Characters you thought "deserved better"

[Kyber]

A particular character in Berserk who if I say his name would spoil the death scene.

Spoiler

Judeau

He's a friendly chap who just like the rest of the Band of the Hawk gets transported to Hell to serve as a sacrifice for Griffith's rise to becoming part of the Godhand. Just like everyone else he dies, but he does so while trying to protect Caska. And as she tries to drag his shattered body to safety, Judeau's dying thoughts are of how Caska will never know that he loved her.

It's pretty damn heart rendering.

I think we can also say just about every single character unfortunate enough to get stuck in that scene. Especially the one who was never the same again after it and still hasn't recovered. I think you know who I'm talking about. It...just seems so unfair.

God, I hope they get off the boat one day and the one you are talking about get backs to normal, annoying to see such a great character transformed into that, annoying yet brilliant.
The Eclipse still stands as one of my favourite scenes ever, I don't mean that I enjoy watching it, I mean the idea and what it means to the story. So much raw imagery and emotion in that whole part, it changes the playing field completely.

 

[DementedSheep]

Well, first on my mind is that Anders from Dragon Age really didn't deserve turning into Whiny McHatesTemplars in DA 2. He seemed like such a cool character in Awakenings. Wait, scratch that. Justice deserved this even less.

Justice was a cool guy. His companion quest was helping a grieving widow. He was a stand-up dude, representing everything about his name. Then the sequel happened. Anders and justice "fused" together for some stupid reason, and was corrupted into a spirit of Vengeance which doesn't make any sense to me. Wasn't how the fade works is that Demons are always bad and Spirits are always good? Are there any good demons? no. So why should there be bad spirits? It doesn't even matter any more. Instead of incorporating both peronalities, the final character didn't seem like either. Just an idiot doing stupid things and refusing to follow Hawke's advice.

I was under the impression that demons and spirits are the same thing just with a different mindset. So demons are obsessed with mortal world and tend to embody negative emotions while spirits are content in the fade and tend to embody ideals. I think Anders even had a conversion with Justice about how he could possibly turn into a demon and Justice gets defensive about it.

but yeah, I didn't like DA2 Anders.

 

[Frankster]

Fellow dbz fans mentioned Tien, for me its Yamcha.
In dragon ball yamcha had a nice character arc+ was one of gokus buddies and one of those wearing the orange togi so looked like was part of the main cast. The way he and Bulma ended up at the end was rather sweet too, only to be utterly ruined by the following series.

Come dbz well...Yeah the character has been turned into a joke to whom everything bad seems to happen xD
I still liked the character though, but it's tough in the dbz fandom where a fair few amount of peeps honestly sees a characters "power level" as the real indication of how worthy that character is.


Otherwise for Game of Thrones: the hound (the tv series).

There's plenty of characters in this series that qualify but in the series, I thought the hounds death was a shame even if it was thematically fitting for a man of his lifestyle. He had a very enjoyable relationship with Arya going on and I'd have loved to see more episodes of it, it's also worth noting reason he died was to protect Arya from what he perceived as being sellswords or w/e working for the lannisters (which was a fairly understandable assumption given the circumstances..).

It also doesn't help that the normally awesome Brienne came off as a prick there, ignoring Arya actually saying flat out she doesn't want to leave with her and being the first to pull out her sword and attack, all that for an oath made to a dead woman that would see Arya end up back in king's landing which would see her dropped in a nest of metaphorical vipers, from which she originally ran away from in the first place.
As much as I love Brienne, she was utterly in the wrong here in every conceivable way.

Anyways tldr I'd have loved seeing more Hound/Arya adventures, Brienne fucked up in killing him and failed with Arya to boot (though convenient circumstances saw Arya find a boat for Braavos... Considering the setting it's just as likely she would have stumbled upon a group of thugs on the way and raped/killed, all because Brienne killed her protector).

 

[StoleitfromKilgore]

Yoshimo from "Shadows of Amn".

Spoiler

He gets killed off too early. Of course, without his unwilling betrayal and subsequent death, his character might lack some of what I like about him.

Aside from being the only good pure thief availabe in the game, most of his dialogue was spot-on. No long-winded exposition. A short explanation here, a vague warning there, a question about the ancestry of the player etc. I especially found the latter piece of dialogue to be very memorable, mostly because it did such a good job of telling the player about Yoshimo. He is not somebody quick to judge and generally somebody who mostly stays in the background. The fact that his character is well interwoven with the story certainly didn't hurt.

