Headscratchers / High School Musical 2

• Why were Troy's friends were so angry with him? Yes, it's not cool to blow off your friends and girlfriend all the time and suck up to the rich people you're supposed to be working for, BUT the whole point was that Troy was trying to get into a good college on a good scholarship. In fact, it seems like he was the only one even THINKING about his future. So it just bugs me that his friends are being selfish and making him feel bad for trying to secure a good future for himself.
  • It's understandable for Troy's friends to get upset when he's continually promoted and receiving opportunities solely because Sharpay likes him (which Troy himself seems oblivious to, seeming to believe he earned all this despite doing the same work as everyone else and even being rewarded after breaking club rules - which Gabriella receives all the blame for). All for a scholarship to a school he doesn't even go to in the end. Troy is totally blind to his own privilege, and that makes people angry.
  • His friends may have been unreasonable, but his girlfriend had every reason to be pissed. Sharpay clearly liked him, and was trying to force herself into the role of girlfriend. How reasonable would you be if your boyfriend kept blowing you off to mildly prostitute himself as the Alpha Bitch's quasi-boyfriend?
    • While it is true, it is kind of hard to be on Gabriella's side when in the third movie, Gabriella does all in her power to get the future she wants, regardless of Troy's feelings, going so far as to dumping him over the phone.
    • Gabriella's actions concerning her future in the third film are kind of ambiguous. She seems prepared to sacrifice her chance at Stanford to stay in Albuquerque and study at UOA for a while to be with Troy. (Taylor actually calls her out for considering delaying her future for her 'first crush'.) It's actually Gabriella's mother and Troy himself who talks to her into going, which matches their positions in the second film, where Troy is a lot more prepared to face the future than she is. And when she tells Troy she's not coming back to East High, it's not anything to do with her academic future, but because she can't handle losing him again.
    • In the second film, the wrongness of Troy's actions and the wildcats reactions are kind of a grey area. Some of the stuff Troy does is definitely out of line: Ignoring Chad in front of the Red Hawks at lunch, letting Sharpay steal Kelsi's song, not calling Sharpay out for flirting with him while treating his girlfriend like dirt. But other stuff wasn't a big deal: Missing a baseball game and not bringing your high school buddies to a closed college practice. The problem is the film didn't differentiate between the stuff that was out of line, and the stuff that was okay. The wildcats overreacted and Troy got blamed for everything. So it was just badly handled.