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  • Complete Monster:
    • Dr. Roberta Griswold is a high-ranking member of Proactive Citizenry and is the one in charge of the Rewind project. She has Camus "Cam" Comprix created and uses him as a puppet. Having Risa Ward brought to her, Griswold gives her the choice of becoming Proactive Citizenry's puppet or having her friends' compound raided. After selling Cam off to the military, Griswold plans to mass produce an army of Rewound slaves for them, before trying to kill Cam for turning against her.
    • UnBound's "UnNatural Selection": Dr. Rodin is a seemingly polite member of the Burmese Dah Zey and is in charge of the "Magic Kingdom" harvest camp. There, Rodin horrifically experiments on and modifies countless people into monstrous forms of "art", such as grafting extra limbs onto them or combining them with animals, leaving many of those who survive in constant pain, something other members of the Dah Zey find disturbing.
  • Fair for Its Day: Some feminists and abortion rights advocates disliked what they saw as a fallacious "both sides"-ness in the first book's approach to the American abortion debate and for being overly generous to pro-life arguments. However, given how polarized that debate was in 2007, any book that took a strong stance one way or the other would likely have a hard time getting published. Other readers have argued that it's not so much an "abortion book" as it is a dystopian parable warning against resolving heated ethical tug-of-wars with solutions that leave things even worse off than they were before.
  • Fan Nickname: "The Wholly Trinity" for Connor, Risa, and Lev. Sometimes Neal Shusterman is referred to as "Uncle Neal."
  • Jerkass Woobie: Roland is a manipulator, a bully, and all-around bad news. He's also a kid whose mother consigned him to unwinding for beating up the stepfather who was abusing her. And it's impossible not to feel for him in his last scene, as he's unwound.
  • Moral Event Horizon:
    • In Undivided, it's agreed that Nelson crosses it when he either betrays Argent and takes half of his face or when he tries to burn down a store filed with AWOL children.
    • Starkey saving the escape jet in the Graveyard for the storks, leaving the Whollies and wards to distract the Juvie cops.
    • Any parent who sends their child to be Unwound probably crosses it by default. No matter what you call it, it's sending a teenager to their death. Especially Hayden's parents.
  • Narm: Connor being unwound in Undivided is an absolutely brutal scene...with the brief exception of "Funkytown" being played.
  • Paranoia Fuel: Clappers. They could be anyone, anywhere, and the only difference is that their blood is volatile, so they explode if they clap hard enough. (Hence their name)
  • Too Bleak, Stopped Caring: To some readers, the premise of parents signing away their kids to have their organs harvested is so unbelievably horrific from the outset that it was impossible for them to be invested in the story.


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