“I’m dressed in my usual uniform; faded black jeans, a white T-shirt, and a world weariness that is both affect and age-earned.”

Tremblay uses the narrator’s physical characteristics to accentuate his character arc. The narrator chooses to wear basic clothing pieces to reflect the malleability of his character. This foreshadows the way he will give himself up to the Thin Kid persona, allowing the identity to inhabit his body.

“A movie is a collection of beautiful lies that somehow add up to being the truth, or a truth. In this case an ugly one. But the first spoken line in any movie is not a lie and is always the truest.”

Valentina marks the beginning of production with a sweeping statement about the truthfulness of film. While she is speaking to the importance of emotional truth over literal truth—a statement that Cleo will echo in Chapter 19—the passage also resonates with Blurring the Line Between Art and Reality as a theme. The artifice of the film is meant to reveal the reality of Cleo’s teenage fears.

“We do not, cannot, and will not clearly see the Thin Kid’s face.

But we almost see him, and later, we will have a false memory of having seen his face.

That face will be built by what isn’t seen, built from an amalgam of other faces, faces of people we know and people we’ve seen on television and movies and within crowds. Perhaps we’ll imagine a kind face when it is more likely he has a face, to our enduring shame, that does not inspire our kindness.”

In the same way that the narrator depicts himself as a malleable character, the Thin Kid is depicted as being open to viewer projection and interpretation. He is never clearly shown to the viewer because it would allow the viewer to distinguish him from themselves. Without a clear image of the Thin Kid, the viewer would have to rely on their subconscious to make sense of him.