10-22-2014, 09:58 AM
Quote:I think I'm just tired of the Bernadette character in general. She is just as grating as AFF at this point. H and B got married so fast that I didn't even have time to figure out what was even going on with them.
To me, the real Howard ceased to exist as soon as B. became a full-time character. You can see some softening/altering of his character even in S3.
It's true that there's nothing very objectionable about her at first, and she wasn't always bitchy, but to me she's just a non-character, a Mary Sue. She's so one-dimensional. She's a cipher, a nothing.
Even in S3/S4, I feel like I'm watching SH interacting with this random woman who wandered in from some other show. It gives me a strange and unsettling feeling of "wrongness" to see her in Howard's mom's house, hanging out in his bedroom. She doesn't belong.
My personal "last episode" of BBT is the Gothowitz Deviation. It's a fabulous ep for all 5 characters, and it's shortly before what's-her-face was introduced. There's still some good stuff after that, but it's not the same.
I know I'm long-winded and probably repeating myself, but the destruction of Howard's personality just gives me fits. It's kind of ironic, I guess, because I hate B's "angry" behavior, but I get really ragey and frothing at the mouth, myself, over what's been done to Howard. I don't necessarily need to watch him flirting with girls non-stop, but the idea that he's stupid and irresponsible makes me spit bullets.
Quote:Howard's character could be one of those forever-single types. When he was single it was never him moping around about not having a girlfriend or complaining about how no one loves him. He just wanted to get girls. The episodes where the guys are going out to find single women were much more entertaining.
EXACTLY. These guys were not miserably unhappy and leading empty lives before A and B came along. H and R maybe weren't getting quite as much female attention as they'd like, but they weren't laying on the floor and crying. They had friends, hobbies, excellent jobs, and FUN. I detest this idea that B came along to "save Howard from himself." Ditto with Sheldon and Amy, I suppose.
Come to think of it, it's like a weird gender-reversal of this idea that a girl is just supposed to sit and wait patiently for her Prince to come along and change her whole life...
TBH, if this were real life, I think most of Howard's "creepy" behavior would've resolved itself with nothing more than time and experience. Some people just take a while to figure out what's going on, in life.
Quote:It's kind of ironic how the writers stay on these tired, stereotypical characters but yet (correct me if I'm wrong) isn't there a stereotype about Jews being frugal or even cheap?
Yes, that's a very widespread stereotype, and it was even referenced a few times, in the early seasons: "Money...told ya!"
Howard is supposed to be the more pragmatic/cynical one, while the others are theorists. They've turned him inside out and upside down.