best Schitt's Creek character

Don't want to come off too negative but to me Eugene is the weakest actor in this show. He just plays the straight man and does a bug eye thing whenever anyone else says something goofy. And I am disappointed his character didn't have a strong trait besides default naive and unsure of himself in ever situation.

Moira is a nightmare, I dread every scene where she makes normal things a complete disaster.

lol like the drug skit episode

Given how often he is surrounded by three larger than life personalities, I think it's the best move to have Eugene Levy play the befuddled straight man.

plus he's really good at it.

exhibit A

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hg1Uk60rBsc

yeah levy is great

Well point is more that his character kind lacked a distinct personality to me besides "pleasant casually pathetic push over fails at every task". Fish out of water makes sense but he was playing it deep into born yesterday territory and it undermined his backstory as mega successful businessman. Was that intended? Maybe, but I would have rather seen a little bit of a shrewd former shark from Shark Tank somewhere mixed in his approach.

I mean, doesn't season 6 kinda...do that?

I also got the impression that when their assets were seized, they were long divested of ownership in the video empire and living off of their riches and 'investments', and hadn't had to have an active role in a while.

Sure his 100% flailing and failing at all times straight man role is not totally unjustified, but I feel some more dimension would have been welcome. The other 3 characters are memorable and imo his wasn't rich enough (get it?).

Sure his 100% flailing and failing at all times straight man role is not totally unjustified, but I feel some more dimension would have been welcome. The other 3 characters are memorable and imo his wasn't rich enough (get it?).

the Jake romantic triangle subplot was one that didn't go anywhere, other than to give a brief obstacle for David to face when he shows up to pick up Stevie when David and Patrick are using her house for...privacy.

lol @ Moira confusing Asbestos Fest for Schitt's Creek trying to bring back asbestos

I love every ep where Patrick and David perform for each other

Jocelyn's unhinged tirade asking David to host her baby shower puts me in hysterics

(my folks have been watching this for hours)

I'm guessing nobody is going for Wendy Kurtz, who was the worst.

Her and Roland seem like they were written for a different, wackier show.

I didn't mind her, she wasn't really the 'focus' of any of the scenes she was in, other than the one ep where she's having issues with her daughter.

but she definitely shouldn't get any votes in this poll

i get why people don't like roland and i didn't either at first - it was like he'd wandered in from a farrelly brothers movie, instead of this show - but he's crucial imo. he's entitled, moronic, selfish, sexist, has no idea how much people hate him, purely driven by his own appetites... he's pure trump. instead of being born rich he was born in this place. imagine if he'd been born into the kind of family that alexis and david were. so he's kind of a warning: beware. this could be you. and chris eliot is just so good at what he does. in the godfather episode when he's choking on his fried chicken at the cafe i about had a heart attack myself watching him do it.

i can't decide how i feel about stevie. the actor's expressions and acting choices are very strange. i don't know if it works or not.

she does a lot of 'tool matching' with david i.e. they both swallow what they were going to actually say and instead communicate with their eyebrows which is funny but yes she doesn't seem to have a lot of other tools in the bag.

I think she's great! She has a lot of damage and hides behind sarcasm and dry humor as a coping mechanism but we see her walls come down towards the second half of the series.

am halfway thru s4 - lookin forward to everything everybody's hinting at itt including that!

She very much feels like someone whose family tree has a sordid history and she's so desperate to break free of it and be her own person, but she has no idea how...until the Roses pop in and inadvertently help her forge a new path.

(no spoilers!).

Enjoy!

I like how in the show's early going, David realises that Stevie is worth making friends with, but he needs to learn how to communicate with her, not because she's the stupid hick that he would've expected when he learned they were moving there, but because she's so sharp and so sarcastic, it's impossible to know what she really thinks about anything without really paying close attention to her. Which he does.

i agree. their friendship was a moving part of the show. david's development in general was pretty incredible. it's hard to fit that kind of growth into a modern sitcom without making it seem forced or hackneyed.

yes!! man thank you for articulating that so perfectly

xpost

David was incredible precisely because, other than Moira, he seemed least likely to adapt to the new surroundings.

Re Stevie: To understand her, I imagine if I had never been able to leave my rural hometown, pop. 3500, and had been surrounded by the same people I went to school with for the rest of my life; how embittered and isolated I would have been.

It's bleak, folks.

completely otm. he pretty much says exactly that when she inherits the hotel from her late aunt

*she

Like, you are not an appealing person who can make friends in that state. You trust no one and everything you do hurts. It's a lot.

that's also precisely why, while it scares her at first, doing the town's production of Cabaret has a somewhat transformative effect on her

she says a lot of things during S1 that hint at that - something about not wanting to have sex with anybody at the party (after David mentions it) because she knows way too much about everybody in this town to want to do that.

I'll happily wave it away because the series in general is so amazing on so many other levels, but one weak spot is the 'having its cake and eating it too' aspect of the town itself. It seems to vacillate between being a miserable Schitthole and a tiny utopia depending on the immediate needs of the plot.

I mean that's kinda how small towns are? it sucks when you want to go to a movie and you only have one theater and it's 15 miles away and only shows 2 movies, or how the nearest hospital seems to be over a half hour away, and all the nice stuff is in Elmdale.

but sometimes you're sitting in Twyla's cafe and your'e in a good mood with people you cherish and in that moment, it feels like bliss?

