Characters With Terrible Priorities

[FalloutJack]

VOIP!

Putting aside the proviso about mentioning villainy here for a second, you do miss it a bit. Killian is all about laughing that the world. Not success, not power, not even revenge stint. Those things came with the package, but his real deal is that all of this happens in order to entertain him.

OT: So...priorities. Uhhh...MICROSOFT!

*Rimshot!*

Nah, we're talking character here, and they don't HAVE any.

ANYWAY!

Wheatley, I know you're an idiot sphere and all, but when you're connected to an all-powerful, self-repairing laboratory system, how do you wreck it when half of it is automated?! It was in pristine condition before we wretched it from Glados! Couldn't you read the fucking manual and do what it says?!

 

[Saladfork]

To continue the dragon age discussion, Alistair.

I actually quite like Alistair through most of the game but his inability to rationally consider accepting Loghain's help is ridiculous with the darkspawn like a week away from Denerim at most.

 

[SsilverR]

I should probably add Goku to the list (when he's not being martial arts, super alien Jesus...saving the world and all).
He's a deadbeat dad, always jumps at the chance to flee from his family, and purposeful does not return (many times) when he has the chance (seriously how do you tell Shenlong after he's been sent to retrieve you "Hey, could you tell them I don't want to be wished back? Kay Thanks".) As I kid I found him charming, as an adult it's hard to relate.

.... with a wife like Chichi can you blame him???

Talking about terrible priorities wasn't it her that literally almost took away the entire worlds only hope because she wanted him to stay home and study?? where will the universities be if the whole bloody world gets pow'd

 

[Mikkaddo]

Keep in mind I'm not talking about, say, a villain's priorities, I'm talking about say Batman and the cure in Arkham City where he finds sorting out Hugo Strange more important that curing himself. Now with that clarified my example is Dennis Leary's character from The Amazing Spider-man. So let me get this straight, there is a giant humanoid lizard releasing a bioweapon on New York but your main goal is getting the one guy who might be able to stop it off the street? How did this guy become chief of the NYPD? I mean I know that the movie had really bad writing but someone needs to wonder about this stuff and it may as well be me. The only reason he drops the chase is because he found out that Spidey was his daughter's boyfriend. "Oh no, if I shoot him, Gwen will hate me." Uh, no, fucking everyone would hate you, want to know why? The one guy who could stop the Lizard is laying in the street dead, WHILE FUCKING EVERYONE ELSE IS A LIZARD PERSON, NICE ONE YOU MISERABLE TWAT!

...

I think I should drop this now.

My only answer to you sir, is J. Joha Jamison . . . Jr. the man who runs the paper and spends every moment of his life trying to get the ONE PERSON who consistantly saves the world AGAIN AND AGAIN off the street. Ideally so the bad guys don't break out of jail over and over? you must wonder how that would help . . . I mean really, if the hero is gone and they get put in jail . . . no one's stopping them from getting out any better than before, but now . . . when they get out (let's be honest, this is comic book writting it's easier for them to get out than to make new ones) there's no one to stop them from just blowing the place up.


Now, heroes with bad priorities . . . well, Goku comes to mind. Fate of the world, villain a few feet away not just threatening to but litterally preparing to blow up the planet they are on and he turns to someone and says "hey, I'm hungry!" . . . . I want to smack you Goku, I want to smack you SO HARD.

Hmm, who else? I guess the main character of most horror games comes to mind . . . Leon, Chris, Jill . . . let's not forget Aya Brea, psychotic evil demonic nigh-invincible monster that bursts into flames anyone that comes near her EXCEPT Aya, and she's more concerned with making sure her partner gets his kid to a safe place . . . inside the area the the monster's power . . . you know, where she's mutating everything into giant monsters that can kill you with a wink. great one Aya . . . great job.

OH I know the perfect one! every person who has ever played any Elder Scrolls game ever.

So, there's a demonic power, infact demon GODS coming down to murder, slaughter and rape everything on the planet . . . but I'm more focused on chasing down those rats in that poor woman's basement! that's SO much more important!

Thank you Bethesda . . . thank you for making me an absolutely ABYSMAL hero. THUMBS UP!

(for those not seeing it I LOVE Elder Scrolls)

 

[AngelOfBlueRoses]

I'm going to say Loghain from Dragon Age: Origins
Technically a villain, but you can also look at him as a tragic hero.
Anyways.

He helped kick Orlais out of Ferelden so it got its independence back. So he doesn't like Orlesians, I get it. But... JFC he's so against having anything to do with Orlais that he's willing to commit regicide (abandoning King Cailan to the darkspawn) while simultaneously dooming the one organisation (the Grey Wardens) that can stop the darkspawn.

