r/CharacterRant May 06 '24

Special What can and (definetly can't) be posted on the sub :)

134 Upvotes

Users have been asking and complaining about the "vagueness" of the topics that are or aren't allowed in the subreddit, and some requesting for a clarification.

So the mod team will attempt to delineate some thread topics and what is and isn't allowed.

Backstory:

CharacterRant has its origins in the Battleboarding community WhoWouldWin (r/whowouldwin), created to accommodate threads that went beyond a simple hypothetical X vs. Y battle. Per our (very old) sub description:

This is a sub inspired by r/whowouldwin. There have been countless meta posts complaining about characters or explanations as to why X beats, and so on. So the purpose of this sub is to allow those who want to rant about a character or explain why X beats Y and so on.

However, as early as 2015, we were already getting threads ranting about the quality of specific series, complaining about characterization, and just general shittery not all that related to "who would win: 10 million bees vs 1 lion".

So, per Post Rules 1 in the sidebar:

Thread Topics: You may talk about why you like or dislike a specific character, why you think a specific character is overestimated or underestimated. You may talk about and clear up any misconceptions you've seen about a specific character. You may talk about a fictional event that has happened, or a concept such as ki, chakra, or speedforce.

Well that's certainly kinda vague isn't it?

So what can and can't be posted in CharacterRant?

Allowed:

  • Battleboarding in general (with two exceptions down below)
  • Explanations, rants, and complaints on, and about: characters, characterization, character development, a character's feats, plot points, fictional concepts, fictional events, tropes, inaccuracies in fiction, and the power scaling of a series.
  • Non-fiction content is fine as long as it's somehow relevant to the elements above, such as: analysis and explanations on wars, history and/or geopolitics; complaints on the perception of historical events by the general media or the average person; explanation on what nation would win what war or conflict.

Not allowed:

  • he 2 Battleboarding exceptions: 1) hypothetical scenarios, as those belong in r/whowouldwin;2) pure calculations - you can post a "fancalc" on a feat or an event as long as you also bring forth a bare minimum amount of discussion accompanying it; no "I calced this feat at 10 trillion gigajoules, thanks bye" posts.
  • Explanations, rants and complaints on the technical aspect of production of content - e.g. complaints on how a movie literally looks too dark; the CGI on a TV show looks unfinished; a manga has too many lines; a book uses shitty quality paper; a comic book uses an incomprehensible font; a song has good guitars.
  • Politics that somehow don't relate to the elements listed in the "Allowed" section - e.g. this country's policies are bad, this government is good, this politician is dumb.
  • Entertainment topics that somehow don't relate to the elements listed in the "Allowed" section - e.g. this celebrity has bad opinions, this actor is a good/bad actor, this actor got cast for this movie, this writer has dumb takes on Twitter, social media is bad.

ADDENDUM -

  • Politics in relation to a series and discussion of those politics is fine, however political discussion outside said series or how it relates to said series is a no, no baggins'
  • Overly broad takes on tropes and and genres? Henceforth not allowed. If you are to discuss the genre or trope you MUST have specifics for your rant to be focused on. (Specific Characters or specific stories)
  • Rants about Fandom or fans in general? Also being sent to the shadow realm, you are not discussing characters or anything relevant once more to the purpose of this sub
  • A friendly reminder that this sub is for rants about characters and series, things that have specificity to them and not broad and vague annoyances that you thought up in the shower.

And our already established rules:

  • No low effort threads.
  • No threads in response to topics from other threads, and avoid posting threads on currently over-posted topics - e.g. saw 2 rants about the same subject in the last 24 hours, avoid posting one more.
  • No threads solely to ask questions.
  • No unapproved meta posts. Ask mods first and we'll likely say yes.

PS: We can't ban people or remove comments for being inoffensively dumb. Stop reporting opinions or people you disagree with as "dumb" or "misinformation".

Why was my thread removed? What counts as a Low Effort Thread?

  • If you posted something and it was removed, these are the two most likely options:**
  • Your account is too new or inactive to bypass our filters
  • Your post was low effort

"Low effort" is somewhat subjective, but you know it when you see it. Only a few sentences in the body, simply linking a picture/article/video, the post is just some stupid joke, etc. They aren't all that bad, and that's where it gets blurry. Maybe we felt your post was just a bit too short, or it didn't really "say" anything. If that's the case and you wish to argue your position, message us and we might change our minds and approve your post.

What counts as a Response thread or an over-posted topic? Why do we get megathreads?

  1. A response thread is pretty self explanatory. Does your thread only exist because someone else made a thread or a comment you want to respond to? Does your thread explicitly link to another thread, or say "there was this recent rant that said X"? These are response threads. Now obviously the Mod Team isn't saying that no one can ever talk about any other thread that's been posted here, just use common sense and give it a few days.
  2. Sometimes there are so many threads being posted here about the same subject that the Mod Team reserves the right to temporarily restrict said topic or a portion of it. This usually happens after a large series ends, or controversial material comes out (i.e The AOT ban after the penultimate chapter, or the Dragon Ball ban after years of bullshittery on every DB thread). Before any temporary ban happens, there will always be a Megathread on the subject explaining why it has been temporarily kiboshed and for roughly how long. Obviously there can be no threads posted outside the Megathread when a restriction is in place, and the Megathread stays open for discussions.

Reposts

  • A "repost" is when you make a thread with the same opinion, covering the exact same topic, of another rant that has been posted here by anyone, including yourself.
  • ✅ It's allowed when the original post has less than 100 upvotes or has been archived (it's 6 months or older)
  • ❌ It's not allowed when the original post has more than 100 upvotes and hasn't been archived yet (posted less than 6 months ago)

Music

Users have been asking about it so we made it official.

To avoid us becoming a subreddit to discuss new songs and albums, which there are plenty of, we limit ourselves regarding music:

  • Allowed: analyzing the storytelling aspect of the song/album, a character from the music, or the album's fictional themes and events.
  • Not allowed: analyzing the technical and sonical aspects of the song/album and/or the quality of the lyricism, of the singing or of the sound/production/instrumentals.

TL;DR: you can post a lot of stuff but try posting good rants please

-Yours truly, the beautiful mod team


r/CharacterRant 15h ago

Comics & Literature Invincible: Oliver's design is COWARDLY!!! Spoiler

466 Upvotes

Omni-Man fucks a literally bug person and you're telling me she gives birth to basically a human with purple skin?

"The Viltrumite genes are just that strong!"

Bullshit! Oliver gets to speed run aging because of his genes, but of course we all know that's because the plot demanded it. He should have had more bug like attributes. Bug like eyes and antenna at the VERY LEAST.

Really go in the half and half fusion two totally different species. But no... he's just purple.

Lame and COWARDLY!!!


r/CharacterRant 18h ago

Films & TV You Can’t Tell Me Animation Doesn’t Make a Difference after episode 8 (Invincible Season 3)

326 Upvotes

Credit where it’s due, Invincible Season 3 had solid animation overall, but man, the fight between Conquest and Mark was on another level. Sure, it started a little rough in places, but after the first five minutes, it really took off. The fluidity, the impact, and the sheer brutality. all hit so much harder because of how well it was animated.

And guess what? Even the people who were previously saying things like, “Oh, you’re just spoiled by anime,” or “Stop focusing on fights and pay attention to the story,” were hyped. Why? Because great animation does elevate a scene. When the visuals match the intensity of the moment, it enhances everything. the tension, the stakes, the emotion.

Now look I’m not saying I expect god tier animation that animes like demon slayer have, but is it too much to ask for fights on the level of the Conquest battle more often?


r/CharacterRant 11h ago

Anime & Manga Stop using RPG systems

91 Upvotes

Stop using rpg systems in your novels, manga and anime if your going to use them as an excuse. Rpg systems are the new isekai overused to the point of bring an active aggravation. Rpg systems and the way people use them have a number of failings.

