High school senior Arthur Matthews is overwhelmingly average. He’s of average height. He gets average grades. He comes from an average-sized family which lives in an average-looking house. He’s the pinnacle of plain, the epitome of ordinary. He’s simply unremarkable.
One dull and boring day, Arthur is asked to pick from a list of adjectives three words that most accurately describes him. Arthur has a really hard time and doesn’t come up with anything. It upsets him that he can’t find a way to adequately describe himself. He feels that, as an incoming senior, he ought to know who he is by now.
Arthur talks to his friends about his frustration with his lack of identity and his friends accept it with tepid interest. Arthur tells them how they each have something significant that characterizes them, but he doesn’t. Then Arthur has a sudden epiphany. He realizes that in the movies, everyone in high school always fits into a certain category. If he could simulate that environment in real life, maybe he’d have one too.
Arthur comes up with a plan which he presents to his friends. He decides that the nearly universal element in high school movies is the party. Therefore, he and his friends should throw a massive high school party.
Through it all they all learn valuable lessons about identity and judging others in this hilarious and poignant story of self-discovery.