PRIORITIES MAN.

And then when you read the novels it becomes EVEN MORE BAFFLING because Cailan's mother was the woman Loghain was in love with, so you'd think he'd want to protect the child of his former lover, BUT NOPE DEAD HE GOES BECAUSE GOD FORBID CAILAN WANTS HELP DEFEATING EVIL MONSTROCITIES. Christ he isn't even getting help from Orlesians per say, but GREY WARDENS from Orlais. AAAAGH.

LOOOGGHHHAAAIIIINNNNNN WHHHHYYYYYY?!

It's possible that it goes a bit deeper than that. It's rumored that Anora, Loghain's daughter, is barren. With this in mind, through a series of letters in the game between the Empress of Orlais and King Cailan, Orlaisian troops -were- to accompany the Orlaisian Grey Wardens. Later on, it is suggested, through Arl Eamon, that Anora be left aside and that a 'permanent alliance' be established between Ferelden and Orlais. This is heavily implied to mean that Cailan was going to dump Anora and marry the Orlaisian Empress.

While this is going off implications, it adds another layer of the dynamic to the relationship, especially if you remember that Cailan and Loghain were having fights over Anora (hinted at by soldiers).

 

[Tsun Tzu]

The protagonists in Jurassic Park: The Lost World.

Save the vicious, man eating dinosaurs! Fuck the human beings! Yeah! PETA! WOO!

 

[cojo965]

The protagonists in Jurassic Park: The Lost World.

Save the vicious, man eating dinosaurs! Fuck the human beings! Yeah! PETA! WOO!

Um, by PETA logic, wouldn't they be killing the dinosaurs? Just throwing that out there.

 

[Tiamattt]

I should probably add Goku to the list (when he's not being martial arts, super alien Jesus...saving the world and all).
He's a deadbeat dad, always jumps at the chance to flee from his family, and purposeful does not return (many times) when he has the chance (seriously how do you tell Shenlong after he's been sent to retrieve you "Hey, could you tell them I don't want to be wished back? Kay Thanks".) As I kid I found him charming, as an adult it's hard to relate.

Then of course there's Vegeta who puts his pride before absolutely everything.

You know despite that I still remember him being a better dad than Goku. Though I am just going on memory so I may be wrong there.

No you're right, not that it's very hard considering that Goku ended up on a "Worst Father Ever" debate

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/no-right-answer/4220-Worst-Father-Ever

Anyway, from what little they're shown together Vegeta does look like he spends a decent amount of time with his kids. Granted it was mostly training with young and future Trucks, but hey least that's something. If I remember correctly he even promised to take young Trunks to a amusement park one time, much to the kid's surprise but man did he looked happy. Also in GT he actually went shopping with his teenage daughter, which I doubt he found fun.

Compared that to the extremely short amount of time Goku spent with his kids? Yeah Vegata wins easily.

 

[Johnson McGee]

snip

"So, we have this reaper-tech IFF module to install. We don't know how safe it is, them reapers are crafty buggers and who knows what aces they hol dup their sleeves. In order to make sure this goes smoothly, we will, um, round up everyone who could fend off an invasion, stuff them into our shuttle and tell them they can take a while off."

I had this same issue, I was in the middle of nowhere exploring planets when suddenly they just up and declare that everyone with a gun needs to get off the ship. My only reaction was 'WTF?'

OT: The aliens in the newer XCOM. The reveal of 'we were searching for races with kewl psi-powers because reasons' didn't make much sense to me. On top of it being pretty weak motivation, they have no contingency to actually control a race that had powerful enough abilities to fight back. One of the things I liked better about the older one is that you could fill in the blanks yourself about what the aliens were after.

 

[Tsun Tzu]

The protagonists in Jurassic Park: The Lost World.

Save the vicious, man eating dinosaurs! Fuck the human beings! Yeah! PETA! WOO!

Um, by PETA logic, wouldn't they be killing the dinosaurs? Just throwing that out there.

Nah. They'd be "euthanizing" them in their privately owned animal "shelters." It's entirely different.

 

[Lady Lucky]

How about Magneto from the X Men? (comic series, not movies) Quite often he wanted to dominate the world for mutantkind and really the only ones standing in the way are the X Men... JUST KILL THEM AND GET IT OVER WITH!
You would think by now he would have had it and knocked them all off! But nooooooo, Magneto wants Xavier and the X Men to join him so he wastes time by trying to get the "Children of the Atom" to see his point of view...

Sorry it just always bugged me, he's supposed to be one of THE most powerful mutants known to the world.
Oh well, I guess it would make things boring if Magneto killed everyone.