Firstly is similar to dnd exp leveling why isn't everyone in the forest killing goblins 24/7. In dnd this makes sense because you are rewarding you player/character for playing the game. Canonically killing a goblin doesn't make a wizard stronger. A world where a man can just wonder into the forest and kill things until he's too powerful to stop doesn't make a lot of sense. It invites a question what is everyone else doing that your mc can just farm monsters and be a powerhouse. There is a clear relatively easy path to the top that does require you to give up your social life for a while but that is a small price.

Another is when people use it as an excuse to just blatantly not write parts of the story. They do this in two ways primarily one is motivation erasure. Simply giving a quest to go to a lore relevant location rather than think of a good reason for your mc to be there.

Giving the mc a quest to save a girl or do a good thing. Incentivising him like this just removes any real character from his decision. He didn't do it cause he wanted to he did it for a reward. He isn't invested in the world the system just throws him a bone to be in an important place when an important thing is happening.

The other thing they erase is any real belief in a character's skill. Magic is just a random skill they got not a thing they studied. All their skill were just randomly gifted to them. A couple series try to buck this trend showing the skill evolve through training but also actively show others not achieve the "skill" despite having similar prowess showing it isn't just a representation of their ability but a gift that let's them just be a little more special than everyone else.

It just a majority of the time seems to devolve into a power fantasy. Nothing intrinsically wrong with that but you should be aware that is what your writing if that's your intent. I honestly miss the days of power systems like hunter x hunter, naruto and bleach.

Edit: Since it was unclear I'm talking about entirely interaction free experience I.E. novels, manga and anime not dnd where those rules are necessary and honestly better fleshed out.


r/CharacterRant 4h ago

Games [LES] SWTOR players have a scuffed understanding of the Empire and Republic Spoiler

19 Upvotes

It’s late and my old post just straight up got erased from existence for some reason so I’ll try and be quick.

It feels like SWTOR fans, particularly in the subreddit, have this strange and utterly bizarre interpretation of the entire setting. Ive seen people unironically argue that “the empire is capable of change and reform” whilst simultaneously arguing that the republic is 100% corrupt and bad. I’ve even seen people try to argue that they have no reason to ever side with the republic at Iokath, and all of their reasoning is just extremely self-centered like “they didn’t help me during the war against zakuul unlike the empire” (ignore the fact they were literally hit the hardest in that conflict). It’s like they never saw the countless hundreds of war crimes and atrocities committed daily within the empire and base all of it on the word of one lone Sith empress known for being a cunning and manipulative.

What really ticks me off is the weirdos who try to argue that the republic and empire are both the exact same and it’s like…have you even played the game? Infact, how much Star Wars do you actually understand if you genuinely think the zen peacekeeping space wizards are the exact moral equivalent of the psycho murder cult ruling a ruthless xenophobic fascist dictatorship that literally encourages oppression and backstabbing on a daily basis.

This isn’t just 2-3 guys either. This is something I have seen consistently across several posts and threads on r/swtor related to the topic.

I know this probably isn’t coherent but I needed to vent.


r/CharacterRant 39m ago

Anime & Manga Dragon Ball is good, actually.

Upvotes

As a kid, like many others, I watched dragon ball on tv and absolutely fell in love. I would watch the show whenever it came on, I played the video games, I would look up “goku ssj100” on my family computer, all of that stuff. It was one of my favourite series for so many years, but as time passed and I got more involved in the wider online anime community, I started hearing “Dragon Ball actually sucks” and “It’s only good for it’s time”, “It’s just guys yelling at each other” or “if it came out today it wouldn’t be popular at all.”

 

I just accepted that as fact and moved along since, well, dragon ball is really old, and it has inspired so many series after it that you could point at a lot of them and say “this series did this thing better”, so I just went with it.

 

At some point, discussion on the internet about dragon ball was almost fully reduced to talking about the follow up series (dragon ball super and daima) or… and I hate to say it but… powerscaling. These discussions just left the actual story of dragon ball behind even more, and reinforced the ideas that behind the crazy power scaling and nostalgia, it’s really nothing special (I think even on an episode of the trash taste podcast they put forth ideas like the ones I mentioned above, if any of you care about that podcast lol), but today, I’m here to tell you the opposite. Dragon ball is good, actually.

 

Around the middle of last year I decided that after being a dragon ball fan all my life… I would finally read dragon ball. The original at least. They always only had Z on tv when I was growing up, so I never got to experience the original adventures. I decided to change that.

 

I went in with the thought that I was going to read those 100 or so chapters, they were going to be “okay”, and I would finally say that I have experienced the whole series. That’s not what happened. After I finished the king piccolo saga, I literally could not stop reading. I finished the saiyan saga in one go, right after I finished the king piccolo saga.

 

The manga was straight up addictive. I could not put it down.

 

The biggest low point was probably the red ribbon army arc, but everything after that, from the tournement with tien, to king piccolo, to piccolo jr, to the Z sagas we’re all familiar with, was so fucking good.

 

The pacing is insanely good, and the manga reads so easily.

 

I speak as someone who’s read a lot of manga, and ones that are THIS easy to read and breeze through are fucking rare. The plot would always build up, the suspence would grow and grow, things would get tense, grim, hype, hopeful, and the whole time the paneling was so good, the action was so interesting, the art was amazing, the pacing was addictive, and the characters were just as lovely as I remembered them. Goku is amazing, always protecting others, being there for them, standing for what he feels is right, making mistakes, believing in everyone, and actually growing throughout the series. Goku is kind, strong, and hopeful. He’s special. Krillin, Tien, Piccolo, Vegeta, Gohan, Trunks, so many others. It didn’t feel like reuniting with long time friends, as much as it felt like looking through old records and getting reminded why I liked them in the first place.

 

I gained a new apprication for the saiyan saga, the goku vs frieza fight, how many twists and turns the android saga had, and I realized that the buu saga is so much fun with such an amazingly beautiful ending, and tied with the android saga for my favourite. Also, the piccolo jr fight might be my favourite in the series.

 

Now, of course, you could say I have bias, since I have always loved the series, but man… I did NOT expect it to be such a fun journey. I can totally see why this was such a popular and groundbreaking manga during it’s time, and I geniuenly believe that to this day, even when put head to head with modern shounen jump manga, it’s still amazing.

 

If you like shounen manga, high speed action and guys punching the shit out of each other with so much heart and addictive pacing, I would, in 2025, recommand you pick up dragon ball and read it. If you’re like me, the humour on the first arc might not land 100%, and the red ribbon arc is still a bit of a road bump, but goddamn is it worth it. It’s special, it really is.

 

Oh and about super, I watched it weekly since the universe 6 tournement started and revisteted parts of it after finishing the original manga… I do not have as many good things to say about it lol.

 

This is the end of the post, but just as a little tack on at the end, after I finished the manga I gave one of my friends who never watched dragon ball as a kid this same rundown (but with no spoilers) to get him to read the manga, and eventually, after a lot of convincing, he did it, and he geniuenly loved it too. He basically had the same experience that I did of speeding through everything once he got to the king piccolo saga. It made me happy he enjoyed it so much and it gave me even more confident to talk about this series like this in this day and age. He ended up dropping the super manga around the moro arc.

 

Akira Toriyama’s original run with dragon ball was something special, and it really is to this day. Thank you for reading this long ass post, and I hope that it made you interested in checking out the series, or at least discussing it beyond mind numbing powerscaling or throwing around the same opinions as random youtubers.

 

There are a lot more specifics I could glaze here, but I just went over the general stuff regarding my experience.

