Pretties (The Uglies)

Characters

Tally Youngblood

Tally is the protagonist of the books, first appearing in Uglies as a young, 15-year-old girl, waiting for her 16th birthday so that she can be turned pretty. Throughout the series, Tally undergoes significant changes physically and mentally from Ugly, to Pretty, to Special, different classes of citizen in her city. Tally is also known as Tally-wa, and Squint, throughout the series.

Ugly

Tally has frizzy, curly hair, "squinty" eyes, and a patchy complexion with a wide forehead, a squashed-in nose and thin lips. Her nickname is "Squint". She notes to her best friend, Shay, that she likes the left side of her face more than the right, which is symbolic because that side is the one Tally hates most because her left eye is barely "squintier" than her right.

Pretties

As a pretty, Tally takes on the appearance of other pretties her age: perfect teeth, jawbone, complexion, large hypnotic eyes, slim frame and full lips. Her frizzy hair becomes sleek, curly and shiny and her eye color is changed to silver. As a pretty, Tally is vapid and shallow, side effects of brain alterations, also called lesions, secretly performed during the pretty surgery. However, when her brain is stimulated and adrenaline is released during a crisis situation, she becomes "bubbly", her mind sharpens and her attitude swings around, resembling that of her ugly attitude in its rebellion.

Extras

Set a few years after the Mind-Rain, Aya Fuse's city comes up with a reputation economy, an economy in which people with a higher reputation get more things. Aya Fuse wanted to be famous, and she joins the Sly Girls. They let her in the clique because they trust her not to be a kicker, however, she deceives them and kicks them. They discover in the hollowed out mountain that there may be someone out to destroy the city. Tally Youngblood hears about this, and later shows up to check everything out. Tally Youngblood is the most famous person in the world and Aya Fuse later becomes the third most famous person in the city.

Shay

Shay is Tally's on and off best friend throughout the series. They meet when Tally returns from visiting her friend Peris in New Pretty Town. Shay believes Tally can keep the secret about The Smoke. Dr. Cable forces Tally to follow Shay to the Smoke by threatening to withhold her operation. Shay becomes a pretty, and Tally follows, and once again when she becomes a Cutter for Dr. Cable. Shay also becomes cured of her specialness near the end of the third book and remains in Diego. Shay and Tally are often in disagreement about David and Zane. Even though Shay can sometimes seem deeply flawed, she is still one of Tally's true friends.

David

David is Tally and Shay's contact from "The Smoke". Shay met David when her friends were running away from the city, because David led them to "The Smoke" and showed them they could live out in the wild. David is the son of Maddy and Az; he was born and raised in the wild, after his parents left Tally's city. He is also in love with Tally, due to her seriousness while she was in the Smoke. But before she arrived, David was dating Shay, which causes tension between Tally and Shay throughout the first two books. In the end of Specials, he accompanies Tally in creating the new "Special Circumstances" that is it set on keeping the Wild safe, and making sure people weren't pushing too far. David never surged to become a "pretty", and is the only main character who was left ugly. At the conclusion of Extras, Aya notices David and Tally's closeness, confirming that, at the series' end, David and Tally are a couple.[5]

Maddy and Az

Maddy and Az are David's mother and father. They are from Tally's city, but they ran away. Maddy was on The Committee for Morphological Standards (A.K.A. The Pretty Committee) and had begun doing some research on how to make the operation safer for everyone. She noticed lesions in the brains of all New Pretties, most Middle Pretties, although Late Pretties were never mentioned. She began doing more research, but Special Circumstances showed up and forced her to discontinue her research, or lose her medical license. She and Az became suspicious, fled the city, and established "The Smoke". Later in the series Maddy discovers a single pill cure, followed by a cure for specials injected by a needle. Az is also killed later on in the first book. They help Tally with some things.

Croy

Croy is one of Shay's friends who moved out to The Smoke. He is suspicious of Tally most of the time, but after she fights against the specials, he trusts her. He brings the cure to Tally at the beginning of Pretties after crashing a party.

