Directed by Justin Wu and written by Crystal Ferreiro, Mary Gulino and Tay Marley, this story comes from Wattpad, where amateur writers share their stories and potentially sell them as books and movies. That story? The QB Bad Boy and Me by Tay Marley.

Dallas (Siena Agudong) is a dancer who just moved to town. Drayton (Noah Beck) is a star football player with surprising depth. Dallas’ dad, Nathan (Drew Ray Tanner), is the new coach. Texas is the place where they meet, a place where football is the most essential thing every Friday night.

I enjoyed the fact that James Van Der Beek plays Drayton’s father, 25 years after Varsity Blues. The same problems of people wondering if they want a life in football are coming up in movies. At least this feels a bit more authentic than most teen romance movies. Sure, it still has the same issues as most teen movies — the guy is a ladies’ man, will he or won’t he change while the girl is always good — and the main reason they fall for each other is looks rather than character, but maybe I’m looking too deeply into this movie because I’m AARP age.

Everyone has secret grief, and once they share it, their relationship starts to mean more. What do I know? I got all my life lessons in romance from movies that led to most guys my age being incels and having strange notions of what courtship is.

You can watch this on Tubi.