i ahve a stupid comparison to make (i love character analysis and yapping)...
in hit tv show the sopranos theres a man whom i love dearly named Ralph Cifaretto. he sucks so hard and is so terrible and shitty. he abuses his girlfriends/women, cheats on them, he is a bad person in general is very violent and of course is a murderer because he is in the mob. he is so shitty in fact there are multiple intentional allegorical plot points that compare him to satan. anyways. nobody likes him.
and in one episode, where he is most developed, he reveals a lot about his character when something happens to someone he loves and he feels the need to repent. he goes to the church, he talks to other mobsters, and to himself. he shows genuine remorse for how he has acted as well as trying to improve himself in order to be better than his parents. he also reveals that his parents were awful to him and it is all but explicitly stated he was abused as a child (physically, mentally, and sexually) and it has left a profound impact on him since. he does not say it to garner sympathy, we truly feel that he is truing to repent and be a better person at this point. but his storyline is cut short due to more spoilers i wont say in case u havent seen sopranos because its 100000000% worth watching i promise on god. there are multiple references in the episode to the song "sympathy for the devil" by rolling stones, they are asking us to have sympathy for ralphie and understand him better as a man and as a character and why he is the way he is.
this reminds me a lot of clay. he is shown to be terrible, a bad person, a bad husband, and especially a bad father. we have no doubts of this. an abusive, childish, unstable alcoholic who blames his problems on others and is raising his son to have severe issues. (no offense orel). and after all this, when we already hate him, they hit us with his backstory to garner sympathy for him; but its not cheap or insincere. its hard to feel bad for him because of the things hes done but i believe they do well with making us feel sympathy for him even if we hate him, because he was so young when he went through what he did, and is clearly so damaged by it. the signs were all there.
of course it doesnt make either of these characters good people, it does not exonerate them of guilt, and it wont save them from themselves. it kind of just depresses you being reminded that oh, yeah, hes like this for a reason. hes not just evil. not the devil. just someone who got fucked up as a kid and never granted to opportunity to fix it, so they never tried fixing it themselves. sad. i want those old men so bad
i, too, love character analysis and yapping!
yesss i love when shows make us sympathize with characters that are awful. especially when they dont want and/or get a chance to be better.
with clay its like, the whole series he spirals further and further. we see him shoot his son. we see him refuse to own up for any mistakes. we see him rant and rave and abuse everyone around him. and then were hit with "passing." and it makes sense. its still not excusable -- not at all -- but you can understand how he got to this point. its SO sad. UGH.
*sneakily adds the sopranos to my list of things to watch*
tangentwithtanner
titsay
jbbartram-illu
yousharknotpass
baratheonpilled
