The Big Picture

• Jenna Ortega delivers a standout performance in the coming-of-age drama The Fallout as Vada, showcasing her versatility and depth as an actress.
• Ortega's physicality and vulnerability brings life to Vada's character, offering a unique take on trauma and coping mechanisms.
• Ortega's chemistry with her co-stars elevates the film, highlighting the importance of relationships and healing after tragedy.

Jenna Ortega is one of the most in-demand young actresses working in Hollywood today, becoming a young scream queen with her roles in X and the Scream franchise, and her interpretation of Wednesday Addams in the horror comedy series Wednesday brought her an even greater level of fame. Joining forces with Tim Burton once again, Ortega stars alongside Winona Ryder and Michael Keaton in Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, which comes to theaters later this year. Ortega thrives in the horror-comedy space, but has no trouble traversing genres, recently giving a standout performance in the erotic thriller Miller's Girl, but one of the best examples of her versatility is her role in the 2022 coming-of-age drama The Fallout. Ortega's lead role as Vada, a sixteen-year-old girl whose life is completely upended when she survives a school shooting, is by far one of her strongest and most layered performances, bringing depth, physicality, and humor to her character.

Who Does Jenna Ortega Play in 'The Fallout'?

Written and directed by Megan Park in her feature directorial debut,The Fallout follows Ortega's Vada, a spunky high school student forced to reckon with the trauma and survivor's guilt of surviving a school shooting. Before the shooting takes place, we get to know Vada only briefly — an intelligent, sarcastic teenage girl who cares deeply for her best friend Nick (Will Ropp) and little sister Amelia (Lumi Pollack). Despite its serious and exceedingly relevant subject matter, The Fallout isn't totally humorless, and this is largely thanks to Ortega's performance, which incorporates a surprising amount of physical comedy. Vada is silly and energetic, and compared to the rigidity of her performance as the stone-faced Wednesday Addams, Ortega brings a kinetic physicality to Vada that you won't find in her other roles.

Vada tries to project a sense of maturity, but the moments where she embraces her teenage angst bring levity to the film. One of the ways Vada copes with her trauma is by experimenting with drugs, namely marijuana and ecstasy, which provide her with an escape from the constant emotional numbness she experiences after the shooting. When Vada smokes marijuana for the first time, she begins pacing frantically and goes on an impassioned rant about trophy hunting. Then she takes ecstasy at school, and she can't hide her erratic behavior. Not even attempting to pay attention in class, she smiles to herself no reason, flails her arms around in slow motion, and chews on a pen so hard that it explodes in her mouth. Eventually, she heads for the bathroom, tip toeing and wriggling down the stairs like a small child as she texts Nick for help. Ortega embraces her physicality in these scenes, but ultimately showcases Vada's bittersweet vulnerability since they come as a result of her trauma, using drugs to escape reality and experience some brief happiness.

Jenna Ortega Elevates the Performances of Her Co-Stars

A significant part of Vada's story revolves around Mia (Maddie Ziegler), whom she befriends after hiding with her in a bathroom stall during the shooting. Bonding over their shared trauma, they make an unlikely pair but quickly forge a sweet friendship, helping each other through the most difficult period of their lives. Ortega has great chemistry with Ziegler, who has far less acting experience, but benefits from working alongside a more seasoned actress like Ortega, who carries the film with ease. Vada is charismatic and outgoing, while Mia is more reserved and soft-spoken, but slowly comes out of her shell as the girls develop feelings for each other. Spending time at Mia's house provides Vada an escape from the prying eyes of her family, who can't understand what she's going through and ask too many questions she doesn't know how to answer. Vada's body language around Mia is much more relaxed, but her nerves and giddiness are the clear hallmarks of a teenage crush, which is heartwarming to watch develop.

Vada's fractured relationship with her little sister Amelia is equally important in her journey, and the moment in which the two sisters finally reconcile is a definite highlight of the film. While Vada experiences nagging survivor's guilt, Amelia carries guilt of her own, believing she put her sister in danger during the shooting. It was a text from Amelia that prompted Vada to leave class and go to the bathroom just before the shooting, and she, like their parents, isn't sure how to act around Vada in the aftermath. Amelia breaking down and confessing her fears to her sister is what finally inspires Vada to make amends with those she pushed away after the shooting, an important step in her healing journey. It's a touching moment of sisterly love, played beautifully by Ortega and Pollack.

Jenna Ortega Embodies Vada’s Trauma in 'The Fallout'

Ortega's performance as Vada is the driving force of The Fallout, which would be a lesser film with someone else at the helm. For all her funny moments, her depiction of the lasting effects of Vada's trauma is even more impressive. In the weeks following the shooting, Vada has little energy, is constantly shivering, and feebly tries to hide her persistent feelings of guilt, fear, and emptiness. During a phone call with Nick in the days after the shooting, he asks if she's okay, a question she is clearly tired of answering. Her voice slightly cracks as she whispers, "I'm just tired" in response, a moment that embodies the way Vada tries to mask her vulnerability from others, even from the people she loves. Ortega's performance also shines during both of Vada's visits to a therapist, which clearly mark her journey to acceptance, showing a noticeable shift in Vada's demeanor and readiness to discuss painful subjects. While she's cagey and defensive in her first session, when she returns after making amends with her family and Mia, she's finally able to vent her anger and bitterness towards the shooter and how the event completely turned her life upside down.

In The Fallout, Ortega brings a sense of relatability to Vada that is essential for a film that is meant to resonate with an entire generation scarred by the catastrophic effects of gun violence in schools in the United States. She drew from her own experience in public school and researched real victims of school shootings, telling Deadline in 2022 that she was inspired by the survivors of the Parkland shooting in 2018 and the March For Our Lives movement they then spearheaded. Ortega impressively communicates Vada's internal struggles and vacillating emotions of anger, numbness, and grief, in one of her most down-to-earth performances. It's a far cry from Wednesday Addams or Tara Carpenter, and a part of her filmography that is often overlooked, but undoubtedly one of her strongest, most nuanced performances to date.

The Fallout is available to stream on Max in the U.S.

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