Television has not required its protagonist to be likeable at all. Indeed, the last twenty years cleared the way to leads who act badly, create mess, and continue to attract viewers to episode after episode.
Some of that change was accompanied by the fact that now that cable is free to take protagonists into more dark and weird, where the line is only slightly more or less anywhere, as critic Maureen Ryan wrote in her examination of the anti-hero of television. The consequence: magnetic characters that are tiring in fact.
This list is limited to lead characters who had regular groanings, chatterings in the group chat, or even entire fandom outcry, either because they were written to be intolerable, or because the show continued to insist that they were right.
1. Alicent Hightower (House of the Dragon)
The talent of being able to make high stakes moves and appear appalled by the outcomes is what makes Alicent powerful because it is influenced by proximity, timing and a talent to make high stakes moves. The problem of her alternating allegiances is very engaging in the court-intrigue sense, but also distinctively exasperating: she is bringing the world to ruin, and then appears to pull back in the very thing she was assisting in setting up. It all hinges on the whiplash and makes her a lead that audiences can hardly emotionally follow.
2. Robb Stark (Game of Thrones)
Robb has his tragedy commonly being discussed as fate, yet the irritation aspect presents itself in regards to the predictability of the manner in which he enters it. He desires to be an honorable plunging the world designed to penalize honor, and he continues to confuse individual sentiments with politics. What comes out is a protagonist whose wrongs can be forgiven, but continue to infuriate, particularly when the collateral damage continues to pile around him.
3. Carrie Bradshaw (Realation and the City)
Carrie is able to tell romantic mayhem with grace, and instantly create more of it with unbelievable narcissism. Her blindness with friends, money and limitations are used on the plot more than once, and it is this repetition that is annoying. Selling her as the way of entry into the world of the audience, the worst thing she does is to live the lives of other people as the supporting material to her inner monologue.
4. Hughie Campbell (The Boys)
The moral thermometer, Hughie frequently becomes, and this is why it is a pain to see him act as the most critical individual in the room even when he makes destructive decisions. He desires the title of the good guy in a show that is meant to contaminate that title. When his understanding becomes less kind, when this is particularly true in romance, his honesty begins to seem an egocentrism in the guise of good manners.
5. Piper Chapman (Orange is the new black)
Piper starts as the supposed anchor, although her right to be is crowded by much more fascinating tales about her. Her development comes in bits even as she learns and she frequently reloads. It was the cleverest decision that the show made later, to make her seem like one of many threads when she is a head of privileged and dumb and her role in the show is more exhaustible than the jail setting.
6. Alan Harper (Two and a Half Men)
The brand of Alan, is helplessness with manipulation on the side. He constantly makes hideous choices, and then proceeds to think that the reality wrongs him personally. His incompetence is frequently relied upon in the comedy, although his never-ending series of mooching, whining and denial may be less of a joke than being trapped in line behind a person who was having a argument with a cashier.
7. Eric Forman (That ’70s Show)
The indecision of Eric is literally a character. He seeks allegiance, seeks acceptance and consistently shuns the tough part of defending himself till he loses his temper. Rewatches are particularly torturous since passivity in the character is not temporary but his default mode.
8. Scrappy-Doo (Scooby-Doo)
The issue with Scrappy is volume: he was too loud, too enthusiastic, too confident he is the answer. The hyper-confidence of the character is a bulldozer of the warm rhythm which Scooby-Doo is built by. Once one of the franchises is known to have fans who plead with a character to quit appearing, the legacy is likely to remain.
9. Selina Meyer (Veep)
Selina is a legend of a nightmare boss: excellent in self-preservation, allergic to responsibility and emotionally devoted to stepping on the nearest. Her acting is comic, and the character is constructed so that it is empty where it matters. As she continues to remain in the limelight the more it becomes evident that it is the limelight that she desire the most.
