Michel Duffield

Alexandra Dudley started watching Skins her sophomore year of high school, and immediately felt a connection to the character.

“She doesn’t care what anyone thinks or says about her and she does what she wants, and I think that’s why a lot of people love her. And then obviously, 15-year-old me wanted to be out partying and doing drugs like her because I thought she was so cool,” she says.

Lex Garcia-Ruiz feels similarly, stating, “I think that Effy was the epitome of the Tumblr girl that we all wanted to be. Mental illness was romanticized all over Tumblr the same way it was in Skins, so you wanted to be her, you wanted people to think you were like her, especially if you were a bit of an outcast or a loner.  You wanted to be that different, ‘not like other girls’ cool girl that Effy was.”

This represents the core of the Effy obsession, and also the crux of the problem with it. She was the ultimate Cool Girl-- enigmatic, beautiful, and always down for a good time. However, the traits that made her so memorable are what make her problematic as an ideal: she became an aesthetic more than a three-dimensional character, and her host of very real issues (addiction, depression, and bipolar disorder) became a part of that image rather than being depicted as legitimate problems to be fleshed out and overcome.

This becomes especially evident when shown through the lens of Skins’ male protagonists, Cook and Freddie.  Effy’s mental illness was essentially boiled down to two things: a convenient addition to her characterization as a beautiful mess, and something to put her in a position where she needed to be saved by a love interest.

While it’s unlikely that making depression and substance abuse seem cool and sexy was the ultimate aim of Skins, this portrayal points to a worrisome correlation between mental illness and romantic attention.  Effy does not present as a mentally ill teenager in need of compassion and help, but as a symbol of sex appeal and anarchy—the driving force behind her status as an idol lies squarely in her desirability.

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