List of East Enders Characters (2009) - Marissa Moore

Marissa Moore, played by Finn Atkins, makes her first on-screen appearance on 13 January 2009, working at the newly opened Gilly's Massage Parlour. The parlour is met with opposition from Peggy Mitchell (Barbara Windsor) and Dot Branning (June Brown), amongst other residents. Peggy tries to convince Patrick Trueman (Rudolph Walker) not to serve Marissa in his shop, but Jay Brown (Jamie Borthwick) sticks up for her and strikes up a friendship with her.

As Kris Green of Digital Spy reports, "Jay (Jamie Borthwick) tries to take his friendship with Marissa (Finn Atkins) to another level. He plans to run away with Marissa. When Jay meets with Marissa, however, he's confused by her behaviour. All's not what it seems with the young female as she brushes Jay off and makes a call and says into the mic: 'I did what you said. Now leave him alone.'"

Atkins discussed her role in an interview with the Nottingham Evening Post. When asked, "The ears of local viewers must have pricked up when they heard Marissa?" Atkins replied, "A lot of people have said that! I've had a lot of nice feedback. When I went for the casting I'd prepared a London accent, but they were like, 'You know what, we prefer your Nottingham accent,' and I was like 'Get in!' A lot of people had assumed I would be giving it the Cockney slang and I said, 'No – I'm doing it with my Nottingham accent.' I kind of felt like I was representing the city." Atkins described the character at some length, noting, "My character, Marissa, was in a lot of scenes with Jamie Borthwick, who plays Jay Brown... Marissa was a runaway who had been let down by people. She arrived in London to stay with a friend, but found the friend wasn't there, so she'd been on her own and the hardship had forced her into prostitution. Obviously that wasn't something that EastEnders could delve too much into, but you got the idea that she was going through hard times. She could seem quite hard but she did have a softer side. I don't know if they'll return to the storyline or not... The character, Marissa, was only 16. Because I'm quite small I can play anything from 15 up to my age or even a bit older."

Grace Dent writes, "I feel sad for Marissa already. Gilly's brothel is a garish tribute to why this really is still a man's world and Marissa's just the faceless droid who masturbates him. I'm not sure that banning Marissa from the so she can't have a bacon sandwich afterwards is really solving anything."