Readers,
I can already hear
several of you asking yourself, “Quinn, why do a list called my ten favorite
female characters of all time, and not just do a top ten TV characters of all
time.” The answer to that is simple. If I did my 10 favorite characters of all
time, there probably wouldn’t even be a woman on the list (well, this list’s number
1 would make it.) In my opinion the history of TV characters (at least on shows I watch) is a lot like the
James Brown song “It’s a man world” only if the song didn’t include the second
part of its chorus. Sadly, of the girls
on my top ten lists only one is my favorite character on the show she’s on, and
the show happens to be named after her. Let me also say that this list is just,
like, my opinion man. And since very few shows I watch (even on tvland, nick at
night or dvd) were started before the 90’s, no one on a show before 80’s is on
this list. It might also be important to note, that while, I would concede the
importance of Carrie Bradshaw in a list that was objective, due to the very
subjective nature of this list, her name is very much absent. Also, while I
would really like to put Buffy Summers on the list, the sad fact is I haven’t
seen nearly enough episodes of Buffy the Vampire Slayer to put her on.
Although, if I had an 11th spot, she would be it, and Rachael Green
would come in at number 12.
10. Kate O’Brien-For
those of you out there who are fans of the show Scrubs (and/or the surprisingly
funny, yet awfully named Cougertown) it’s hard to remember that Christina
Miller, once played one of the nicest, coolest, single women in all of
sitcoms. Friend of Drew Carrey, Lewis,
and Oswald, and the groups lone source of estrogen, she was more than able to
keep up with their hard drinking, blue collar, late night at the bar ways. Kate
was also one of the four brewers of buzz beer. Christina left the show after
season seven to work full time on her real life husband’s (Bill Lawarnce) hit
NBC show Scrubs, and while the Drew Carry show marched on for two more seasons
without her, it was never the same.
Two quick Drew Carrey
show related side notes having nothing to do with this list
1.) How
much does Drew Carrey hate Lebron James right now, If I was a five year old
child, I would say
ttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttthhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhiiiiiiiiiiiiiissssssssssssssssssssss
mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmuuuuuuuuuuuucccccccccccchhhhhhhh and the only
reason I wouldn’t say more is cause that’s as far as my five year old hands
could reach apart
2.) The
Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson on CBS is by far and away the best late
night show of the current big 5 (6 if you count the George Lopez show on TBS,
but, personally I don’t count the
George Lopez
show on TBS, so for me it’s still the big 5)…anyway, there is very little I can
say about it to give it justice. The show is really only him talking and
interviewing guest (without the use of index cards). He also has a robot
sidekick that was created by one of the guys that works for mythbusters. It is also
the first late night talk show since Conan O’Brien that I DVR on a regular
basis whether or not I like the guest. Paris Hilton was on last week, and it
was the first interview I’ve seen or read of hers, where I didn’t wish a pox
upon her houses. (and the list of Paris Hilton interviews I’ve read or seen is
much higher than I’d ever want to admit to)
9. April O’Neil- April
O’Neil deals with a lot in her day to day life as Chanel 6 news lead field
reporter. She has a boss that wants her to get to the story first no matter how
dangerous it is. A camera man, who often runs or drives the news van away at
the first sight of danger, even if she is not in the van too, a co-worker, best
friend who has no one else to talk to in her personal life. And April’s only
other outlet is a group of teenage ninja’s, who love pizza, and also happen to
share 100% of their DNA with turtles. While on the show April was often a
damsel in distress for the turtles to save, she also helped them and her
ability to make sure that LDRM knew of the dangers that the city was in for,
and they were able to save the city before the peril got to be too great.
8. Pam Beasly- The
genius of Pam Beasly is best seen in season 3 of The Office, when she is
finally single and Jim leaves her as the only somewhat normal person at
Dunder-Miflin’s Scraton branch. Her greatness on that season is seen even
better when Jim comes back with a brand new girlfriend. The coupling that all
fans wanted finally happened at the very end of that season, after Pam (in her
best episode) walked over a pile of coals and then told Jim how she felt about
how they are around each other (in my opinion the show was just never as good
after that.) I haven’t brought a season of The Office on DVD since season 3 and
stopped watching it on a regular basis last year. And perhaps one day I will
blog about why I stopped liking this once very awesome and promising show
(Hint: it has a lot to do with Michael Scott.) Oh well, I guess I am what I
am…oh wait, that’s Popeye.
7. Susie Greene-When
your fat fuck of a husband is manager and best friends with Larry David, a man
who is very much the real-life influence for the greatest hapless schmuck in TV
history; George Castanza. There are two ways you could go about handling the
shenanigans the two will get into in their day to day lives. The first is to
simply ignore it and just think of your children. The second is to take it head
on in a screaming and cursing fit, usually only seen on Sam Kinnison DVDs.
