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Is Misty the worst written character?

Tomboyish Mermaid

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I have gone through the Original Series again for nostalgia reasons and I still enjoy it, but I have to say this anime series had one element that really bothered me and that was the characterization os Misty. Am I the only one who thinks she was the weakest part of the whole series? I would even go so far that she is the weakest written character of the whole franchise.

Backstory
She does technically have a backstory. She left her home because she couldn't stand living much longer with her sisters, who really looked down on her. That is actually not a bad attempt for a backstory for a character like her. The downside is, that they never addressed this issue much more. It is like they dropped this part of Misty's backstory, to the point where it seems she didn't even have one. The writers should have brought this up much more. Maybe they should have made her sisters even meaner or make more episodes about Misty dealing with this issue in her life.

Goal, motivation, and role
Her goal was to be a very talented water type trainer. Okay, good. Problem is, we almost never see her doing anything related to this goal. We never see her train and we never see her try to learn more about Water Pokémon. She lacks motivation, she also infected her role in the anime. Without a goal, she has no motivation in doing anything, and without a motivation she also has not a real purpose for the anime, which is sadly very clearly reflected in her role during the Johto arc. She didn't have one and technically never had a role from beginning with. You could write her out of the anime and nothing will change. Compare her to the other characters: Ash wants to be a master, Brock a doctor, TR wants Pikachu, May and Dawn want to be coordinators, Serena wants to be with Ash, even Iris, who had a similar goal, worked more for it compare to Misty.

Personality
To be honest, there isn't much. There is her fear of bugs, her mother-goose-like side when Togepi hatches, she has a bit of a temper, but that's about it. Her character is sadly a bit too superficial written for my taste. Now, the other characters are not deeply written either, but you can tell that they have grown as characters a bit until the end of their story. Each of them grew as characters. Brock wanted to be a doctor, TR soften up a little, Dawn had more confidence by the end of DP, and Lillie lost her fear of Pokémon. Misty, on the other hand, started out as one character and by the end, she still was the same character. Maybe they could have made her lose her fear for bugs or maybe they could address more the trouble she had with her sisters.

Character interactions
She was funny sometimes, I have to admit that. But after a while, it became pretty passive. Since she didn't develop as a character, didn't had a rival, a clear goal in mind, or a better-written backstory, she as a character didn't have much to say by the end. And you can tell because she was later reduced to an extra in the background during the whole Johto saga.

Conclusion
I have to say, she is actually a perfect example of how to not write a character. Her personality is reduced the most superficial girl cliches, she had no real backstory and no goal, and by the end, she also didn't do much. You could replace her with a stuffed doll that looks like her and it wouldn't really change the formula of the anime. I really enjoy all the cute fanfics about her and Ash, but as a character, she really fails in every regard. I can see why she was the first of the original characters that got kicked out of the show.
 
STOP THE PRESSES!
126179
Joking aside, her actual goal was becoming the most talented and beautiful trainer ever, or at least more prettier than her sister. Because of her inferiority complex.
 
Not even close.

Misty is a well-written character, just not a highly developed one and there is a big difference. All it takes to be a well-written character is to have a defined personality, consistent ideology, and good chemistry with the other main characters. Misty hits all of those points. Also the notion that you could remove Misty from the OS and nothing would change is pretty ridiculous. The strength of the OS is the chemistry between the Trio and on the flip-side the chemistry between Team Rocket. Remove any member from the group without a suitable replacement then the whole thing falls apart.
 
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She's not perfect, but I think you are looking at her the wrong way. She was only meant to be a side character who would only serve the function of calling Ash immature, but eventually evolved into her own character with her own quirks and was a vital part of the group dynamics. Also, she truly developed, her character from Chronicles is completely different from her in early Kanto, I think she changed more than Brock, Cilan and Lana.
 
Truth be told, she actually kind of grew on me after numerous and numerous rewatches of older episodes.

No doubt her goal (and may I add her team) could've been handled way better, but I've notice now that she's changed more than even I initially gave her credit for; Johto showed some progression in her personality being significantly nicer, being generally less angry, and actually focusing more on her love for water Pokemon, for example going crazy sometimes when seeing one she really likes, and getting super excited trying to catch a Corsola. Her Pokemon Chronicles episodes also gave her some pretty nice moments. Lastly I'd like to also say I personally enjoyed her interactions with Max in AG and Lana in SM.