Peris

Peris is Tally's childhood friend. Peris was older than Tally, therefore he got the operation before Tally. Peris is a member of The Crims, and has been a pretty through all of the books. He is also a very understated character throughout the series. Peris was Tally's best friend until he left her to jump alone off the hot air-balloon.

Dr. Cable

Dr. Cable is the head of Special Circumstances. Dr. Cable is described by Tally as a cruel pretty with cruel features. In the third book (Specials) Dr. Cable and Shay turn Tally into one of the cutters and Tally joins their big team of Special Circumstances. By the end of the third book [Specials], Dr. Cable is cured by Tally Youngblood. Dr. Cable then helps Tally Youngblood escape just before Tally goes under despecializing operation because she wished for at least one of her creation [Specials] to remain alive.

Zane

Zane is the leader of the Crim clique, and almost became a Smokey, but at the last minute he backed out and he became a pretty. He becomes close friends with Tally, and they eventually start dating. When they received Maddy's cure, Tally and Zane each took one pill. The cure included one pill that contained nanos that eats the lesions in the Pretties' brains and one pill that stops the nanos from making you braindead ( Zane took the nanos and since he didn't have the other pill to control them, he became braindead). This had dire effects on Zane's health. As a Special, Tally struggled with past memories of Zane and his "weaknesses" and tremors caused by the brain damage, affecting Zane's relationship with her.

Fausto

Fausto is another Crim who made it to The Smoke. He later becomes a special, and is kidnapped by the New Smokies, who experiment on him for a cure for Specials.

Andrew Simpson Smith

A villager from a reserve used by anthropologists to study human nature. Andrew Simpson Smith helps Tally escape the reservation. Which is an area in the wild outside the cities used for an experiment, fenced in like an animal; Andrew and the villagers call the dolls on the fence [little men] and believes it is invincible. Later in [Specials] it is told Andrew freed himself by burning the [little men] and aids the New Smokies by handing location positioners. Andrew Simpson Smith thought of Pretties as gods because of their beautiful features.

Aya Fuse

Aya Fuse (pronounced EYE-a FOOZ-eh) is the protagonist for the book Extras. While the world suffers from a metal shortage, she discovers a secret stash of metal, which she believed was to be used for weapons. She then allies with Tally Youngblood and her friends to find out the purpose for the metal stash.

Moggle

Moggle is Aya's hovercam. He gives Aya someone to talk to, and is also helpful in many situations in the book. Moggle follows Aya and he takes photos of the Sly Girls for Aya's kick stories.

Hiro Fuse

Hiro is Aya's older brother. He is popular in their reputation-based city and is invited to the Thousand Faces Club, which consists of the top 1,000 popular people in the book.

Frizz Mizuno

A leader of a clique called "Radical Honesty", where the members must have a brain surgery that gets rid of all deception. He becomes Aya's boyfriend. His surgery did not agree somewhat with the story as he was unable to hide anything, and it especially did not agree with Tally. She convinced him that he was not strong enough to tell the truth all the time (he took the surgery because he lied constantly, especially to girls).

Ren Machino

Hiro's technologically gifted friend. He installed the mods on Moggle to make him waterproof, able to fly and carry Aya, and fitted Moggle with artificial intelligence.

Ellie and Sol Youngblood

Tally's parents. Tally mentions that she had never been that close to them, calling them "Ellie" and "Sol" rather than "Mom" and "Dad". Though this is normal in the Uglies universe since the Bubblehead Regime during Prettytime severs family bonds at twelve years old. They visit Tally in the first book and are only briefly mentioned in later books.

Ho

Ho is a Cutter, and was one of the original Cutters.

Tachs

Tachs is a Cutter, and was also a Smokey.


This content is from Wikipedia. GradeSaver is providing this content as a courtesy until we can offer a professionally written study guide by one of our staff editors. We do not consider this content professional or citable. Please use your discretion when relying on it.