Loathesome!: Characters We Hate

[HunterHunted]

Jeremy from UnREAL. He stalks his ex-girlfriend, assaults her, and murders 2 people, but still thinks he's within his rights to be smug and superior to his ex about her bad choices. 

[AntiBeeSpray]

Elizabeth from The Americans. She gets on my nerves with her attitude sometimes.

[Duke2801]

On 4/25/2018 at 7:58 AM, Tanichka said:

Roseanne.  And the woman who plays her can’t act!

The woman who plays her... you mean Roseanne? ??

[Tanichka]

2 hours ago, Duke2801 said:

The woman who plays her... you mean Roseanne? ??

Yes!

[Duke2801]

Heh I actually like Roseanne (the character, not the actress) but I totally understand why many others don’t. She’s very polarizing. 

My character I hate the most currently is Gina on Brooklyn 99. She’s just mean, rude, and not really funny. I was hoping she’s never return from her maternity leave! 

[legaleagle53]

Wyatt Logan on Timeless.  Actually, I don't hate him, but he's really pissing me off right now with his "dog in the manger" attitude about Lucy.  Dude, you just got your dead wife Jessica, for whom you had spent years pining, back.  You basically dumped Lucy after a one-night stand in 1941 Hollywood so you could make a go of it with Jessica to atone for fucking up your marriage in the first place.  And Lucy even encouraged you to go for it.  So you get all jealous and possessive when you think she's hooking up with Flynn and all but scream "MINE!!!" at Flynn and second-guess Lucy at the same time?  Lucy and Flynn were both right to call you out on being a selfish dick. You don't own Lucy, she's not your wife OR your girlfriend, and she sure as hell doesn't owe you an explanation, much less an apology, for the way she chose to fix what you broke.  I'm beginning to see why your marriage to Jessica REALLY fell apart -- and it wasn't because of Jessica.

[Blergh]

On 12/27/2017 at 4:41 PM, Wiendish Fitch said:

I hate that episode, because it rang maddeningly false. Hey, Marie? You're the mother of Baby Boomers, and you yourself are a Great Depression baby, you're from the generation of parenting where parents prided themselves on their kids hating them, because that means you did your job as a parent! You're not like today's helicopter milksops who try to be their kids' friends! What the hell, woman??!

And all kids hate their parents, at least once in a while, it usually means nothing! Get the hell over it!

Hate to dissent  Wiendish,

 

 But I think Marie wanted her sons to 'love' her so she could control their every move for the rest of their lives (even long after she'd gone to the great beyond) and was furious about finding out Ray had expressed a momentary hatred her as a teen because that introduced the tiny possibility that he'd stand up to her and maybe even. .. rebel. Even though the ensuing years showed no signs of backbone growth, she was too paranoid about the possibility of not being able to control him to accept that at one point of his life he didn't have complete 'love' (read: unquestioning slavish devotion) for her. Oh, and of course, it gave her plenty of guilt ammo which she used to her advantage!

[Wiendish Fitch]

Just now, Blergh said:

Hate to dissent  Wiendish,

 

 But I think Marie wanted her sons to 'love' her so she could control their every move for the rest of their lives (even long after she'd gone to the great beyond) and was furious about finding out Ray had expressed a momentary hatred her as a teen because that introduced the tiny possibility that he'd stand up to her and maybe even. .. rebel. Even though the ensuing years showed no signs of backbone growth, she was too paranoid about the possibility of not being able to control him to accept that at one point of his life he didn't have complete 'love' (read: unquestioning slavish devotion) for her. Oh, and of course, it gave her plenty of guilt ammo which she used to her advantage!

Curses, Blergh, but that's a good argument. 

And, hey, dissent away, it's a free country and message board, right? ;)

[Katy M]

7 minutes ago, Blergh said:

I hate that episode, because it rang maddeningly false. Hey, Marie? You're the mother of Baby Boomers, and you yourself are a Great Depression baby, you're from the generation of parenting where parents prided themselves on their kids hating them, because that means you did your job as a parent! You're not like today's helicopter milksops who try to be their kids' friends! What the hell, woman??!