Thankfully for us, Susie Greene chooses the later. Cursing and spitting up such
hellfire that Larry David and Jeff Greene have no choice but to leave the house
with their tail tucked between their legs, and the even greater thing about
Susie is she often justified for her behavior.
(For those wondering, I
am not a Sam Kinnison fan. Mostly cause I prefer my comedians to be, I don’t
know, funny. Ironically that is the same reason I don’t like Bill Hicks either)
6. Kate Austin-On the
first episode of Lost, we see Oceanic flight 815 go down in flames and 48
passengers arise from the wreckage. Kate, who is one of the first to grab our
attention, quickly forms a bond with Dr. Jack Sheppard when she helps him patch
up a wound. Soon, however, Kate and Jack along with the other passengers, learn
the island is far from the tropical paradise it seems to be. Through a series
of flashbacks of her far from prefect pre-crash life, we soon learn a few
things about our dear friend, that fellow crash survivor James “Sawyer” Ford,
endearingly calls “Freckles.” The biggest thing we learn about Kate early in
the series is that she killed her abusive step-father and her mother reported
her to the police. She was actually in handcuffs on the plane after being found
in Australia and being taken back to LA to be booked. Kate quickly became a fan
favorite and also found herself torn between two men on and off the island;
Jack Sheppard: the good guy, naturally charismatic, leader of men, doctor. And Sawyer:
the brooding, rebelling, stubble having, badass. The two men are often at each
other throat and Kate was many times the cause of it. Kate often did the exact opposite of what
either men asked her to do (such a rebel, that one) but at one point in the
show is able to leave the island and plays mother to a fellow passengers baby,
who was missing and presumed dead when Kate and another five passengers were
able to get off the island in season 4. She stays bunked up with Jack for a
while, but the two drift apart and she finds herself wanting to go back to the
Island to find and save Sawyer. For those of you who haven’t seen Lost yet
(spoiler alert) The ending sucks. However I’ve come to realize that one bad
apple don’t spoil the who bunch and the show itself is so rich in character
development and storytelling that as long as you go in knowing the ending blows
chunks, you won’t be too disappointed and should be in for a decent time.
5. Lucille Bluth-The Matriarch
of the Bluth family who’s later revealed to be the brains behind the entire
operation (including the “light” treason) Lucille is a rich elitist in every
sense of the world; she won’t even make eye contact with waiters and assumes
anyone of Latino decent is a maid or gardener. She also hates her oldest son,
accuses her daughter of being fat, makes many demands of her only somewhat
together son, and over mothers her youngest adult son. She one time adopted a
Korean boy (or girl, who can really tell at that age) just to make him pay for
not appreciating her enough.
4. Veronica Mars-Veronica
Mars had the ideal teenage life; she was popular, she had an awesome best
friend, an all-American, good looking, boyfriend (played by “The Iceman” Bobby
Drake’s real life twin brother), who is also her best friends brother, a
farther who is a head detective and beloved member of their affluent Neptune
community (a fictitious city, loosely base on Malibu). Then one day her best
friend is found murdered, her dad suspects her best friend and boyfriend’s
farther (who is a very rich and powerful member of the community) and goes
after him with everything he’s got. The farther gets off and Veronica’s dad,
having put such a man through a trial, loses his job and is blackballed from
the community. Veronica’s mother leaves him, and her relationship with her
boyfriend becomes somewhat frigid to say the least. This is where the show
kicks off. Veronica now an outcast at the school has the sleuthy DNA of her
farther and starts to take cases for the kids at her high school while trying
to secretly help her dad solve the murder of her best friend (which he
forbids). Though her dad no longer works for the police he still has a police
instrument or two to work with. When not doing school work, solving school
mates mysteries, or trying to help solve the murder of her best friend (not
always in that order) Veronica hangs out with her new friends and fellow social
outcast (including her new friend and new kid in school Wallace, who often
helps her in the mystery solving), quotes Big Lebowski (my kind of girl), and tries not to get in
fights at parties with the children of the rich elite of the town whom she once
called friends. She is able to solve her friends murder by the end of the first
season only to see the crashing of a bus at the beginning of the second season
(her senior year) be the next mystery. Sadly, the show was canceled in the
middle of the third season, but it did launch the career of Kristen Bell (who
would later play Sarah Marshall in Forgetting Sarah Marshall), as well as
Amanda Seyfried (who played the murdered best friend, Lilly Kane, in flash
backs and dream sequences in season 1). And many actors on the show star or
guest star in the show Party Down.
3. Lisa Simpson-Lisa is
the smartest girl in grade number two (also the saddest), ever. Lisa is so
smart that even at 26, I appear to be smarter than I am when I quote her. Lisa
is the counter pointer to any argument anyone makes (including George H.W.
