"Hey, it's Clay. Clay Jensen. That's right. Don't adjust your... whatever device you're hearing this on. It's me, live and in stereo. No return engagements, no encore, and this time, absolutely no requests. Get a snack, settle in, because I'm about to tell you the story of my life. More specifically, why my life ended. And if you're listening to this tape...you're one of the reasons why."
13 Reasons Why: The Tapes of Clay Jensen
is fanfic adaptation of the series of the same name, which is adopted from the novel by Jay Asher. The work faithfully adapts many of the concepts from the series, only with one major difference: Clay Jensen is the one who committed suicide, and Hannah Baker receives the tapes in which he narrates the 13 reasons why he committed suicide. While she has already been exposed to some of the darker sides of Liberty High School, Hannah Baker has yet to discover the true darkness lurking within the school. She slowly realizes what has been happening all around her. People will try to stop her, but they are soon to discover that Hannah Baker is not a weakling to be manipulated.
13 Reasons Why: The Tapes of Clay Jensen contains examples of:
- Action Girl: Sheri Holland is surprisingly is one in a high school setting. She says that her mother grew up on a survivalist compound, and that her mother taught her how to protect herself. After Marcus assaults Hannah, Sheri starts teaching her to defend herself, making her one too.
- Adaptational Badass: Hannah Baker and Sheri Holland. See Action Girl.
- Adaptational Heroism: Sheri is not one of the tape subjects this time, and is nothing but a true Nice Girl to other characters.
- Adaptational Intelligence: Hannah toes the line between this and Character Development via Dumbass No More. In the flashback scenes, Hannah still is a Horrible Judge of Character, but in the present, easily determines who other tape subjects are long before she reaches their tapes, and also is smart enough to plan ahead for what these people would do.
- Break Them by Talking: Hannah is incredibly fond of this. Tyler gets the worst of it when she lists the three California laws that apply to stalking a minor and taking pictures of them without their consent. She does the same thing to Tony, when she gleefully claims that she'll out him as a gay boy. Both of these actions horrify her victims to tears.
- Decomposite Character:
- Tony's original role in the series is given to Sheri Holland and Charlie St. George.
- Courtney's original role is given to Tony.
- Double Standard: Abuse, Female on Male: Discussed on side 1B of Clay's tapes. The pain and betrayal of being struck by Jessica in the middle of Monet's is just compounded by the feeling that everyone is looking at Clay as the one in the wrong. Clay spells out that the presumption is that if a young man is slapped by a young woman for any reason, then he must have done something to deserve it, and she's awesome for "standing up for herself."
- Forced Out of the Closet: Hannah threatens Tony, claiming that she will rip him out the closet after listening to Tape 5. She doesn't actually do it.
- Gender Flip: Ryan Shaver is made female.
- Jerkass Realization: By the time Hannah confronts Jessica about the events depicted on Side 1B, the latter girl readily admits that she'd been "a shitty friend" to Hannah by first breaking off from her to date Alex, then coming to scream at her about allegedly stealing him. However, Jessica was still clinging to the idea that Clay was "a user and liar" who did deserve the treatment she'd given him.
- Laser-Guided Karma: Marcus attempts to buy drugs from Bryce to plant on Hannah to take her down. It backfires massively because he doesn't know that Hannah's already done the same thing to him. When Charlie overhears Marcus and Bryce, he and Sheri immediately report Marcus for drug possession, getting him suspended just as Hannah would have been.
- Manipulative Bitch: Hannah Baker becomes this after receiving the tapes. One major example is when tells the school officials about various events between herself and Marcus, Justin, Zach, and Alex to explain why Alex got so violent with Monty. She does this to cast some doubt on all of these people, so that when she'd accuse them of worse things, they would be more inclined to listen. It works when they choose to believe Sheri and Charlie when they out Marcus for having drugs that Hannah planted on him.
- Role Swap AU: Hannah and Clay swap roles, though it is not a completely straight example, as both characters retain their original backstories and some of Hannah's canon traumas still occur.
- Underestimating Badassery: Zach and Justin try to kidnap Hannah off the side of the road. She surprises them by drawing upon Sheri's training to beat the tar out of them.
- Villain Protagonist: The author outright claims that Hannah Baker is meant to be one of these.
- Xanatos Speed Chess: Certain events catch Hannah by surprise, particularly Alex and Monty's fight, and Zach, Justin, and Alex trying to kidnap her off the side of the road, but Hannah makes full use of these events to further her own plans for the tape subjects.
