It’s that time of the year again: time for insipid, arbitrary “best of” lists counting down things I liked in movies, TV, and books. Perhaps the most popular of these is my annual “Ten Best TV Characters” of the year, and I promise that’s coming…next week. But, for now, why not take a look at the first-ever “Ten WORST TV Characters of the Year.”
Hey, we wouldn’t know how good we’ve got it with the best list if it weren’t for the bottom of the barrel. Worth noting: I excluded bad characters from bad shows (think Dads, or Real Housewives). I wanted to focus solely on bad characters who are on otherwise good shows.
Dishonorable Mention: Pretty Much Any Lead Character on Showtime…Showtime is supposed to be challenging HBO for premium cable dominance, but I’m not so sure how it can with title characters that are either repressed, unlikable bores (Ray Donovan, Masters of Sex), lead characters that are unbelievably shrill (Web Therapy), or just a more standard form of unlikable (House of Lies, Shameless). With Dexter, The Borgias, and The Big C gone, plus Homeland struggling in season 3, I don’t see a corner being turned anytime soon.
10. The Good Guys on The Walking Dead…Except for Michonne, I have a really hard time caring about any of the “good guys” on The Walking Dead. Would it really have been so bad if The Governor had killed Rick?
9. Marnie on Girls…It’s not just that Marnie is an unbearably pretentious and horrible stock character. It’s that no other characters on the show seem aware of this. You keep waiting for the moment when somebody will tell her what a cliche she is, and it keeps not showing up.
8. Dr. Narcisse on Boardwalk Empire…This character should be fascinating. He really should be. Why isn’t he? Maybe it’s because of Jeffrey Wright’s odd performance of him as Snidley Whiplash (complete with ultra-mannered speech and mustache twirling evil) but I’ll bet it’s because the writers never carved out a consistent vision for this character. Narcisse felt a little all-over-the-map, and they just never invested in him the way they asked us to.
7. Joel on Parenthood…I’ve never liked him, but he’s become even more annoying this season. His way of dealing with family problems? Not dealing with them at all, then somehow getting mad when that blows up in his face. Great strategy Joel!
6. Andy on Parks and Recreation…Andy has been gone for most of the first half of this season since Chris Pratt is shooting a movie, and it just reminds me of exactly how little he really brings to the show. “Andy’s dumb”–every joke ever made about him.
4./5. Pete from The League/Katrina from Sleepy Hollow…It’s not that either of these characters are horrible, so much as completely unnecessary. Pete serves no purpose on The League. The show already has Ruxin (the antagonist), Andre (the butt of most jokes), Taco (the lovable idiot), Jenny (the girl), Rafi (the insane sociopath…an original sitcom archetype) and Kevin (the flustered straight man). Pete is mostly just there to occupy space and because the actor who plays him (Mark Duplass) helps create the show. Katrina on Sleepy Hollow brings the action to a standstill every time they force her on us.
3. Frankenboy from American Horror Story: Coven…I don’t even know this character’s name, but there’s a Frankenstein frat-boy on this season of AHS, and it’s really, really not working out. I know that the strategy for this show has always been to throw a bunch of shit at the wall and see what sticks, but can we all admit that watching Evan Peters (so good in the first season) stumble around all season just isn’t making for compelling TV?
2. Agent Donald Ressler from The Blacklist…He was just the annoying pretty boy on Homeland, but now the exact same actor (mysteriously named Diego Klattenhoff) is regularly quadrupling the generic factor on The Blacklist. You’ve got Spader over there doing his thing, and then Ressler shows up to say something the audience never cares about like “You’re on thin ice!” or “I don’t like you!” We get it, he’s the straight arrow FBI agent (the message boards call him Captain America), but that doesn’t mean we couldn’t replace him with a piece of wood and get the same effect.
1. Dana Brody from Homeland…”You know what I want to see? More of Dana Brody on Homeland”–Nobody, ever. The actual Nicolas Brody was in exactly one episode in the first seven episodes of this season, meanwhile Dana was in all but one of them. What a cruel, cruel world…