10. Skyler White (Breaking Bad)
Skyler turned into a fandom lightning rod, usually with causes behind it that have as much to do with the viewers as with the writing. Even her struggle against the fall of Walt is by some seen as nagging, although the circumstances warrant alarm. The fact that the character is the worst lead in terms of his reputation is entangled with the period of the anti-hero boom, where viewers were conditioned to accept the man who does bad and punish any one person who stood in the way of the fantasy.
11. Sookie Stackhouse (True Blood)
The love triangle turmoil of Sookie turns into a treadmill: intense, dramatic and eventually repetitious. She alternates between her defenseless state and bursts of strength, which can be less of character development and more of plot convenience. As the mythology of the show grows, her indecision continues to draw attention back to the least watchable part of the question, who she is dating this week.
12. Frank Gallagher (Shameless)
Frank is charismatic like the way a tornado is charismatic mesmerizing, destructive and someone will have to clean up. He learns not often, does not change, and seldom pays the emotional bill of what he does. It is that inertia that is the character, but also that is what makes him so detestable because the series is asking the viewers to watch his family take in the casualties.
13. Ted Mosby (How I met your mother)
The romantic idealism of Ted becomes self-destructive in a circle. He rationalizes emotions, issues blanket statements, and goes on to create the same errors under fresh wrappings. Gradually the pursuit of the one begins to sound not like hope but like an attempt to remain fixed.
14. George Costanza (Seinfeld)
George is proudly horrible, and that is his comic superpower and his irritant. He tells lies on reflex, schemes on gladness, panics with the frenzies of a person who is running away with the things he himself initiated. The genius lies in the fact he does not often feign to be any good; the fatigue is that he does not even once stop and be otherwise.
15. Ross Geller (Friends)
Even when Ross is the one causing the situation to get out of control, he tends to play the role of the wounded party. His selfishness, arrogance and his insistence that he is correct can overpower what are supposed to be light scenes. The insecurity is created into the comedy in the show, but it is the very insecurity that time and time again becomes the toxin in his relationships after the cute phase.
16. Leonard Hofstadter (The Big Bang Theory)
Leonard is the written character whom one can connect with, yet he is often petulant, bitter, and sarcastic. He would like to appear as the one who behaves reasonably, but he can be as lowly as the very people he is complaining about. The grinding is good sitcom rhythm; it is also like having a running score to which nobody consented to play.
17. Ray Barone (Everybody Loves Raymond)
The major weakness of Ray is his preference of comfort over a partnership. He does not fight until it is the issue of his wife and then pretends to be confused as to why she is angry. It is based on the fact that he is an immature person, yet the same mindset of trying to avoid responsibility and enjoying the work of all other people can turn into less lovable goof and more habitual disappointment.
18. Rachel Berry (Glee)
The ambition is the engine and the hunger over the spotlight can flatten anyone around Rachel. She has been using opportunity as oxygen, which she needs better than anyone else, and the show tends to reward that attitude. A diva lead is pleasant; and an everassertive diva is annoying as the series tells the room to spin around her.
19. Hannah Horvath (Girls)
Hannah is a self-centered female, but the way the author portrays her is uncomfortable and actually the reason why it is difficult to watch. Her demands, fears, and assertions consume the entire air leaving very little space to empathize with her as she destroys the lives of the people who are nearest to her. This frustration is increased by the fact that meaningful change comes slowly, maybe not at all.
20. Patrick Murray (Looking)
The messiness of Patrick can pass as realism until one starts detecting that it falls into a pattern of carelessness and little awareness of oneself. He fumblingly goes through relationships without constant patience which he fails to reciprocate. The attractiveness of Jonathan Groff can do a favor but charm cannot entirely conceal a protagonist who continues to disregard emotional after-effects as non-essential reading.
Unlikeable leads are more likely to endure due to the fact they generate motion: conflict, fallout, and the uncomfy excitement of seeing one make a bad choice once more. The TV, particularly in the contemporary period of supple lines, has created room to allow protagonists who are not aspiration-based.
The difference between show to show is the payoff, is the writing owning up the damage, or silently requesting the viewers to forgive it.