And all kids hate their parents, at least once in a while, it usually means nothing! Get the hell over it!

My grandmother was maybe a generation before that.  My dad was born in the '30s.  But, my grandmother totally wanted to control him all the time.  My mom said when they got engaged my grandmother told them they couldn't get married and when they disagreed with that assessment she told my mother she was going to outlive her so that my dad would have to go back home and live with her again (she did her best living to be 101).  She may not have wanted to be his friend, but she definitely didn't want him hating her.  And she wanted him completely dependent on her.  Marie rang too close to true for me sometimes.

[Pippin]

Since the revival of Roseanne, I've found a new character to hate. Or, rather, I remember my previous hatred.

Darlene.

You snotty, sarcastic unlikeable little bitch. 

God.

In the original series, there was an episode where she had dumped David and then had in turn been dumped, and David tells her she's "mean" and she gets the sad face and we're supposed to feel sorry for her. 

Uh-uh. No fucking way.

David was spot on. If any thing, he understated the matter.

Now in this new incarnation, she's lost her partner and job, yet still feels superior to her siblings. I'm willing to bet she lost both because she's such an insufferable bratty bitch. 

Writers, do us all a favour. Have this character struck permanently mute. Better yet, permanently comatose.

Mind you, I'm not all that wild about Roseanne, either.

[MaryPatShelby]

I liked young Darlene though, in the early seasons.  

[HunterHunted]

I'm far too old to watch Wolfblood and remember watching it with my nephews when it first came out. I had decent recollections from then. I decided to rewatch it when I saw it pop up on Amazon Prime. My opinion hasn't changed much, but I was reminded of how much I hated Shannon. She really is a self-centered sociopath for season 1 and season 2.

The show is about a a family of werewolves in Great Britain. The protagonist is Maddie who is a werewolf. A new boy moves into town. He's also a werewolf, but doesn't know anything being one because he's an orphan. Maddie and the new boy become friends and he becomes part of Maddie's family/pack. Maddie also has childhood best friends, Tom and Shannon, who don't know about Maddie being a werewolf. Shannon is obsessed with the legends of the monster on the moors, which are probably legends of Maddie's family.

Halfway through season 1, Shannon becomes convinced that Maddie is a werewolf and stops at nothing to discover Maddie's secret. She secretly records Maddie and her family, tries to steal their DNA, tries to trap them, exposes their secret on the internet, and continues to do this same shit after Maddie and her family come clean to Shannon and Tom. The worst part about this is that Tom keeps reminding her that if she proves that Maddie is a werewolf, Maddie and her family will be captured, studied, experimented on, and possibly killed. And Shannon is always contrite for a second, but never stops doing the same shit. It's really so fucking heinous and she never seems to understand how out of bounds her actions and behavior are even after she takes a trip with Maddie and werewolf hunters mistake both if them for werewolves and try to murder them.

I don't think she even truly understands even after Maddie's family's secret is discovered by the wider world and the family is forced to go on the run and never return. It's like the show doesn't realize that Shannon is awful because they never have the characters stay mad at her for more than half an episode. She's a completely terrible character who can't look beyond her own desires to really feel any empathy for anyone else.

Edited May 14, 2018 by HunterHunted

[Pindrop]

Chandler Bing: in reality after the 100th sarcastic comment the only response he would get was "shut the f*** up"

Starbuck in the BSG remake (specifically in the mini-series and Season 1): I know that they recast the role as a female and she was supposed to be a swaggering hard-ass, but it was just too much! It felt like the short kid at school who would compensate by calling everyone out for fights. She was also quite astonishingly unpleasant to most people around her. 

Everyone in The Big Bang Theory, but especially the canned laughter: Which may as well be a character because, frankly, it has more (unearned) screen time than anyone else. 

