#realityhigh (2017)
Directed by Fernando Lebrija
No — #realityhigh is not woke, scoring 16 out of 100 on our wokeness meter.
#realityhigh arrives as a 2017 Netflix teen comedy with a hashtag in its title, which functions as a mild warning label.
Consciousness Markers
The lead is a Black actress (Nesta Cooper) with a Black romantic interest (Keith Powers) and a diverse supporting cast, but the film never comments on race or frames this as a representational statement.
The film mildly satirizes the emptiness of influencer consumerism and high-cost shopping/partying, but it is a lifestyle critique rather than an economic one.
The film delivers a soft moral about staying true to friends over popularity, but it is delivered through plot rather than preachy monologue.
A female protagonist navigates mean-girl rivalry and social-media bullying, but the film treats this as generic teen-comedy material rather than advancing any feminist argument.
The cast is racially mixed, yet race is never a subject of the story or dialogue.
No LGBTQ+ characters or themes appear anywhere in the plot.
No environmental or climate content whatsoever.
No body-positivity themes; the plot in fact hinges on Dani 'looking hot' to gain status.
No neurodivergent characters or themes are present.
No historical subject matter to revise.
Why it received this score
#realityhigh arrives as a 2017 Netflix teen comedy with a hashtag in its title, which functions as a mild warning label. Dani Barnes studies hard, volunteers at a dog clinic, and pines for Cameron, a popular boy currently attached to Alexa, a social media celebrity with a large following and a mean streak. Alexa discards Cameron, befriends Dani, and pulls her into a Southern California circuit of expensive shopping and partying. Dani neglects her best friend Freddie, embarrasses herself in public, gets branded a stalker in a viral video, then repairs the damage in time for a beach bonfire. The machinery is familiar and the film runs it without friction.
The cast is racially mixed, and the central romance pairs a Black actress with a Black leading man. The film treats this as unremarkable, which carries its own quiet value. Nothing in the screenplay comments on it, and no character is asked to carry a thesis. The satire aims at influencer emptiness, at the price of the clothes and the parties, and it lands a few soft jabs at a lifestyle that rewards looking hot and posting about it. This is a critique of taste, not of economics. The film is not angry at anyone's bank account.
The moral arrives through plot: keep the honest friend, ignore the follower count. No character halts the story to explain the lesson, and for that small mercy we can be grateful. Dani's arc is framed almost entirely around appearance, so the film's notion of growth amounts to a wardrobe correction. The result is a mild, watchable, deeply conventional comedy that knows what it wants and wants very little. It will not trouble anyone's evening, and it will not trouble the culture.
Analysis generated by our Consciousness Algorithm
Synopsis
When nerdy high schooler Dani finally attracts the interest of her longtime crush, she lands in the cross hairs of his ex, a social media celebrity.
Questions about #realityhigh
Is #realityhigh woke?
No — #realityhigh is not woke, scoring 16 out of 100 on our wokeness meter. That earns it a verdict of Ultra Based.
Does #realityhigh have any woke elements?
1 of the 10 markers register at 30 or above, led by Representation Casting (48). On Representation Casting: The lead is a Black actress (Nesta Cooper) with a Black romantic interest (Keith Powers) and a diverse supporting cast, but the film never comments on race or frames this as a representational statement.
How does #realityhigh compare to other 2017 movies?
It ranks #114 of the 309 films from 2017 we've scored; their average is 19. The wokest is I Am Not Your Negro (92).
How is the Woke Score calculated?
An AI-assisted process researches the film and its reception, scores it 0–100 on ten markers, then combines those into one 0–100 Woke Score. It measures a specific set of 2020s cultural themes, not film quality.