Edit: Also, several characters from the "Prince of Nothing"-fantasy-books. It is hard to say, who is off worse: Cnaiür, Achamian or Xinemus. And that's just the main characters. For people, who never want to read the series:

Spoiler

Xinemus is tortured and loses his eyes, falls into major depression and eventually dies. Achamian is constantly tortured by nightmares and painful decisions and Cnaiür is a madmen, who acted as a puppet for another in killing his own father.

If it wasn't for Kellhus, I would say this is one of the greates fantasy-series, I have ever read. Unfortunately the character comes across as a deus ex machina a bit too often. Being "inhuman" is one thing, but this also acts as an excuse for preternatural fighting capabilities. Training is one thing, but there are a few parts in the book, where his survival just comes across as cheap as it often is for "heroes".

I still wholeheartedely recommend the series. It's just so well written and most of the characters are believable.

 

[Twinrehz]

just something you throw on on a sunday night or after work to watch for 40min, its definitely outdated I suppose (for the reasons stated) but in a way it doesn't mean you're dying to binge on it in one weekend, you think "oh whats this episode going to be about?....oh Picard and his archeologist girlfreind?....meh skip"

Comforting is a good word for it I think. It's un-stressful and uncomplicated, you can just let yourself be carried away for about half an hour. As for ongoing storylines there were a few, particularly in the later seasons. But especially early on they were written in an unobtrusive way that wasn't hard to follow and usually didn't interfere with the "A" plot of an episode. Both of Worf's main plotlines actually carried over and increased in intensity with him when he joined the crew of DS9.

A show being formulaic is less noticeable and less likely to bother you if you only see one 40 minute episode a week.

True, but I had access to the entire series, and often watched more than one episode at a time. It made all the minor flaws a bit more obvious. I try to tell myself that I'm done with the series, but I can't help but feel a twinge of interest in the ongoing remastering released on blu-ray. Apparently there's some extended cut involved as well...

Incidentally that archeologist character "Vash" showed up again in Q's only appearance on DS9.

I thought it was quite weird that she was basically recruited to be a part of the Q continuum. Same with that other girl, whose parents had run from the continuum.

 

[beastro]

Michael in Lost. Does a lot of stuff to save his kid, a lot doesn't go his way and he gets branded a traitor for the rest of the show and condemned to Island hell while characters like Locke and Ben do unjustifiable shit often with bad moral compasses guiding them and get happy endings.

The Step dad in 2012. I haven't watched the show myself, but watched it around family watching it and he saves the heroes family and keeps them alive until the end when he gets killed off and forgotten a second later so the hero and his ex and get back together.

Can't blame Yar's lack of development on anyone but Denise Crosby, who in essence put a phaser on kill and shot the character's future because apparently she was allergic to money. Before you say recast, the series was already a big risk and recasting her may have put TNG in an early grave if they screwed it up. So instead they decided to use her as the "anyone can die, not just redshirts" example. Sucks, but that was how things worked.

Her death wasn't the problem, the episode they chose to build her death around was. It was a bad, at best mediocre ep and it dragged her death down with it.

For games, it would be Zalbaag. He's a decent guy that happens to become an antagonist and winds up fighting you in the end because of being mindfucked and given a gem to use.

Yarr stands out because it was season 1 (though she wasn't handled that great but more on that in a sec) but no one had much faith in season 1 at the time...in retrospect it wasn't the best career move on her part but how would you know that at the time? whos to say TNG wouldn't get passed 2 seasons and be known forever as a bizarre joke? (or "I don't know I kind of liked it" at best")

The only thing that saved TNG was Gene dying during season 2 and allowing sensible minds to finally save the series from his wish-fufillment obsession and finally bring drama into the series. With that in mind, I can fully understand her decision.

Who would bet their career on hoping the head of the show you're on will die before it gets cancelled? I bet at the time she thought she got lucky getting off the sinking ship so early until she found out he kicked it and suddenly the show picked up and became what everyone hoped it would become.

On top of that, IIRC she was the only one really do anything beyond Star Trek at the time being in movies here and there (She was in Pet Cemetery 2 I think) while the rest of the cast save Stewart were pretty much tied to the show.

I assume you know the technical reason to Saruman being cut like that, the length of the film, having to cut out stuff that doesn't directly affect the story, blah blah blah, but anyway. I'm gonna go and put this in a spoiler, in case someone hasn't read the books yet, and wants to do so without having their shit ruined.

