AUSTIN, Texas—Even if it looks straight out of the DCOM (Disney Channel original movie) playbook, do not be fooled by the familiar bubblegum-ness of Anna and the Apocalypse‘s first 15 minutes.

Yes, likable young people fill in various archetypes, from the artistic outcast to the popular jerk to the nice-guy best friend who’ll forever be “just friends” with our heroine. And yes, Top 40-pop styled musical numbers focus on familiar adolescent themes of defying the expectations of others or how life doesn’t follow movie scripts in practice. At one point, a stick-in-the-mud principal devoted to rules and regulations literally proclaims, “hand sanitizer is your friend; kissing on the mouth is not your friend.”