Wow, most of them suck =/

[Vicariously]

The point was clear in the first post. The thread is for discussing what characters you think suck, and why you still like the program despite those characters

Dont you think the word "suck" is a little harsh to use in refrence to characters that a board is devoted to?

I mean people would be more inclined to answer your question if you used the phrase "which characters could you have lived without" or "Which particular charcters did you dislike"

"Suck" is just well...I dunno I agree with Joyce here, people are gonna be a little defensive rather than answer your question.

 

[Rowan Hawthorn]

The point was clear in the first post.

No, it really, really wasn't. This:

Ok so i was sitting here the other night and i realise, must of the characters in Buffy and Angel suck, i mean really, think about it.

...and this:

So guys, discuss, why we all love Buffy and Angel when most of the characters suck?

...takes for granted that "most of the characters suck" is an objective fact that other viewers agree with. And with one or two exceptions, none of the examples you list below give any reasons why you think those characters "suck." I also notice that, as far as "Buffy" is concerned, the only characters you think don't suck are those who are antagonists rather than protagonists - with the lone exception of Giles, and even there you relegate him to the role of "comic relief", which he decidedly was not. I don't think the rest of us here are the ones missing a point...

Willow - She had her uses sometimes i suppose. The show was very nearly as much about her journey as it was Buffy's.

Faith - Should have been the main slayer, was way more entertaining than Buffy. Speak for yourself. While I liked the drama that Faith brought to the show, I never liked Faith until Season Seven. Buffy would have been well within her rights if she'd killed Faith in Season Three or Five, except that then we'd have missed the chance to see Faith actually set herself on the path to redemption.

Tara - Did she ever become more than just scenery? She wasn't even good scenery. =/ 🙄

Oz - C'mon, Oz was an idiot, i assume he was just there to make the others look better Well, you know what they say about "assume."

Spike - Ok, let's be honest, how many of us watched Buffy just to see how awesome Spike was? Spike was a good character, but "awesome"? Not hardly. And certainly not good enough for me to watch the show just for him. I might have watched the proposed Spike spinoff just to get my Buffyverse fix, but it would have had to have been more than a one-character show to hold my interest.

Atleast Angel had better characters Not as far as I'm concerned. I even pretty much lost interest in the ones who moved over from BtVS.

and which characters can you absolutely not stand and wish were never in Buffy/Angel? Connor is the only one I can say that about.

ETA: The characters are what drew me into the Buffyverse and kept me there. If I'd hated them, I'd have dropped the show after the first couple of episodes, because for me, fiction is all about the characters. If I don't care about the characters, I don't care about the story.

 

[UlaGan]

Adding another voice of disagreement: upon re-watching the series for so many times, I came to conclusion that nearly every character served their goal well for the story. Even quite-an-extra-in-my-eyes-Dawn made Buffy mature finally and gave her strength to sacruifice herself for Greater Good, all the boyfirends on this show shaped up, molded the personality of Buffy/Willow, even Xander helped Cordelia to overcome her egoizm and snobbish attitude. Angelus, Parker taught Buffy the lesson of thinking carefully before giving up herself entirely. Also, there were so many talks about Joyce's, Tara's untimely deaths, and we can go on and on here.
As it was already stated above: Why I enjoy this show, despite knowing it by the heart, and watching it for so many times over and over - is it's very realistic portrayal of its characters.
If you think they suck, think just what else would this story be about without them? Would it be worthwatching?

 

[TabulaRasa]

I am still stuck on how someone can watch a show when to them most of the characters sucked. I don't watch charmed because I don't like it or characters etc, I don't watch How I Met Your Mother because I don't like it or characters, etc. A TON of people love those shows, love the characters. But just because I don't like them I don't think I could ever go to a place where people love those shows and say, HEY, these suck! I have mucho better things to do with my time.

Just try wording it differently next time CR. It could have been a very interesting debate/conversation if we all wouldn't have felt offended. Or felt like you were speaking for us. Truly your post made me feel like we all thought that way of these characters.

 

[Clem Rocks]

I never tried to offend anyone, and i never tried to make it anymore than my opinion, i don't really see how you lot thought that in the first place =/

 

[Rowan Hawthorn]

When you can't see/hear the person you're talking to, phrasing is everything. Admittedly, I'm kinda quick to take offense, because at a rough guesstimate, probably 98% of the people who post on the internet/usenet really do assume that their opinions are gospel and/or intend to be offensive. Makes it rough on the other 2%, I guess. But I'm being serious when I say that I really can't understand liking a show where I either hate or can't relate to the characters, because in that case, what is there left to like?