Except it did directly affect the story, only it wasn't the story Jackson wanted to tell.

The Hobbits and their experiences were at the heart of LOTR and their coming home as war veterans to see the Shire had been touched by evil and that they could never truly go home again because home had changed as well was key to the themes of the story Tolkien laid out (it echoed his return to England after WWI and was a criticism of Merry Old England which sadly people still think to their day is something he praises and idealized in his books), but Jackson just wanted the shows packed with sword and sorcery because those were the parts of the book he loved the most.

On the one hand, it meant he developed a personality other than "French guy with British accent and unexplained nationalism," but on the other hand, it wasn't a really good personality.

Picard's odd national nature could have been a good moment in Star Trek for them to lamp shade how much culture and nationality had changed since our times instead of people being stuck 10 minutes into the future loving everything about history we know about and nothing that took place between them and us.

On top of that it could have been a good moment to show how much technology had messed up culture, where universal translators have become so endemic to life that humanity still speaks different languages, but it's rendered moot because the UTs made everyone understand everyone else.

Have it where Jean luc grew up around English people (which instilled in him the love of English culture he has on display during the series) and so his mind filters everything around him via the UT as being English sounding English in the same way we all read second languages through our first and "speak" in that primary language in our mind's eye.

 

[Eddie the head]

Honestly I've been unemployed for the last few weeks so I've been watching a lot of Star Trek. And man dose space travel suck. I think a lot of people got a shit run in Star Trek. But man T'Pol was one unlucky Vulcan. First she gets mind raped in season 1. In season 2 she gets forced out of the "High command." In season 3 she gets poisoned and neurologically compromised. Then in season 4 she gets emotionally manipulated by a xenophobic a hole. And then there was the last episode.

Look I didn't like Enterprise that much, but that last episode was the definition of deserved better.

 

[Twinrehz]

Except it did directly affect the story, only it wasn't the story Jackson wanted to tell.

The Hobbits and their experiences were at the heart of LOTR and their coming home as war veterans to see the Shire had been touched by evil and that they could never truly go home again because home had changed as well was key to the themes of the story Tolkien laid out (it echoed his return to England after WWI and was a criticism of Merry Old England which sadly people still think to their day is something he praises and idealized in his books), but Jackson just wanted the shows packed with sword and sorcery because those were the parts of the book he loved the most.

Don't get me wrong, I really think they should have made those scenes as well, and Jackson's vision fails to capture the overall grimness of the world of Tolkien, reading the books you'll see that there's not an ounce of happiness anywhere, everyone gets their shit ruined one way or another, which could be why Tolkien created the hobbits as a very reclusive people, not wanting anything to do with the rest of the world.

That being said, the sheer scale of these three movies is MASSIVE. As an example, the Golden Hall of Rohan took 8 months to build, they spent 8 days shooting on set, and then it was all torn down again. It's very much the same story with many of the great sets throughout the movie, they're being used so little, yet require a whole lot of effort to go through. It's not Jackson's vision being wrong, it's about overall production costs, running length of the movies, and how narrow you can make the story before it starts to alienating the general public. For my part, they could've made an entire mini-series of it, much like they've done with Game of Thrones. The magnitude of it could have been much larger, but there are physical limitations to making anything, be it the patience of the production company, the budget, stretching of the budget, or the working ability of the crew. I don't know if you've seen the behind the scenes documentary by Costa Botes, that comes with the Extended blu-ray Edition of the movies, they show a very interesting side of the creation of the movies, that might make fans more approving.

So instead of bashing the movies for all the stuff cut out, why not bash it for what they actually put on screen? For example, my comment about Elijah Wood not fitting the part, stuff like that. We've been moaning over the omission of Tom Bombadil and Saruman's ravaging of the shire for over a decade now, give it a rest! I suspect if they'd wanted Saruman's doings at the end of the book, they would have had to add another movie, which would have confused those not familiar with the books, since the war against Sauron is at this point over. At least Saruman got closure, although not in the cinema version of the movie.

 

[Diddy_Mao]

Garrosh Hellscream from WoW.

I get the impression that Blizzard wanted to develop his character in Cataclysm to make him more interesting and complex. WoW fans, being WoW fans, threw a shit fit, and thus his character was derailed from an impulsive brute with a code of honor to a completely monstrous orc-nazi.

A golden opportunity completely squandered.

In the same vein I'm going to go with Sylvanas Windrunner.

