fandomsecrets | [ SECRET POST #6450 ]

[ SECRET POST #6450 ]

⌈ Secret Post #6450 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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Notes:

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Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
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Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

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What makes you dislike a fictional character?

Lately it’s characters who are incredibly inconsiderate and never experience meaningful repercussions. They’re awful to others, often in a familial or professional context and are forgiven again and again, allowed to continually harass/abuse people.

I know they’re often characters that are there for comedy purposes, but I just have a hard time enjoying the joke when I can’t help imagining having to deal with someone like them in real life.

I wish I could let go of that and get in on the joke, but it’s just too close to home right now.

Really sexist male characters, especially if they never learn any better, and especially if they are supposed to be a hero.

Anti-heroes in general, though sometimes there will be one I like.

Basically any "hero" who is a villain in all but name but because they are a "hero" canon ignores their flaws.

Ugh sexist male characters, especially heroes, are so frustrating. They can be so perfect in every way and then the writers just decide to throw in some toxic masculinity and sexism and ruin a perfectly good man.

Yup. I find it particularly annoying when the creators clearly don't realize he's sexist. And where other characters grow and change, but he really doesn't. Like Xander on Buffy.

I absolutely cannot stand this. It's one thing in a work that's fairly old, but jfc I have very little patience for writers who write a male hero who engages in toxic, scary behavior and glosses over it, or worse - tries to romanticize it.

Assuming this is about characters that we're supposed to be rooting for and not characters we're supposed to hate...

Honestly mostly meta things. When they get obvious plot armor. Or the author is heavy-handed in how they totally were justified even if they did horrible things. When the author's vision of the character is something completely different from what I am perceiving on screen or in text.

e.g. I don't hate this character for being a piece of shit, lots of characters are glorious and funny and interesting pieces of shit. I hate it because the author and the fictional world the author created keeps insisting it's not a piece of shit when it is one, and that's grating.

To add to this: I can absolutely love a villain character who has no redeeming qualities and is just an awful horrible bastard for being a great villain character. I'd hate them in real life obviously but I can love the way they are written or how they move through the plot or how they are just so fantastically terrible.

Just keep the meta aspect clean and we're good.

Character traits: when they're hypocrites, have no flaws, are the obnoxiously quirky type that's supposed to be so funny and relatable but ends up just annoying.

Meta: when they're obviously the creator's pet, when they're blatant author inserts or obvious soapbox characters for the author's opinions.

+billions to all of this

Excluding characters we are supposed to hate, quirky characters or ones who are always cracking jokes. Like Darcy or Tony from the MCU.

Characters that make bad decisions or hurt others without repercussions. I chalk it up to mostly bad writing, but it makes me annoyed with the character too.

The "asshole with a heart of gold" type of characters. Where they are all jerky mcjerkerton but they are secretly a wounded woobie so we should excuse all of their jerky actions and words.

This probably makes me a bitter jaded asshole, but I am done with rich characters. I just automatically dislike them or at least lose interest when they are billionaires.

Kinda same.

Millionaires are eh hit or miss. Lots of idk doctors are millionaires.

Billionaires unless something exceptional better be at least some flavor of evil because how could they not be?

Re: Question for the comm

(Anonymous) - 2024-09-03 02:43 (UTC) - Expand

Characters that the narrative treats differently than how they're actually shown on screen. Like the world building saying that a character is always virtuous, the music is always upbeat in their scenes, other characters agree that the character always chooses the morally correct option, but the actions of the character are at odds (i.e. cheats on their partner, kills non-combatants either directly or indirectly, steals, etc etc). The narrative is not trying to show that everyone is wrong about this character; the writers honestly believe that the asshole they've written is a morally virtuous person.

Yeah, that's bad writing, and it annoys me, too. I don't understand how dense you'd have to be as a writer not to notice that your character who's supposed to be good keeps doing awful things. Is it because the writer him/herself has a slippery grasp of right vs. wrong? Or do they just fail to grasp that you can't tell everyone character X is an honest, good person and then show them burning down an orphanage and act like that doesn't undermine their supposed goodness.

Re: Question for the comm

(Anonymous) - 2024-09-03 05:37 (UTC) - Expand

One dimensional villains who are just crazy evil. I don’t mind evil villains that are irredeemable, but I don’t like it when all they do is laugh and kill people. They need to have a bit more personality and dimension than that.

Hmmm. My standards are different for supposed good guys, morally grey characters and villains.

SA Dammit, hit post accidentally.

The biggest one is when the narrative insists that a good guy protag is a moral paragon, but the character's actions demonstrate the exact opposite. For example, the designated good guy acting like a hypocrite, being awful to his allies, or bullying another character for no reason and the narrative doesn't call the character on that shit. If the behavior I don't like is a pattern rather than a one-off, I find it impossible to ignore, and end up hating that character.

The same issues I dislike in real people: assholes, people who never take responsibility for their own actions, people with weak integrity, people who blame everyone else for their problems. I hate it when the good guy has a bunch of sexist, misogynist red flags that the author doesn't regard as red flags. I hate female characters who make excuses for men and their shitty behavior, especially when they do it because they're secretly in love with the shitty man and are willing to tear down other women for it.

But honestly, a lot of it is in the writing. A really compellingly written character makes a lot of difference, it's just hard for most writers to pull off.

How much of a Mary Sue they are, I have a low tolerance for the instantly talented superpowered teen characters.

Fans who think they're morally superior for being fans of that character and pretend any reason someone has for not liking them is rooted in some kind of bigotry.

Yeah, that can really put me off as well.

I'm a bit confused - so you are basically saying the fans of a character make you dislike the character? Which if so, I get.

Yeah. There's a certain contingent of fans of "good guy" characters or characters who've been labeled progressive in some way who really do seem to think that because they like a good character or are stanning for a progressive cause, that means they are automatically good people. So whenever they are mean to other fans, bully other fans or just act like assholes in general, it's always justified. If anyone doesn't like their imaginary darling, doesn't find said darling interesting or just happens to like other characters much better, it can only be because they are a a bigot in some way. Thus any bullying or asshole thing they want to say or do is OK and a social good.

It gets pretty creepy fast. It's like they've gone beyond pretending that their shit doesn't stink to having convinced themselves that it actively can't.

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