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Main Characters
Millie Kessler
Played by: Kathryn Newton
An ordinary high school student and the main protagonist of Freaky. Still reeling from the loss of her father a year ago, Millie is very meek and nervous which her tormentors love to take advantage of. That is until her literal life-changing experience with The Blissfield Butcher.- Character Tics: Her thumb biting and hair fidgeting which carries over into the Butcher's body after the switch.
- Chekhov's Gun: Having learned first-hand of how excruciatingly painful it is to be on the receiving end of a Groin Attack, Millie puts it to good use by kicking the Butcher's balls in the final act and allowing her to finish him off.
- Cursed with Awesome: She doesn't like being in the Butcher's body, but finds his strength and size very useful.
- Disappeared Dad: Millie's father passed away the year before the events of the movie. His death seriously devasted Millie's family with all of them having trouble coping, especially her mother.
- Freudian Trio: The Ego to Josh's Id and Nyla's Superego.
- Girls Love Stuffed Animals: Millie has a pink teddy bear and several similar accessories in her home.
- Ironic Echo: Josh tells her she's "a fucking piece" in the beginning to which Millie declares herself as one after killing the Butcher.
- Nice Girl: Generally a sweet, likable girl.
- Odd Name Out: Out of her family (barring her nameless father), she's the only one whose name doesn't begin with a "C".
- She Cleans Up Nicely: Once the Butcher in her body puts on makeup and less casual clothes, she starts turning heads in the school hallways (The newfound confidence also helps).
- Shrinking Violet: Ever since her father's passing, she finds it difficult to be assertive and stand up for herself. Something her tormentors (Ryler, Mr. Bernardi and the jocks) take advantage of.
The Blissfield Butcher
Played by: Vince Vaughn
- Alliterative Name: The Blissfield Butcher, same goes for his actor Vince Vaughn.
- Bad People Abuse Animals: When not committing murder sprees for his own amusement, The Butcher decorates his hideout with tortured, dead animals hung by nooses.
- Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: Takes full advantage of being this while in Millie's body, as everyone reveres him just for appearance alone and he is able to sic the police on Millie in his body if Millie dares to come near him. This only failed on Mr. Bernardi, but seeing that he's the wood shop teacher in a classroom of saws and tools all the Butcher had to do was turn Bernardi into a science project in his own field.
- Blood Knight: Judging by the Butcher's grin when he initially had trouble attacking Mr. Bernardi in Millie's body, he may enjoy the challenge of killing in a weaker body as it lets him draw out his kills.
- Bound and Gagged: After getting knocked out in the golf course and being driven to Josh's home. He still manages to escape.
- Cop Hater: While incredibly quiet almost the entire time, seeing cops pass him by while he's in Millie's body makes him mutter, "Fuck off piggies" but then he summons them back as his Unwitting Pawns to chase away Millie who is in his body demanding her's back.
- The Dreaded: EVERYONE is scared of him and whenever they see him they run away screaming.
- Evil Genius: While there is some luck involved in the Butcher planning his murders such as being able to serendipitously locate a chainsaw in a warehouse next to a high school prom, he is indubitably cunning especially where he faked his death in the ambulance by unplugging the heart rate monitor, strangling the cop and paramedic next to him to death and making it to Millie's house to "apologize" to her.
- Evil Is Bigger: Expected when the Butcher is played by the hulking 6' 5¼" (1,96 m) Vince Vaughn.
- Evil Makeover: Gives one to Millie in her body by trading her unkempt hair and frumpy outfits for a tight ponytail, equally tight-fitting clothes and a red leather jacket with matching lipstick. Needless to say, he's killing it both fashion-wise and literally.
- Hidden Depths: He has a surprisingly good sense of female fashion; all it takes for him to make the self-conscious Millie head-turning sexy is a jacket belonging to her sister and tying her hair back.
- Honey Trap: Has become an expert at this in Millie's body.
- Jabba Table Manners: Upon being offered the lavish and continuous breakfast by Millie's mother, he scarfs down the food with his bare hands like a wild animal. Judging by his previous living conditions, it's been a while since The Butcher had a proper meal.