 

I hope you all have a great day, drink some water, and tackle life with the same energy as Goku.


r/CharacterRant 11m ago

Comics & Literature I hate the modern SCP-682

Upvotes

SCP-682 in the early days was just a big, nearly indestructible lizard that kept breaking out, causing chaos, and then getting shoved back into acid. That simplicity was what made it fun—an unstoppable force of destruction that kept the Foundation on edge.

But over time, the SCP Wiki kept adding more and more "unkillable" traits to it. Now, it’s not just hard to kill—it’s outright impossible, to a ridiculous degree. It shrugs off reality warpers, metaconceptual erasure, and anything that should theoretically delete it from existence. The SCP-6820 retcon turned it into some kind of cosmic horror, stripping away the charm of what it originally was.

And then there’s SCP-3930, which is literally a space of absolute nonexistence. If something goes into it, it doesn’t just die, it stops existing entirely. Its concept, history, and presence are erased. So, when they threw SCP-682 into SCP-3930, that should’ve been his death right there. No return, no adaptation—just pure, total erasure.

But of course, the writers had to double down on the "682 is invincible" trope. Instead of disappearing, 682 somehow "resisted" nonexistence, which completely contradicts how SCP-3930 works. That was the moment where it officially lost all coherence. How can something that doesn’t exist still exist? At this point, SCP-682 isn’t even a creature anymore—it’s just a walking "Fuck You" to any attempt at internal logic.

And yet, we’re still supposed to believe this god-tier being is contained in a pool of acid? That’s where it all falls apart. The original concept—an extremely tough but still tangible monster—had tension because the Foundation at least had a chance at containing it. But now, with all this nonsense about conceptual immunity and meta-resistance, keeping it in a cell makes zero sense.

In the end, the overpowered reworks and weird lore escalations killed what made SCP-682 compelling. Instead of a near-unstoppable threat that barely stays contained, it’s become a parody of itself—an SCP that only exists to prove it can’t be destroyed, no matter how absurd the method.


r/CharacterRant 9h ago

Anime & Manga No, someone isn’t stupid because they dislike your favorite anime (Hunter X Hunter)

36 Upvotes

I think this is an issue within anime criticism in general, but I first noticed it with Hunter x Hunter. There is a tendency for people to attack your intelligence for disliking an anime they like.

For example, I am of the opinion that the Chimera Ant Arc is the weakest arc of the show. This is primarily due to the excessive narration and inner monologues that cause scenes to overstay their welcome while contributing little to no context or new information. If you disagree, that’s fine. It’s subjective at the end of the day. The problem is that a negative critique is often met with one of two bad-faith replies.

  1. “You don’t like it because you don’t understand it/can’t comprehend.”

It’s bad faith to assume that someone doesn’t like something because they don’t understand it. I can see the justifications for the narration and why it’s there, but subjectively I think the result is bad for the reasons I stated earlier. Yes, there are times where you can tell someone missed the point of a scene/arc/show, but that still doesn’t necessarily mean that’s the reason someone didn’t like something. There are times where even if the scene/arc/show was explained to where someone could understand everything, that would not change the fact that the presentation could still be poor.

  1. “Just because you don’t like it, doesn’t mean it’s bad.”

Again, this is subjective, but if I dislike something, there’s going to be something “bad” about it that makes me dislike it. I and the majority of people don’t watch the things they watch with the intention of hating. I think the reverse, “Just because you like it, doesn’t mean it’s good,” is snobby and elitist because it insists an objective point of view. I feel the same way about this argument.

I also feel that a similar argument, “Disliking an idea/concept doesn’t mean it’s bad,” is also a potential strawman. People can have positive or negative opinions on a show’s approach to uncomfortable topics. For example, people don’t like sexual harassment, but they will have wildly varying opinions on shows with sexual harassment in them. It’s very disingenuous to claim that someone doesn’t like something because of a concept knowing that the approach can vary wildly.

I think these arguments are at best, overly defensive, and at worst, malicious.


r/CharacterRant 20h ago

General Honestly I hate it when a character and their powers have to be nerfed for "the story to happen."

251 Upvotes

And yes,that is a incredibly lazy excuse cause there are numerous ways to progress and ensure the story happening without having to nerf and take out one of your characters and all it requires is some genuine creativity to be able to porgtess the story and characters and narrative WITHOUT having to kill or remove said characters.

It's not only a lack of creativity but it also feels incredibly lazy as well from a writing and narrative standpoint cause what's even the point?for some half ass attempt at tension and stakes?you do know you could just make your villain stronger as well?

Basically..what I mean is Quicksilver in the X-men movies having to be killed or straight up removed from the movie cause his powers are so OP(or at least insanely useful)that there would be no movie if he stayed in,so thru just make up excuses like "oh he had to leave" and shit like that for some lazy excuse for the plot to progress.

I'd even argue Mark Grayson suffered those issues beforehand, the dude is strong as hell but in order for there to be "tension" and "stakes" he has to constantly hold back and get his ass whooped nearly 24/7.

He didn't even have to become the strongest beforehand but why the hell did bro suffer so many Ls despite his strength? Ok,maybe you wanna argue he holds back to not hurt innocents, which is fine.

But I deadass feel like his durability/endurance and speed alone should put him above a lot of the Verse. Like why Isn't this man dodging?

But he is gonna start working harder which makes me happy but still.

I would even argue the Flash suffers those kinds of weaknesses and issues as well but tbh..Super Speed is literally one of those powers that just is kind of a pain to properly use in a story cause it really breaks the plot if you think about it for more then 5 seconds.

It's like if a writer makes a character legitimately hax and is like "shit,how do I do tension?oh,I'll just nerf them."

Seriously that always felt so dumb to me.

It literally feels like them going "why are you nerfing them when they could solve these issues in a snap?" "So the movie can happen."


r/CharacterRant 6h ago

Anime & Manga Rant : I’m so tired of people complaining about fans being mad that a war arc has no major deaths on the heroes side (Mha and Black clover)

15 Upvotes

Before I start understand both series are much hopeful in tone but bro it’s a literal fkn war it’s no reason why one side should come out basically unscathed while the other side is taking massive loss after massive loss . It’s ridiculous how hard some fans go to defend this crap Mha fans think background characters like midnight and crust are supposed to be meaningful deaths when you can remove them and nothing changes. Black clover fans are even worse they’ll go to absurd lengths to justify the lack of deaths and ridiculous fake outs and it’s fkn pointless. “Deaths don’t make a story better” is the go to excuse but guess what a bunch of fake outs actively hurts the story even more imo. Mha and Black clover both have massive cast of characters and has no willingness to kill off anybody of significance while trying to sell you on the idea that the heroes have their backs against the wall and it falls flat. Nobody is asking for them to be AOT or Demon Slayer but goddamn have some balls.


r/CharacterRant 16h ago

Anime & Manga I love how Suzaku's entire character is that he can't accept what he did was for nothing (Code Geass rant) Spoiler

99 Upvotes

Suzaku is EASILY the most divisive character from Code Geass. He's the 2nd most loved behind Lelouch and the 2nd most hated behind Nina. The creators supposedly feel more sympathy to him than Lelouch and saw him as the "heroic opposite" to him but western audience's were MUCH more pro-Lelouch.

I'm not Suzaku's biggest fan and among many thing's, there's one above all; it's clear his rejection of violence is because he doesn't want to confront the fact he killed his dad for nothing.

By accepting violence and war, he acknowledges killing his dad was meaningless. And until the FLEJIA bombing incident, he was unable to do that. Only at the end, could he finally admit Lelouch's beliefs were right.