From the perspective of having a potentially great storyline, the forsaken are, to me, one of the most interesting races in the game. One of the shining moments of the Cataclysm expansion was the revamped starting area where they had come to realize they simply couldn't rely on the Horde to help them defend their boarders and began to actively go on the offensive to secure their rightful homelands.

And then nothing for the rest of the expansion and not a peep through all of Mists of Pandaria.

By extension, their leader has had nothing at all to do in the game.
Worse still is the small hand full of character moments she does get (usually in the books) are random bits of cartoonish super villainy that hardly mesh with the personality and motivations that had been previously established.

 

[Zombie Badger]

Ellie from The Last of Us.

Spoiler

She deserved to have some actual input into the resolution of her story, instead of just being forced into the position of surrogate child to a prick who just wants a replacement for his dead kid.

 

[Lieju]

Umh, everyone in Bleach?
Especially Ishida. He will have his moment, I'm sure, but man is he sidelined.

Also Sakura In Naruto.
She is supposed to be a part of the main trio, but even after lately having this whole speech about having to stand on Sasuke's and Naruto's side as an equal, it was immediately clear it was just all about the two boys.

Justice was a cool guy. His companion quest was helping a grieving widow. He was a stand-up dude, representing everything about his name. Then the sequel happened. Anders and justice "fused" together for some stupid reason, and was corrupted into a spirit of Vengeance which doesn't make any sense to me. Wasn't how the fade works is that Demons are always bad and Spirits are always good? Are there any good demons? no. So why should there be bad spirits?

The way it was explained was that demons and spirits are the same thing, humans just tend to divide them into 'good' and 'evil' based on how dangerous or useful they are to humans.

I also recall it being mentioned that many spirits don't have that much interest in the human world, so they rarely come in contact with humans.

I think Justice being corrupted makes perfect sense, spirits are very simple, focused on one emotion or aspect.

What is just is really complicated, so it makes sense it would turn into vengeange upon seeing injustice and not having any simple way to fix it.

Personally, I liked Anders's characterization in DA2 and what happened to Justice, but meh, opinions.

 

[CrazyGirl17]

I have issues with series/movies/games ending on at least a bittersweet note, only for the follow-up to throw all that away.

Spoiler: Bioshock Infinite

Booker allows Elizabeth to drown him to prevent Comstock from coming to power. In Burial at Sea, we find there are still some Comstocks left... somehow... and in the end of episode 2, she is killed by Atlas and set in motion the first Bioshock game. While I appreciate them connecting these games, I can't help but feel like the two of them fought and died for nothing.

Spoiler: Rebuild of Evangelion

At the end of Evangelion 2.0, Shinji manages to save Rei from an Angel... only to start the Third Impact... which is in turn, stopped by Kaworu. Come 3.0, and Shinji awakens to find that somehow the world got screwed up anyway, and everyone hates him even though he did what he thought was right, but the girl he risked everything to save is gone. And while I'm not a fan of Shinji, I won't deny that I wanted to give the kid a hug after that (and maybe a few rude gestures to other characters). And considering the more hopeful shift the movies were taking, this sudden 180 in tone is enough to give you whiplash. Seriously Anno, do we need to have a talk!?!

Spoiler: Puella Magi Madoka Magica

This one's... a bit complicated, but here's the cliff notes: after a bit of wibbly-wobbly-timey-wimey stuff, Madoka is able to become the Goddess of Hope, even thought it negates her very existence, to change the hopeless cycle of magical girls. After the show came two compilation movies, then the third (are you starting to see a pattern here?), the Rebellion Story, things get... grim. The happy(ier) ending at the end of the show? A manipulation by the Incubators to study the magical girls. (Bunnycat is such a dick.) After fighting back, Homura, who fought constantly to save Madoka, ends becoming a witch and usurping her power and place, going through endless torment because of it. And considering what these characters went through, this just seems needlessly cruel. Though I will admit Kyubey's fate is VERY cathartic.

So yeah, characters who deserved better than what they got, especially after it seemed like they got a happier fate...

 

[Imp_Emissary]

(Insert Lil Jon WHAT?!) 1. Whynne has a son? Secondly,it figures that the A-hole bunch of Templars would want to control the Tranquil as such. Did they really touch on "how" the Tranquil could be made "normal" again? Because based on what I've seen within DA2, and Origins to an extent, your best bet to re-establishing a Tranquil's connection to the Fade is taking a part of the Fade itself and either bringing it here, or being possessed by a Fade spirit.