- Jerkass: Being a Serial Killer is bad enough, but he also takes time to bully and taunt Millie whenever they're in the same room together.
- Kubrick Stare: The Butcher in Millie's body is very fond of this look, which combined with his perpetual silence makes him all the more frightening.
- Lady in Red: His outfit when in Millie's body.
- Man, I Feel Like a Woman: The first thing he does upon realizing he's in a girl's body is fondle his breasts.
- Mysterious Past: He has no backstory on what drove him down the Serial Killer path.
- Only Known by Their Nickname: His real name is never mentioned by any of the main characters at any point in the film, only his nickname. A newscast playing the morning of the body swap confirms his name to be "Quentin Shermer".
- Room Full of Crazy: His hideout at the old mill can be described as an art studio's descent into madness. When Millie first woke up in her new body, she was surrounded by hanged, dead animals and mutilated mannequin parts.
- Self-Made Orphan: A background newscast mentions that the Butcher left his mother's decapitated head on a Dairy Queen doorstep in 1992.
- Soft-Spoken Sadist: He's as quiet as he is vicious.
- Showing Off the New Body: After switching bodies with Millie, the Butcher starts dressing in sexier, cooler clothes and starts walking with a confident, cocky strut through the high school, turning heads wherever "she" goes.
- Urban Legends: The four teens in the film's opening scene believe him to be this, but they are very wrong.
Nyla Chones
Played by: Celeste O'Connor
Millie's rational, no-nonsense best friend.- Black and Nerdy: Downplayed on the "nerdy" aspect since she's only going to the homecoming dance for yearbook committee and has the most common sense amongst her friends, before and after the swap.
- Freudian Trio: The Superego to Millie's Ego and Josh's Id
Joshua "Josh" Detmer
Played by: Misha Osherovich
Millie's openly gay and spontaneous best friend.- The Alleged Car: Drives one that's on the verge of breaking down but despite its poor, dilapidated state, it became the go-to vehicle for the protagonists.
- Be Careful What You Wish For: Josh wants to go to the homecoming dance because he's only in it for the "drunk straight boys who suddenly realized they're fluid". He got his wish when Phil tricked and forcibly kissed him without consent, brushing it off as being under the influence.
- Blatant Lies: Tells his mom that he's straight and into roleplay in order to explain the presence of a Bound and Gagged "Millie" in his house. His mom, knowing full well who he is, doesn't buy it for one bit.
Josh's Mom: "Joshua, you are many things, but straight isn't one of them."
- Camp Gay: Josh is a sassy, theatrical young man who is openly gay.
- Coming Straight Story: Played for laughs; he tries to "come out" as straight to his mother to justify "Millie" being tied up as their attempt at roleplay, but his mother doesn't believe it.
- Disappeared Dad: While not touched upon like Millie's, his father is seemingly out of the picture since all the family portraits around his house only feature Josh and his mother.
- Freudian Trio: The Id to Nyla's Superego and Millie's Ego.
- Wrong Genre Savvy: He thinks he's in a classical slasher when in reality he's in a modernized, subversive take on the genre. During his and Nyla's first encounter with The Butcher (Actually Millie by this point), he even says this gem of a line.
Booker Strode
Played by: Uriah Shelton
- If It's You, It's Okay: Once Millie has confirmed that she wrote a poem he found in his locker, he's willing to kiss her despite her being in the body of a hulking, older male Serial Killer at the time. Although Millie finds it too weird and both agree to wait until she has her own body back.
- Lovable Jock: In contrast to his womanizing, Jerk Jock teammates. Before the switch, he was the only one outside of Millie's friends in school to treat her nicely.
- Sixth Ranger: Once informed about the situation, he joins Millie and co. less than five hours before the switch becomes permanent.
- Token Good Teammate: Booker is the only jock we've seen in Blissfield High to not be a total, scummy douchebag.