Essentially a character is bad when it is clearly trying to achieve one thing but misses. If Chandler's remarks were intended as relentlessly irritating, he would be fine. If Starbuck was intended as an arrogant narcissist who swaggers around like a 14 year old boy in the playground, then she would be fine. If everyone in the Big Bang Theory, but especially the canned laughter were intended to make you throw your TV out of the window and then hunt down the cast, writers, producers and directors with a gun, then they would be fine. Unfortunately they weren't.  

Edited May 13, 2018 by Pindrop

[chenoa333]

On 5/13/2018 at 2:50 AM, Pindrop said:

Chandler Bing: in reality after the 100th sarcastic comment the only response he would get was "shut the f*** up"

Starbuck in the BSG remake (specifically in the mini-series and Season 1): I know that they recast the role as a female and she was supposed to be a swaggering hard-ass, but it was just too much! It felt like the short kid at school who would compensate by calling everyone out for fights. She was also quite astonishingly unpleasant to most people around her. 

Everyone in The Big Bang Theory, but especially the canned laughter: Which may as well be a character because, frankly, it has more (unearned) screen time than anyone else. 

Essentially a character is bad when it is clearly trying to achieve one thing but misses. If Chandler's remarks were intended as relentlessly irritating, he would be fine. If Starbuck was intended as an arrogant narcissist who swaggers around like a 14 year old boy in the playground, then she would be fine. If everyone in the Big Bang Theory, but especially the canned laughter were intended to make you throw your TV out of the window and then hunt down the cast, writers, producers and directors with a gun, then they would be fine. Unfortunately they weren't.  

God I HATE that f'n show AND the f'n "canned laughter". I hate it so much I won't even hate watch that show.

[Pindrop]

On 28/05/2018 at 8:20 PM, chenoa333 said:

God I HATE that f'n show AND the f'n "canned laughter". I hate it so much I won't even hate watch that show.

Yes, it is the worst kind of dumb, trashy, reductive stereotyping, 3-camera, catchphrase comedy. Bazinga!

Edited May 30, 2018 by Pindrop

[roamyn]

13 hours ago, Pindrop said:

Yes, it is the worst kind of dumb, trashy, reductive stereotyping, 3-camera, catchphrase comedy. Bazinga!

Sorry.  I disagree.  Canned sometimes, yes.  But most characters have shown growth, there are some smart episodes (and dumb ones), when they need each other(like when Howard’s mother died) they are better friends than Friends, and Mayim alone is enough to tune in.

[Shannon L.]

51 minutes ago, roamyn said:

Sorry.  I disagree.  Canned sometimes, yes.  But most characters have shown growth, there are some smart episodes (and dumb ones), when they need each other(like when Howard’s mother died) they are better friends than Friends, and Mayim alone is enough to tune in.

I have friends (a married couple) who are self proclaimed science nerds.  When they heard about the premise of the show, they flatly refused to watch it because they were tired of nerds being made fun of.  Then they heard that Mayim was going to be on it.  That surprised them enough that they decided to watch the first few episodes.  They immediately fell in love with it and it became one of their favorites.  For our family, the first two episodes alone had us laughing so hard we were practically in tears.  Yes, there are some dumb episodes and the characters have their annoying moments, but that's true of all shows.  For the most part, though, imho, it's one of the better ones out there (at least the first few seasons were).

As for canned laughter, I don't even really hear it anymore ::shrugs::

[biakbiak]

For what it’s worth TPTB insist they don’t “sweeten”!the studio audience laughter.

[Pindrop]

6 hours ago, roamyn said:

Sorry.  I disagree.  Canned sometimes, yes.  But most characters have shown growth, there are some smart episodes (and dumb ones), when they need each other(like when Howard’s mother died) they are better friends than Friends, and Mayim alone is enough to tune in.

So do 20m other people, I hope they don’t all respond to me individually.

[Spartan Girl]

Olivia Benson on SVU. People think she's become a sanctimonious know-it-all it recent seasons. I've got news for you: she was ALWAYS a sanctimonious know-it-all. We just didn't notice it as much with Stabler around.

