Netflix’s Irish Wish is full of bad rom-com tropes, great Lindsay Lohan

As a big fan of romantic comedies, both in movie and book form, I have a shortlist of beloved tropes. Enemies to lovers? Sunshine and grumpy? Second chances after a missed connection? Love, love, love.

But I also have a shortlist of my most hated clichés. I know it’s a me thing, but I just don’t like a workplace romance where one party is clearly working directly under the other. I also don’t like romances that kick off when one party is in a relationship with someone else. Or romances where someone is pining for their best friend’s partner. And I absolutely loathe rom-coms where we’re supposed to buy the strength of a couple based on some sort of alternate-reality-slash-dream situation where literally everything else about their lives is different, and only one person remembers the details. When the tropes are the premise, there’s often no hope for me latching on.

Netflix’s new, vaguely St. Patrick’s Day-themed romantic comedy, Irish Wish, is basically built on a whole bed of rom-com tropes that I actively hate. So even though I love a Lindsay Lohan-led rom-com — Just My Luck was one of my favorites growing up, and Lohan’s recent Netflix Christmas rom-com was over-the-top cheesy in the best way — I knew the odds of enjoyment were stacked against me. But there are exceptions to every one of my taste rules, if the movie is good enough. I came in hopeful! But while I am not immune to Lindsay Lohan being charmed by a roguish Englishman played by Ed Speleers (Star Trek: Picard, Eragon), the rest of Irish Wish failed to sweep me off my feet.

[Ed. note: This piece contains some spoilers for Irish Wish.]

Hated trope crime No. 1: Lohan’s Irish Wish character, Maddie, is an editor who is hopelessly and unrequitedly in love with one of her writers, a charming Irishman named Paul Kennedy (Alexander Vlahos). But because Maddie doesn’t have enough guts to confess her love to him, Paul meets her cute friend Emma (Elizabeth Tan) and the two get engaged instead, all while Maddie is still hopefully pining after him. (Second point, *insert eye-roll emoji*!) On the eve of their wedding in Ireland, Maddie meets a strange giggling woman who encourages her to make a big wish, so Maddie then wishes that she was the one getting married to Paul. She wakes up in another reality, one where she’s the one getting married. But as it turns out, Paul isn’t the partner she thought he would be. And also she keeps running into a scruffy yet dashing photographer named James (Ed Speleers) and sharing very romantically charged moments with him. If you’re counting, that’s points three and four.

Thankfully, Lohan and Speleers have mastered the art of making charged eye contact across a room; their chemistry infuses their characters with more longing than the text makes the case for. Since most of the romantic moments happen in the “wish universe” (what I’ll be calling the reality where Maddie is marrying Paul), it’s already hard to believe that they’d get together in real life, since everything about their meeting and relationship there is already different. But still, the wish universe does give them some adorable moments — getting caught in a rainstorm while scouting out locations for wedding photos and then cozying up in a quaint little pub. While the sparks definitely fly, it is still just one full day of knowing each other, which is hardly enough to justify those angsty looks of yearning.

Photo: Patrick Redmond/Netflix

Yet! Those looks are so good. Their individual moments together are delicious, especially set against the gorgeous Irish landscape and some cute little set-pieces. But it’s not enough to save the fact that their relationship is built on an alternate reality. So when they do meet for realsies, Maddie just knows all these things about James that make it seem like she’s been stalking him, whereas he barely has any idea who she is. Maybe there’s an attraction, but it’s hard to buy that it’s true love.

Maddie’s crush on Paul, despite him being a terrible person to work with and also generally a spoiled man baby, is also frustrating. Yes, the plot of the movie hinges on her realizing they don’t work well together, but it’s a wonder what she even saw in him originally! There’s a superfluous side plot involving Maddie’s mother trying to get a plane out of Des Moines. I do not know why it’s there, other than to put Jane Seymour on the cast list. She never even has a face-to-face conversation with her daughter!

Some tropes might not be for me, but other people do love them, especially when it comes to romantic comedies. But there are movies that overcome my preconceived dislike and make me reevaluate why I hated certain tropes. The Proposal, for instance, bypasses my usual disdain for the “workplace romance where one party is clearly working for the other” cliche by just being a solid movie. Despite the lovely chemistry between Speleers and Lohan, Irish Wish did not rattle my preconceived notions — if anything, it’s the worst version of my hated tropes. Speleers and Lohan deserve a movie worthy of their electric eye contact and charming banter — and who knows? James and Maddie’s romance just barely started in this movie, so there could be more ahead. Irish Wish may have played into my least-liked cliches, but I am invested in these characters.

Irish Wish is out on Netflix now.