Millie's Family
Coral Kessler
Played by: Katie Finneran
Millie's widowed mother who has a hard time coming to terms with her deceased husband. She copes by drinking and becoming overprotective of Millie.- Alcoholic Parent: After the death of her husband, she drowns her sorrows in booze.
- Failed a Spot Check: For someone whose extremely protective of her daughter, she sure didn't find anything suspicious with "Millie"'s unusually silent demeanor and eating habits. But to be fair she almost got killed the night before so she assumed she was just traumatized.
- Food as Bribe: She tries to make an extravagant breakfast as an apology to Millie for leaving her behind for hours at the football game, but it went to the Butcher in Millie's body instead who having went a long while without a decent meal gobbles it down so well Coral thinks it's an accepted apology.
- Never My Fault: As Char berates her for leaving Millie behind by falling asleep from too much wine, Coral defends herself that she only drank one glass. Char retorts she actually downed a whole bottle while Millie's football game was happening.
- Parents as People: While she clearly loves and cares about her daughters, after the death of her husband she has also become a bit overbearing of Millie as well as turning to heavy drinking sessions in order to cope, leading to her doing things like passing out and leaving Millie without a lift home after school which put her in danger and allowed her to be attacked by the Butcher in the first place, she does improve though.
- Supreme Chef: She cooks up extravagant breakfasts for her daughters as a coping mechanism to keep the family together. The Butcher would most certainly agree when you see him wolfing down one of her meals.
- Unwitting Instigator of Doom: She has a Drowning My Sorrows episode and because of that, Millie doesn't have a ride home from the football game, gets attacked by the Blissfield Butcher and so commence the rest of the plot.
Charlene "Char" Kessler
Played by: Dana Drori
Millie's older sister and a policewoman on the Blissfield Police Force for The Blissfield Butcher.- Big Damn Heroes: She arrives just in time to save Millie from being killed by the Butcher in the two's first encounter (although she subsequently makes it difficult for Millie and her friends to undo the switch).
- Cool Big Sis: She's a cop who's trying to hunt the Butcher.
- Locked Out of the Loop: She is apparently never told about the body-switch, which leads to complications when Nyla shows up trying to steal evidence in the company of "the Butcher" and "Millie" appears to claim that she was abducted by the killer.
Millie's Father
- No Name Given: His first name is never revealed.
- Posthumous Character: Has been dead for a year at the time the film begins, and his wife and daughters are still struggling with the loss.
Victims
In General
- Asshole Victim: Most the victims shown are jerks at best; once the Butcher is in Millie's body, most of his victims are people who were trying to bully "her". Granted, the jocks aside, they definitely didn't deserve to die for it.
- Cruel and Unusual Death: The Butcher shows a talent for improvised weapons in either form, such as stabbing one teen in the head with both sides of a broken tennis racket in his body and slicing Millie's woodshop teacher in half with a buzzsaw in the classroom.
Ryler
Played by: Melissa Collazo
- Alpha Bitch: A perfect textbook example with your standard bitchy attitude, mean girl comments about one's poor fashion sense and sexuality and lingering Girl Posse.
- Heteronormative Crusader: Double Subverted. When the Butcher strokes her hair while in Millie's body, Ryler gently turns her down, but then calls her a freak and outs "Millie" as a lesbian to her friends.
- Literally Shattered Lives: The Butcher puts Ryler into a cryotherapy unit, which freezes her solid. So when Millie goes to touch her, Ryler's corpse pitches forward and shatters to smithereens.
- Pet the Dog: Utter Alpha Bitch or not, Ryler does try to warn "Millie" that they need to run after seeing who she thinks is the Blissfield Butcher. She ends up killed for it.
Mr. Bernardi
Played by: Alan Ruck
Millie's abusive and unsympathetic woodshop teacher.- Half the Man He Used to Be: Gets vertically sliced in half with a table saw.
- Impromptu Tracheotomy: The Butcher stabs him in the neck with a screwdriver before the table saw is brought out.
- Jerkass to One: He goes out of his way to pick on Millie every chance he gets, from berating her for not handing in a project that isn't due for another week to calling her out in class just to demean her. He even took great pleasure in beating up "Millie" when attacked by "her".
