# Supposedly sympathetic characters you just can't stand **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [December 28, 2005, 6:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/supposedly-sympathetic-characters-you-just-cant-stand/337462 "2005-12-28T18:28:35Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![PastAllReason](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/f07891/32.png) [@PastAllReason](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PastAllReason)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2005, 2:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/supposedly-sympathetic-characters-you-just-cant-stand/337462/21 "2005-12-29T02:05:00Z")
> [@Interrobang!?](#): > > How about Cordelia on _Angel_ seasons 1-3 or so? Couldn’t stand her. She’s supposed to be the common-sensical, unafraid-to-speak-truth-to-Angel bitch with a heart of gold, but she was just irritating. In fact, I only really started to like her when Jasmine was in the driver’s seat. Intreresting that you say that. I didn’t like Cordy on _Buffy._ I very much liked her on _Angel_, and missed the character when she left. Her reappearance on her final episode in the fifth season highlighted to me what the show lost with her character’s departure and it was as much to do with a lightness of tone as with her willingness to tell Angel off. The character that I did not like was Fred. When Illyria appeared I realized my dislike wasn’t for Amy Acker, but for wimpy, whiny Fred. I much preferred Illyria. I often also felt quite meh about Angel most of the time. (Wes, however, is a different story altogether. Damn those last few minutes of the final episode.) ---
**Author:** ![Kamino\_Neko](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kamino_neko/32/34_2.png) [@Kamino\_Neko](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kamino_Neko)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2005, 2:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/supposedly-sympathetic-characters-you-just-cant-stand/337462/22 "2005-12-29T02:20:06Z")
> [@Fabulous Creature](#): > > The best Batman story I’ve seen in the past ten years or so was a two-parter in the 90s animated Batman series I was referring only to the comics. The animated versions are generally pretty good. (Although he took a turn comicward in the first season of JLU.) And, actually, starting in the early 80s, mostly. (His dickishness in issues 1 and 30 of Batman and the Outsiders verges on the hillarious.) Sorry for the confusion. ---
**Author:** ![eleanorigby](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ee7513/32.png) [@eleanorigby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eleanorigby)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2005, 3:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/supposedly-sympathetic-characters-you-just-cant-stand/337462/23 "2005-12-29T03:08:02Z")
> [@GorillaMan](#): > > It’s the whole “ewwww, my parents _never_ have sex” thing. If you can’t believe she ever had sex, you’ve got to start explaining the three kids by some other means. And she admitted to at least one affair when Nathaniel was alive. No-it’s not. The men in her life (not her sons) keep going on and on about her passionate and sensual nature–they compliment her on her proclivities and her technique! They laud her for her sensuality. Dunno 'bout you, but when I look at Ruth Fisher, hot steamy nights are not what comes to mind. I should have said I can’t see her as enjoying sex, ever. Maybe it’s the bun or the frumpy skirts–I dunno. I believe in more than one type of expression of sexyiness, but I can see Ma Walton getting more action than Ruth. Speaking of the Waltons–John Boy should have been drowned at birth. I agree about Rebecca narrator–notice she is nameless throughout. Tiny Tim–someone beat him with that crutch. grrrr. Very hostile to literature at present… ---
**Author:** ![First\_Amongst\_Daves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/4491bb/32.png) [@First\_Amongst\_Daves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/First_Amongst_Daves)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2005, 3:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/supposedly-sympathetic-characters-you-just-cant-stand/337462/24 "2005-12-29T03:08:07Z")
> [@Tengu](#): > > I was referring only to the comics. The animated versions are generally pretty good. (Although he took a turn comicward in the first season of JLU.) And, actually, starting in the early 80s, mostly. (His dickishness in issues 1 and 30 of Batman and the Outsiders verges on the hillarious.) > > Sorry for the confusion. What did you think of Mike Allred’s “Batman-A-Go-Go” in _Solo_? ---
**Author:** ![Lynn\_Bodoni](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e47c2d/32.png) [@Lynn\_Bodoni](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lynn_Bodoni)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2005, 3:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/supposedly-sympathetic-characters-you-just-cant-stand/337462/25 "2005-12-29T03:17:52Z")
> [@eleanorigby](#): > > Lucille Ball–in any of her series. I always wanted “Ricky” to drown her and then kill himself. > The entire cast of the Brady Bunch–blech. > The mom on Six Feet Under–can’t remember her name, but she annoys me. She is supposedly so sensual and erotic, but she dresses like June Cleaver in California in the 21st century! God knows I don’t want senior smut, but I could never believe her character. > Raymond-from Everybody loves Raymond. I liked the show (my MIL is Marie on a bad day), but I never liked him. I always wanted to yell at the TV–you could do better than him! Dump him! I haven’t seen Six Feet Under, but I agree with everything else. Lucille Ball always played a blithering idiot, got away with it, and I always hated it. I don’t like stupid characters who end up doing well. I don’t like Dennis the Menace. I don’t find him charming or funny, and wish that he’d disappear. His parents need to put him on a leash until he’s willing to act a little better. He knows better, but he also knows he can get away with quite a lot. I hate mascots in general. These are particularly obnoxious in Japanese cartoons, games, and stories. ---