Yeah, she had him with a templar, but since she was a mage, they took him away at birth. :/
She was suppose to talk to Alistar about that in DA:O, but I think they cut out that conversation. It may still be in the game's code, because I heard it once on youtube.
Anyway.

The way it went was that the chantry was having a Tranquil mage research how to take way mages magic without having to make them emotionless. While experimenting on this, the Tranquil ended up possesed by a demon. I think he somehow forced the demon to enter his body. Odd I know.

Wynne and the gang go to save him, enter the fade, fight the demon, and set him free from it. He comes out of it no longer tranquil. To do it for others, they pretty much figure they have to do about what you just guessed.
=w= b[sub](<-thumbs up face)[/sub]
Didn't read the comics, only the summary, but they sound interesting enough.

Hope we meet Wynne's kid in DA:I. I also wonder how people will react to the information about the Tranquil.

Spoiler: Side note: one of the big things in DA:I may be....

picking if everyone becomes a mage.

That's my guess based on Sandal's prophecy.

Also, since Morrigan's kid is confirmed to be a boy, my guess is that's who Sandal is talking about when saying "When HE raises, everyone will see...".

Then again, I thought ME3 would have a lot to do with Dark Energy killing stars. Turned out to just be glitchy robots. ;p

 

[Edl01]

Makoto from School Days. I mean he was such a stand-up guy, and I don't think there was any reason to hate him.

 

[major_chaos]

As one of the few people here who watches WWE I'll say half the damn roster, but The Wayatt Family in particular. The Wayatt family is IMO one of the best gimmicks currently in the increasingly weak roster, excellent in the ring and absolutely goddamn amazing on the mic, and yet they never actually win at PPV events and are perpetually stuck in losing feuds with WWE's go to boring invincible supermen like Cena, Jericho, and the Usos. Also worth mentioning: Rybaxle a surprisingly likable and talented tag team that gets relegated to jobbing despite the crowd cheering for them, Damien Sandow who has been reduced from a love to hate heel to a absolutely awful unfunny comedy costume gimmick for no reason, Aberto Del Rio whose talent was so thoroughly wasted as WWE left him to float aimlessly in the midcard that he chose to not renew his contract, Kane who despite being a legend and having a great feud with Daniel Bryan not that long ago has been reduced to a joke to be repeatedly fed to the absolutely awful Roman Reigns, and Cesaro who went from a dominant heel with huge potential to a jobber who is never allowed anywhere near a mic.

 

[Vault101]

I have issues with series/movies/games ending on at least a bittersweet note, only for the follow-up to throw all that away.

Spoiler: Bioshock Infinite

Booker allows Elizabeth to drown him to prevent Comstock from coming to power. In Burial at Sea, we find there are still some Comstocks left... somehow... and in the end of episode 2, she is killed by Atlas and set in motion the first Bioshock game. While I appreciate them connecting these games, I can't help but feel like the two of them fought and died for nothing.

.

I'm ok with Brooker but...

....yeah that was a REALLY shitty way to go...

 

[Vault101]

The only thing that saved TNG was Gene dying during season 2 and allowing sensible minds to finally save the series from his wish-fufillment obsession and finally bring drama into the series. With that in mind, I can fully understand her decision.

heh....you know I was actually going to originally say this but it felt mean, but your right

[quote/]Who would bet their career on hoping the head of the show you're on will die before it gets cancelled? I bet at the time she thought she got lucky getting off the sinking ship so early until she found out he kicked it and suddenly the show picked up and became what everyone hoped it would become.[/quote]
agreed...again its so easy for people to criticise actors, I'm sure some might see it as "special snowflake" syndrome but I beg to differ

I got the second hand info (in that I saw it in an online reveiw show) that she might have stayed on had she had just a little more to do (like that moment with worf on her death episode) and you know....working long hours to say a few lines and press a few buttons


[quote/]On top of that, IIRC she was the only one really do anything beyond Star Trek at the time being in movies here and there (She was in Pet Cemetery 2 I think) while the rest of the cast save Stewart were pretty much tied to the show.[/quote]
there was a Pet Semetary 2?.....she was in Pet semetary 1 as the wife I know that much (that was before TNG though) its funny I also watch a rather obscure movie the other say (Desert Hearts) and she shows up with one or two lines XD... can't think of anything she did after trek...though I think she ended up in The Walking dead so thats something (best case scenario she might have just been a well known trek actor) I think I got a osft spot for her...and I'm not entirly sure why...must be that amazing 80's/90's hair