User blog comment:The Flaming Sword of Fury/Are We Seriously Still Doing This?/@comment-1037137-20141108190104/@comment-1037137-20141108215656

Oh no, it has its detractors. There are more than a few of us who don't think of it as highly as all the rest do, even if we are something of a minority. And frankly, I'm sick of its glorification, I'll just be dead honest with you now. That thing does have some serious issues, I don't care where it ranks. The controversies in it were enough to get one of the creators coming forward to explain what they were all about, which does say something about the things a fair amount of people did take issue with.

Revenge is more split than that, or at least it was. Its reception was far more divided in the year it debuted. Then the hate seemed to shine through even more, Dakotazoid and Zoke being by far the biggest points of consternation. But people still came to adore Jo, Dawn, Brick, Lightning, and later Scott. And these days it seems a tad bit more even again, if only modestly so. Revenge is by no means the most well-liked season, but I would still call it a deeply divisive one.

They ended up going TDAS in the first place, right? Even with all the problems it had between continuity errors and character destruction, with horrible rehashes of old plots that didn't payoff yet again, it still got through to production and ultimately to the airwaves. Something that dysfunctional should never have gotten that far, so forgive me if I'm wary of it happening again. That was a gargantuan mistake that should've been easily avoided, the problems were too big to miss. But it got by, so I have to question where the quality control was when it was needed. I would hope that they take the bad reception as a signal that they need to work stringently to avoid a repeat of a similar mistake, but their track record has always been rather spotty, so I'm keeping my hopes guarded.

Well even if it's better than its immediate predecessors, I can still see that there are elements that could stand to be closer still to what Island gave. Island had the formula down pat. Not everyone would say that the stereotypes of this season weren't childish or uninteresting, some did find them such. And it still is a bit more cartoony than its parent predecessors. Maybe it was this much more effectively, but some elements still need to be addressed. And no, I'm not calling it a good or bad season. I can't do that. I am however going to state what I've observed. Plus I'm not sure what made it so monumentally good. Good maybe, but is it *that* big a gem as you're presently saying? Was it really special for a particular reason that rose above all else or is it just because it came as such a huge refreshment in the aftermath of such a big bomb? Again, I'm not saying it's bad, just wondering what makes it so special.

The damage to the characters is the principle source of its problems, though yes there are others besides that. But damaging the characters from the earlier casts is a major disservice and the source of many, many of the most popular and frequent complaints regarding the show. So it cannot be overemphasized what a problem it is. Fact is, most of the older characters get butchered so badly in spite of their followings that it's having a negative impact on opinion of them and the series. I've seen it all over the place, most of us have been affected by it in some way or share one or more of those many character-related complaints. So forgive me for highlighting it as I do. They're the central element of the show's appeal, of ANY show's appeal. And once you kill and abuse it, you're in serious trouble. Flanderization, it's a poisonous path for any show to follow. Total Drama definitely got hit hard by it. It's the trend that most urgently needs to be addressed and stopped.

You look me up during season six before either of arrive at such a conclusion. I'm not counting TDPI since as I said, it was largely unrelated to the longstanding elements of the show, the elements worst tampered with. Show me season six which is a long way off before either of us can definitively say that "something good" came out of a season I hate. Gonna take a lot to make up for that damnable travesty that TDAS was. Again, that should've been an easily avoidable mistake.