User blog comment:Duncan 99 New/Character Appreciation - Week 49: Topher/@comment-30567301-20171207232637

sierra's obsessiveness over meaningless things, justin's vain nature, and dakota's pitifully pathetic intentions all come to fruitation in this horrible human being, known as topher. i've always had positive feelings on topher, but i never truly began to acknowledge him as amazing until my last rewatch, and while i don't think that his humor is for everyone, i always find his criticism really far-fetched. first of all, yeah he mostly interacted with chris ... and that's cause... his purpose in the season lie with chris? just how dave and sky were meant to mostly interact with eachother, as well as max and scarlett, shawn and jasmine, and the twins. does this excuse the horrible writing? not really. but it's not really a valid excuse considering it was not really a problem intertwined with his character, it was a flaw of the season. another criticism i see often is that he "floated", but... three zones and a baby was literally the perfect send off for topher lol. like honestly what would ella or the twins do that would be better than his contributions? if there's one thing i'll give to pahkitew island is that it gave the perfect send offs for almost all the characters (aside from shawn he should've left first).

anyways on to topher himself. he's hilarious. i really enjoy his exuberant energy and how laughably insufficient he is. one of the most scarily consistent things i see in total drama fiction is topher somehow being a caring good person but... he literally did not care for anyone else on that island except himself lol <3 just by the way he went out of his way to participate as least as possible. he's always self-concerned and it's funny to me that the only genuine compliment he gave anyone was amy, how fitting. one of my favorite things about him is how versatile he is with interactions. it was truly a missed opportunity we didn't get more content of the delicious rivalry of sugar and topher:

(episode 1)

topher: anyone seen chris? have you seen chris?!

sugar: stop your fidgetin', you scuff my pageant shoes and i'll toss you out the window! you'll be squished flat in 2 minutes!

(episode 3)

sugar: that topher is as wily as a hog with a library card. i wouldn't trust him any farther than i could throw a tractor, and that ain't more than a couple of feet!

(episode 8)

sugar: smell what ya' missed, SUCKER!

and the jasmine and topher interactions in this is the pits were actually quite interesting as well, to see how such different characters work together.

yeah, i can see that most of his dialogue is directed at chris, but this never really bothered me. it always felt versatile, or at least not dry enough to bore me to tears. the constant sucking up meanwhile secretly firing attacks at chris' self esteem was quite enjoyable. especially when it ends up backfiring on him perfectly lol. "thanks TOPHER!" is a gigantic highlight of episode 8. the fact that he lives up to the "chris 2.0" label perfectly is really funny to me, because he really is just a watered down version of chris with more vitrol and interesting character traits.

while i do really like topher, i must acknowledge his biggest flaw: his missed potential. i don't think that tdpi was the season for it, but topher has so much more potential than what was given to us. we know that he's an egomaniac and he also has ambitions, which the only characters' ambitions we got to know were the final 4. i think that if the producers were willing to delve into him more, he could be one of the best characters in the series. someone so desperate and charmingly psychotic would easily provide us some very unique and entertaining moments. however, i'd be lying to you if i said the writers would go through with it. he's obviously very damaged whether it be because of his family, his need for attention, or insistence

back on him, he's really just a scream. his confessionals always deliver and he's pretty much a self parody to the point of ironic love. he's really just a friendly mix of so many characters i enjoy all wrapped in thick layers of selfishness, flamboyance, and patheticness. while it wouldn't hurt for him to be a little more over the top, he played off very well with his surroundings whenever he was shown and if he was a main character, i'd have no doubt he'd play off just as well with multiple other characters.

there's still an elephant in the room though. his fanbase. i don't think it's fair to blame a character for their fans, but topher's fans tend to be especially awful. mostly on deviantart on fanfiction.net, who seem to insist on him being some gary stu sex symbol or love interest for any hot female they feel like pairing him with that day. it's kind of embarassing to see how many people enjoy him for his looks and not actually what he brings to the table as a charicature. he's definitely not anything they make them out to be and really sad to see especially how common it is just by looking up "total drama topher".

depth wise, i think there's a lot more to do with topher. i think that he definitely has potential, not to be a love interest or anything like that, but an actually fleshed out character. he'd work as an anti-hero, villain, hero, whatever purpose needs to be filled. but it's actually fearful to me that him being a love interest may be the reality we get... there's still hope however unless christine carries out her master plan and garners control of the series and makes her horrific fanpairing of taylor and topher a reality. </3

so yeah, i get why he's not for everyone. i get why people may not find him as entertaining as i do, that's fine. personally, he's one of the best from his season and is easily in my top 30, and if he improves in the way i'm holding out for, he'll likely go higher.

best season:.

best episode: Three Zones and A Baby

best moment: being the pivot point of universal hatred in the aforementioned episode <3

most likely to: turn out NOTHING like i want him to in his possible return. </3