I can't imagine how that council gets anything done with Roland, though.

Moira -- overall best imo
Alexis -- idk why but she always cracked me up and I loved her, I loved when she went back to school and the thing with Ted was very sweet even if every younger man in this show is some kind of fantasy boi
Jocelyn -- hilarious, sort of the anti-Stevie

xpost I guess. My own bliss aggressively evaporates the further I move away from my mom's home into my podunk high school town but maybe that's just me.

Jocelyn's near meltdown in the apothecary when she wanted to ask David to do her baby shower sends me into fits each time. it's the friendly demeanor barely concealing bubbling rage that kills me about her. esp with Moira.

I loved the one ep where David mocked the way Alexis talks - "why would I do thahhhht"

I also think Moira is probably the empirically correct answer here, but I'm tempted to vote for Alexis. Anne Murphy does so much--mostly physically--with what starts as a really tired cliche of a character. Also, the running gag of matter-of-factly referring to her ludicrous tabloid past somehow never gets old (contrast with a similar running gag on The Good Place that does get very old).

yeah, I lost track of how many drug lords, sultans, or other people of power she either had to seduce or escape

Annie Murphy is a stealth MVP for sure. Her various character tics are endlessly hilarious. So glad all of the main cast won Emmys this year.

I can't imagine how that council gets anything done with Roland, though.

There is a great line in Gilmore Girls, which is said about TJ and also applies to Roland. That he has terrible instincts, but he combines them with zero follow-through, so it all works out.

Also, the running gag of matter-of-factly referring to her ludicrous tabloid past somehow never gets old

Partly because they never, ever delve too deeply into it. I will be heartbroken if Netflix does an Alexis Rose origin story.

every younger man in this show is some kind of fantasy boi

If I want to see regular-looking men in sitcoms, there is plenty of Chuck Lorre on offer. Clearly Dan Levy likes to surround himself with beautiful things and people, and I am fine with that.

yeah, I lost track of how many drug lords, sultans, or other people of power she either had to seduce or escape

― Lover of Nixon (or LON for short) (Neanderthal), Monday, December 7, 2020 4:08 PM (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink

I tried to find a tweet last week but came up short--something to the effect that Alexis is INCREDIBLY resourceful, adventurous, morally suspect enough not to look back too critically at whatever worked, in complete control of her sexuality... in short, an international woman of mystery! She has been kidnapped, borderline prostituted/sex trafficked??, has pick-pocketed and scammed and bluffed and seduced her way around the world and no one has ever seen her as anything but a beautiful object, which is why she gets away with half of it. She's a whole universe in one character and I agree it only works because they never elaborate but really...she's the whole deal.

xp - i'm not talking about their looks, though there's that too! -- i was referring to the combination of their looks + their personalities. i like them, they just don't seem like people i have ever encountered irl. it's a nice contrast to the roses as well as more typical portrayals of "men alexis might date" (esp considering her reckless behavior in the past -- i think this is why i love her so much!)

There’s no way I can pick a favorite although I like some characters more than others.

Twyla’s amazing in her faux-friendly presence and matter-of-fact delivery of the rare bits of insight she drops that are almost always hinting at bad personal circumstances. Never as over the top as Alexis’s stories, just more relatable and depressing. How do you know if you’re actually close to someone so guarded? They opened that up toward the end but she keeps everything so close to the chest

i got legit choked up when my folks up on the Cabaret season finale today. just in the moment where Stevie really launches into "Maybe This Time" and simultaneously realizes things as Sally and herself, and then her friends give her a warm standing ovation afterwards.

I think Always Sunny in Philly brought on the "toxic protagonist" comedy trend where comedy after comedy would trot out complete assholes with no redeeming qualities and we were supposed to root for them getting comeuppance week in and out. Some shows pulled that off really well, but after several seasons of it, I often would get frustrated that there'd be no actual warmth or character development, just a new way for the mains to act like pieces of shit and then get the shit beat out of em for it.

I wouldn't say Schitt's Creek subverted it in that it never really painted its main characters as complete assholes, more narcissistic fish out of water who are rich and entitled and aren't used to living in a small town or do things for themselves,but it was refreshing that they grew as people and found the town changing them as much as the inverse - slowly and gradually.

*when my folks put on

Annie Murphy is so physically talented, and so pretty, and she brings so much life and likeabilty to what could otherwise be a flat character. Patrick is the same. Roland seems like he's from a broader show. But my vote goes to Jocelyn, who started out funny and stayed that way for the entire time. I would totally hang with any of these characters in real life.

I finished it and yyyyeaaah it gets pretty self-indulgent in the last ep or 2, but I feel like that's allowed. It does become slightly too much 'The David Show' which is maybe less allowed. And I'm not sure I buy David resisting the allure of New York. Surprisingly affecting moment for Roland in that boardroom - genuinely unexpected.

I've been enjoying imagining favourite albums for each of the characters.

David - Violator.
Alexis - What's an album? Any playlist with "Ibiza" in the title
Moira - The Way We Were soundtrack by Marvin Hamlisch
Johnny - Jim Croce, I Got A Name

Come on, Alexis's favorite album is a total gimme.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IKoxky2h2qc

We are somewhere in season 4, and this remains something like a cross between Local Hero and Three's Company.

haha that's dead on