 

[Joyce Summers]

Your poll also makes it seem as though you are forcing your opinion onto us. You're asking us 'what would Buffy been better as' which is implying that we all think how the group was done was terrible, which isn't the case at all.

 

[Clem Rocks]

Your poll also makes it seem as though you are forcing your opinion onto us. You're asking us 'what would Buffy been better as' which is implying that we all think how the group was done was terrible, which isn't the case at all.

If you don't like the choices of the poll, you just don't answer it 😉

I thought the last option would make it clear that the poll was just for laughs anyway...

 

[Bangelxx]

um, I love all the characters (excpet Riley)! I can't believe that you dislike so many of them! and thats your buisness of course but I just thought I'd mention that I think most of the characters are brilliantly made!

 

[Spirit_Of_Fred]

hm...maybe we should just use this thread (or if not, start a new thread) to give reasons why we think each of the characters on ClemRocks' list were important or unimportant. it was interesting reading the opinions in the lists thus far, such as those of Joyce Summers and Rowan Hawthorn. plus, it gives people the option to explain why they like the characters if they disagree with this thread (which we've kind of been doing anyway 😛).

 

[Angelic Slayer]

I personally love the characters of BTVS, can't really picture the series with anything different.

I mean don't get me wrong, as I re-watch the episodes I can't help but think "aww! Buffy's such a biatch!" one second, but then a few episodes later I'm just as in love with her character as before.

I think one of the things I've loved about the characters from day one is that they AREN'T perfect. They ARE flawed, the DO make mistakes, and sometimes you want to grab them by their shirt and toss them across three countries because they're so damn frustrating.

They're human.

Take any gang of people and there's some that are bound to stand out more than others. There's only so much air time, and with such a large cast I think they did a good job of giving everyone some camera time. So maybe Tara only had a couple episodes exclusively focused on her ("Family" being a big one), but isn't that how life goes? I mean is there really a day when you're the sole centre of attention among your friends? And I try to imagine what seasons 4-7 would have looked like had she not been there, and I really can't figure it out. Same with a lot of the other characters-- would Faith have really stood out as much as she did if the cast had been only say Spike, Giles and herself? In every group you'll have stronger characters and those that kind of fall into the background; which is something I always thought Joss and the team used to their advantage. I'm sure that if the show had been based mostly on the minor characters (Harmony, Dawn, Tara, etc), we'd be having the same arguments about them as we are having now.

And again, sometimes I throw up my arms and totally "give up" on some characters as I'm watching the show, but to me that's how life is. I could rhyme off the sames of dozens of people that I just want to slap up-side the head sometimes. People react badly or just plain wierd to situations sometimes, sometimes they even go totally against anything you would have ever guessed they would have done. Like Buffy cutting her hair randomly in s6, for example. It was a stupid thing to do, wasn't going to solve ANY of her problems, and was pretty much plain old wierd. But she did it anyway. It was her way of dealing.

This is all just my take anyway, I think the cast was so disfunctional that they somehow all fit together. A fit that I don't think I would change if I could have (despite my occational "I hate dawn!!" arguments 😉).


And as a side note.... see Spirit Of Fred's post, she phrased it much better than I! 🙂

 

[JCC]

I don't get why everyone's getting so worked up about this.

It's just an opinion on some TV characters.

 

[Blondie Bear]

Cause it's an opinion on TV characters that everyone loves very much or else they wouldn't be here talking about it and they come here to talk about them because they get laughed at for talking about them out in the "real" world and here is a place where other people like these characters too and it makes them kind of mad when someone here in the safe place starts bashing the characters.

 

[Senior Watcher]

after my "ranting" post to CR, i decided to follow up with some positivity.

i love pretty much every post in this thread (remember, i said "pretty much"....not "all"). i never really thought about it too much, but one of the reasons i come here is for fellowship with other whedonverse lovers. what i mean is, i have noone at work to talk to about how awesome buffy is; if i did, i might get moved into the basement just like milton from the movie office space.

i love everyone here for their love of whedon-shows and their ability to express their opinion about it.

 

[palabravampiress]

Like a lot of the other folks, I pretty much loved all of the characters. There are some (like Angel) whom I love to hate and others (like Giles) whom I love more than is normal or appropriate. I feel generally indifferent to some characters, but when I think about them, I tend to realize that they're brilliant (like Riley). lol. Some characters filled me with joy every time I saw them (like Fred). Some characters always made me laugh (like Harmony). All of the characters managed to either make me think or to make me feel something. Many even did both. That's impressive.

Basically, I think they all add something important to the show. I watched Buffy for the characters. I loved the way they interacted with one another, even when one character would make me angry. I loved how much they changed and grew over the years. I loved the absolute transformations undergone by some of the characters. I think the casts of both shows were wonderful. The characters were almost always beautifully written and very believably performed. In terms of character development, I have very few complaints. I have seen few casts of characters that can hold a candle to those in the Buffyverse.

 

[JCC]

Cause it's an opinion on TV characters that everyone loves very much or else they wouldn't be here talking about it and they come here to talk about them because they get laughed at for talking about them out in the "real" world and here is a place where other people like these characters too and it makes them kind of mad when someone here in the safe place starts bashing the characters.

That's ridiculous. Clem Rocks is here for the exact same reason, and his opinion is that while the show is great, the characters aren't likeable. That doesn't mean that he's mocking you for liking the show, it means that you all take it for granted that people like the characters and become increasingly hostile when someone disagrees with it.

Plus, it's not like you can't talk about Buffy in the 'real' world. Most of my friends love Buffy, and even if they didn't, I still wouldn't get so worked up.

Most of you act as if Clem Rocks has insulted you personally. He hasn't, he stated an opinion about a television show, the same way that I could say "Ah, the lighting in 'Normal Again' isn't up to standard. Bad director, baaaad!"

 

[TabulaRasa]

That's ridiculous. Clem Rocks is here for the exact same reason, and his opinion is that while the show is great, the characters aren't likeable. That doesn't mean that he's mocking you for liking the show, it means that you all take it for granted that people like the characters and become increasingly hostile when someone disagrees with it.

Plus, it's not like you can't talk about Buffy in the 'real' world. Most of my friends love Buffy, and even if they didn't, I still wouldn't get so worked up.

Most of you act as if Clem Rocks has insulted you personally. He hasn't, he stated an opinion about a television show, the same way that I could say "Ah, the lighting in 'Normal Again' isn't up to standard. Bad director, baaaad!"

Uh yeah when he made it seem like we all felt that way, it was an insult.
Do you even read these posts or just scan for things you want to read?

And you can't like a show if you don't like the characters. Reason you ask? It's the characters the make the show what it is. You can have a great storyline, but have a crappy actor/character, it just won't make that story great. It goes down the tubes with the characters.
Education is key. Don't skip school people.

 

[JCC]

Education is key. Don't skip school people.

You assuming that I am uneducated sums up everyone's ridiculous reaction to this thread. Did you need to demean yourself to the level of petty name-calling and insults? I'm not stupid, or sub-literate, nor do I have any mental impediment. You need to learn to put up with differing opinion.

Plus, a show can still be good if you don't like all of the characters.

 

[Blondie Bear]

Plus, it's not like you can't talk about Buffy in the 'real' world. Most of my friends love Buffy, and even if they didn't, I still wouldn't get so worked up.

Just because YOU have friends in the really real world who you can talk to about Buffy doesn't mean everybody does. You're lucky. Most of us don't. Most of us are considered freaks by our real friends because we like a weird Fantasy show with a girl whose name is Buffy and runs around killing vampires cause *valleygirl scoff* how lame is THAT? I'm lucky in that most of my friends are freaks about other stuff (one of my friends is so into Anime that she dresses like an anime character most of the time) and so don't laugh at me about my Buffy lovage, but again, most people don't have this. So they come here, because they know they won't be laughed at. So, yes, people take offense when someone says all the characters suck, because the characters MAKE the show. Saying all the characters suck is slightly different than saying that you don't like the lighting in a specific episode. The characters, en masse, are so integral to the show that many people probably took CR's statements as saying the SHOW sucks. And no, that's not a popular opinion here.

 

[TabulaRasa]

You assuming that I am uneducated sums up everyone's ridiculous reaction to this thread. Did you need to demean yourself to the level of petty name-calling and insults? I'm not stupid, or sub-literate, nor do I have any mental impediment. You need to learn to put up with differing opinion.

Plus, a show can still be good if you don't like all of the characters.

You assumed I directed that at you? See why education is key? Try to relax man. That was actually sarcasm. And until you can know someone you shouldn't assume.