“ All my life , I need to be pretty . ” Joey King ’s Tally Youngblood recites those words inUglies , Netflix ’s new dystopian teen drama . In a futuristic world , 16 - year - olds undergo a ornamental operation to become “ Pretties , ” a unexampled version of themselves that satisfies society ’s peach standards .
Pretties move across the river to live among one another in a community with no responsibilities or obligations . Without the surgery , citizenry are known as “ Uglies . ” Tally has been dreaming of becoming a Pretty forever . But after learning about the government activity ’s nefarious reasons for the surgical process , Tally question everything she ’s ever known about her life .
Ugliesis an version of the 2005 novel by author Scott Westerfeld . It ’s been a foresightful and arduous operation , but Westerfeld ’s musical theme in the book are finally on the big screen door . In an interview with Digital Trends , Westerfeld discuss the dystopian bonanza of the 2000s , the dangers of societal media ’s unrealistic beauty standard , and the grandness of being our bona fide selves .
Note : This article has been edited for length and lucidness .
Digital Trends : I want to originate with how you ’re feeling aright now . It ’s emphatically been a foresightful procedure , to say the least . You wrote the book in the mid-2000s . Do the mathematics , and it ’s almost 20 long time since 2005 . Even filming wrap up three years ago . How did you remain patient for so long with this project ?
Scott Westerfeld : Well , I mean , it is kind of funny . First , there was a pandemic , and then there was a writer ’s strike and an actor ’s strike . I feel like everything has been thrown at this movie . But at the same prison term , there was a cast , a theatre director , and Netflix , who were all super behind it . There ’s a immense fan stem out there who desire it and kept asking for it . It just goes to show you that no matter how much globose uncollectible fortune you have , you may still get a picture made if people are passionate about making it .
I feelUgliescame at the beginning of the young adult teen boom . You haveHarry Potterbefore [ Uglies ] , and then theHunger GamesandDivergentafter it . Why do young grownup Scripture and their report remain so popular with teenager ?
What I ’ve always liked about writing for teenagers is that the amplitude of their emotions is very high . Like , the practiced Clarence Day when you ’re a stripling is amazing and incredible . But a unfit mean solar day is really , reallybad . It ’s like the goal of the world . you could indite these big dramatic sweeps [ for teen ] that adults do n’t really have . We ’re a little bit more regulated in our emotion . We ’re a little bit more boring in our lifetime . So it bestow itself to natural dramatic play .
I think the dystopian boom thatUglieswas passably much at the front of is also about the mode teenagers subsist in the humankind . That they ’re under the control condition of other citizenry . I always used to say that five little Kid in your store is cute , and five adult in your memory is practiced business organisation , but five stripling is a fourth dimension to call the cops . [ laughs ] There ’s this horse sense that teenagers are not old enough to be under the rule of practice of law and not vernal enough to advertize them around . They ’re dangerous , and I think they feel that . They cognize that they ’re on foe territory , so dystopian stories make a lot of sentiency to them .
Did you have any non - negotiables when adapting the book to the screen door ? As an executive manufacturer , were there one or two thing where you say something has to go in no matter what ?
The most important thing was for it to not look like every other dystopian movie . Because most movies about a dystopia are about being plug in the face every twenty-four hours . They are stormtroopers with big truncheons , riot shields , black helmet , and bang . That is not whatUgliesis about . It ’s not about the governance oppressing you ; it ’s about the way that you persecute yourself .
It ’s about the way you are seduce into wanting something and to give up part of yourself to get that matter . It ’s a pot more like the world we live in now than some world in the future . seek to check that that it [ the setting ] did n’t look like a bragging prison camp was really authoritative to me . In fact , it looks more like a big , giant vacation spot , and that ’s what I love about it .
You mentioned timing . I do n’t require to say it was a blessing in disguise because I ’m sure you would have likedUgliesto issue forth out in the first place , but , it [ the movie ] fits in with today ’s themes of beauty and image . Was this the perfect metre for it to come out ?
Yeah . I think that if it had fall out 20 eld ago , it would have been about formative operation . Now , it ’s about all this other stuff and nonsense . It ’s about social medium and the way that we Facetune ourselves , and change and present ourselves online , and seek to make ourselves reckon like movie stars every freaking day when we ’re not . It ’s this idea that we ’re express ourselves when we make content , but we ’re not really express our authentic selves .
Sometimes , we ’re deplorable . Sometimes , we ’re boring . Sometimes , we did n’t get the best latte in the earth , but we feign like we did . Thatyassificationof our life sentence creates such a requirement , especially for young people . I think that that ’s whatPrettiesis about now . Not so much plastic surgery , but digital OR .
I even obtain myself trying to stay off the internet as much as I can , even though we ’re doing it the right way now . You judge and give yourself a little break , but it ’s hard .
No , it ’s wild . [ laughs ]
I want to speak about the far-famed pedigree Joey says toward the end . “ I ’m Tally Youngblood . Make me pretty . ” It ’s very knock-down the fashion she deliver it . How did you total up with that line ? Did you know early on in your process that it would be one of the concluding agate line ?
That ’s interesting . I mean , it is the final line of credit of the moving picture , and it ’s the final line of the book . That was really adept . That was really of import to me that it works that way of life . There ’s a funny affair where the last business ofUgliesis pretty , the last line ofPrettiesis special , and the last billet ofSpecialsis ugly . [ laughs ] I go for we get to keep that small thing because I put that in there opine no one would notice it . And of course , mass do acknowledge it because the great unwashed notice everything .
It ’s [ the final line ] about the fact that everything that happens is tie in to the next affair that happen . The oddment of every tale is the outset of the next story . And I think that ’s how life works . It ’s how style function , and it ’s how the future works . The solution to our last problems are our next problem .
Ugliesis now streaming onNetflix .
