TDPI Thoughts Part II: Wasted Potential Rant

Originally Posted: Aug 14, 2014

1. Leonard - As a fan of Harold, Sam, and Cameron, I had high expectation for this guy, and for the most part, I was satisfied. He gave me a few chuckles with his wizard shtick and he has one of my favorite designs within the new cast. However like Sam before him, we only got know him for his shtick, but not his character as a whole, which is starting to become a dangerous trend with this show. It started when they flanderized Harold in Total Drama World Tour to make him elimination fodder for THAT GUY which killed any real thrill that I had for the season. Then, they cranked Sam's butt monkey meter to 11 in All Stars. Then as Sam finally showed signs of becoming more of a threat to the writers' Gary Stu self insert, they created a "plot twist" to make sure that he won't interfere with their self-ship fanfic. Therefore, they eliminated him early, which made Sam returning piss people off especially anyone who was rooting for him that season. Meanwhile, they spent all of the same season keeping Cameron in the game just to reverse his development from TDRI.

The problem is they did this again with the writers not giving Leonard any other traits. They made him blatantly just to be another nerd to mistreat and throwaway when he showed signs of potential. By potential, I mean room for growth. I believe Leonard thinks his luck as magic. My strongest example is when the Wizard Tower was about to fall on him, and completely missed him when he yelled force field. This leads him to keep "activating spells" because his abnormal luck which either works for his favor or completely screw him over harshly. Something else that bugs me is that he was the only one with a decent idea for a hideout in episode 1 since they didn't have enough supplies from the first challenge. It only didn't work because a stampede gag that never came up again. With that in mind, this season would have benefited by having three more episodes, because I want to know more about this guy. Instead of reversing past character development (Harold and Cameron), just not caring (Sam), or getting him thrown out the game which gives their Villain Stu Justin Clone no real threats/entertaining conflicts against his game breaking (Harold and Sam), they must give him his development and let it stick. Just in case that they want to keep him around, they must keep his development coherent and believable in the show's universe because I want him to get his focus like Harold did in TDA. In conclusion, this season was probably my favorite in the entire show. However, if the writers do not give depth to the characters in the world/universe that they are creating, how will they ever expect to keep the series running properly or keep people invested. Flanderizing the characters will not make those characters be hated by the fan base; it will be the writers, directors, and even the producers that will get the hate for ruining their favorite characters or not using them properly. Heck, I'm writing this rant because I believe Harold, Sam, Cam, and Leonard deserve a better treatment than they ended up getting. Adding that I have been holding this series on a loose string because I love many of the characters in it, but I am now willing to drop it. In other words, Leonard is this show's last life in the game, and if they bring him back just to pull another All-Star Sam Jobbing. This is how quick that I will drop this show: