Stream It or Skip It: ‘The Princess Switch: Switched Again’ on Netflix Triples Down on Vanessa Hudgens

Netflix hopes to kickstart another enduring holiday movie franchise with The Princess Switch: Switched Again. Vanessa Hudgens returns as baker Stacy and vaguely European princess Margaret—and this time around, there’s a third lookalike looking to mix things up! The Princess Switch was a big hit for Netflix in 2018, but the streaming service has had diminishing returns with holiday sequels in the past. Is The Princess Switch: Switched Again as much fun as the first film?

THE PRINCESS SWITCH: SWITCHED AGAIN: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

The Gist: When we last left Stacy and Margaret (Hudgens and Hudgens), Stacy was married to Prince Edward of Belgravia (Sam Palladio) and Princess Margaret of Montenaro was dating baker Kevin of Chicago (Nick Sagar). Two years have passed and while Stacy and Edward are living happily in his luxurious Belgravian castle, Margaret and Kevin aren’t in such a good place. The king of Montenaro is dead, the implied victim of a horseback riding accident (a detail hilariously conveyed via a super cute opening animation segment!). With Margaret on track to becoming the queen, the stress got to the couple and she and Kevin called it quits. Now Margaret has a busybody chief of staff (Lachlan Nieboer) angling for some attention and affection. Ugh!

But don’t worry, because Stacy has a plan. She’s gonna invite Kevin and his daughter Olivia (Alexa Adeosun) to Montenaro and hope that she can rekindle their romance in time for the Christmas coronation. There’s just one thing that Stacy—and not even Margaret—can plan for: the arrival of Margaret’s freeloading, socialite, con artist cousin Fiona. And yes, Fiona looks just like Margaret and Stacy! She’s also on a mission: she needs a major payday in order to fund her very early retirement and decades of extravagant partying. Her plan: switch places with the queen in time for the coronation and use her royal power to transfer a ton of money out of the kingdom and into her pocket!

And if you think that’s the only switch going on in this movie, think again! There are twists and swerves in this movie, including one Easter egg that could potentially change the Netflix holiday romcom as we know it.

What Movies Will It Remind You Of?: Obviously you’re gonna get Princess Switch vibes from this one, but there are moments that feel a lot like the A Christmas Prince sequels simply because our once average American protagonist is now royalty in a far away land. And just to keep you guessing, Switched Again even has a tiny dash of Home Alone style shenanigans in its final act.

Performance Worth Watching: It feels obvious to say Vanessa Hudgens since she’s playing a third of the speaking roles in the film, but… you gotta give it to Hudgens as new lookalike Fiona! Hudgens clearly loved chewing all the scenery as Fiona and washing it down with a swig of champagne. Everything about the character, from her British pop trash style to her wild accent, is a delight. Seriously, Hudgens sounds like a British Eartha Kitt in this role, and I loved it. Also notable are her two delightfully dim henchpeople Reggie (Ricky Norwood) and Mindy (Florence Hall). I would watch a Switched Again prequel just about the three of them running successful cons via dumb luck.

Memorable Dialogue: It doesn’t get more iconic than, “Surprise! Now it’s my turn to switch!”

A Holiday Tradition: When Stacy arrives in Montenaro with Kevin and Olivia in tow, queen-to-be Margaret is planning the annual Christmas concert and Christmas ball. She’s not feeling it, though, what with the breakup and unwanted promotion. That’s when we get a delightful decking-the-halls montage as our cast turns the royal palace into a breathtaking Christmas wonderland. Netflix outdid themselves with this production design.

Does the Title Make Any Sense?: Okay—yes, it does, but I’ve always had a problem with The Princess Switch as a title. It should’ve been titled The Christmas Switch, but maybe Netflix avoided that since there are already films titled The Christmas Switch, A Christmas Switch, and Hallmark’s Switched for Christmas (starring two Candace Cameron Bures). There’s even a Holiday Switch, a Lifetime movie starring Nicole Eggert! So taking all that into consideration, I guess The Princess Switch is a fine title, even if it does not properly convey the level of Christmas cheer contained within.

Our Take: Holiday romcom sequels are hard to pull off. The entire genre depends on having a couple that’s not in love at the start fall in love by the end of the film, so a sequel starts off at a disadvantage. Do you break up the lead couple? Do they date someone else? Do you start over with an all-new cast? This is the problem that the A Christmas Prince franchise faced in its two increasingly dull sequels. There’s nothing to do once the elaborate ruse has been revealed and the vows have been said!

Fortunately for all of us Princess Switch superfans, the team behind Switched Again figured out a way to make the formula work again. They kept one couple together (Stacy and Edward, the less interesting of the two pairs) and broke up the other (Margaret and Kevin) so we could have that romcom, will they/won’t they storyarc.

But even better, returning screenwriters Robin Bernheim and Megan Metzger don’t put all their eggs in the romance basket (apologies for referencing the wrong holiday). They don’t have to hang all the drama on Kevin and Margaret, a couple that we’ve already seen fall in love once before. They know that The Princess Switch franchise has switcheroo shenanigans built into its premise, and they indulge in a switch on top of a switch that is both confusing and hilarious. It also lets Hudgens attempt accent turduckens that are increasingly complex (low-class British inside upper crust British inside Chicagoan)—so much so that, at one point, one of the lookalikes just resists speaking for half a scene. It’s totally ridiculous and a great heightening from the antics of the first film.

It does, however, take a little while for the antics to get going. The first half hour plays out with the same slow, low-level palace—well, intrigue is too generous a word—that bogged down the Christmas Prince sequels. It’s so thoroughly average that I completely forgot that princess switching was what The Princess Switch was all about. When the switch is finally proposed and the mix-ups begin, the movie comes alive and Christmas is saved!

Our Call: STREAM IT. After a slow start, Switched Again remembers that we’re all here for the identity swaps and then it delivers.

Stream The Princess Switch: Switched Again on Netflix