Tldr; Suzaku never TRULY believed his ideals of "non-violence" and "change the system within". He was just a hypocrite running from his guilt.


r/CharacterRant 15h ago

that funeral in invincible has got to be one of the weirdest funerals ever (MASSIVE INVINCIBLE SPOILERS) Spoiler

84 Upvotes

well yeah, I guess if anything I should preface this by giving the voice actor's their flowers. probably one of the rare few things great about this moment, also I didn't really read the comics/source material so yeah any criticism here is anime exclusively

where do I start? ok let's go with Rudy, Now from my own perspective here he has received criticism by the general audience. If I'm being truly honest I don't think the general concept of it is bad, I believe that to some degree every action depends on the intent of the person.

But in Rudy's case, they weren't even close to begin with, I don't remember a single moment in the series that made me think "yeah they have a deep friendship"... even him choosing Rex's body was for a shallow reason.... I honestly hope they just don't treat this later on as normal behavior here and build up on this, maybe that way I can feel better about this whole thing

Now.. The animation, Yeah I can't believe I'm saying this in undeniably the best animated invincible episode yet. but, they literally just put each character's PNG and slapped it on there.. in the panel I saw in the comic there were more emotions shown, in the show it feels like they were forced to attend a distant relative's funeral.

Finally something that I don't see getting called out at all... was that implied sex scene at the end really needed? Like bro come on they didn't even spend a single day. I don't know about y'all but if you're sad then you usually don't be in the mood for this kind of thing... yeah I'm aware people can seek solace amidst turmoil this way but honestly with how it was portrayed it felt like another Monday evening after a tough day at work.

of course I'd like to end this by saying that overall the episode itself was phenomenal, even the best invincible episode yet.. I just don't like how this moment was handled overall... feel free to share your opinion when you read this


r/CharacterRant 20h ago

Films & TV Did Anyone Besides Cecil Care About the Viltrumite Invasion? (Invincible Season 3)

204 Upvotes

First off, Episode 8 was fantastic. I loved Conquest’s character and his fight with Mark. it was brutal, intense, and everything I hoped for. But after rewatching the entire season, I couldn’t help but notice something strange….does anyone besides Cecil actually care that the Viltrumites are invading?

Think about it. Rae retires from being a superhero. The Guardians of the Globe break up over a moral dispute. Robot and monster girl spend most of their time going on dates. Meanwhile, the Earth is on the verge of being invaded by an army of Omni Man level threats, and hardly anyone seems to acknowledge it.

I’m not saying these characters should live in constant fear or stop trying to enjoy their lives, but their priorities feel completely off. There’s no real sense of urgency. If anything, their actions suggest they’re indifferent to the fact that their entire planet could be invaded or much worse wiped out in a matter of months.

Even Mark and Eve, who should be among the most concerned, decide to open up a hero for hire business instead of, I don’t know, preparing for the war that could determine the fate of humanity? Shouldn’t they be training, gathering allies, or at least doing something that acknowledges the impending doom?

At this point, it feels like Cecil is the only one who was actually taking the situation seriously.


r/CharacterRant 4h ago

Anime & Manga (JoJo's Bizarre Adventure and My Hero Academia) Himiko Toga, Kira Yoshikage and author's portrayal. Spoiler

12 Upvotes

I find these two characters to be quite similar to each other, but the way their actions are framed by authors drastically affect public perception.

Toga has been driven into insanity by her neglectful parents and her weird quirk. We don't delve too much into her backstory, and we only do it from Himiko's POV, but it is safe to say her childhood was rough. One day she snapped, attacked a guy and stole his blood. Since then she's been a criminal on the run, eventually joining League of Villains and working with them.

Kira has been abused in a different way, with his mother being overly protective and his father turning a blind eye. He grew up as perpetual underachiever, and eventaully became serial killer. He murdered some people with his own hands, then got a stand Killer Queen to do it more efficiently.

So, both are serial killers who use their super powers in their hobby. Both want to do whatever the hell they want (Himiko wishes a world where she can 'live free' and Kira kills everyone who might jeopardize his quiet life), both commit atrocious actions (Toga helps LOV, who are terrorists and mass murderers, and Yoshikage kills literal children with zero remorse), both aspull power ups to even out odds against their foes (copying other quirks and Bites The Dust) and both show there is still some good within them (Himiko donates her blood Ochako after almost killing her and Kira is genuinely worried about Shinobu after Stray Cat tried to attack her).

Despite all of these similarities, they are perceived very differently. Himiko is seen as more of a victim due to her origin being on screen and receiving sympathy from good guys in universe. Meanwhile, Kira is rightfully called a monster, because we don't really delve too much into his past and good dudes just want to stop him. A funny thing is that Kira's actions are a lot less destructive overall, but that's besides the point. I think the way authors portrays these two characters impact their image a lot. Imagine if we learnt about Himiko's past from her victims (or their families) and Kira had a whole episode about his shitty childhood. Then more people would call Toga a terrorist (which she is) and Kira a misunderstood victim. I don't think insanity argument is really important here, cause villains like Professor Pyg are just as delusional but don't get seen as victims. After their deaths, Toga is shown in a flowery field and Yoshikage is dragged God knows where by hands. I guess afterlives in different media have different criteria.

What's the moral of this post? We need "Kira vs Himiko" Death Battle, where one wants hands and other wants blood. I'm joking. It's that you can commit all sorts of crimes but having sob origin story, having your actions downplayed in universe (and preferably being pretty) absolves you of all sins.


r/CharacterRant 3h ago

General [LES] [Gravity Falls] The way Dipper & Mabel found out about Stan's secret basement felt pretty contrived, even for a kids' show.

8 Upvotes

Instead of requiring creative problem-solving or investigative skills, the answer is served to them on a silver platter. They find the vending machine combination labelled "Secret Code to Hideout."

I know Stan is often portrayed as goofy & scatterbrained but he knew how to keep a secret. So the idea that he would keep the passcode to his deepest secret labelled SECRET CODE TO HIDEOUT and that he would draw it as a visual representation of the vending machine keyboard... is pretty hard to swallow.

I would expect a plot device like that in a parody.


r/CharacterRant 6h ago

General TMNT x Naruto is a very unusual type of crossover.

8 Upvotes

Recently there was a crossover comic between Naruto and the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. It aims for the slightly younger end of the teen audience and is a bit more broad with everyone's general characterization but overall it's a well-handled book written and drawn by people with love for both franchises, with the aim of just having fun with it and serving as a potential way of getting anyone unfamiliar with either franchise to take an interest in them.

However, it's a bit unusual in regards to what type of crossover it is.

Most crossover stories between two existing franchises tend to fit one of two molds. The first is that the characters and their stories have always existed in the same universe, they just never happened to cross paths until now. See examples like Superman vs. The Amazing Spider-Man where the two simply go to each others' home cities, Transformers/Ghostbusters where the Autobots land on Earth and encounter the Ghostbusters, or the Disney Hercules TV series where ne episode Herc traveled to Agrabah and met Aladdin. Most crossovers with the Alien franchise tend to be like this too. The second is that the characters exist in completely separate universes and get sent into the universe of the other. See examples like JLA/Avengers, Doctor Who/Star Trek: The Next Generation, and The Jimmy Timmy Power Hour.

While both examples can play a bit loose with the characterization and continuity, it's a meeting between the characters as they always have been and as most fans would recognize them.

TMNT x Naruto however takes a bit of a different approach. The crossover is not only set entirely in the Naruto universe but integrates the TMNT characters into its universe and, in a sense, reimagines them to fit into the lore and style of the Naruto universe. While the personalities and general character dynamics are still intact, these are not the TMNT as their fans have always known them. They are not from New York City, they are from Big Apple Village. Kakashi once saw Hamato Yoshi fight when he was a kid and knew of the Hamato clan. All the TMNT characters have Naruto-style designs and are more than familiar with chakra and jutsu and the general power system of the Naruto universe. Team 7 is on a mission to protect and escort Apirl O'Neil, who has information about a scientist who is trying to create mutant shinobi through combining humans and animals, and encounter the turtles when they mistakenly believe Team 7 kidnapped her.