**Author:** ![Snooooopy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ee7513/32.png) [@Snooooopy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snooooopy)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2005, 3:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/supposedly-sympathetic-characters-you-just-cant-stand/337462/26 "2005-12-29T03:19:55Z")
> [@PastAllReason](#): > > Intreresting that you say that. I didn’t like Cordy on _Buffy._ I very much liked her on _Angel_, and missed the character when she left. Her reappearance on her final episode in the fifth season highlighted to me what the show lost with her character’s departure and it was as much to do with a lightness of tone as with her willingness to tell Angel off. Not the final episode of the fifth season – she reappeared halfway through. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2005, 3:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/supposedly-sympathetic-characters-you-just-cant-stand/337462/27 "2005-12-29T03:31:25Z")
Carla from _Cheers._ Always wanted to watch her die. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2005, 3:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/supposedly-sympathetic-characters-you-just-cant-stand/337462/28 "2005-12-29T03:32:41Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > Carla from _Cheers._ Always wanted to watch her die. Lilith, too. What was Frazier thinking? ---
**Author:** ![Rilchiam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/2bfe46/32.png) [@Rilchiam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rilchiam)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2005, 4:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/supposedly-sympathetic-characters-you-just-cant-stand/337462/29 "2005-12-29T04:35:12Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > Errmmm . . . Was Jar-Jar Binks **supposed** to be a sympathetic character? No. ---
**Author:** ![Reepicheep](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/ed655f/32.png) [@Reepicheep](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Reepicheep)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2005, 4:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/supposedly-sympathetic-characters-you-just-cant-stand/337462/30 "2005-12-29T04:40:16Z")
> [@eleanorigby](#): > > … and Melanie Wilkes needs to be taken out back and smacked around (as does Ashley). As do Scarlett and Rett. That was the point of the novel, none of them are sympathetic characters. When I wrote a paper stating that, in 12th grade, I got a B and none of the girls in my English class would speak to me for two weeks. ---
**Author:** ![RikWriter](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/49beb7/32.png) [@RikWriter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RikWriter)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2005, 4:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/supposedly-sympathetic-characters-you-just-cant-stand/337462/31 "2005-12-29T04:47:02Z")
Ian Malcom in Jurassic Park 1 and 2. In 1, he was an arrogant prick that couldn’t argue his way out of a paper bag and mouthed a moronic misunderstanding of chaos theory. In 2, he and Vince Vaughn’s monkey-wrencher were basically guilty of murder. ---
**Author:** ![First\_Amongst\_Daves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/4491bb/32.png) [@First\_Amongst\_Daves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/First_Amongst_Daves)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2005, 4:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/supposedly-sympathetic-characters-you-just-cant-stand/337462/32 "2005-12-29T04:47:18Z")
Sgt Schultz in \* Hogan’s Heroes\*. There are only so many times "I see nothing! can be funny. > [@Rilchiam](#): > > No. If George Lucas was trying to emulate the cuteness of the Ewoks by using a character which looked like a flanged hard plastic dildo, then he failed at the one thing he is actually good at (marketing). ---
**Author:** ![Odesio](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/odesio/32/20003_2.png) [@Odesio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Odesio)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2005, 4:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/supposedly-sympathetic-characters-you-just-cant-stand/337462/33 "2005-12-29T04:58:09Z")
> [@lissener](#): > > I also can’t stand Marshall Will Kane, the “hero” of _High Noon._ How are you sposed to respect a Marshall who spends the whole movie whining around town trying to get somebody else to risk their lives to do his job for him? As I recall he was going to retire because of the Quaker wife he had just acquired at the beginning of the movie. He could not flee because the outlaws would just catch up to him and his wife on the plains so his only option was to stay and fight. Through the course of the movie we learn that Marshal Will served the town well throughout the years and was a driving force in clearing it of the rougher elements. So years later one of the outlaws he sent to prison is returning with a few other men to take their revenge and murder Marshal Will. Because the outlaws are coming for the Marshal alone most of the citizens don’t feel the need to assist him because they’re not the ones in danger. I felt a great deal of sympathy for Marshal Will who was under a great deal of stress as he awaited the men arriving to end his life and dealt with people he thought were his friends who abandoned him to his fate. Remember the scene where a bunch of men at the church agreed to form a possee, as they had a few times in the past, but the pastor talks them out of it? Man, that was a great movie. Marc ---
