User blog comment:Epic~00/Character Opinions/@comment-1037137-20150508201611/@comment-1037137-20150509073048

Nevermind, let's move on.

Anyway, I definitely can agree with a lot of those counts regarding Courtney, she's absolutely one of the most complex and compelling characters in the cast and her diversity as a character has been a strength of hers. And it is a diversity I do appreciate and encourage. However, I do think they have gone too far at times in how they elected to exploit this diversity, and it has been taken to an extreme in a lot of the aforementioned instances here, so I personally think a lot of these instances ultimately proved counterproductive. Not all, but definitely some. And may have actually gone and weakened that diversity for some time here and there. There are plenty of things to admire about Courtney's multilayered persona at the surface, but like with so many others there were some they just keep going off the deep end with. So the result is more frustrating than entertaining at times, same with so many others who fell into the same pattern. Especially when those instances of maturity and genuity mentioned throughout are axed in process as they too often are, that's when it really proves damaging. And all too often, it just all amounts to the same outcome, everything else gets invalidated in playing these antics and traits well beyond the rational lines. That's a little something called flanderization, which is seeded through a lot of what is outlined here and ends up overshadowing the genuinely positive elements you mentioned such as her diversity so completely.

There were indeed many things to enjoy about Courtney's run for at least a part of TDAS, at least more so than all the rest and it really looked like it might've been her season, or at least she'd finally shine above so much of these more toxic moments for once in her run. I'm going to disagree about Scourtney for all the obvious reasons, but I am going to acknowledge it seemed to play a role in her bouncing back and that it seemed to be played straight at least for a time. I will agree that Gwen and Courtney's friendship in Regatta was done stupidly, but that story would've been just fine if it carried on as naturally as it once had in TDWT's first half. Good concept, sloppily written as you said from Regatta onward. But for a time, it seemed well-intentioned and there was some strong development on Courtney's side for a good bit.

All that and so much more......is what makes her run in TDAS with the arrival of SMS such a particularly inexcusable debacle. We are definitely agreed on what mess this was, this was a deliberate destruction of one character. And it does a lot to illustrate why a lot of the prior trends were finally taken too far.

She really is a fantastic character and a complex one, we're agreed there. Never a boring one, this much is certain, even when some plots may wear out their welcome. But the writing behind her needs a serious reexamination in some areas. So we're not left with yet another repeat of the same outcome all over again.

'Kay, I did not mean to write that much. O_O But I am a creature of habit. That's my two cents as far as Courtney goes for now.