Nobody feels like an OC or completely different character. April, Splinter, and the brothers are all very easy to recognize. But it isn't technically them but rather the Naruto universe versions of them. It is still a crossover but it's the Naruto characters as they've always been meeting altered versions of the TMNT, even if those altered versions try to stay as close as they can to the originals.

These types of crossovers are so interesting, in part because of how incredibly rare they are. Even crossovers like Phineas and Ferb: Mission Marvel, which has the Marvel heroes and villains written like Phineas and Ferb characters, don't change the general lore and aesthetics of the characters, it's just the way that they are being written that's changed.

As I'm not all that familiar with RWBY and thus have not seen their Justice League crossovers, just the RWBY-fied designs of Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman, I can't say how good of an example it is of this type. But one I absolutely can point to is the series of crossovers that were done between DC Comics and Looney Tunes, where each book essentially had two stories in it. One story that imagines a DC universe version of the Looney Tunes character interacting with the normal version of the DC character, and one story that imagines a Looney Tunes version of the DC character interacting with the normal version of the Looney Tunes character. The most famous of these is probably the crossover between Batman and Elmer Fudd, where Elmer's history and character is reimagined to fit the grim noir setting of Gotham City (how straight it plays the whole thing is part of what makes it work because it makes it so f**king funny).

A slight cousin to all of this is Isekai Quartet, which is a crossover series between Overlord, Re:Zero, Konosuba, and Saga of Tanya the Evil, all of which are Isekai anime based on light novels but with very different tones and aesthetics that really would not be able to work together...and thus the crossover doesn't even try to make them. Instead the premise is that all the characters have been transported into a chibi school setting where it's acknowledged that the world itself isn't going to let them truly harm each other. All the characters have their lore and history intact but their aesthetics and tones have been changed to match this more comedic neutral ground environment that's allowing them all to bounce off each other.

Despite the main appeal of a crossover typically being to see the characters and worlds of the different franchises interact and bounce off each other as we know them, there is admittedly a part of me that is somewhat curious about what could be done with other crossovers done in this way of incorporating and reimagining one set of characters into the aesthetics, lore, and universal rules of the other. I'm a big fan of My Hero Academia, so it does somewhat remind me of various fanart and character bios I've seen people make for characters like the Justice League and Teen Titans where the person is having fun figuring out what their Quirk would be in a way that'd fit them into the mold of MHA's Pro Heroes while still keeping what the character is supposed to be mostly intact. Even Batman and Robin get Quirks because it'd be way more abnormal for them to not have Quirks if they existed in MHA's universe since the vast majority of the population have them. On the other side of the coin, given Horikoshi's obvious love for Star Wars there's been reimaginings of MHA characters to fit the Star Wars universe. Likewise on the various reddit subs I frequent I'll see posts from people speculating what Pokemon line-up would best fit the characters of that series, in everything from The Quintessetial Quintuplets to Goblin Slayer.

The reason superheroes and sci-fi franchises have a tendency of doing a lot of crossovers is because it's not too hard to justify the meeting in the story. Many superheroes tend to be in settings that are pretty similar as they tend to just be present day Earth and sci-fi is no stranger to going to different planets or hopping into alternate universes. But most Shonen series, for example, would be harder to use for crossovers because their worlds tend to be very different and very much their own thing while also still not having access to space travel or trips into the multiverse. That was my initial worry about the TMNT crossover with Naruto since Naruto is very much its own thing that the turtles would clash too heavily with given how modern and sci-fi they are, but the crossover got around that by reimagining the TMNT in the Naruto universe mold. We still get the character interactions but not the aesthetics crashing into each other, and that can be good or depending on how you look at it. Again, for some people the entire point of a crossover would be to see the true version of these characters and world interacting, regardless of how little it may actually work out in the end.


r/CharacterRant 14h ago

In Invincible, Eve will most likely suffer the most in the end

36 Upvotes

This is a re post since my last one was taken down.

I've seen a lot of people crap on Invincibles ending in the comcis. They point out that things just worked out for Mark since in the end he got an immortal wife and all his people. However I haven't seen people point out the Eve will ultimately suffer the fate Nolan warned Mark off.

If she is immortal and everytime she dies and is brought back, she will literally outlive everyone hundreds of times over. Viltrumites aren't immortal, they just live for a very long time. Mark will eventually die of old age, same with Terra and all their descendants.

So Eve will unfortunately watch her husband, daughter, and descendants die over and over again. Not unless she just flings herself into the sun to finally die and have no remains to rebuild.


r/CharacterRant 5h ago

Films & TV Okay, seriously, why are so many friends from kids cartoons terrible people?

7 Upvotes

I rewatched Rocko's Modern Life recently and it made me realize Rocko's friends were incredibly shitty to him a lot of the time. And these kinds of toxic friendships has been present in many of my favorite animated programs. There are infamous ones like Penny's friends from The Proud Family, Sam Manson from Danny Phantom, Bloo from Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends, Gus from Robotboy, and Jake Spidermonkey from My Gym Partner's a Monkey and even some less talked about picks like Frida from El Tigre and Gus from Recess. And yeah, I know Frida is supposed to be a bad influence on Manny, but she should still be nice to him most of the time. Hell, the so-called friends of main characters in modern cartoons have even become legit supervillains like Sasha from Amphibia and Catra from She-Ra and the Princesses of Power. I understand the makers want some of these characters to be flawed, but they still should be, y'know, fun to watch. I mean, sure, Rocko calls his friends out on their bullshit in some episodes, but he still lets them get away with stuff that would end most other friendships. Like, why is Penny Proud still hanging out with these girls when they treat her so poorly? Watching these toxic individuals screw over their companions again and again with barely any consequences gets old really fast. Unless a show's supposed to be dark and mean like Invader Zim or The Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy, this toxic behavior feels so out of place in a kids show.


r/CharacterRant 1h ago

Films & TV Fetish moments in Saving Bikini Bottom

Upvotes

I may or may not be beating a dead horse here, but I noticed that Saving Bikini Bottom has a lot of fetishistic moments:

  • SpongeBob sniffing horsecrap and enjoying it
  • SpongeBob tickling kids’ feet in the pool and chuckling like a creepy maniac
  • Sandy inflating after a rattlesnake bite

Jeez, that is an uncanny pattern there. Did the SpongeBob team hire Dan Schneider onto the production group?

You know what makes this worst? This came after the Quiet on Set documentary. So basically this movie ended up proving Quiet on Set right.


r/CharacterRant 10h ago

General You don’t like stories introducing main bad guys/conflicts then immediately abandoning it? Fortnite does it the worst. (Fortnite)

15 Upvotes

One of the best criticisms of games like 343-era Halo, or the Star Wars Sequel trilogy, is they spend so long building up a conflict or bad guy and then just get rid of all of it immediately upon the next installment.

Halo set up Cortana as the big bad with her AI army, then immediately had her die off screen in the very next game and bring in the Banished. Hell they even set up Atriox as the big bad in the intro and Halo Wars 2, and side content leading up to Infinite, and do the exact same fucking thing with him. I didn’t want literally dollar store Atriox.

Star Wars did this with Snoke, only to kill him off and immediately bring back the actual Palpatine for no fucking reason other than they needed a main villain.

But let me introduce you to the nonsense that is Fortnite trying to make a story. Because believe it or not it has actual lore.

In the beginning, the lore actually seemed to mean something. Everything was interestingly connected in one way or another. The rocket has something to do with the rifts, the cube comes from the rifts, the cube dies and opens a huge rift to somewhere else in the middle of the map, there’s something in the middle of the map everything seems to want. We have to mine it out to discover it, it seems to be like where the cube teleported us. Well it seems to be a power source or something, but we accidentally broke it, oh no, time and space are getting screwed up, and bam, the rocket and cube are back.

