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{draw:rect} *Investigate two related texts* which reflect the thematic concerns of the prescribed text or topic.
The related texts I have chosen to study are the television show Gossip Girl, and the classic film: Rebel Without A Cause. These texts both include an antihero character, and deal with teenage themes. The cultural values differ between the two texts, and they both depict very different versions of teenage life. My essay will reflect the changing characteristics of the antihero, and how the need for a teenage antihero is ever present. My essay will include reference to the different values prized in contemporary antiheroes, in contrast to those that were valued in the 1955 protagonist of Jim Stark (Rebel Without a Cause). This will reflect our changing social characteristics, and the transformation of antiheroes between texts.
Rebel Without a Cause is linked with timeless images of actor James Dean slowly smoking a cigarette, a half smile playing on his lips, dressed in his trademark red jacket. But the deep importance of the film to a nation of troubled post-war teenagers cannot be underestimated. The film’s antihero is protagonist Jim Stark, who is first seen in the opening credits of the film lying drunk on the pavement, as police sirens wail in the background. Jim is quickly cast as a ‘juvenile delinquent’ by the opening long shot of him being hauled into the juvenile division of the police station. Jim’s conflicts and issues are established in the opening scene in the police station when he confides his trouble with his parents to Officer Ray. Jim’s sincere and kind personality is first demonstrated when he offers the troubled character of Plato his jacket, in order to keep the boy warm. The viewer is first at odds as how to view the character, as he has been deemed a delinquent, yet behaves in a compassionate and kind way to his peers. Jim Stark proves himself to be moral, honest...