There may have been issues, but ultimately I'd say she's definitely not the worst written character.
 
She's not perfect, but I think you are looking at her the wrong way. She was only meant to be a side character who would only serve the function of calling Ash immature, but eventually evolved into her own character with her own quirks and was a vital part of the group dynamics.
That I always find so ironic. Iris did the same stuff with Ash, calling him out for been immature, but she gets hated for that, while Misty gets a free pass.
 
Misty isn't the worst written character on this show....Imo that's when Paul, Solidad, Burgundy, Georgia, Cameron, and Tobias come in .So don't fret.

Sure people here love to say Iris, but even she developed into a much nicer person just like Misty did and she was able to connect with Dragons spiritually even though the battling and goal aspect of her character isn't the strongest.

That I always find so ironic. Iris did the same stuff with Ash, calling him out for been immature, but she gets hated for that, while Misty gets a free pass.

Coming from someone who likes Iris, I think it’s because Misty was much more justified than Iris since Ash was unnecessarily rude to Misty unprovoked. Also, Ash got her bike destroyed and he was a brash and immature rookie trainer who would think that he was Mr. Hotshot when things would go his way longer than it deserved.

While Iris deserves criticism for how much of a jerk she can be, I agree that the hate is too overblown considering this is a Japanese kids show at the end of the day. Also, I did feel that Iris calling him a kid for certain reasons was pretty justified at times (for example, Ash deliberately using a Pokémon that has a type disadvantage to his opponents’ or any other stupid thing that Ash did that Iris usually doesn’t, such as one time he threw a poke ball at a Pokémon without weakening it).
 
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That I always find so ironic. Iris did the same stuff with Ash, calling him out for been immature, but she gets hated for that, while Misty gets a free pass.

Misty doesn't get a free pass just because of nostalgia or anything like that. She doesn't get hated for that because the circumstances between both relationships are pretty different. Ash was much more immature during the original series, especially during the Kanto portion of it, and Misty would usually be justified in calling him out on his behavior or mistakes. I think it also helped that Misty wasn't that much more experienced than Ash was. She had more Pokemon than he did when they first met, but her skills made her seem more like a slightly more experienced rookie than anything else.

By the time we got to BW, Ash was a far more experienced trainer and Iris, before they changed her backstory, came off as a rookie trainer. That made the catchphrase more annoying from the start when it didn't feel like they were close to equal terms in regards to skill or experience. A trainer who couldn't even get their Axew to master a simple move like Dragon Rage really had no business for being annoyed at Ash's decisions during a battle. There were also plenty of times where Iris called Ash a little kid for really weak reasons, like how he didn't know something about the Unova region or the Pokemon there when he isn't naive to the region. Iris could also be just as immature as Ash was, if not more so, which made her look like a hypocrite. Ash could be immature in BW, but not to the same level as he was in the original series and Iris shouldn't be been the one to call him out on his behavior anyway given her own problems. It all boils down to how Misty was usually justified in calling Ash out, while Iris really wasn't.
 
Also,
1. Misty wasn't always being critical of Ash just to get on his nerve.

When he uses Caterpie to attack Pidgeotto, we don't see her taking pleasure in chewing Ash out as she's rightfully calling him his ignorance, plus needlessly endangering Caterpie.

2. Don't really see the point of giving her a fear of Ice Types just cause they have an advantage over her preferred Types. Feels like a flimsy attempt to copy Misty having her own fear, except that's based on real life people being scared of bugs.
 
Don't really see the point of giving her a fear of Ice Types just cause they have an advantage over her preferred Types. Feels like a flimsy attempt to copy Misty having her own fear, except that's based on real life people being scared of bugs.

Out of all the reasons to dislike Iris, this one has to be the pettiest. This reminds me of how some fans hate Amy Rose from the Sonic the Hedgehog series simply because she’s pink.

I found her fear of Ice types to be humorous since it made little to no sense. That’s the joke.
 
Out of all the reasons to dislike Iris, this one has to be the pettiest. This reminds me of how some fans hate Amy Rose from the Sonic the Hedgehog series simply because she’s pink.