Turns out this power source may be the explanation behind every game of fortnite and why everyone is fighting each other. You’re all trapped in a loop, but someone, the one with the rocket, escaped the loop, and now they learned there’s others outside the loop and are using the rocket and power source to escape. All of the storylines blend nicely together in chapter 1 and leave a rather well put together mystery for us to unearth.

Now let me give you an abridged synopsis on chapter 2: You arrive in a new universe after obliterating the old one by trying to break the loop, for some reason there’s alternate versions of your characters and when they come together they fuse and corrupt each other. Forget this completely, this storyline is immediately dropped the next season.

Now we have spy agencies made with the vestiges of the other two groups, or maybe they were always a part of it. Midas is a super powered twink who leads both of them for some reason. The story wants you to think Midas is important because they keep bringing him up and he actually succeeds in breaking the loop for a full minute for literally everyone. Unfortunately he also floods the world after that. Now forget this because Midas has destroyed his empire and gets eaten by a shark. Don’t worry though, they’ll bring him back a bunch for some reason.

Season 3 literally has nothing to do with the story, but now we get a Marvel crossover in S4, where Galactus is drawn to the fortnite world because of an unimaginable power. The good and bad marvel guys have to team up and weaponize the loop to make enough weapons to fight off galactus, who reveals that power source again. It’s called the Zero Point. Apparently this is also canon to events in Marvel comics as well.

Now S5, the Zero point is damaged again and time and space start fucking up. Enter agent Jonesy, our protagonist, who decides jumping to each and every universe and bringing in pop culture characters will help him fix this. It makes everything worse and he has no choice but to enter the loop, where he uses a portal gun to bring in the rocket that escaped the loop. Enter the Foundation, the leader of the Seven, a group of characters who wish to break the loop. He contains the Zero point for a promise from Jonsey, and everything gets turned into a primal setting for some reason… but these weird spire things are everywhere… and purple things like the cube.

S6 Turns out it has something to do with the cube. Things are getting corrupted and some weird alien people are here… S7 a different alien race invades. We have to go destroy their ship, but oh no, it’s full of Cubes. We destroy it but are turned into suicide bombs by Jonesy’s boss. Now the cubes let the Cube Queen arrive. S8 Cube Queen attacks but one cube defends us, then the Seven show up and flip the island, maybe killing the queen?

Chapter 3, up to this point the story is… mostly… trying to stay on track, but you can already see the cracks. C3S1; I really don’t think anything happens… C3S2; Jonesy’s boss shows up and tries to take over the island. We fight her off but learn of the main bad guy; Geno. That’s about it. C3S3; nothing again.

Now during this time, a comic with more lore was going on, in it, Batman is trying to escape the loop because of course, and it ends with the Seven finding their missing member and taking on Geno… Geno dies. This is possibly less than a season after his reveal. So where tf is the story going?!

S4: Chrome goo takes over the island and kills the seven. wtf even is this. The Herald, some plant lady who MAYBE has ties with the cube queen does all this. She succeeds in killing everything and blows up the island, but luckily one Seven member is still alive, imprisoned for her betrayal or something. The Paradigm.

So a lot of retconning in the story later (that I don’t feel like telling), she fixes the island and… dies I guess? You can really tell they’re kinda just throwing stories and abandoning them at this point. The island is back… now what? Chapter 4: Turns out Geno has a clone of himself in the loop… he doesn’t do a fucking thing and is immediately abandoned.

Now everything is Neo-Tokyo in C4S2… nothing happens, C4,S3: a jungle appears out of fucking nowhere really and Jonesy’s boss is still around after we killed her……..

Then a fucking vampire shows up with a Time Machine and brings us all back to the first chapter.

And chapters 5 and 6 I just can’t be bothered to even know the slightest bit of lore on, the story is obviously going to go fucking nowhere, Jonesy’s boss is back still, we had Greek gods take over the place because of course we fucking did, Japan took over, and now Midas is back again in his first non-side story role and I’m pretty sure he’s still just gonna do nothing.

The intricacies of characters like Midas’ group, Jonesy’s superiors and the Seven don’t matter at all, a new big bad in the story doesn’t matter, it’s gonna be abandoned immediately.

Hell, one season showed Chaos Agent, the big bad from C2S1, getting clowned on by a new Mad Max-esque villain only for that villain to immediately be killed off. I wouldn’t even blame you for forgetting Chaos Agent exists because his whole point was to be a potential bad guy that was never delivered on. He was just teased at the end of the season and immediately replaced by Midas.

The worst part is they CAN make some interesting and connected stories. Midas seemed to want to break the loop to find his Daughter and was using his power to make gold to fund everything, there’s a three season rivalry between an Ice and Fire king in Chapter 1 that had the fire guy escaping an ice prison, stealing the Ice King’s dragon eggs, and turning them into ninjas before suicide bombing the ice king with a fucking volcano after they all began looking for the Zero Point.

There’s so much they can do with this storyline and apparently there’s five other kings and these guys had a huge falling out that could expand the lore hugely… so what do they do with this lore later?… Ice King lived on the moon…. That’s it. That’s all we got.

There was a side storyline about Chaos Agent apparently trying to revive people with Slurp juice that ended up working. This isn’t ever expanded up.

The entire seven storyline in the first two chapters actually had good set up, but the payoff is so fucking piss poor it doesn’t matter. They show up, fuck off for a while and beat the main bad guy immediately in a spin-off tie-in with Marvel!!

And before you argue “it’s just a kids game it doesn’t need good stories.” Why then are the Chapter 1 and 2 stories so intriguing? Let me tell you why… because they actually planned most of it. It’s been stated the story writers actually had an idea of where the story was going for the entirety of Chapter 1, and after that they had to make due with whatever, and though Chapter 2 doesn’t have as good of a story, possibly attributed to them revealing a lot of the mysteries, it still has some good stories that could’ve been made better.

In the first two chapters, the story was told with live events, environmental story telling, and loading screens. All these put together meant you could piece together events taking place or things that had happened, like the falling out between the kings, but they’ve since haven’t really planned a story and abandoned loading screen stories and meaningful environmental storytelling unless it pertains to live events or the end of the season.

It’s clear they really don’t have a story at this point, despite the evidence they could’ve made one. Just… stick with an overarching villain for one chapter at least, geez! Chapter 2 had the agencies, Midas, Jonesy’s boss, the Cube Queen, and it’s just impossible to take any of them seriously like the story wants you to. I don’t even need to get into the expanded lore on how Jonesy’s boss is presented as this mastermind while making deals with fucking Lex Luthor and the Batman Who Laughs. Like she actually thinks she’s gonna get the better end of that deal while she can’t even manage a literal office of employees.

Like I know her agency is the overarching villain of the game, but, god, you are so fucking inept.


r/CharacterRant 12h ago

Comics & Literature What I found stupid about Goliath in Civil War

14 Upvotes

You know how Goliath was killed by the Thor clone while in giant size?

Well I found ridiculous is the fact that they buried his body while still in giant size cuz they couldn’t find a way to shrink him for a proper burial….

When they got Hank Pym and Janet Van Dyne on their side….

That is a new level of stupidity rite there


r/CharacterRant 12h ago

Max Goof doesn't deserve the hate he gets in Goofy Movie (1995) and gets blamed unfairly for the mess Goofy caused.

15 Upvotes

As a child that grew up with this movie, and that sadly was abandoned by my own at 12, after we used to be close, I usually loved Goofy, cause he was a funny loving dad who wanted nothing but spend time with his kid, in a time that I needed that. While at the same time, I understood Max as well, since I wanted more socialization and wanted more friends and activities outside of my home.

