Lilo
Lilo Pelekai (first name pronounced /ˈliːloʊ/ LEE-loh) is one of the stars of Lilo & Stitch and its subsequent sequels and animated series. Lilo (literally, "lost" in Hawaiian[1]) is a young Hawaiian girl who lives on the island of Kauaʻi with her older sister Nani and her extended family of alien visitors marooned on Earth.
Lilo is a young girl with long, straight black hair and brown eyes. She is most often seen wearing a muʻumuʻu and sandals, but also wears other warm-weather clothing as well as traditional hula costumes. In Lilo & Stitch 2: Stitch Has a Glitch, her reflection in a mirror is compared to a picture of her young mother, suggesting that they look similar. In the episode "Skip" where an experiment is used to skip time 10 then another 10 years, it is mentioned that older Lilo looks a lot like her sister Nani.
Her spirited and highly eccentric personality, especially in light of her parents' death, has alienated her from her fellow children, yet Lilo makes the perfect best friend for Stitch, an alien experiment whom she adopts as her dog. Lilo attends Hula school and her hobbies include the photography of obese people, talking about creatures from horror/sci-fi movies, and capturing and rehabilitating Jumba's evil genetic experiments. In "Spooky", it is revealed Lilo is afraid of broccoli, clowns, and the scary/haunted house on the hill nearby where she lives. It is also revealed in this episode that Lilo, like her father, plays guitar. While frequently shown to be a strong swimmer like many Hawaiians, Lilo is also a strong free diver, shown when she swam from the stalled x-buggy in sub-mode and carrying Rufus, to Drakken's lair on the bottom of the ocean to rescue Kim Possible and Stitch.
Lilo's parents died in a car accident some time before Lilo & Stitch (it is suggested that rain made road conditions treacherous), and they have not appeared in the series apart from three photographs: one of Lilo, Nani, and their parents having a picnic on the beach, a photograph of Lilo's mother winning the Hula contest at her school's May Day celebration, and a photo of Nani with her parents when she graduated to intermediate Hula.
Lilo's mother is depicted as kind and loving (and perhaps eccentric like her younger daughter), as well as an excellent hula dancer. She would placate her children by holding a family night, singing lullabies, and making up funny constellations. Lilo's father played the ʻukulele and was the one who coined the phrase ʻOhana means family, and family means nobody gets left behind or forgotten. The phrase becomes a sort of family motto for his daughters and their intergalactic adopted clan. Lilo loves and misses her parents very much. She keeps a picture of them under her pillow and initially would not allow Stitch to touch it (rejecting him when his fight with Jumba caused her house and the picture to become damaged). In the episode "Remmy", which takes place on the anniversary of the accident, Lilo is depressed and takes a nap to help deal with her sadness. The picture is used to turn Lilo's nightmares into a dream of the day the photograph was taken, which manages to make her happy again.
The development of Lilo's ʻohana (extended family) begins with the adoption of Stitch in Lilo & Stitch. Though Lilo technically owns Stitch by Hawaiian state law, the relationship between the two is more like siblings and best friends. By the end of the series, Lilo's extended ʻohana includes Nani, "Uncle" Jumba and "Aunt" Pleakley, David, Cobra Bubbles, the Grand Councilwoman, and all 627 (627 and 628 was shown dehydrated in the episode of 627, although it could be argued that he still counts) of Stitch's "Cousins".