**Author:** ![drm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/a88e57/32.png) [@drm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drm)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2005, 5:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/supposedly-sympathetic-characters-you-just-cant-stand/337462/34 "2005-12-29T05:54:03Z")
> [@First Amongst Daves](#): > > 1. Luke Skywalker is a whiny bitch and a hick. I wholeheartedly agree with this. Is Napoleon Dynamite supposed to be sympathetic? I think he’s a bit of a jerk. ---
**Author:** ![cmkeller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmkeller/32/118_2.png) [@cmkeller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmkeller)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2005, 11:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/supposedly-sympathetic-characters-you-just-cant-stand/337462/35 "2005-12-29T11:15:03Z")
SCARLETT O’HARA!!! Good heavens, she’s awful. But the vibe I get from _Gone With the Wind_ is that we’re supposed to admire her attachment to Tara and her determination to survive. Me, I can’t think of her as anything but a lying bitch. ---
**Author:** ![Coldfire](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a587f6/32.png) [@Coldfire](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Coldfire)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2005, 12:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/supposedly-sympathetic-characters-you-just-cant-stand/337462/36 "2005-12-29T12:36:30Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > Lilith, too. What was Frazier thinking? Am I the only one who found her hot, then? 🙂 In fact, [she’s still cute at 47](http://www.imdb.com/gallery/granitz/3726/Events/3726/BebeNeuwir_Kambo_6229588_400.jpg?path=pgallery&path_key=Neuwirth,%20Bebe). ---
**Author:** ![Stentor\_2.5](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bc8723/32.png) [@Stentor\_2.5](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stentor_2.5)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2005, 1:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/supposedly-sympathetic-characters-you-just-cant-stand/337462/37 "2005-12-29T13:24:19Z")
> [@First Amongst Daves](#): > > 1. Yorick in \* Y: The Last Man\* is a goofy and a flake, when I think he is supposed to be amusing. Only recent issues have given him some depth. Of course he’s goofy and a flake. The entire premise of the comic is what if a guy who was routinely told “not if you were the last man on Earth” actually did turn out to be the last man on earth. Yorick is just one of those guys who doesn’t quite realize that he’s not nearly as amusing to others as he is to himself. ---
**Author:** ![Ponder\_Stibbons](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ponder_stibbons/32/343_2.png) [@Ponder\_Stibbons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ponder_Stibbons)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2005, 1:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/supposedly-sympathetic-characters-you-just-cant-stand/337462/38 "2005-12-29T13:37:28Z")
> [@First Amongst Daves](#): > > 1. Superman. The character is too righteous and humble for me. I must agree. He is such an ubiquitous character in American culture, and he is such a total dick ( [http://www.superdickery.com/dick/1.html](http://www.superdickery.com/dick/1.html) dick ). ---
**Author:** ![raindog](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/2bfe46/32.png) [@raindog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/raindog)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2005, 2:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/supposedly-sympathetic-characters-you-just-cant-stand/337462/39 "2005-12-29T14:24:46Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > Lilith, too. What was Frazier thinking? For me, Sam’s girlfriend. I think her character was named Diane Chambers. I’d rather hear nails on a ckalkboard. I _detested_ that character. ---
**Author:** ![raindog](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/2bfe46/32.png) [@raindog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/raindog)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2005, 2:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/supposedly-sympathetic-characters-you-just-cant-stand/337462/40 "2005-12-29T14:26:01Z")
> [@Coldfire](#): > > Am I the only one who found her hot, then? 🙂 > > In fact, [she’s still cute at 47](http://www.imdb.com/gallery/granitz/3726/Events/3726/BebeNeuwir_Kambo_6229588_400.jpg?path=pgallery&path_key=Neuwirth,%20Bebe). Yes, you are the only one… 😉 [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/supposedly-sympathetic-characters-you-just-cant-stand/337462.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/supposedly-sympathetic-characters-you-just-cant-stand/337462.md?page=3)