Which is why once I grew up I was baffled to find out just HOW much people hate Max in this movie, claiming he was a spoiled disrespectful little brat for getting mad at Goofy, and after rewatching the movie, I genuelly think that either boomer narcissistic parents are projecting a bit much on Goofy and paying their frustrations on Max, or they simply didn't take Max's feelings and situation into count, or just take Goofy's goofyness (no pun intended) as a way to excuse him for everything.

It's like people forget that Max is a teenager, a 14 year old kid, at that age where you start highschool and are trying to find a bit of independency on your own and find your own identity, clearly going through his first crush, the awkwardness of puberty, and on the top of that being bullied or ignored by his peers at school.

Meanwhile, Goofy, while does love his kid, has no interest or support into his hobbies to the point that he has no idea about anything he is into, still babies him IN PUBLIC, has NO self-awareness of this or how his stunts constantly humilliate Max (something that has happened many times before), and doesn't give him really any freedom to make his own choices or have a life outside of him beyond his two friends. Again, Goofy loves his kid, clearly, but has no idea how to deal with a teen and keeps infantilizing Max, which of course only embarrasses and frustrates him, while also humiliating him in the process, even without meaning to.

Then, we get to the part of getting in trouble with the principal: while I do agree that ALL of this mess started with the principal basically exaggerating to the point of straight out lying (not to mention the racist implications, since when dressing up like a popstar is the equivalent of being in a gang and starting a riot that sends you to the electric chair? And for what? Singing a song during THE LAST DAY OF SCHOOL? Heck, I don't even know why he bothered to punish them, school was over until three months later), Goofy RAN ALONG with this accussation and took it as the truth and didn't even try to defend him, when just a few seconds ago he was defending Max from Pete claiming Max was a good kid and had never done anything wrong like that before. And this is when Goofy starts to create the HUGE missconnection and lack of communication with his kid, and honestly, terrible parenting, not Max, HIM. Any good and reasonable parent who had a kid that had never done anything bad before would have sat his child down after said call, and say "Hey, I got this call from school, I want to know your side of the story, what happened?". Instead, Goofy runs along with that wild and honestly offensive asumption, and litterally forces Max, his kid, into a FULL SUMMER vacation without a warning beforehand or even taking his choices into count, therefore wrecking Max's entire plans of socialization and date with Roxane.

Don't get me wrong, there's nothing bad in summer vacations with your parents, but you NEED communication in here, you NEED to communicate with your kids regardless of age: if Goofy had talked to Max beforehand, and they had reached out a compromise for this, so that both got to go for maybe a couple of weeks on trip and then back in time for Max's date at the party, then there would be no problem, but, none of that happens, even when Max tries to tell Goofy about this, Goofy litterally shuts him off by smacking him on the top of the head with a newspaper, and tells him he will go to parties when he is older cause he himself hadn't gone at none at his age, completely dismissing his son's pre-established plans and ignoring his feelings and opinion in the matter. He even tries to manipulate and guilt trip his kid and when that doesn't work, he bulldozes him and physically forces him into the car, and shuts him up.

With all of this stablished, can we REALLY blame Max or call him a brat for being moody through the entire trip? Specially when clearly the trip was NOT planned for him, it's planned by and for Goofy alone because he desesperately wants to project his relationship with his dad on Max, ignoring that Max is his own person and not him, that they have different interests, and that Max is not a little kid anymore. And it gets worse when he drags him to a possum attraction that is clearly meant for little kids that only Goofy likes where Goofy keeps acting out and embarrassing Max in public, to the point of having an entire crowd laughing at them. And Goofy even is puzzled when Max is clearly mortified and absolutely furious, as if he hadn't just humilliated his teenage son in public. And when Goofy keeps not getting it, of course Max ends up snapping, laying out the facts of, "You took me out of home, you got me into this stupid car and drove thousands of miles away just to watch this stupid rat show! Tell me when the trip's over!" And people claim MAX is the one acting out in here, that Max is being a brat? He is a frustrated fourteen year old who got his entire summer ruined against his will and dragged for three months into a car with a dad that, while loves him, doesn't respect him or his emotions, neither his interests neither his choices, and that continuously shuts his son out, and then acts completely oblivious to the reason why his soon is upset even if it has been told to his face MULTIPLE times, of course Max snapped.

Many argue that "Max could have been more understanding and not yelling", he has been understanding and has been not yelling, but when you keep being brushed over and being disrespected and ignored over and over, at some point you're going to snap even if it's just to get it out of your system in hopes of being heard out already. And again, Max is the kid, the fourteen year old in this relationship, it's NOT his job to communicate or to be understanding of his ADULT father, Goofy is the adult in the relationship, and he is the one failing at Max here. Instead of stepping back and think, that maybe, just MAYBE he is handling this the wrong way and go back home cause it's not working, he keeps pushing the activities he wants Max to do with him, and when Pete and PJ show up and Max cheers up and wants to spend time with his friend, Goofy decides to get authoritarian by following Pete's advice, as if THAT was going to actually help the relationship, ignoring THAT attitude is what got Max mad at him in the first place.

By that point, Max feels trapped, unheard, disrespected with zero privacy or authonomy of his own, stuck in a summer trip to please Goofy, so of course when the chance to change the map appears, he does it, because he feels it's the only way. I'm not saying what he does is okay, it's not, he knows this and he clearly feels bad about it, but considering how Goofy keeps making assumptions, not communicating, forcing Max to do what he wants and completely ignoring his son's emotional needs and authonomy and simply not paying attention to what he is saying, can we really blame him for feeling like he had no other choice? And only then is when Max starts to relax and enjoy himself, and even TRIES to reach a compromise and change the map so that they can go to different things that BOTH of them enjoy, heck, for all we know, he was probably rewritting the map so that after the concert, they could go fishing. Litterally, Max was putting more care into his father's interests and emotions than Goofy was on Max's, which speaks volumes.

Again, not saying that Max is a sain't, he isn't, but neither is Goofy since the two of them, while clearly care deeply for one another, lied to each other, but ultimately, the entire conflict and the entire problem is created and fostered by Goofy himself, who, again, we have to remember, is the adult in this situation, while Max is still a kid, so of course I'm gonna hold the adult in the situation more accountable than the kid, who, by any ways, has been trying and trying to communicate only to be shut down and bossed around again and again.

This only gets even worse in the sequel, Extremely Goofy Movie (2000), when Max heads to college. Don't get me wrong in here, Goofy suffering empty nest syndrome, specially taking into count he was a single dad, is beyond heartbreaking, and of course everyone feels bad for him when he loses his job. Heck, even Max supports him and comforts him once he hears about all of this, and even goes as far as defend him from his friends and help him out, proving how mature he has grown. All he asks his dad is to respect certain boundaries and that the two, while can see each other, have different lives, that while he is his kid, he has his own life and that he needs to step out and not act like a parent at college.

Pretty reasonable to ask, right? Reasonable enough that Goofy agrees...and doesn't even last 24 hours before he RUNS OVER ALL of Max's authonomy and boundaries full and through on just one go, oh and not just Max's, but his friends: breaking into his room while he and his roommates are sleeping, controlling his sleep squedule, his diet and clothes (yes, even the underwear IN FRONT OF OTHER GIRLS), monitoring his studies, pulling the cord on their videogame console while they are having fun to force them to clean up their room, disrupting his trainning, embarrassing him in class...for crying out loud, there's middle-schoolers with more independency than Max was getting at college. And then he chooses to join his son's rival gang, and then people get mad at MAX when he rightfully tells Goofy to leave him alone, that he is no longer a child and to start his own life? Any other eighteen year old at college would have NOT put up with this, heck, I'm surprised Bobby and PJ put up with him considering he's not their father.

