20 of Michelle Trachtenberg’s best roles

There used to be a time when all young actors got their start on soap operas. Michelle Trachtenberg was no different than the likes of Amber Tamblyn and Hayden Panettiere when she appeared on All My Children in 1993 when she was only eight.

Inspector Gadget might not have won over many, but that doesn’t mean it was the fault of Trachtenberg’s Penny.

In 2004, Trachtenberg scored a guest role on Six Feet Under as a pop star who gets up close and personal with Keith Charles.

The early 2000s saw an abundance of teen sex comedies, such as Road Trip, which paved the way for an international adventure, EuroTrip. In it, Trachtenberg plays a fraternal twin who sees the European sights with her brother and a couple of friends from high school. In between the sights and sounds, there is good, old-fashioned, comedic debauchery.

Nickelodeon took a big swing with The Adventures of Pete & Pete, and it worked for a niche audience. So much so that fans of the series hold every scene, line, and character close to heart. That includes Nona F. Mecklenberg, Little Pete’s best friend who loved to itch her cast-riddled arm.

It’s said that Mischa Barton had originally been pegged for the role of HBIC Georgina Sparks, but when The O.C. actress turned it down, Trachtenberg swooped in and turned her run on Gossip Girl into a momentous one.

Once upon a time, Trachtenberg played the daughter of Matthew Perry and Zac Efron in the same film — wild.

Ice Princess didn’t skate to victory at the box office, but it has become one of Trachtenberg’s most beloved cult classics as it has that Disney underdog charm, and in a way, paved the road for High School Musical and challenging the status quo.

Before she was in Nickelodeon’s first theatrical release, an eight-year-old Trachtenberg guest starred on one of the network’s biggest hits at the time, Clarissa Explains It All, as a neighbor no one would ever want to babysit.

Trachtenberg wasn’t afraid to get a little spooked as she found herself in a retelling of 1974’s Black Christmas as one of the sorority sisters who faced the unimaginable around the holidays.

Only in a show like Buffy the Vampire Slayer could a character like Dawn Summers appear out of nowhere in the fifth season, and cause no one to bat an eye. Trachtenberg did just that and rode out the rest of the hit series as the titular character's little sister.

True Crime girlies owe their lives to Harriet the Spy. This was Nickelodeon’s first foray into movies, and it proved successful. The film propelled Trachtenberg into the limelight, all while inspiring a generation to seek out the mysteries of life and take note of the world around them along the way.

Okay, so Trachtenberg didn’t really have to get into too much character for Truth of Scare, but it’s still a moment in her career that resonates with stans.

This wasn’t a huge role, but Trachtenberg made the most of her time as Ashley, an ‘80s goth dynamo.

Trachtenberg appeared on half a dozen episodes of the wildly popular Showtime series Weeds back in 2011 as a boss just targeting the show’s leads and their family business.

Sexy Evil Genius is a dark comedy with some twists and turns that featured Trachtenberg as Miranda, a woman with a pretty bad case of the ex.

Almost every actor will appear on either Law & Order, CSI, or Criminal Minds at some point in their career. Trachtenberg did so on the latter in 2013.

Mysterious Skin is not for the faint of heart, but Trachtenberg helps provide that as the best friend to Joseph Gordon-Levitt's Neil in this coming-of-age drama.

In 2009, Trachtenberg tried her hand at medical dramas as a fresh-faced, overwhelmed nurse in the NBC medical drama, Mercy.

Fans of the graphic novel The Scribbler got to see it come to life in 2014 when Katie Cassidy took on the lead role with Trachtenberg right there as part of the supporting cast that also included The Big Bang Theory’s Kunal Nayyar, Eliza Dushku, and Fear the Walking Dead’s Garret Dillahunt.