- Manly Facial Hair: In spite of the verbally abusive jackass he is, his handlebar mustache isn't for show when he nearly wipes the floor with The Butcher using karate moves.
- Sadist Teacher: He bullies and targets Millie for no reason, is verbally abusive, shames her when she shows up to his class late, tries to humiliate her for not having completed a project which wasn’t due for several days and then clearly gets enjoyment out of kicking her in the gut after “she” attacked him (actually the Butcher in her body) and is on the ground.
- Would Hit a Girl: Granted he was doing it in self-defense, he seems to take pleasure when he repeatedly kicks "Millie" in the stomach when "she's" down.
The Jocks
Played by: Erza Jeb Sexton (Brett), Timothy Luke Johnson (Squi), Carter Woodward Glade (Tobin) and Magnus Diehl (Phil)
- Armored Closet Gay: Phil is revealed to be one, forcibly kissing Josh in the pretense of being drunk and then calling him a "faggot" once pushed away.
- Eye Scream: Phil dies from a hook in his eye as the Butcher attacks him from behind.
- Groin Attack: The Butcher kills Brett with a chainsaw to the groin.
- Hidden Depths: While it doesn't detract from his Hate Sink status, Phil is a surprisingly good woodworking student. He and his friends also organize a massive private, unofficial homecoming dance in a very short amount of time.
- Jerk Jock:
- Rape Is a Special Kind of Evil: Brett lures "Millie" to a more secluded area of the old mill where Squi and Tobin await to perform a gangrape and claiming it's fair since "she" got three holes to go around. Unfortunately for them and fortunately for us, the Butcher takes the opportunity to strike.
- Ripped from the Headlines: Would-be high school rapists Brett, Squi and Tobin's names are references to Justice Brett Kavanaugh's Supreme Court confirmation hearings.
The Rich Kids
Played by: Kelly Lamor Wilson (Ginny), Mitchell Hoog (Evan), Emily Holder (Sandra) and Nicholas Stargel (Isaac)
Four friends who throw a party in the opening and another four victims on The Butcher's extensive kill count.- Asshole Victims: Ginny and Isaac, they both treat their partners rather poorly and are pretty unlikable for the brief screen time they have before their deaths at the hands of the Butcher.
- The Can Kicked Her: Sandra receives a massive headache from The Butcher bashing her skull against a toilet seat multiple times (And by massive, I mean fatal).
- Daddy's Girl: Ginny, who may be the only child in her family, says "Daddy!" upon hearing both of her parents coming home. Of course, this may be because she thinks her father can provide more protection against the Serial Killer roaming the house. Also, the sentiment seems one-sided, as her father gets pretty mad at Ginny upon seeing that she's having boys over due to the presence of their cars.
- Hidden Depths: Ginny comes across as a tough-talking, confident rich girl, but it's mentioned that she's another victim of Alpha Bitch Ryler's bullying and Malicious Slander.
- Impaled with Extreme Prejudice: The Butcher made quick work of Evan and Ginny by breaking a tennis racket through his head and hoisting her up into a thrown spear respectively.
- Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Ginny is a bit caustic and a bit inconsiderate to her boyfriend, but she is upset at Isaac for spilling beer on Sandra while shoving her and gives Sandra advice for cleaning the stain.
- Kill the Cutie: Sandra is the nicest and shyest of the four, and the only one who acts more like a Final Girl than a generic slasher victim. It doesn't save her from having her head bashed in as she screams for mercy.
- Straw Feminist: Ginny tells her friends not to "underestimate a straight white man's propensity for violence." She also refuses to keep having sex long enough for her boyfriend to orgasm, saying that "it's a vagina, not an all-night drive-thru." When Evan calls that inconsiderate, she turns this back around by sarcastically saying "Guys are so considerate."
- Teaser-Only Character: None of them survive the opening scene courtesy of The Butcher.
- We Hardly Knew Ye: Their short-lived existence is only there to illustrate what a dangerous, malevolent man The Butcher is.
