12 Popular TV Characters That Are Actually Awful

Friends

Ah, Ross. Who doesn't love an emotionally stunted man who never really moved past high school and is desperate for love? His obsession with Rachel is a bit creepy. He pines for her in high school to the point he sets up a secret “I Hate Rachel Club” because she doesn't want to date him. Then, when he finally does get the chance to be with her he treats her horribly. Not only does he screw up his relationship with her, but in all of his romantic arcs, he never once seems to accept any part of the blame. Aside from his total lack of accountability in his romantic pursuits, he's also just a bad friend. Whenever he's in the room the conversation seems to shift to his problems and his life. Let's be honest, that kind of person is EXHAUSTING. If he seems to be the odd one out it's probably because Chandler and Joey realized he was better in small doses. Good going guys.

-Daren DeFrank

The Office

Steve Carell never won an Emmy for playing Michael Scott, which feels wrong on so many levels, but is a true cosmic injustice given just how much heavy lifting Carell did to make Michael Scott lovable. And Michael is lovable, I know. He means well, he's earnest, and he's capable of profound sweetness. By the time Michael moseys on from Dunder Mifflin seven seasons in, it's an emotional loss that hits every viewer hard, even this one.

It wasn't the loss of Michael that the show never recovered from, however. For all his lovable qualities, Michael is also completely insufferable. He's vain. He's petty. He's impulsive. He's stupid. He'd be annoying just to know as a person, but imagine having him as your boss. As a boss, he's five-alarm fire. He regularly crosses serious lines accidentally and entirely on purpose. He's self-involved and oblivious, smiling innocently even as he leaves a wake of destruction, whether he's running Meredith over, ruining Phyllis's wedding, or peering out at Ryan from behind the blinds in his office. 

-Tucker DeSaulnier

The Flintstones

While many kids of the 1960s and ‘70s spewed their breakfast cereal excitedly while cheering “yabba-dabba-do” with Fred Flintstone, a few were instead muttering “yabba-dabba-don’t!”

Despite his genuine love for his family, his loyalty to his job at Slate Rock & Gravel Company, and his kick-ass talent for bowling, Fred wasn’t exactly the most endearing character. His boorish eating habits put King Henry VIII to shame; his raucous voice was about as opposite from ASMR as it gets; he had a penchant for gambling and lying to Wilma about it; and it didn’t take much to set off the hair-trigger that kept his volatile temper in check.

Besides being a glutton, a loudmouth, a spendthrift, and a hothead, he’s also rather sexist. Granted, Fred was a product of his time, just like many mid-20th century men in real life. However, sometimes this so-called protagonist took things too far. Remember 1962’s “The Happy Household” episode, where Wilma achieves her dream of being a TV show host, only to have Fred sabotage her career because he’s pissed she hasn’t been home to prepare his dinner? Cook your own Bronto Burgers, you bully!

-Shari Witaschek

The Office

Jim Halpert was a bully hiding behind a sloppy shirt, messy hair, and a casual demeanor that masquerades as workplace camaraderie. Truth be told, he made every day a nightmare for most everyone except for the ladies who crushed on him and the guy who thought he was cool. Yes, Dwight might have been an insufferable bore who took workplace rules a bit too seriously, but did that necessitate endless tormenting day in and day out? Perhaps Michael Scott needed to be demoted to the sales floor, but instead, he was needled and prodded into doing an awful job, for which he was usually humiliated, all for Jim's amusement. And those are just the people he used on a daily basis, for Jim has a trail of victims who fell for his "nice guy" act, people who he used and abused like so much trash.

Think of poor Roy, whose life went to hell after Jim stole his fiancé? Or Karen? As soon as Pam became available, Jim abandoned her completely. And what of Pam, the love of his life? In the episode of "The Dinner Party," he was going to ditch her at the first opportunity before she was able to outsmart him and keep him in tow. Jim has proved again and again to be untrustworthy, even to those he claims to adore. 

Jim is not a nice guy. And as the years go by, the facade of his false humor slowly slips away, it is only a matter of time because nothing is left of the nice guy at all.

-Erin Maxwell

The Shield

Vic Mackey from The Shield - although it’s not so much a matter of character but of performance. Michael Chiklis was inexplicably showered with accolades for his portrayal, which isn’t bad, per se... just a pale, corny imitation of the many other morally ambiguous antiheroes that defined the rise of the “prestige TV” era. 

Thought experiment: Imagine Dean Norris (Hank from Breaking Bad) as Vic Mackey instead. Doesn’t the Chiklis version seem embarrassing by (admittedly hypothetical) comparison? Norris - all 5-foot-7 of him - is as overpowering in his physicality as he is in his temperament. He’s scary, he’s intimidating; his genial “ordinary alpha guy” charisma is as effortless as his emotional vulnerability. Chiklis is none of those things, even as he’s supposed to be all of them. Sure, he looks the part - he’s a tough bald guy built like a life-sized Lego man, it’s no surprise he got cast as a cop - but there’s nothing primal about his rage or his violence. Nothing volatile. He’s a pretend tough guy; he's got big High School Gym Teacher energy. Which would be fine, if he were playing a high school gym teacher - maybe on a CW show? - instead of a brutal, angry, hard-nosed street cop. How exactly has this performance remained in the same conversation as James Gandolfini’s Tony Soprano, Ian McShane’s Al Swearengen, Bryan Cranston’s Walter White, or Jon Hamm’s Don Draper? Or, for that matter, any of the primary leads from The Shield’s cop-drama contemporary, The Wire?

Actually, the better - and more specific - counterpoints are Vic Mackey’s torture-enthusiast predecessors from network TV: Dennis Franz’s Andy Sipowicz and Kiefer Sutherland’s Jack Bauer. Those guys were the real thing. The Shield revolved around a character who was ostensibly the most dangerous man on the LA police force, but in Chiklis’s hands, Vic Mackey is a silly little dork.

-Chris Bellamy

Friday Night Lights

Oh, QB 2, who doesn’t like you? You’re kind, unique, a hard-luck case… some would even argue you’re the perfect boyfriend. And honestly, my beef with Matt Saracen has to come with a series of acknowledgments: I understand that he’s an artsy jock who provides a counterpoint to the masculinity of characters like Tim Riggins and Smash Williams. I understand he has way more on his plate than any teenager ever should, and his care of his grandmother is beyond commendable and downright moving. I understand he needs a father figure like Coach, as his own dad is an absentee veteran with some alluded to anger issues. I understand he is a good boyfriend and support to perhaps the most annoying character in the history of television: Julie Taylor.

But even with all those acknowledgments, I don’t like Matt Saracen. Matt Saracen is the kind of character who has me yelling at the screen “SPIT IT OUT” as he quietly - repeatedly - stammers a reply to another character even after you as the viewer have persisted through an entire Saracen growth arc, waiting patiently for the moment he expresses himself with clarity and conviction, a relief which basically never comes. His equivocation in the face of others’ belligerence may make him human, but it also made him straight-up annoying in my view. And this is all not even to mention his actual athletic ability. Saracen’s Season Three anger at his displacement on the field by J.D. McCoy (which again is a totally human response), registered as frankly ridiculous to me considering the obvious fact that J.D. is a superior athlete. Give Coach a break and be realistic, Matt!!!! Even with the clearest eyes and fullest heart, you are best placed in the background of actual football games. It’s fair to be chagrined when an underclassman bumps you back to the bench, but getting mad and raging around at Coach like he isn’t just fielding the best, most rational team possible, is too much. Honestly, let’s get Lance on the field!

I hope you’re enjoying Chicago, Matt, all the best.

-Ryleigh Nucilli