Is That a Zit...or a Wrinkle???

If watching the buff "high school" jocks of Friday Night Lights has ever made you feel, well, pathetic about your mushy muscles and non-existent growth spurt, or if you've ever wondered why even the nerdiest girl in American Pie looked so annoyingly together, you are not alone.

We at SparkNotes just could not get down with the freakishly mature high schoolers on TV and in movies, so we went on a mission, otherwise known as internet research. And thanks to that magical, ego-boosting tool also known as IMDb, we came up with an A+ reason that all those "high schoolers" look so old.

Um, they are.

Without further uh...do(?), here's our list of actors who prayed to the no-crows-feet gods so they could keep their jobs playing high school kids:

When Napolean Dynamite hit theaters in 2004, star John Heder was 27.

In the same year, Mean Girls debuted with meanest girl of all, Rachel McAdams, then 26.

When American Pie came out in 1999, female leads Tara Reid was 24, Alyson Hannigan was 25 and Shannon Elizabeth was 26.

When Grease debuted in 1978, Olivia Newton-John was omg...wait for it... wait for it... 30!

In 1995 when Clueless came out, Alicia Silverstone was just 19, but her sidekick Stacey Dash was 29.

Bad boy of The Breakfast Club, Judd Nelson, was 26 when that movie came out in 1985.

And in the land of TV, things aren't too much better (Gossip Girl and Degrassi aside). In 1990 the ORIGINAL 90210 began with main character Steve Sanders, who was played by 26-year-old Ian Zerling. Worse, the curly-haired nerd bomber Andrea Zuckerman was played by 29-year-old Gabrielle Carteris! Who did she know to get that gig?!

But today's most ridiculous TV culprit is by far Friday Night Lights. Check it out:
Zach Gilford, who plays Matt Saracen, is 27.
Minka Kelly, who plays Lyla Garrity, is 28.
Scott Porter, who plays Jason Street, is 29.

Just... wtf.