Lately, I’ve been enjoying re-watching one of my favorite shows, the first generation of Skins. Unlike many of the other shows I watch, the draw of this show isn’t the drama or the storyline, but rather the kids themselves. I say kids instead of characters because the show blurs the two together as we follow each on on his or her journey. What I mean by this is that not only are the characters very real, raw, and gritty, but the actors themselves also embody these qualities and this is represented in the show. Unlike many shows today where a 16 year old is played by a 25 year old or a high schooler is portrayed wearing seamless makeup and 4 inch heels, the kids of Skins all actually look, act, and dress their age. Many of the female characters are shown without makeup, sometimes in ill-fitting or awkward clothing, and close-ups don’t try to hide the blemishes, braces, or flaws of these real life teens or their characters.
In addition to the physical blur between actor and character, the characters written for these actors also have a way of bringing out the real feelings and fears of anyone who has ever been through high school. In each character, Skins takes something that almost every young person has dealt with and hyperbolizes it. Take, for example, Cassie. Cassie is known by all her friends as an anorexic mental case, but the show allows us to see behind closed doors into her life where she is utterly ignored by everyone around her. Though not all viewers have experienced eating disorders, almost everyone has known what it’s like to feel completely alone and unnoticed. Each character personifies a challenge of youth in such an honest and complex way that by the end of the series the whole cast has become both a projection of your inner feelings and your best friends.
I’m not writing this solely to suggest you go watch Skins (though if you haven’t, you really should), but rather to demonstrate that having honest, flawed, non-glamorous, and real characters can be so much more powerful than those impossibly beautiful and glamorous creations of Disney and ABC Family. These characters fall into a dramatized plot rather than grappling with their own problems and insecurities over the course of the show as is the case with the characters of Skins. I’m not saying that there are no honest characters on TV, but I have yet to see anyone bring the realness that Skins delivered in 2007.
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