Types of Characters That Annoy You

Blondes portrayed as bitchy cheerleaders. My school's cheer team (in fact 49% of its entire population, that's like 1000 kids) is Asian, Latino, and Spanish. I know very few blondes & the ones I do know are decent people.

That being said, as it's been stated many times here, emo teenagers.

Let me paint you a picture:
Name: Alex (m)
Age: 16
Height: 6'2
Weight: 110
Hair: Black
Eyes: Blue
Music: Screamo, "classic rock"
Clothes: black, ATL, PTV, MCR, Nirvana, KISS, The Ramones, & other band related things
Voice: low & sexy (like what)
Personality: When present; insecure, self-loathing, shy, artsy, cute, quiet, funny
Rate: 0/10 would kill

You get the idea?

I hate underdeveloped minor characters. The author just spends so much time on the main characters, that the rest just fall flat. I wish people spent as much time with their minor characters as they do with their main characters, because minors add such a good flare to a story.

I look at it like the way I look at musicals: you can have amazing leads, but if your ensemble sucks, then the whole show kind of sucks.

When the main character falls in love blah blah blah and then they totally forget about their best friend, siblings, or any other minor characters there may be. Like, the author needs to fill in the gaps but they just DON'T. That makes me so irritated because other people exist.

coward.:

I hate underdeveloped minor characters. The author just spends so much time on the main characters, that the rest just fall flat. I wish people spent as much time with their minor characters as they do with their main characters, because minors add such a good flare to a story.

I look at it like the way I look at musicals: you can have amazing leads, but if your ensemble sucks, then the whole show kind of sucks.

This so much. I try to develop my extras sometimes better than my main man.

I'm beginning to get annoyed with characters that have these...recycled idiosyncrasies, I guess, that are overused because I feel like the author thinks that it makes the character come across as unique, but in actuality, if it's a quirk I've already read a gazillion times in online fic/published novels or saw on tv, it just comes across as dumb and like the author is trying too hard to make their character "different."

I love characters that have quirks to a certain degree because I feel like everyone has things they're weird about, but there's definitely such a thing as overdoing it.

That probably makes no sense at all, but whatever.

Characters that know everything. Or just things they have no reason to know and there's no explanation as to why they'd know them.

Girls who are more badass and better at everything than all the guys solely because they're girls.

Katie Mosing:

Special little snowflake characters who are just so unique and important.

This. Also characters who have everything handed to them, or for whom the narrative seems to bend itself backward just to serve. Especially if all of this is at the expense of better characters.

So as not to reiterate things already said, I'll do a few less spoken ones.

- "Skater girls". I know, skater girls are real (my best friend's one), but they're no fun to read about because they act so hardcore and awesome and funny and so un-likeable.
- Abusive/dead/apathetic parents. Can't a guy just have a functional family without ruining an entire story? Most authors seem to kill the parents as soon as they can.
- "Awkward" people; most of what they do that's considered awkward by everyone except their love interest would be awkward to everyone in real life. It's not cute just because you like someone, it's awkward either way.
- Those characters that are all cutesy and shy until they are in a relationship, and then they're suddenly some sort of underage sex god. What? No.
- Girls that are "plain or ugly" but have c+ cup size, long blonde/black hair, beautiful eyes, perfect skin, straight teeth, size 2 hips, and a BMI of about seventeen.

The manic pixie dream girl characters. I just loathe them completely because they're there to fulfill the fantasies of some male character and that's their only purpose.

Male characters with the hero complex; the type of complex in which they have to save everything and everybody and they have some destiny to fulfill and blergh. I dislike them because they seem so "perfect" that they come off as two-dimensional and underdeveloped.

liam payne.:

I hate underdeveloped minor characters. The author just spends so much time on the main characters, that the rest just fall flat. I wish people spent as much time with their minor characters as they do with their main characters, because minors add such a good flare to a story.

I look at it like the way I look at musicals: you can have amazing leads, but if your ensemble sucks, then the whole show kind of sucks.

Amen.

I mean, the minor/side characters have a life too, yeah? They don't just appear out of nowhere to help the main guy or whatnot. They have to have their reasons, their own beliefs.
Shamefully admitting I spent too much time on all my side characters and now my main character feels like he lacks any flesh!

Also. When they appear and then once their job is done get killed off for no particular reason or just suddenly move away and/or disappear from the story.
I.e., mysterious stranger appears, hands main character a map to the treasure, mysterious stranger disappears and is never mentioned again.
I get if if he had a reason but most of the time they're never mentioned ever again, it makes me sad and annoyed. >.<

Characters that are there for the sole purpose of destroying the main character's life with no reasoning other than the fact that they just do it. I mean, I get it if they have some back story with the MC that made them enemies, but what I'm talking about is like when a female character goes after the MC's boyfriend just to piss her off and the reasoning is never explained aside from maybe that the girl is just jealous of the MC.

Characters who don't matter.

We get it, your main character isn't surrounded by ten thousand friends 100% of the time. Your precious special snowflake needs 5 really great friends who are always at their side at a moments notice for anything.

Also: If your shit doesn't pass the Bechdel Test up shut. Yes, sometimes (especially in romantic pieces) a relationship between a main character and some other character needs to be hashed out between close friends. But if all you do is use that best friend to give advice about such and such shut up.

Lastly: Stop using friendship hang outs as filler chapters to give your story tempo. If you think your making relationships happen to quickly or other plot points don't drag a best friend character in to give you time to think. Stop using characters to cover up your inability to write a story.

^ 100% agreed.

To people saying "I hate all female characters" PLEASE reconsider your lives.

I hate it when characters only have completely positive or completely negative traits. People aren't just 'good' or 'evil': human nature doesn't work like that. Also, characters who only exist to serve the main character and have no other relationships or purpose.

sobre mi cadaver:

Male characters with the hero complex; the type of complex in which they have to save everything and everybody and they have some destiny to fulfill and blergh. I dislike them because they seem so "perfect" that they come off as two-dimensional and underdeveloped.

This. The only exception the the rule is if it's written well and classed as a flaw. I have read a few stories where the main man has had a hero complex which has caused catastrophic damage to both the character and the world around then and it shows that hey, having a hero complex isn't desirable all of the time, it can cause major problems. Unfortunately, man characters like that are difficult to find so for the most part, I still find them incredibly two-dimensional and unrealistic.

@ RhetoricalTendencies

I agree! There needs to be an even middle where things could go either way.

I hate a damsel in distress. Why is it in stories females are so pathetic and helpless? Am I the only one who would stab someone if they tried to hurt me in any way?

Smug characters; the people that have an air of arrogance and are incredibly smug (I don't know how else to describe them). I think there's a line between confidence and arrogance, especially that type of arrogance.

Whiny characters. I'm sorry. I can't deal. I just cannot.

I get annoyed poorly written sarcastic/witty characters. Or characters that are supposed to be 'bad-ass' and spend too much time talking about or trying to prove to the reader that they are.

I also get annoyed by weak characters and characters that are always in distress for some reason or another (whether it's physical or emotional distress).

Characters that everyone loves for no reason at all. Meredith Grey from Grey's Anatomy comes to mind.