Aiden's teacher says "Certainly is very independent isn't he?" Again this is done deliberately to show that Aiden has to do a lot of things for himself rather than the mother providing for his every need. Now making my first point relating back to the question, the female characters in the three films in which I am going to relate this to, ("Texas Chainsaw Massacre", "Scream" and "Halloween"), all three of the main characters aren't so independent as her, they certainly do not have the responsibility level that Rachel seems to have. Again the age is different, Sally, Sidney and Laurie are all roughly around the same age, 18, whereas Rachel seems to be entering her late 20's. This subverts one of the conventions that we have been accustomed to. Another point, which I consider to be a big factor, is the fact that Rachel is more alone than any of the others. Laurie has some friends in which she socialises with, while Sally and Sidney are popular and in a large group, but with Rachel, we don't seem to learn much about her personal life away from work, Aiden and then later on Noah. She seems to want to keep herself to herself. .
After the opening scene with the schoolteacher and Rachel, we see a clear defiant gap between Rachel and Aiden. This is shown when Rachel is saying goodnight to her son, but Aiden replies "Good night Rachel" , where as the obvious reply would be "Good night Mum". So there is a bridge in the relationship of these two characters, it may be that Rachel does not take enough interest in what her son does and doesn't do. Again may be subversion to typical horror genre female lead women. What I mean by this is that all of the other horror films in which I am comparing this to, the main lead role is played by a popular character, who no one seems to have a large problem with. Comparing this with Rachel, there is a mountable gap from her, as we do not find out about her social life.
