Romantic comedies, like them or not, are generally working off a clearly marked formula. Nobody's really sure why that is, they just do. There's been a few films that have tried to subvert the genre in some fashion; 500 Days Of Summer is one good example. But, for the most part, they stick to the plan because, well, they do.
How To Be Single opens with Dakota Johnson breaking up with her long-term boyfriend in a bid to find herself and start her own life. The reasoning behind this decision is that, if they're meant to be together, they'll find their way back together. Off she pops to New York to live with her workaholic sister, Leslie Mann. Johnson then meets Rebel Wilson, a hard-partying, hard-drinking, sexually-liberated woman who resolves to show Johnson the way singledom works in the modern age. Parallel to this is Alison Brie, who's using a sophisticated algorithm to find the perfect man and is using the free WiFi of Anders Holm's bar to do so. Of course, there's something of a flirtation between them. Johnson's character goes on a few dates with various different men, but ultimately realises that she's better off with the boyfriend she dumped at the start. This, of course, doesn't work out and on the story goes.
The idea that women should enjoy being single and live it up isn't a particularly ingenious idea; be it in film or TV or in real-life. Yet, somehow, How To Be Single seems to think that it's a revolutionary idea and that Johnson has stumbled upon it all by herself. Of course she hasn't. That's just silly and unrealistic, much like the film itself. How To Be Single operates in some sort of parallel universe where women are solely concerned with either drinking, having sex, having a boyfriend / husband or having a baby. There isn't one female character in the entire film that isn't concerned with anything else. Not only that, they all seem to have jobs that allow them to sit in hipster bars or at home in their incredibly well-designed apartments and look longingly out the window or speak pages and pages of dialogue about relationships and love.
Of course, it's a romantic comedy so reality is supposed to be in short supply. But to this extent? Come on. Dakota Johnson here is basically Zooey Deschanel a few years ago, complete with maxi-dresses and a quirky haircut who lives in an equally quirky, cute apartment with vintage furniture and paintings everywhere. Her character, it seems, is trying to find herself and who she is, but spends most of the film pinging from one man to the next and back again. If the film is called How To Be Single, why does she spend the entire film in a variety of different relationships? That's just false advertising. Rebel Wilson does a reasonable enough job of being the comic relief whilst Leslie Mann and the relationship she strikes up with human Ken doll Jake Lacy has its moments here and there.
Sadly, the film as a whole is just so bland and forgettable that you'll eventually stop caring about any of them. It's all so predictable and beige that there's nothing to either like or dislike. There could have been an interesting examination of how women cope in the era of Tinder, Match.com and the like, but instead it just becomes another by-the-numbers rom-com. Not terrible, not great either.