Seinfeld ended with the characters in court because they were such self-absorbed assholes.
The episode featured flashbacks of their most appalling behavior.
Jason Alexander was the worst and always scheming to work the system.
Their stealthy bad behavior made them interesting. You could meet any character and think they were friendly. But they’d mock and belittle you afterwards.
I think we covered Seinfeld earlier on in this thread. The Seinfeld characters were never really perceivable as ‘good’-- they were always all self-absorbed assholes, and never really changed for better or worse (if anything, for worse). “No hugging, no learning” was Larry David’s mantra from the very start.
Flag on the play - Mrs. Banks was a radical feminist before Poppins showed up; due to Poppins’ intervention, she gives up her activist ways, turning a suffragist sash into a kite tail
Was she really giving up activism? One might argue that the kite tail was publicity for the movement.
I’m sure the metaphor of “flying (high as) a kite, up where the air is clear” was not lost on the audience of the 1960s. Neither was “up where the smoke is all billowed and curled.” The whole thing was a salute to the drugs culture.
Just like the “little old ‘birdwoman’” coming “everyday to the steps of St Paul’s” to peddle “her wares” for “tuppence a bag.” In other words, she’s selling cut-rate “opiates” of another sort to “the masses” of impressionable youngsters to get them hooked on drugs under the guise of “feeding the birds.” The children are even willing to defy their parents in order get their hands on her so-called “breadcrumbs.”
I’m convinced the Sherman Brothers were bent on corrupting American youth with the lyrics to their songs. It took ten-year-old me about five minutes to transform “I Love to Laugh” (another paean to “getting high”) into “I Love to Fart.” “Sister Suffragettes” was a veiled salute to lesbianism. And “Step in Time” promoted the gay agenda of Bert and his prancing “mates.”
And what’s up with Bert, anyway? It’s clear from his horrible accent that he’s not even English! Was he sent to London by a foreign power to corrupt British youth by offering them “trips” into his psychedelic “sidewalk art”? The cacophony of his “one-man band” mirrors perfectly the tuneless discord promoted by degenerate rock musicians of the 1960s. And “blow me a kiss/and you’re lucky too” encourages promiscuity and male domination, not to mention archaic superstition.
Looking back, I can see just how much of this movie went over my head when I was in fourth grade!
Were there any good people on Babylon 5?
G’Kar hated the Centauri and took great pleasure in belittling Londo. The Narn were becoming power hungry and abusive just like the Centauri.
Delenn had a vision to change her appearance and seduce Sheridan. She was told to help him and he would be a great leader against the Shadows.
O’Hare was secretly working with the Vorlons
Vir Cotto and Lennier started innocent and were corrupted by the war.
Londo, Morden, and Bester were obviously bad.
The intro made it clear everyone was seeking power and had their agendas.
Brother Theo
Marcus Cole
Dirty Harry was just the beginning of a long list of hero cops (or vigilantes, ex special forces agents, etc) in movies who quite honestly belonged in prison next to the few perps they didn’t shoot. This was a common thing in movies in the 1970s and 1980s; the skyrocketing crime rates made people terrified of crime and movies played to that big time.
I mean, how many people does Martin Riggs arrest in “Lethal Weapon?” He shoots everyone. He’s a terrible cop even by the worst impressions of cop standards. Anyone who saw “Cobra” with Stallone knows what I’m talking about. The movie’s tagline is literally “Crime is a disease. Meet the cure” with a picture of Stallone holding a ludicrous weapon thats looks like a remainder from the Star Wars prop shed.
“I must admit I am worried what will become of them now that I have gone. I had planned to send them to boarding school, since their education at the moment seems to consist mostly of marching around Salzburg singing scales.”
Good training in preparation for the impending Anschluss! 
Correct, which pretty much follows the OP clearly. The characters weren’t portrayed as “White Hat” good. They were all complicated and compromised in their own ways. And there was a huge scale with certain characters being more good and selfless compared to the other end.
Bab 5 is fun in that if you look at it the right way, both the Vorlons and Shadows are ‘good’ - they feel they are doing their best (admittedly for selfish reasons as well) to raise the young species. They just have strong differences of opinions on how to do so! So you have mom and dad first arguing about the right way to raise the kids, and eventually come to blows, and finally start trying to get the kids to take their sides, manipulating them the whole way.
I have more or less said the same thing- but not as well. Nice mini-rant.
Cal is no good guy, but Rose is no better.
Oh then, instead of using her necklace to found a school for Girls or something, she tosses it overboard.
I always interpreted her character arc as “leading the suffragettes is something to fill my time since my husband is a workaholic - but now that he’s spending time with me and the kids, this sash is of no further use to me” - I could be wrong.
Lenny is a fun character to watch, but he was not the kind of police officer we want in the real world. He was willing to lie under oath when he wanted to (and openly admitted that) - and at least once he got a confession out of an innocent person.
More nonsense from the Pygmalion-style “happy ending.” No family is that happy and harmonious in real life!
Vorlon. Mary Poppins is a Vorlon.
He, like many a long-running character, was written inconstantly. In one episode, he fights against police corruption, in another, he forgives an old friend for letting a rich kid get away with murder.
Now Logan, he’s real life NYPD. Beats up suspects, coerces an confession at gunpoint, and even shot and killed a cop.
That’s not really inconsistent - he’s against corruption in general, but will give friends a break.
I should say “That’s not a writing inconsistency - that’s an accurate characterization of a person who is inconsistent, being against corruption in general, but favoring his friends even when they are corrupt”