Representation of Characters

We got the ideas of creating our characters from a TV show; Pretty Little Liars. We thought it was interesting on how the teenagers in the show are represented. Whilst identifying the way the characters are represented, we were able to create and develop our characters for our opening sequence. In Pretty Little Liars, the teenagers are represented as good and bad, this enabled us to use females for the antagonist and protagonist. One of the characters that stood out was Spencer Hastings played by Troian Be llisario. Spencer is shown to be an intelligent, overachieving teenager and confident. Spencers clothes reflect her personality and sophistication. Through Spencers portrayal, this represents teenagers as dedicated and smart. Although the character Spencer is portrayed as smart and sophisticated, spencer is also shown as being victimised by a group called the A-team, by her being victimised, she has no choice but to do tasks that affect themselves and people negatively. Throughout the series, Spencer has also been shown as innocent because she has never disobeyed or broke the law and school rules. By Spencer being represented this way, this helps represent young girls to be innocent and obedient. In Pretty Little Liars, there is a subliminal message that bad things happen to good people, this subliminal message relates to our overt message and our opening sequence, as our character Gursimran (antagonist) is portrayed in a similar way to spencer and is victimised by Jasdeep (Protagonist).

Another character that stood out was Mona Vaderwaal played by Janel Parish. At the beginning of the series, Mona was presented as a stereotypical school nerd. As the series progressed, it was revealed that Mona was a part of the A-team that victimise Spencer. Later within the series, Mona was sent to a mental hospital. Mona has different representations throughout the series, her current representation in the series gives a bad representation of teenage girls currently. Due to this representation, teenage girls could be represented as traitors, for example; Mona takes a video recording of the four girls and sends it to the members of the A-team, and threatens the four girls. This could represent teenagers as heartless and unsympathetic. This representation works well with Jasdeep (protagonist) for example; the protagonist punches the antagonist and walks away, this shows that the protagonist is heartless and unsympathetic.