Character Derailment

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Fat Chance with Jesus

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For those who don't know of this term, a specific website has an article on it. Basic, when a show lasts for so long, a character from said show changes for the worst, to the point where the character would loose his/her/its charm, no longer be recgonize or be enjoyed by viewers. Who do you think have suffered the worst of this?

I vote The Fairly Oddparents on Nickelodeon. A former shell of itself would be an understatment and the thing is that is could have been a well written show with a very good concept. What heppen(what, I sak that already)?

Has this thread been made before?
 
A really good example of character derailment has to be Ben from Ben 10: Alien Force and Ultimate Alien. During the first season Ben showed a little bit of maturity but after the whole Highbreed story arc, his character just fell apart. Instead of trying to develop him further, the writers' felt the need to make him an ego maniac jerk.
 
I think this is an interesting thread; however, I totally disagree more with your choice. FOP right now is the only Nicktoon I actually still enjoy, and I think the show has actually gotten better as it aged. Wishology for last year was my highlight for the series, and I think this shows eagerness to keep moving forward is admirable, especially compared to other shows.

Getting back on topic, however, I do think a Nicktoon has perhaps run its course: I do not enjoy SpongeBob that much anymore. His character, and the rest of the cast, have gotten annoying for me. Furthermore, I think the series has actually gotten mean-spirited in its approach to comedy. I did really like the series, and thoroughly enjoyed the movie, but to show just doesn't do it for me anymore.
 
If you want to make a TV Tropes list thread, go ahead and make a naked, blatant TV Tropes list thread. It's not like the people who are annoyed by them will be less annoyed because you tried to disguise it. :)

Here are my examples:

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/CharacterDerailment


  • Like the Kelly Bundy example, Luanne from King Of The Hill started out as a somewhat promiscuous teenager who didn't take any guff from anyone. Later episodes turned her into a shy moron who was afraid to stand up for herself. The promiscuity, however, was given a proper episode when it disappeared.
    • Bobby Hill was similarly much less effeminate in his early years. It could be argued as Character Development though if you didn't take well to his original characterization as slow, awkward and not "right" as Hank would say. Sure he got effeminate, but he got also got some charisma and charm, even if it was limited to trying to be a class clown and entertainer.
  • Depending on which side of the ever expanding break you stand on, Transformers: Beast Machines may have done this to pretty much everyone, via a poorly done mass Freak Out, turning Rattrap from a sneaky-but-reliable Jerk With A Heart Of Gold into an annoying Dirty Coward, Optimus Primal from a competent and inspirational yet down-to-earth and approachable leader into a spiritual guru who bordered on fanaticism, Dark Action Girl Blackarachnia into the Shallow Love Interest deprived of her boyfriend, etc, etc. Especially bad regarding Megatron who got no explanation as to why he became obsessed with eliminating individuality and hated Beast Modes.
    • Although that's a fair cop for Megatron's unprecedented manias, it's arguably justified for the Maximals, given the impact of the massive shock of rapidly going from having won the Beast Wars with Megs as their captive to suddenly finding themselves mode-locked, downgraded, amnesiac and on the run from a massive army of drones amidst the newly post-apocalyptic landscape of their homeworld after Megatron arrived ahead of them at an earlier point in time and conquered Cybertron before they ever got there, and realising that the entire population have had their sparks ripped out and stockpiled. Planetary genocide is a pretty good motivation to shake your personalities up a fair bit, so for some viewers this was more a case of justified (if not necessarily welcomed) Character Development.
      • Honestly, people have turned into religious fanatics over much, much less than what Primal had to deal with (not only has his entire race been wiped out, he's indirectly responsible).
    • Cheetor was, arguably, the one who actually had some really good character development that continued his maturing from Beast Wars. Near the end of Beast Wars he reached what Rattrap called "Cyber Puberty" and just seemed to grow more and more during Machines.
  • Many of the characters in Thomas The Tank Engine have suffered from this. Edward, previously an old, kind and wise engine, became younger and ruder in later seasons.
    • It's not just Edward that this has happened to. Percy went from a mischievous Cloud Cuckoo Lander to a naive, forgetful moron who can't pronounce simple words, Toby was a kind and confident Cool Old Guy but later became a wimp with self-esteem issues, and Skarloey, previously one of the oldest and wisest engines on the island, is now childish and afraid of everything (from thunderstorms to the incline yards to the wharf). Thomas himself was once depicted as friendly and helpful, if somewhat cocky and brash. He's now a poorly-written Wesley Stu that is obligated to make appearances in every single episode (even episodes about the narrow gauge engines!) and dispense advice to everyone.
 
No, he/she's right. That does fit Homer. Peter's actually worse.

Are you sure? Compare the characters in the original "Oh, Yeah! Cartoons" shorts and the earlier seasons to now. Two of the worst, biggest offenders are Cosmo(From deep voiced, brainy, clever, man of the house to slightly loopy, but still caring to annoyingly voiced, idiotic, concern-free manchild) and Vicky( From bossy,manipulating, but still fair deceiver to child-killing, greedy(money & power), sociopath... who wants to take over the world. OH COURSE!).
 
Every Gargoyles Character who appeared in The Golaith Chronicles, some worse then others. Particularly egregious examples include...

David Xanatos: Went from complex manipulative badass to dude who occasionally lent the gargs a helicopter.