I found her fear of Ice types to be humorous since it made little to no sense. That’s the joke.

Amy wasn't made to emulate a pre-existing character. I mean if Iris wasn't made to be Misty 2.0. at time I'd probably think nothing of her having her fear of Ice Types.
 
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Out of all the reasons to dislike Iris, this one has to be the pettiest. This reminds me of how some fans hate Amy Rose from the Sonic the Hedgehog series simply because she’s pink.

I found her fear of Ice types to be humorous since it made little to no sense. That’s the joke.

Iris's fear of Ice types was too inconsistent for my tastes. Sometimes she'd panic over seeing an Ice type Pokemon, but other times she was perfectly fine with them. Misty's fear of Bug types was more consistent and actually made sense. Aside from some of the traditionally cute Bug Pokemon, she'd pretty much always scream or be uncomfortable around Bug types. It also helped that other characters like Ash or Brock noticed that difference too. The closest we got to something like with Iris was Trip pointing out that she should also be afraid of Dragon Pokemon with that same logic.

I should note that Iris' fear of Ice types isn't one of the reasons I dislike her. I think it's an annoying, weird and inconsistent gag that seems more like a blatant attempt to make Iris look more similar to Misty, but it's pretty low on the list of problems I have with her character all things considered.
 
Paul, Solidad, Burgundy, Georgia, Cameron, and Tobias

I am curious on your thoughts on Tobias. The others I can see (even Paul), but Tobias wasn't really a "character", but a plot device. I mean I hate him, but his purpose in the story is pretty clear IMO.
 
I love misty. The wrost the most stupid girl which is iris


Yup, fearing from ice is stupid and not funny at all and even trip who is also one of the wrost asked then why you hang with dragon. They also do have high effection in dragkns. Also, she in reality never scared from then and only she scared when the writers want to say that she scared and mostly she never scared. They knew that she iz the worst so they want to make funny and feel sorry but it is not.

Misty in other hand scared from bug and it is a real thing even in our life. Also hate bugs so much and also say the bug noisy and hate them day by day even if i don't acared from them but really they are noisy, irritating, and terrible. So, scared from bug is natural and alao loving the cutey beauty bueatyfully i meant butterfully is also natural. Because the girls in realitty even if they hate bugs but some type of bugs are lovely from. The butterfly is different than they noisy terrible insects. They annoying me, they try to eat anything in your body. But the ice type isn't like this

And she alwaysnis call with them
 
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Definitely not. I can think of way more characters on this show who are far worse written than Misty.

Misty definitely evolved over the course of the series and became more of her own character. I'm not using nostalgia as an excuse, but I do think it's sometimes harder to judge the OS. It was the first season of the series, after all, so things were a little different than they are now. It never really seemed in the onset that Brock and Misty were necessarily supposed to stand on their own. For the most part, they were pretty much there to serve as supports to Ash. As the series went on, they started to flesh them both out a bit more. Someone mentioned the Chronicles episodes, which I think is a great point. I feel like Misty really shined in those. In fact, they kind of addressed the fact that she had initially felt she couldn't do much of anything without Ash and Brock, and how she got around that. Things obviously changed as they introduced characters like May and Dawn, who had their own goals that were based within side quests and got to be fleshed out more.

While I don't hate Iris as a character as a lot of people do, I would have to say she got the short end of the stick in terms of writing, much more so than Misty or any other female companion. After having May and Dawn, who did have their own goals and were much more focused on, Iris felt like a huge step backwards. It was like being transported back to when the companions were strictly there as support for Ash, but much more poorly done. It made sense in the OS when it was their initial run at the series and there wasn't much established; but after growing accustomed to fleshed out companions in AG and DP, the way BW was approached just felt off.

I do also agree with everyone who's said her criticism of Ash is far different than Iris'. I have yet to rewatch BW from the initial watch of it, but I do remember Iris calling Ash out for some relatively stupid stuff. Misty's criticism of Ash was generally justified. Plus, Ash and Misty's bickering was a big part of their relationship with one another, and I feel played a role in how they both developed over time. With Iris, it felt very one sided a lot of time, which is why I think it generally came across as more annoying than anything else. It felt more like Ash was just being picked on rather than being called out for his mistakes or ignorance, which in turn gave him the opportunity to grow as a character.
 
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