[kokapetl]

I’m watching Big Love, so Bill and Nikki are my worst offenders, 2nd prize goes to the cartoon characters that the compound provides, but I basically hate everyone who isn’t one of the kids, and Margene, though she frustrates the hell out of me.  

ETA, also Rhonda. She’s a kid but a truly terrible person. 

Edited June 14, 2018 by Kokapetl

[AntiBeeSpray]

On 6/3/2018 at 10:06 PM, Spartan Girl said:

Olivia Benson on SVU. People think she's become a sanctimonious know-it-all it recent seasons. I've got news for you: she was ALWAYS a sanctimonious know-it-all. We just didn't notice it as much with Stabler around.

Yep. He helped to rein it in.

[Irlandesa]

3 hours ago, AntiBeeSpray said:

Yep. He helped to rein it in.

Ha.  I actually think he was worse which, mixed with his rage, overshadowed her sanctimony.

[Anela]

Fred and Serena, in the Handmaid's Tale.

[AntiBeeSpray]

On 6/14/2018 at 10:07 PM, Irlandesa said:

Ha.  I actually think he was worse which, mixed with his rage, overshadowed her sanctimony.

Nah. That was the fault of the writers for making him that way along with the show runner (in my opinion). I have a special dislike of Warren Leight in that regard. He really didn't seem to like Stabler all that much.

[Picture It. Sicily]

Stabler was a rage case long before Warren Leight showed up.

[AntiBeeSpray]

5 hours ago, Picture It. Sicily said:

Stabler was a rage case long before Warren Leight showed up.

Up to a point. He took it to a new level.

[Pindrop]

On 15/06/2018 at 3:07 AM, Irlandesa said:

Ha.  I actually think he was worse which, mixed with his rage, overshadowed her sanctimony.

I only watched SVU occasionally, but always found something incredibly pious about it. I think it was that everyone was overly serious all of the time. I know it was a serious subject matter, but people still crack jokes or laugh at adversity, or just act plain silly to relieve the stress. It desperately needed some levity, and for its characters to behave like real people. Instead it constantly sermonised on how terrible the crimes were and how damaging the job was to the main characters... we know the crimes are bad, we are not stupid; introducing levity and realistic character interactions won't numb us to it.  

[Spartan Girl]

Chuck on Better Call Saul. His so-called morality is just a front for expressing his resentment for Jimmy. Yeah, Jimmy has done shady things and their parents blindly played favorites. That still doesn't justify him undermining and sabatoging Jimmy when he tried to become a legitimate lawyer. It's even more despicable when you recall that Jimmy was the one person that stuck by him and took care of him when his mental illness kicked in -- until he found out about Chuck screwing him over behind his back.

So I'm glad that it looks like he

 

burned to a crisp.

Edited July 21, 2018 by Spartan Girl

[DrSpaceman]

On ‎7‎/‎20‎/‎2018 at 9:41 PM, Spartan Girl said:

Chuck on Better Call Saul. His so-called morality is just a front for expressing his resentment for Jimmy. Yeah, Jimmy has done shady things and their parents blindly played favorites. That still doesn't justify him undermining and sabatoging Jimmy when he tried to become a legitimate lawyer. It's even more despicable when you recall that Jimmy was the one person that stuck by him and took care of him when his mental illness kicked in -- until he found out about Chuck screwing him over behind his back.

So I'm glad that it looks like he

  Reveal hidden contents

burned to a crisp.

Yes there have been long discussion on the show board about Chuck/Jimmy.  I can't stand Chuck either.  I am SO glad he died and we are done with that.  They drug out that bitter brother feud so long and its one of the reasons I think that show is overrated.  Multiple seasons of that petty back and forth crap.  One or two seasons tops was plenty. 

Its funny about the canned laughter, I notice it much more now that most shows I watched seemed to do away with it.  The Big Bang Theory I think is the only current show I watch that has it. 

