re: Stories where the "good guys" are actually the "bad guys"

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While RENT has more than its share of issues, frick Bennie. He is the goddamn worst.

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what about Angel?...he/she kills a fricking dog

that's sociopathic behavior and she deserved to die

It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia. All-time great show, obviously, but also obviously, the protagonists are probably the worst people in the world.

Law Abiding Citizen. I was rooting for Gerard Butler's "bad guy" character and hated Jamie Foxx's "good cop" character.

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look at Bennie as one of them, naive an irrational on how the real world works. He allows his known drug addict friends to live there rent free until his boss catches him and essentially forces him to force them to pay rent (which... duh)

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Which is precisely why he is so terrible. He's playing both sides of the fence, and badly at that. At the end of the play he's trying to buddy up with his old friends again, even saying that he always hated the dog and is glad its dead. I mean, choose a side you two-faced bastard.

I mean, Maureen is obnoxious, but she's managed to at least take an ethical stand and stick to it, even if she cheats on her girlfriend throughout and tries to justify it as her just being free or whatever. But she is right, she never presents herself falsely.

Sienfield

The entire theme of the movie, in fact, was

that Munney and Ned were “unforgiven””.

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a.) They provided jobs for thousands of storm troopers
b.) if not for the rebels - there is no war
c.) they provided a great police presence


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Sound like the Nazis


No. The rebels are terrorists per the definition.

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The emperor literally changed a Republic into a Dictatorship.

There were no "good guys" in Unforgiven.


Moving on... don't forget that Jean Valjean is a thief and ex con, while Javert is an honorable and upstanding law enforcement officer.

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I mean you’re not supposed to really root for Walter White

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That’s the reason I say it should be at the top of the list. It practically seems like a primary theme of the show by giving you many reasons to pull for him (shite life, cancer, arrogant and condescending SIL/BIL, poor, underdog) but then there’s the whole meth manufacturer/distributor thing.

As we go along, the sympathetic factors are gradually decreased, but you still come back to pulling for him because there’s that likeable element, portrayed masterfully by Cranston.

My nomination comes from throughout the series, and even now, I too kept catching myself pulling for him, then having to remind myself that he’s actually a pretty awful person. Of course during that time we see how he’s kind-of trying to do the right thing, sort of, and does do some things that are at least his version of the right thing.

BB even demonstrates how difficult it is to pull off the “protagonist who is actually an awful person” angle. It’s tricky because if you try and fail, ie, viewers just hate the protagonist, seems like it could kill the show.

Sopranos should be top 2 or 3. Just not sure how to measure it. Tony’s a complete monster, far worse than White, but IMO we don’t become quite as endeared to him as we do with White, we just kinda accept the good with the bad.

Another top 5 would be Mad Men. Draper is a reprobate, at least when it comes to marital fidelity. But I don’t recall much other in the way of negative traits, other than being kind of a dick at times. Strangely, I don’t think we like him as much as White or even Tony, even though he isn’t nearly as bad of a person as they both are.

Good topic btw.