early 2000s was like, I would show them the Bring It On car wash scene. It’s got this retro cam cord vibe to it and they all look like they are having so much fun as they wash the cars. Cliff shows up to the car wash and his car is suspiciously dirty. It’s clear he’s just rocked up to the car wash purely to perv on Torrance. The car wash is a smash hit and they manage to raise the money.
The next scene is the choreographer entering the gym. Cinematic masterpiece. We get a close up of his ridiculous lace up leather boots squeaking on the gym floor as he makes his entrance. “Prepare for domination” comes over the speakers and he breaks out into a ridiculous routine. He then proceeds to walk past the squad, slinging horrendous insults at each of them. It’s disgusting. The film really shows its age here. I understand this guy is meant to come across as a complete dill, but the language used is very icky. He tells everyone on the squad to take what they eat in a day and halve it along with some other extremely fat phobic comments.
It’s regionals time. There are cheerleading squads everywhere. One of the teams is praying, others are marking out their routines, some teams are practicing stunts and some are primping and styling. Missy is looking around in awe at the world of competitive cheerleading that she never knew about.
The Clovers arrive, looking completely badass. They absolutely crush their routine, the stunts are insane and their dance moves are unique. During an interview with Cheer TV, Torrance is answering a question when she hears the familiar intro music of "prepare for domination" echo throughout the stadium and her face drops. Another team is performing the exact routine that they paid the choreographer for. The Toros are up next and they have to perform the exact routine that the judges just watched. It’s horrible and embarrassing. They finish the routine to complete silence and awkwardly run off the stage.
While the Toros still qualify for nationals, their reputation takes a major hit, and Torrance's leadership is questioned by her team, her exasperated parents, and her increasingly condescending boyfriend.
Her boyfriend, Aaron, drops a deflated Torrance home from the competition and gives her a good night kiss. She gets out of the car to see Cliff waiting at her porch with flowers and a mixtape he made for her. He had no idea she had a boyfriend and after seeing the kiss, he leaves heartbroken. It has to be said, it was actually so shitty of Torrance to string Cliff along the way she did. She completely led him on and I don’t blame him for being pissed she didn’t tell him about her boyfriend, even though Aaron is a complete douche.
When two of the catty cheerleaders on the squad, Courtney and Whitney, tell Torrance they are taking over the squad and pulling out of Nationals, this snaps Torrance into gear. She rallies the squad and motivates them, taking control and telling everyone that they are going to work their asses off to come up with a new routine.
We then get an amazing training montage of the squad throwing themselves into learning a new routine. They study swing dance, interpretive dance, mime, martial arts and musicals to get inspiration. It’s a great scene and I love how they show Torrance’s creativity by having her explore different disciplines for inspiration.
Torrance also finally confronts her lying, cheating, pathetic, snake boyfriend and dumps him. Good riddance.
As the Clovers work to secure funding for nationals, Torrance tries to help by securing sponsorship for them. However, Isis rejects the money, insisting the Clovers will succeed without charity. Meanwhile, Cliff distances himself from Torrance after witnessing her and Aaron. Torrance, feeling the weight of her decisions, begins to evolve as a leader and person.
It’s nationals baby! The lead up to this scene is impeccable. The music. The montage of the different teams performing. The iconic cheerleading commentary. It paints the picture that we are in the big leagues now and that the National Cheerleading competition is no joke.
Torrance approaches Isis and gives her a tip about her squad going out of bounds on the mat. It's clear the two of them share a mutual understanding, captain to captain, and Isis tells Torrance one of her cheerleaders is out of time.
First up is the preliminaries. We get a fantastic montage of the squads competing. There are slow-motion scenes of the squads doing their stunts and routine. It feels like watching art. The cheerleading competition scenes were my favorite as a kid and I used to put the DVDs on and just skip to the cheerleading scenes sometimes. It was so nostalgic watching these scenes as an adult.
Both the Toros and the Clovers make it through preliminaries (of course).
Next up is finals.
I loved this scene because they actually show the full routines from each squad. The Clovers are first and absolutely smash it out of the park. One thing I did notice while watching this scene is that Gabrielle Union is concentrating so hard during these scenes that you can see it on her face. I watched an interview where the cast said they actually did all of their own dancing and a lot of their own stunts.
Next up, it's the Toros. Their performance clearly has a lot of different styles interwoven but it works really well. It's clear they've tried to be creative and unique, at odds with the routines their squad previously stole.
The final five teams are on stage, waiting to hear the results. The judges claim that deciding a winner was very difficult because there were two outstanding squads. They announce second place and it's the Toros. For a moment, the squad looks around at each other, unsure of how to react before Courtney says, "second place, hell yeah!" and the squad all begin to celebrate. It's really sweet how excited they are.
First place is announced and it is of course the Clovers, which they absolutely deserved. I remember first watching this and being so surprised that the Clovers won. Not because they didn't deserve the win with their routine, but because Torrance was our protagonist and the story really follows the Toros journey. Up to that point in my life, I hadn't seen a movie where the main character didn't win. Cliff approaches Torrance to congratulate her and she pulls him in for the most aggressive kiss ever. I remember being so grossed out watching this kiss as a kid. I didn't care about the romance and only wanted to see cheerleading.
The movie ends with an iconic performance of "oh Mickey you're so fine" with the Clovers and Toros intercut with bloopers from the movie and the whole cast joining them in dancing to the song. Spectacular way to end the movie. There’s even a clip of the Toros recreating the iconic Dallas Cowboys kick line up. This reference obviously went right over my head as a child but after watching America's Sweethearts: Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders documentary on Netflix I immediately recognized it.
Now I remember watching this movie as a child that after the "oh Mickey" scene, there was another cut scene featuring Torrance, Cliff and Isis at college.
They’re at UC Berkeley and Torrance is wearing the cheerleading uniform, walking hand in hand with Cliff, when they start to kiss. Isis interrupts, telling Torrance this is why she won’t get captain, because she has other priorities. The two of them are at college together, on the same squad, competing for captain. What a GREAT way to end the movie.
When this scene didn’t play during my rewatch, I was confused. Did I make this up? Is this a Mandela Effect? So I googled it and turns out the Bring it On DVD had two endings. One containing the college cut scene and the other containing a clip of Torrance talking to the audience.
I personally thought the college scene was a great ending to the movie and was completely pumped for a sequel featuring Torrance and Isis competing for cheer captain in college. Safe to say, I was disappointed when the sequel, Bring it On Again, took a different direction. But that’s an article for another time.
Overall, I love this film and re-watching it brought back all of the early 2000s nostalgia. Not all of the jokes aged well and its definitely a product of its time, but I really enjoyed revisiting it, and its got some great scenes.
BY JORDAN DRON
from Obsessions Central
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