Its Always Sunny in Philadelphia (no canned laughter) did an episode last season, Old Lady House, where they create a sitcom out of Mac and Charlie's mom living together and they footage they take of them.  Part of the episode they add in the canned laughter over typical clichéd sitcom tropes.  They show it with and without the laughter.  It really is remarkable how much it changes the tone of the show, whether you do or don't like it being there

[Blergh]

OK, I never liked Carol Weston in Empty Nest. She was deliberately mean to every single other character and any time one of her younger sisters was on the verge of telling her off, they'd always get guilt tripped into apologizing by the closing credits. What's especially sad here is that  I always thought Dinah Manoff is an excellent performer and every other role she played, she was able to extract some sympathy (and Miss Manoff seems to be a nice person). However; why the show and Miss Manoff had her depict Carol as someone with zero likability or redeeming features, I'll never understand.

[WarnerCL45]

Phoebe on Friends - just watched a couple of reruns & boy, is she annoying.  Smelly Cat?  I don't know why she was a "friend".

[auntlada]

She makes the best oatmeal raisin cookies in the world, and her ancestor, Nesle Toulouse, made the best chocolate chip cookies.

[roamyn]

On 8/17/2018 at 7:27 AM, WarnerCL45 said:

Phoebe on Friends - just watched a couple of reruns & boy, is she annoying.  Smelly Cat?  I don't know why she was a "friend".

I loved Phoebe.  Joey was just dumb, but Phoebe had an innocent nativity about her.

[Katy M]

On ‎8‎/‎19‎/‎2018 at 4:04 AM, roamyn said:

I loved Phoebe.  Joey was just dumb, but Phoebe had an innocent nativity about her.

in the first couple of seasons, maybe.  But, not later.

[biakbiak]

1 minute ago, Katy M said:

in the first couple of seasons, maybe.  But, not later.

By the end of the series they made him so dumb that I didn’t find it believable that he could function without a caretaker! I think it’s one of many reasons his spinoff failed!

[Snow Apple]

I've been watching reruns of Alice and I decided l can't stand the title character. She acts like she's a saint but is always trying to make Mel the villain when most of what he does is actually reasonable, like putting in a time clock.

[vibeology]

On 2018-08-20 at 4:28 PM, biakbiak said:

By the end of the series they made him so dumb that I didn’t find it believable that he could function without a caretaker! I think it’s one of many reasons his spinoff failed!

It was painful. His pyramid episode was ridiculous. The episode where he bonds with Elle Fanning (? I think that's the child actor) showed that he was basically a seven year old. I liked early Joey but he was so dumb by the end that it was hard to watch.

[Wiendish Fitch]

Joey became nightmarishly stupid. In the beginning he was vapid and dim, but you at least believed he had enough street smarts to get by on a daily basis. By season 5 or 6, I didn't trust Joey to tie his own shoes or go to the bathroom unattended. 

Honestly, it wasn't just Joey's idiocy that bothered me, it was the idea that he was caring, wonderful guy who was also catnip to the ladies. Uh, nope. I saw a doughy, greasy-haired, orange-hued, badly dressed schlub who came off as a Tinder creep and someone who'd lurk around high school parking lots, a la Matthew McConaughey in Dazed and Confused. I couldn't stand the storyline where Joey pitches a fit because Chandler kissed his (Joey's) girlfriend. Up yours, Joey, you would have done the same thing to Chandler a dozen times over!

[Pindrop]

On 25/08/2018 at 2:11 AM, Wiendish Fitch said:

Joey became nightmarishly stupid. In the beginning he was vapid and dim, but you at least believed he had enough street smarts to get by on a daily basis. By season 5 or 6, I didn't trust Joey to tie his own shoes or go to the bathroom unattended. 

Honestly, it wasn't just Joey's idiocy that bothered me, it was the idea that he was caring, wonderful guy who was also catnip to the ladies. Uh, nope. I saw a doughy, greasy-haired, orange-hued, badly dressed schlub who came off as a Tinder creep and someone who'd lurk around high school parking lots, a la Matthew McConaughey in Dazed and Confused. I couldn't stand the storyline where Joey pitches a fit because Chandler kissed his (Joey's) girlfriend. Up yours, Joey, you would have done the same thing to Chandler a dozen times over!

What about Pheobe? She should have been under 24 hour care, she was single digit IQ. 

[Brookside]

Lily on Modern Family.  The actress is terrible, but the writers don't do her any favours.

[Enigma X]

1 hour ago, Brookside said:

Lily on Modern Family.  The actress is terrible, but the writers don't do her any favours.

I am not a fan of Lily or Manny. The writers don't do either any favors.

[Brookside]

15 minutes ago, Enigma X said:

I am not a fan of Lily or Manny. The writers don't do either any favors.

Luke too for that matter. 

(I had come back here to add Manny and Luke to my original post, but you'd beaten me to it with Manny!)

[cpcathy]

I hate everyone on Modern Family, except for Mitchell, Cam and Phil.

[Spartan Girl]

Amy on The Secret Life of the American Teenager was a heinous bitch. She acted like it was okay to treat everyone like crap just because she was a teen mom.

[Katy M]

1 hour ago, Spartan Girl said:

Amy on The Secret Life of the American Teenager was a heinous bitch. She acted like it was okay to treat everyone like crap just because she was a teen mom.

I only watched the first half of the first season, but I felt like everyone on that show was heinous.  Amy was a spoiled brat.  Ashly was a sarcastic brat.  Their mother was a prissy brat.  Their father was a cheater. Adrienne was slutty brat with a slutty mother.  Grace was a hypocrite. Ben was a supercreepy stalker, serial-killer in training and his father was insane for encouraging him in his weird behavior.  I think we discovered why their lives are so secret.

[Annber03]

I only know "Secret Life" from the clips of it that I saw on "The Soup". Judging from those, that show looked hilariously bad. 

[Anna Yolei]

On 8/27/2018 at 2:22 PM, Spartan Girl said:

Amy on The Secret Life of the American Teenager was a heinous bitch. She acted like it was okay to treat everyone like crap just because she was a teen mom.

Oh, God, right?! I think the worst moment came when she demanded her parents let her go to Italy with her boyfriend in a think veiled attempt to keep tabs because she was "a woman now," as she reminded the audience of at least three times an episode.

Mind you, I don't even think she'd even had her 6 week checkup when all that happened. From, yanno, the baby she conceived the last time she went on a trip unsupervised.

And she ended up not going--not because her parents put their foot down unequivocally, but because her principal told her she'd missed too much school and needed to go to class over summer.

Again, because of the baby  she had at 16 years old. 

Amy remains the least likeable protagonist of any show I've ever watched, before or since. I'm glad Shailene Woodley was able to rise above it and step outta the shadow of that role. 

[Anna Yolei]

18 hours ago, Annber03 said:

I only know "Secret Life" from the clips of it that I saw on "The Soup". Judging from those, that show looked hilariously bad. 

The only thing worse than Any Jeurgens herself was Brenda Hampton's recycled, plodding dialogue. Like the basic recipe for a story "arc" went like this:

-event happens

-character A discusses event blow by blow with Character B

-Character B discusses event with Characters C and D

-Repeat ad nauseum until the plot "resolves" or you blackout from the TWoP drinking game for whichever  word/phrase becomes overused that week ("have sex" was the default but "Does Amy know about the baby?" replaced it in season 4. Eight. Full. Episodes of that!)

Secret Life was never a so bad it's good type of show. This was "So bad I can't believe anyone greenlit this show, or that it had enough ratings to grant four *more* seasons, like were teens that starved for anything talking about this topic that they were willing to overlook all of the glaringly stupid technical writing behind it?" It got too tedious to even watch for snark.

[Annber03]

I remember a clip where one of the girls was saying something about how her dad had a heart attack, I think it was, because she had sex? Or something to that effect? It was a real, "WTF?" sort of thing. If the show's arcs were as repetitive as you describe, though, I get the feeling the conversation in that clip wouldn't have made any more sense in context :p.