HazelNoir

This is my first post here! I've been lurking forever but I finally decided to join. I agree with so many posts people made here. Bubbles' post about Jimmy on the last page was spot on. He treated all of his girlfriends terribly, not to mention his mother. I feel like they could've done so much more with him and he was more compelling than Spinner but he didn't get that much focus after the shooting. My biggest UO? I disliked JT. He was petty a lot of the time and it wasn't even poor writing or something you could chalk up to him being 12 or 13. When Manny got her makeover in Season 3, we were supposed to feel bad for him that he didn't get to date her, as if he was entitled to her just because he knew her longer. When she dated Sully instead of him, he just acted like those "nice guys" who complain about being "friend zoned" instead of realizing that Manny was her own human being who was allowed to date whoever she wanted. Then the show sets them up together, which says "see? Manny was stupid after all. Bad boys Sully and Craig messed her up, but JT would never!". Then he brings up Craig before they date, which Manny shuts down gracefully, and then again in the next season, when he thinks Manny would still have feelings for Craig because of the hot tub scene. Manny was right to end the relationship right there and then she called him out on his pettiness at Rick's funeral, but she still was friends with him because the show didn't think it was wrong of him to act like he deserved her over anyone else because he's inherently a better person because he's goofy. Then I also hated how he treated Toby. He tried to ditch him for the popular kids and still wouldn't be friends with him after the Rick stuff but Toby was always there for him no matter how terrible JT was. It kind of reminds me of Dave and Wesley in a way but at least those two were forgotten about before they were able to get too toxic. I didn't like his relationship with Liberty that much either but that's for another day. I like Ashley a lot. I like how she always changed her style for who she was hanging out with (a more visual interpretation of personal discovery in adolescence, I guess) and she acted like a real human being, which isn't always taking the high road (like the frenemy dynamic with Paige when they were in middle school or outing Manny's pregnancy or feeling overwhelmed by Craig and wanting to go to England) and making decisions based on communication and rationality. I usually see people hate how she's negative or petty but I feel like it's more of people calling any kind of female character who isn't perky all the time a bitch. Maybe that's a stretch but some of the things Craig or Peter or Drew have gotten away with get less comments sometimes. Like, Craig took Ashley off his credits on his CD but nobody thought that was wrong, but Ashley wanting her own direction for her song was way worse. Yeah she could've talk with him about it, but I like Ashley because communicating was an issue for her. I didn't like Adam that much. I understood his impact and role and I liked some of his episodes and since he had a lot of friends he didn't always interact with the same people, but I feel like the writers didn't know what to do with him for how to progress his storyline. I feel like they were moving at a snail's pace or giving him subplots which didn't really give us anything new about him. It sucks that (from the looks of it) Jordan wanted to leave the show (are we allowed to talk about behind the scenes or fandom things here?) but at least Adam isn't stuck in a limbo of dating and breaking up with Becky for these last 2 seasons. If they'd have another trans character on the show, I think they should do more research, whether that involves trans writers or trans actors and actresses, but that's for another thread. I liked Mia, before she became a model at least. I liked the episodes where she was dating Lucas and having to deal with her child almost being taken away and stuff. Yeah, she wasn't helping Liberty or Toby at all at JT's memorial but I've gone through loss and there's ALWAYS someone who thinks they were closer to the person than you were or tries to invalidate your mourning somehow so it was good to see that on TV somewhere. I really liked Paige, Marco, and Ellie's college plots. They're not realistic at all but I liked how they talked about things like anxiety, dropping out, not knowing what you're doing in life, loneliness, codependency. I feel like I can relate to Free Falling and Don't Stop Believing more than some of the early "relatable" year plots. That's all for now, but I'll probably be back here if I think of something else!