Bush) that the Simpsons is a bad show or that they are a bad family. While she
is often the foil (along with Marge) to the antics of Homer and/or Bart, she is
still able to connect with them on many levels, she is after all, just an 8
year old. Lisa isn’t always happy with the place she is given in life. Whether
it be because of her dads baboonish behavior or that no one in the family wants
to do anything as a family that is culturally significant (which is slightly
Ironic in that they are the most culturally significant TV family of all time).
Lisa has done as much growing up as anyone could who has been 8 years old for
21 years, she has questioned religions (she is now a Buddhist.), Become a vegetarian
(eating meat is Bhhhhhaaaaaaaaad) dated the dumbest kid in school, tried to
change the schools bully, became a badass hockey goalie, played Martha
Washington, found out that Springfield’s founder was nothing more than a pirate
that once tried to rob from and kill George Washington, helped Bart foil the
criminal plottings of mastermind “Sideshow” Bob Terwilliger, and even taken a
college course at the beautiful Springfield U. amongst many other things. It’s
also revealed that while at college she would meet, fall in love with, and
almost marry a British gentleman. However, she couldn’t marry him because he
didn’t respect her family (mostly her farther) and he wanted her to move with
him to England and not see their family again.
2. Dana Scully-Dana
Scully must have pissed someone off while getting her M.D. from Georgetown or
while training in the FBI. Cause her gig right after FBI boot camp was being
teamed up with Fox “Spooky” Mulder. Whom the entire bureau thought was a
lunatic for his undying believe that the government is hiding its knowledge of
extraterrestrials. Scully starts
following Mulder on missions and tries to explain the crazy things they see
(lights in the sky, the Jersey Devil, men who can start fires with just their
minds, etc…) using her knowledge of science. The two form a bond and friendship
and soon become each other’s only allies as it turns out much of Mulders
paranoia isn’t really paranoia at all. Very few fictional characters are so
blatantly based on another fictional character as Dana Scully was on Clarice
Starling from The Silence of The Lambs, from speech pattern to the hair length
and style. My only real gripe with Scully was that no matter how much strange
stuff she saw while traveling with Mulder and how many times Mulder was right
with his crazy ideas, she never agreed with him until after the fact. She was
always 100 percent based in science, even in a world where science fiction is
much more the truth.
I was always a much bigger fan of the X-file
monster of the week episodes than I was of the one that looked at the mythology
of the show (the cigarette smoking man, deep throat, Samantha Mulder’s alien
abduction) and I think my favorite episode is either the one about the Negro
League baseball player, or the giant Fluke worm.
1.Elaine Benes-Elaine lives in a
world surrounded by men. Whether it be her bosses (Mr. Pit, who eats his
snickers with a knife and fork, J.Peterman, who once purchased Kramers life
rights, or Mr. Lippman, who once got her to go to Yankee stadium wearing a
Baltimore Orioles hat (the very same hat she had recently got kicked out of her
seats for wearing before)); her many boyfriends, most notably The New Jersey
Devil body painting David Puddy; or her Three good friends (the ex) Jerry
Seinfeld, (the nebbish New Yorker) George Costanza, and the always wacky Kosmo
Kramer (the ass man). Because of her cuteness (which she once used to get a
discount on furniture, it didn’t go over well with the Soup Nazi though) it is
easy to forget that Elaine has a mean and vindictive streak that rivals that of
any of her male counter parts. (Does the phrase not a square to spare, ring any
bells?) Also, as mentioned before, she refused to take her Orioles cap off at a
Yankees-Orioles game (she is from Baltimore after all) even though the people
who gave her the seats for free asked her too. Elaine also has a sultry streak
in her as well; one time as a prank she left a rather sexy and throaty message
on Jerry’s machine after one of his standup shows. The message blew all the
guys away before they found out it was her, and then George acted awkward and
nervous around her. Elaine also finished third in a certain contest the group
had, helped break up a couple because she want to date the man and Jerry wanted
date the woman, and admitted that she often faked while in bed with Jerry.
A couple of quick notes on Elaine
Benes and Julia-Louis Dreyfus
1. The
part of Elaine wasn’t in the pilot, but was added to give the show a little bit
of a feminine side. Before Dreyfus’s audition at the request of Larry David
(co-creator) the part was going to go to Rosie O’Donnell, who was friends with
Jerry and Larry and at her peak ability (see: A League of their own)(seriously,
see the movie…it might be my favorite baseball movie of all time)
Julia-Louis Dreyfus is a total trust fund baby,
she is one of two kids and her farther owns one of the world's largest
commodities trading and merchandising firms, which is worth over a billion
dollars. She easily could have been just another Hilton like kid, but instead
used her talent to make the world a better place
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