Fox: Same as above but really taken to the extreme in the episode Ransom. The old Fox wouldn't have broken down into hysterics on finding her son kidnapped. She would have hunted down every last person involved and done things to them that would give Quinten Tarantino nightmares. Last time somebody tried to mess with her kid, she put him through a wall and THAT guy was a nigh-omnipotent demigod. Do not frack with Alexander Xanatos or Fox will end you.

Brooklyn: Brook established himself as a leader in his own right and worthy successor to Goliath in the later half of season 2. Then TGC came along and all of a sudden he's acting like a self absorbed 15 year old.
 
What was up with Numbuh 4 suddenly crushing on Numbuh 3 on "Kids Next Door"? That came straight from nowhere. Although to be fair, he wasn't changed TOO much; he even seemed oblivious to his own crush many times.
 
I disagree. It's kind of been implyed since operation ARCTIC. Also on the subject of Numbuh 4, he became very stupid as the seasons progressed. He started off normal, but as the show went on he became dumber and dumber which was totally unnecessary IMO since Numbuh 3 was already the dumb one.
 
I feel that every character in Spongebob and Fairly Odd Parents have been suffering from this. It just seems that they have degenerated from characters who could get along and had thier own quirks, to mindless idiots and jeks who scream alot and get on each others nerves.
 
The Fairly OddParents: The whole show lost any purpose to exist after about 2004. Cosmo especially became unbareably stupid, Timmy's adventures became more unnecessary after Channel Chasers, and Trixie just got meaner and crazier.

Rugrats: When the show returned in 1997, and even moreso after the first movie, The babies weren't as cerebral as they were in the earlier years, and Angelica wasn't much of a bully anymore.

Family Guy: At some point, the show got drunk on its uncancelled status, and turned nearly all the characters into screaming jerks, particularly Peter. The other characters had basically lost control of their inner demons, but Brian changed from a world-weary sophisticate to a know-it-all liberal loser.

King of the Hill: Quite a few characters have suffered from this show. Bobby was getting really effeminate by Season 5, where it seemed there was an attempt to make him "come out the closet". :sad: Peggy became an egotistical nut, the worst of its kind, until near the end of the series. Hank became too mellow in the show's later years to really care about what ailed him anymore. Dale had emerged into the show's regular show stealer, where almost every main plot of sub-plot required his presence, no matter how pointless of unfunny it became.
 
I dunno, I think KOTH was really good with characters and their development. There's only one character I can think of where it made no sense.

The Bobby stuff was just a way to play off Hank. Later in the series it was Hank that wanted Bobby to do effeminate stuff like the powder puff cheerleader thing that Bobby wanted no part of, the whole thing was just for the jokes.

Peggy was always egotistical, she was just really boring in the first few seasons because she didn't have nearly enough attitude and was a real drag when she was on screen. Her mother issues were also really confusing because of some really inconsistent writing in this area.

Hank wasn't really mellowed, he was just a far more accepting person. He used to be really angry in the early seasons, but instead learned to calm himself down in most situations. Don't you remember what happened to Big Jim? He died of anger. After that Hank really did seem to keep his anger in check, and I think it was a good idea for his character. I don't really think that's derailing, it seems like he was just changing.

The only thing about KOTH in regards to lacking character development that I would agree with was Luanne. This might have had something to do with Brittany Murphy's career getting bigger at the time, but Luanne continually had less focus to the point where she left community college 'just cuz' and went right back into beauty school which she originally left because she wasn't any good at it. Not only is it confusing, but it makes no sense.
 
Total Drama Island/Action/World Tour have some examples of character derailment. For example; Geoff when he become the co-host of the Aftermath with Bridgette, get a "Captain Hollywood" attitude and became a 2nd Chris McLean. Trent when he was Duncan a bit too much close to Gwen, became crazy and Courtney turned into a bossy antagonist.
 
Dale wasn't that big of a derailament to the show. He had a very big presence, but I can think of a good amount of episodes where he wasn't a major presence and even a few where he doesn't really do much at all.

I also think that the Bobby stuff was cut back later on, or at least was used in a different direction. Instead of doing effeminate things, Bobby would do stranger activities like witchcraft. Even in episodes like when he became a peer counselor he mainly did it to get girls.
 
Yeah, I also found Luanne to be derailed later in the show's run. After Buckley's death and her decision to quit beauty school in favor of college, I thought she would develop into someone more independent and less of a ditz. But instead, she dropped out and quickly found love with Lucky.
 
Well, sometimes really stupid people just make really rash, stupid decisions. Luanne was such a brainless dumbass that abandoning college to go and do hair again didn't seem like a big deal to her, even if it was completely asinine and brought the character back to square one. There are people who are that messed up that they do things like that.

Luanne is an example of a person who really doesn't have much of a future, or at least not a very productive, successful one. Not every character has to show progress. Regression is also character development, as far as I'm concerned. That's what I loved about King of the Hill. It was smart enough to be realistic with the way life works. Luanne was a twit who made awful decisions and even though she attempted to better herself in the end she fell in love with a butt-ugly hillbilly, threw away any chance of having a real career and got knocked up. Hank and Peggy will probably be helping Luanne and Lucky for the rest of their lives.
 
I agree with you 100%. FOP is a loud annoying shadow of its former self, and Cosmo in particular has lost all of his charm. He's a pain in the ear and a pain in the rear. I very very seldom watch the show anymore. Which isn't hard because it's hardly ever on Nick anymore.
 
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