favourite twdg villain?
I'm a fond enjoyer of the St. John's as villains. I don't know if they're my favorite just because they're only in one episode, but I love the concept of this family almost immediately jumping into cannibalism toward the start of the outbreak, dealing in human flesh to bandits, and casually feeding this group their friend's legs.
Like... what the hell was this family like before the outbreak that all three of them were like, "Hey now listen... nothing should go to waste, the dead are eating people so why shouldn't we? We gotta survive and in our defense, we only target those who were gonna die anyway... like y'all."
Dude, Mark was shot in this shoulder with an arrow. He wasn't going to die from that injury. It's so fucked that these seemingly friendly people took the group into their home and then fed them Mark's legs.
If we take the idea that everyone is infected and have the capacity within themselves to become walkers, to become monsters, then the St. John's were infected long before the outbreak, y'know? Not literally, but something was wrong with them and the outbreak just further spread that infection and changed them.
But again, are they my favorite? I dunno if I can say that since I have a lot more appreciation for Lily now. Yeah, some of her writing gets a little wonky in ep3 of TFS when she goes on her monologues and shit, but y'know what? I'm into it.
You have to remember who we're talking about and the fact that she's the antagonist; Lily isn't some anti-hero in TFS who secretly has a heart of gold that's brought to light because she reunited with Clementine... she's a fucked up woman who did fucked up things in the name of survival. She's full of rot now. She sees kidnapping children and turning them into soldiers to protect her home as a means to an end, but she doesn't actually give a shit about the people she's taking. They aren't people to her, they're as the episode title suggests, toys in her game. The only one she sees as a person is Clementine, and while that makes her hesitate at first, she sees Clementine's a prize to bring back.
She remembers what happened in S1; her father had a heart attack and as she tried to save him, Kenny smashed his face in with a saltlick and then expected Lily to just stand up and help him get back to his family because "he did what he had to, he made the hard choice." Yes, Larry was a piece of shit. No one liked him, and you can even question Lily on him and she'll tell you that he has a lot of pain. Yes, it makes him an asshole, but he's still her dad and he's all she has. I mean... the simplification is daddy issues, but in all seriousness, I don't doubt for a second that many of Lily's issues stem from Larry being a shitty father to her.
Then everyone thought she was losing it when she insisted there was a traitor in the group, which she was right about, but she was unstable. She was unwell, but how do you help someone like that when you don't have training to go about it? Then Lily ends up killing either Carley or Doug and the group turns on her, and either she's left behind or she steals the van and runs away.
Then we don't know what the hell happened to her until we see her again in TFS, but like... a lone woman with decay festering inside of her joining the delta? Exposing her to their methods? I mean, what else did she have to lose? She had nothing, she lost everything, and she has a lot of issues. Survival is easy when you're numb, when you don't care about the individual; they're all just cogs churning to make the system run, and if a piece doesn't cooperate, you get rid of it and find a new one.
Plus I think there's something to say about Lily not wanting to be perceived as weak again. That whole display she put on in the cells? Telling the story of what happened to Minerva and Sophie? I get the criticism that it feels like Lily did a 180 between episodes but like... yeah dude, because it's a performance. It's not just her and Clementine anymore. It's a display of power and authority. She's playing the part and thriving in it as she ensures everyone else is terrified of her.
But then when Clementine and AJ get the upper hand? Again, she's not afraid to play up the pleading to earn enough sympathy to spare her- hell, just to let their guard down enough to strike and get the upper hand again. I mean, she's got nothing else to lose, right? If she doesn't go for it, she'll be killed and sure, you can kill her anyway but at least she tried.
Honestly, I look at Lily in TFS and still see that scared little girl playing the tough bitch, just like Carley said in S1. It's just now escalated from "tough bitch" to a downright vile person. She's so... lost? I suppose? Lost within herself and the monstrous means she's taken to survive.
I get the criticisms of how she was used in TFS, but for me, it's like when people complain about Minerva not getting the redemption arc she supposedly should've gotten, y'know? There's no saving her. Lily was never on our side, and there was no getting her on our side. She wasn't ever going to redeem herself. Even if you spare her and she drifts away on her raft, can someone like her actually find redemption? Or will she just find another group that'll feed into her rot?
Truly, I say let her be horrid. Let her be the piece of shit villain with a few fleeting moments of humanity. Let her drown in the blood she's spilled.
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Okay, apparently shutting the fuck up was never an option but the way no one likes to look at the marina situation and go "wow what the fuck is wrong with portia"? Crazy.
Like she immediately didn't like her, not because of anything she'd done, but because she took attention from her daughters no matter how bright she dressed them.
It didn’t matter that the main reason is that, honestly all 3 of her daughters are painfully awkward, and in ones case literally 17. It didn’t matter that Marina was only there at her fathers instance, or that theoretically through having someone thats clearly popular in her home she could have used it as a jump off mark to match her daughters, she was seen as her big hurdle to marrying them off. Marinas immediately othered, to the point that when shes being dressed the maids helping put on her shoes is enough to piss Portia off. She immediately puts Marina in the same ring as her daughters, fight for my attention and maybe maybe it'll be positive. But Marina doesn't do that because she doesn't want to even be there.
And then they find out she's pregnant and shes othered even more. She immediately tries to send her back, and when she's not allowed to do that shes locked away and the other girls aren't even allowed to talk to her. She literally tries to freeze her out, like Marina has any say in being there in the first place, before lying to her about her being abandoned by George.
She makes no attempt to find out if George has family, she doesn't care enough to try even though that would have been a way to get rid of her "problem". She tries to push Marina onto a man old enough to be her grandfather and slaps her across the fucking face when she tries to stand up for herself.
Theres no concern for her safety, for the babys safety, just getting her out of her house as fast as fucking possible, and I'm meant to be surprised that when Colin saves Marina from her elderly suitor she turns her attention to him?
Like the nicest guy, who everyone likes, who's attractive, who isn't multiple decades older than her and most importantly not going to literally assault her? Yeah not a big shocker. Should she have lied to him? No, but she wouldn't have had to or felt the need to if she wasn't in the most hostile fucking house. Even Penelope, who she likes, why does everyone forget that she fucking likes Penelope and viewed her as a friend, becomes aggressive towards her. Shes cornered, shes scared, and all of this could have been avoided if Portia was a slightly better person and said "hey soilder boys not written back, you're gonna have this kid, does he have any family?" instead of setting this entire mess in motion.
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this is something i only noticed in my current rewatch, but as much as i consider callie my favorite character, i do hate that a lot of the moments where she acts in an insensitive manner (specifically about the plane crash) are played off as something the audience is supposed to laugh at. it rubs me the wrong way. as if when they start playing that quirky comedic backing track were supposed to ignore that she just suggested celebrating winning a lawsuit for the thing that cost two of her friends their lives and her wife her leg and then traumatized the group of them. there are a lot of one offs like that. idk. i adore her WITH her lack of a filter. i love the fact that every little word that scampers across her brain tumbles out of her mouth. but those moments where she really crosses a line and we're supposed to be like "aw, silly callie!" as if she didnt just say something heinous? eugh.
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