Ash - Erin Surkitt
The main character of our Teen Angst film is Ash, a socially awkward, unpopular teenager who is also diagnosed with depression. In some respects she is a very stereotypical main character in a teen angst film; however there are some aspects that challenge these traits. Stereotypical aspects include the fact that she is unpopular and classed as a misfit, which are demonstrated in popular teen angst films such as Mean Girls, Angus, Thongs and Perfect Snogging and Juno etc. The social group that Ash represents are the less popular teenagers at school with a small circle of friends. I think that because there are a lot of people in this situation during school it makes her character more relatable to the audience as they can understand the difficulties that she is going through. Even the people who are not classed as unpopular can relate to this as at some point in everyone's life they are in a situation where they feel they are a 'misfit' and do not fit in. Areas where Ash challenges this stereotype would be appearance wise and the level to which she is unhappy with her life during school (her illness). The first time the audience is introduced to Ash they can see straight away that she is unconventional of a teenager - she does not have long blonde hair, she isn't wearing lots of makeup and she isn't dressed all in pink and skirts etc. We wanted to challenge this stereotype as we felt that the audience didn't relate to this very much but instead would relate to a character dressed in very causal, dark clothing. In teen angst films however, the main character does not usually fit this stereotype either so in terms of these films Ash could be argued to be conventional. The apart that makes her completely unconventional would be her mental illness. We wanted to include this as the number of depressed teenagers in increasing and we wanted to raise awareness of this and give those teenagers something to relate to in the hope that it would help them in some way.
Darcy - Alice Nutter
With Darcy, we wanted her character to almost be the alter ego of Ash. We thought that we needed to make the film more light hearted and stereotypical of a teen angst film, so we included a character who is the complete opposite of Ash. She is loved by most and always sees the light in every situation, which is the reverse of how Ash is presented. We based this character mainly off of Jas out of Angus, Thongs and Perfect Snogging. When watching the film we instantly recognised the strong friendship that Jas and Georgina have and we wanted to replicate that within our film also. This is a relatable aspect which is another reason way we found it so important to include a best friend for Ash. The majority have at least one person who they tell all their problems to and look to for support, whether that be a friend, family member or boyfriend/girlfriend; we wanted a relationship that most people if not everyone could relate to. Darcy is stereotypical of a best friend in a teen angst film both in appearance and nature. She is always there when needed and always has a solution. In the film she is seen wearing light clothing, such as a white top and cardigan with blue jeans, this also adds to the relatability of the film as this outfit is very casual and something most teenagers would wear.
Helen - Darcey Page
The last character in our film is Helen. In order to be a stereotypical teen angst film, it is essential that there is a 'mean girl', in our case this was Helen. She is very stereotypical of a 'mean girl' all a part from one thing which is her clothing. Instead of wearing lots of pink and light colours and skirts and dresses, she wears and all black outfit, which consist of a shirt and jeans. We decided to do this because we thought that in order to attract an audience we need to make the mean girl more appealing and challenge this stereotype a bit more. We wanted Helen to almost blend into everyone else at school and appear to be just like everyone else. That it's not until the two main characters meet that you realise Helen is in fact the 'mean girl'. Another reason why Helen is wearing black is to make her and Ash more linked together. This almost created the idea that they are more similar than the audience first thinks, which will be further emphasised as the film continues. We based the personality of our character off of Regina George; this is because when asking other people we found that she was the most iconic "mean girl". We wanted Helen to display the same sarcastic, rude attitude as Regina does in the film Mean Girls, however we found this difficult to do as Helen is only in the opening sequence for a very short period of time, but we felt that this attitude is still recognised by the audience anyway. 
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