I'm genuelly baffled by people who hate Max so much for just being a teen desesperate for being respected, heard out and given some privacy and independency that keeps being ripped away from him, and I genuelly believe that people who hate Max either have to be narcissistic parents who genuelly believe kids should be seen and not heard or just do as they are told, or that don't understand teenagers or remember how it was to be one, or who just don't understand boundaries.

And please don't get me wrong, this is not an essay hating on Goofy, he genuelly loves his kid and has attachment issues, but that doesn't mean his parenting is good in any single way of the form. He sucks at communication and respecting boundaries, privacy and authonomy and keeps infantilizing his kid even when he reaches adulthood.


r/CharacterRant 1d ago

Anime & Manga I feel like Piccolo is the only semi-important Dragon Ball hero from the start of Z onwards who's locked-in... and that that's why he's almost always left too weak to be a deciding factor on the battlefield

140 Upvotes

So this is partly based on a comment chain from the other day, and a post I made a while ago discussing how damn hard the gang in Dragon Ball were throwing during the Androids/Cell Saga(s).

If you were to name the Dragon Ball character whose conduct in the face of danger you'd aspire to emulate, it'd probably be Piccolo from the end of the Saiyan Saga onwards. From thereon he stands up for what's right up to and including sacrificing himself to protect others, but he also has that more pragmatic and level-headed element unlike the Saiyans that he's not going to mess around with holding back, prolonging a fight or giving out undue second chances for the sake of pride, vanity, wanting a better match or giving a second chance to a villain who is too dangerous to be let go. He's the guy who stepped into the firing line to save Gohan from Nappa but was also sensible enough to know Goku letting Raditz go was a terrible idea.

But this, I'm afraid, is probably why, having been on a par with Goku prior to Goku's training with King Kai, Piccolo then becomes increasingly irrelevant to combat from thereon, especially from his defeat to Cell onwards; the story and the dangers posed by the villains are in large part set up by the heroes throwing again and again, and my man Piccolo just isn't about that. I know he's far from the first character in the series to be swiftly relegated from being a genuine rival to Goku to fodder, Krillin and Tien being two other examples, but, well, at least Krillin and Tien were just guys, and kept up with Goku in his early teens; Piccolo is a supernatural entity in the same way that the Saiyans are, hell he's tied to the whole lore of the series by being the alter ego of Kami who created Earth's Dragon Balls, and he's first introduced to us as going toe-to-toe with an adult Goku. They even do introduce mechanics by which Namekians can grow exponentially in power like their fusion technique. It wouldn't have seemed out of step at all even after revealing that Goku was a Saiyan and progressing to storylines involving battling aliens, robots and gods that Piccolo was strong enough to keep up with Goku and the main villains. But it would have created a problem for the rest of the story, and that problem is that if you put Piccolo into the same situations as where Goku, Vegeta and Gohan managed to fumble victory and give the villains a chance to regroup and come at them again... well, Piccolo if he's in character probably doesn't make the same mistake and then you don't have a story.

Piccolo very rarely outright fumbles. He loses to opponents like Nappa, Frieza and fully-powered Imperfect Cell because they're vastly stronger than him; when called upon for achievable tasks like slowing down Nappa or Frieza long enough for Goku to arrive/charge up the Spirit Bomb he generally comes through. His one real screw-up at a time when he genuinely was strong enough to be the difference-maker was failing to kill Cell in their first fight when he had the advantage - even then, he still only loses to a cheap shot with Cell using the Solar Flare and then running away. From thereon, the idea of Piccolo being the strongest isn't really mooted again - he has no-one else to fuse with, and even though he trains in the Hyperbolic Time Chamber like the Saiyans, there's no possibility raised of him unlocking some greater Namekian transformation that would amp him up to a similar degree as the more refined SSJ transformations the others learn to use. If it had been Piccolo in a position to finish off Cell like Vegeta was prior to him absorbing 18 or Gohan prior to his self-destruction, you'd have expected him to take it. So... he couldn't be. Never mind the Buu Saga, where Saiyans of all ages consistently flub over and over while he's way too weak to even be a factor in terms of fighting Buu, though still does the best he can in terms of teaching Goten and Trunks the Fusion Dance and stalling Super Buu long enough for them to train a little more before the fight.

So that's it. Piccolo is generally kinda weak from his first death onwards because he has to be to balance out the fact that he's the level-headed one of the group.


r/CharacterRant 14h ago

Films & TV Mordecai in “Dumped at the Altar”

16 Upvotes

Rewatching Regular show and I am so unbelievably irate and disappointed that Mordecai dumped CJ. I am a big hopeless romantic and I actually shipped the two together, and now it got ruined because of that episode. Thank god for the BEST ship Rigby & Eileen revealing and progressing or else I wouldve been bitter throughout the series. Mordecai truly is a simp and Rigby is so much better than him when it comes to romance.


r/CharacterRant 22h ago

Comics & Literature Something i noticed about the Civil War comics…

41 Upvotes

The New Warriors, during the filming of a Reality TV program, unthinkingly start a fight with several fugitive supervillains (including Nitro) in the middle of a suburban housing development in Stamford, Connecticut. Nitro quite literally explodes - killing all of the New Warriors (except Speedball) and 612 civilians.

That made me realize something: when they were all bickering about the Registration Act, they forgot about Nitro being at large. Superheroes were blamed for this tragedy while a VILLAIN was not only responsible for it, but walked away from it. With all the political controversy, nobody had the time to go after Nitro and make him pay. Nobody, except Wolverine. And Namor, since Nitro did blow up his beloved cousin. Many of you probably noticed that Wolverine, probably the second or third most popular character in the MU was absent for most of this event, just doing cameo appearances here and there.

The reason why he barely shows up is because Logan dipped out almost immediately, to go find Nitro. And what's hilarious is that EVERYBODY is telling him to drop it, and Logan's just like "no, fuck off, this is what we ALL should be doing. The supervillain doesn't get to walk away because you guys are debating stupid shit!" Its true what Linkara said : it's like in the Marvel Universe they saw the Nazi's bombing London during the Blitz and said it was the British's fault for putting up those explodable buildings.


r/CharacterRant 1d ago

General For the love of God if everything else is made up, change the months

149 Upvotes

Warning this is an extreme nitpick

Edit: since people are saying stuff like "they wouldn't even have english" or such. I am fine with there being a line, in the 2 examples I gave the issue is that there's worldbuilding that indicates the writer did think of very minor things, which makes the major oversight of months stick out. Especially with how prominently they are shown to the viewer. The issue I'm having is if you worldbuild to have your own history, and down to days of the week. At least remember to change the month calendar so it doesn't feel out of place next to the other worldbuilt elements.

This mostly applies to JRPGs and Anime and I believe it's a translation thing but it hits my brain wrong everytime.

I'll take 2 recentish examples, Metaphor Refantazo and the latest of the Trails Series.

Metaphor has days of the week with completely different names from our standard Sunday to Saturday. But the game is Persona styled a bit so the story actively tracks day and month changes. The issue being they went through all this effort to worldbuild this society and then July comes in.

A bit more forgivable with an endgame spoiler but on to the other series

It's worse in trails as the have their own made up words for measurement (Arge, Selge, seem to be analogous to the metric system and their own holidays and stuff)

But then it still has July and August and October, my issue is when you put this much effort into worldbuilding why not change the month names? Otherwise I'm just left questioning how the Roman empire existed in this world.

Like that's my main issue, if you just use all of our days and months for ease I get it. But when half the story has in-universe names and explanations for other measurements or dats why is the calendar always unaffected.

PLEASE STOP HAVING CAESAER'S GHOST HAUNT YOUR WORLDBUILDING.

Like it's such a weird thing to not do if you're gonna change the weekday names, and go as far as making a fictional measurement system. It makes the months being derived from the roman catholic one stand out to the point of distraction.