This document discusses how the author's thriller media product challenges conventions of real media products. It analyzes conventions of the thriller genre and how stereotypical characters are often portrayed. The author's thriller "No More" challenges these stereotypes by portraying the female protagonist as strong rather than weak. Several similar popular media products are also discussed that portray strong female leads or challenge gender stereotypes, including Girl on the Train, Fatal Attraction, The Shining, and StarCraft. Overall, the author aims to subvert expectations and challenge social conventions through their thriller.

1. Aidan Murphy
IN WHAT WAYS DOES YOUR MEDIA
PRODUCT USE DEVELOP OR
CHALLENGE FORMS AND
CONVENTIONS OF REAL MEDIA
PRODUCTS?

2. CONVENTIONS OF A THRILLER
A thriller is a genre and style of film that is often tense gripping and scary at some points
examples of famous thrillers are jaws and the dark knight rises. These movies always have a
lot going on. They like to keep the audience in suspense and keep them intrigued throughout
and I think that good thrillers do most certainly do this. In what ways does your media product
use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

3. CHARACTERS IN A THRILLER
• Characters in thrillers- characters in thrillers can be very predictable as they are often very
stereotypical and adherent to the stereotype of that character. E.g. woman who are lawyers in
films are usually divorced or people trying to escape have usually been kidnapped and taken
away somewhere and they are trying to break free. Often in thrillers there is a main
protagonist and antagonist and each conflicting however the antagonist and protagonist are
often very stereotypically the same in a lot of movies however some try to challenge this and
that is what our movie ‘no more’ tries to achieve.

4. ABOUT OUR THRILLER ‘NO MORE’ AND HOW IT
CHALLENGES REAL MEDIA PRODUCTS.
• Our thriller ‘No More’ is about a woman who has been abused in a bad way by her husband
and beaten by him, and she can’t stand it for any longer so she eventually kills him, which is
similar to our thriller. As an audience we have to debate who we think was the bad person in
our thriller and who was the good person and doing the right thing and it is a thriller why most
certainly provokes a lot of thought and definitely makes the audience think. And challenges
the stereotypical view of the female being weak and not powerful and the male being strong
as we see in the opening sequence we have reversed the stereotypical view on these two
genders. So we challenge the conventions of other products in that sense.

5. SIMILAR PRODUCTS TO OUR THRILLER
• Girl on a train- Film
• Fatal Attraction- Film
• Shining- Film
• Lion spot- TV Series
• Love the way you lie Eminem Ft. Rhianna- Music Video
• Star Craft- Video Game

6. ‘GIRL ON THE TRAIN’ AND HOW IT IS SIMILAR TO
OUR PRODUCT
• It is about a woman who drives past her old house every day on
the train and her old husband and children lives there she has to
deal with the pain every day she goes past. Much like the
character in our thriller has to deal with the abuse from her
husband as she has been beaten and fought with him. And it
shows in this film the woman has a lot of mental problems and she
creates her own visions of how life could have been in her head,
so in that way it is similar. They also seem very innocent normal
woman however we soon figure out that there is something wrong
with them.

7. ‘FATAL ATTRACTION’ AND HOW IT IS SIMILAR TO
OUR PRODUCT
• Fatal attraction is a Fatal attraction has a similar concept and idea to the film that we
are filming. Mainly due to the fact that a man is killing a women in it. The women is
extremely violent in this film but from parts of costume and looks you would not
expect her to be which is similar to ours. We want her to look as innocent as
possible just like in the opening sequence that we are doing, the women in this is an
innocent looking women who is a lawyer and her husband who appears to be at
first... a happily married man however we see how violent the woman turns after and
we realize that there relationship is perhaps not a pleasant one at all. In this movie
the main actors are Michael Douglas and Glenn Close. It is set in New York which
is different than the location of surrey which we are using. It also is similar to our film
in the way that he is killed in a kitchen, just like our one. So in many ways it is
similar. The women and man in the film our both similar to the characters age that
we want in our film and the woman looks similar as well, and we also want to show
the love hate which i think is most certainly shown in this film as well. Movie about

8. ‘THE SHINING’ AND HOW IT IS SIMILAR TO OUR
PRODUCT.
• The shining is another film which I believe is similar to our product. It is about a
man who goes to a house and gets psychologically possessed. He then tries to
kill his loved ones. ‘The Shining’ is similar In the fact that it has a very gruesome
nature, there is lots of blood and it is overall very violent In what happens during
the film which is similar to what we want to achieve in ours as well. Also the
main character in ours has a mental problem and it is the same in the shining as
well. So I think the whole psychological aspect is similar and the way in which
mise-en scene was used was similar in terms of props such as knives and the
bloody make up that they used as well was also similar to ours. The character is
also shown to defend herself against a strong male character which is also
similar to ours. And we also see the traumas that both the characters are going
through and how they cannot do anything about there situation as well

9. ‘LOVE THE WAY YOU LIE BY EMINEM FT. RHIANNA’ AND
HOW IT IS SIMILAR TO OUR PRODUCT.
. This product is a music video created by Vevo and produced by Rhianna and
Eminem. The music video is adherent to the stereotype of relationships however it is
also subverting as well as it is shown in an extreme form. We know that couples fight
and argue. But in this music video it is shown in a very extreme and exaggerated way.
Which is similar to our thriller as it is about a couple who have had an argument and it
has spiralled out of control. And I believe that is shown clearly in our media product
and in the music video as well. We want to show the horrible side of relationships and
not only the romantic ones and in the music video it changes. Usually in arguments In
films we see one dominant character however in this we see two. The husband and the
wife. And it is often the man due to him stereotypically being strong and powerful ,
however our product and the other one wanted to show it differently we wanted the
woman to have power as well.

10. ‘STAR CRAFT’ AND HOW IT IS SIMILAR TO OUR
PRODUCT.
• ‘Star Craft’ Is a popular video game created by Chris Metzen and James
Phinney. It comes under the genre of military science fiction. And it was
produced by blizzard entertainment , a well established company who have
created great games such as ‘diablo’ and ‘over watch’ which have both been
very successful. Star craft is an action packed game set in a different setting to
ours as it is in space. However there are quite a few strong female characters
within the game, similar to our thriller as there is most definitely a strong female
character in that and usually and stereotypically we do not see woman fight and
show dominance over stereotypically strong female characters however in star
craft we do. It represents a lot of similar aspects to our product , in the way that
it is very different from social expectations and stereotypes that we as humans
think of when it comes to gender and social class and how they are represented
in that area.

11. OVERALL EVALUATION AND CONCLUSION
• Overall I believe that our film has taken inspiration and is very similar to a lot of other products
out there including videogames and music videos and films. They all have strong female
characters who are shown to be the opposite of the usual stereotype of weak and kind and
caring but are shown to fend for themselves and fight of the strong man and we wanted to
challenge the ‘normal’ social conventions, and make the woman appear stronger as I think
with the stereotypes the film can become predictable and reversing these makes the audience
ask questions, and challenge what they think of the genders and social class as well.