If Daria were to be adapted for a live-action movie, wouldn't Aubrey Plaza be the perfect actor to take on the role? Her bored expression and deadpan humor would make her a great fit to take on an older version of the lackluster teen from the beloved MTV '90s sitcom. College Humor imagined such a scenario with a hilarious trailer that revisits Daria in a live-action trailer for a movie that will probably never be a reality but is still fun imagining, especially with Plaza in the lead.
In the trailer, it's a decade or so after Daria, Jane and her other classmates have graduated high school. Quinn's running the reunion and desperate to have her sister there, though it's less about seeing her sister as it is about how Daria's absence would reflect on her. Because that's Quinn. The more things change, the more things stay the same, right? Plaza's version of Daria is fittingly expressionless as she reconnects with her old friends and acquaintances at Lawndale.
Jane's back though she assumed if she ever returned, it would be for a funeral. Daria's dad is overreacting. Her mother's more optimistic than ever. Trent's still rocking out without much enthusiasm with Mystik Spiral, though they're changing their name to the Pembroke River Family Disaster (there's a survey going around). Brittany and Kevin are still loving high school ten years later. And Daria thinks it would be worse if Tom were married than if he were a serial killer. It's new, but it all feels familiar.
It's a pretty great imagining of where the characters of Daria would be if they existed in a live-action universe. And it's just as fun to imagine what a Daria movie would look like. Plaza really is perfectly cast here, and our own Eric Eisenberg has already nominated Isla Fisher to play Quinn in a 10-years-later scenario. I could see a dark-haired Thora Birch as Jane, but maybe I just have Ghost World on the brain.
Just a couple of months ago, we shared the 5-minute pilot of the original Daria series, so thoughts of Daria aren't in the distant past, but this trailer comes just in time to remind us of how funny Plaza is ahead of the release of Maggie Carey's new comedy To Do List. The 90s flashback seems especially relevant with that in mind, as To Do List is set in 1993 and stars Plaza as a teen who wants to shed her good-girl rep before heading off to college.