Side note: X Men should have just killed Magneto... just saying..

 

[sextus the crazy]

I have to bring up Lelouch in the last episode(s) of Code Geass. Like what the flying fuck...

Spoiler

He literally wanders off from the final decisive battle, he turns and flies several miles out to sea to check on/save his little sister instead of y'know winning the war he's been fighting for god knows how many episodes?

His army was sieging the final capital building and their one tactical genius of a leader fucks off, leaving them without a response to the counterattack that hits them. They instantly fall apart without Zero there to lead them. Understandably so, because Zero singlehandedly raised and trained this army + military resources out of thin air without even using his Geass on them and they just accept everything he tells them to do without question.

Quite sure there's a scene that was just various people screaming "what are our orders?!" into their comms.

Sister complexes lose wars.

Ah well, at least he gets his act together in R2...

Yeah, if you look at most of his battle strategies beyond anything on the tactical level, they aren't really that great. He really has no idea how to fight a guerrilla war.

 

[Callate]

Now with that clarified my example is Dennis Leary's character from The Amazing Spider-man. So let me get this straight, there is a giant humanoid lizard releasing a bioweapon on New York but your main goal is getting the one guy who might be able to stop it off the street?

Coming soon to a TV Tropes page near you:

The Lopsided Arm of the Law.
[link]http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/discussion.php?id=bohstpwvv8oe4fdicicejy31[/link]

This was definitely one of the things that annoyed me about Dawn in Buffy the Vampire Slayer. "The world is going to end if we don't-" "No one is paying any attention to meeeeeee! *tantrum*"

Similarly, the first Transformers movie. "Sure, the world is to be subjugated by gigantic evil robots if we don't get to work- but right now, the important thing is hiding the good giant robots from my idiot parents."

 

[Vegosiux]

every single pc in every single rpg. excuse me while i ignore the world eding horror and go collect 10 plants for this farmer

Blame it on the merchants. "Oh, you're saving the world from a calamity that would destroy us all and need a good sword to fight it? That'll be 999 gold."

 

[Baron von Blitztank]

Now with that clarified my example is Dennis Leary's character from The Amazing Spider-man. So let me get this straight, there is a giant humanoid lizard releasing a bioweapon on New York but your main goal is getting the one guy who might be able to stop it off the street?

Coming soon to a TV Tropes page near you:

The Lopsided Arm of the Law.
[link]http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/discussion.php?id=bohstpwvv8oe4fdicicejy31[/link]

This was definitely one of the things that annoyed me about Dawn in Buffy the Vampire Slayer. "The world is going to end if we don't-" "No one is paying any attention to meeeeeee! *tantrum*"

Similarly, the first Transformers movie. "Sure, the world is to be subjugated by gigantic evil robots if we don't get to work- but right now, the important thing is hiding the good giant robots from my idiot parents."

And in the original Transformers movie: "Sure Galvatron is delivering the Matrix to a planet eating god who is in orbit around our home planet, but first let's have a dance to Weird Al Yankovic with the robots made of garbage!"

 

[Stasisesque]

How about Magneto from the X Men? (comic series, not movies) Quite often he wanted to dominate the world for mutantkind and really the only ones standing in the way are the X Men... JUST KILL THEM AND GET IT OVER WITH!
You would think by now he would have had it and knocked them all off! But nooooooo, Magneto wants Xavier and the X Men to join him so he wastes time by trying to get the "Children of the Atom" to see his point of view...

Sorry it just always bugged me, he's supposed to be one of THE most powerful mutants known to the world.
Oh well, I guess it would make things boring if Magneto killed everyone.

Side note: X Men should have just killed Magneto... just saying..

Well, he and Charles are best friends. He doesn't want to kill his best friend.

Plus, while Magneto is powerful I don't think he was ever Omega level, whereas Xavier is and... y'know, Jean Grey. As for the X-Men killing Magneto, they never would, they don't kill anyone.

 

[goldenjester]

I have to bring up Lelouch in the last episode(s) of Code Geass. Like what the flying fuck...

Spoiler

He literally wanders off from the final decisive battle, he turns and flies several miles out to sea to check on/save his little sister instead of y'know winning the war he's been fighting for god knows how many episodes?

His army was sieging the final capital building and their one tactical genius of a leader fucks off, leaving them without a response to the counterattack that hits them. They instantly fall apart without Zero there to lead them. Understandably so, because Zero singlehandedly raised and trained this army + military resources out of thin air without even using his Geass on them and they just accept everything he tells them to do without question.

Quite sure there's a scene that was just various people screaming "what are our orders?!" into their comms.

Sister complexes lose wars.

Ah well, at least he gets his act together in R2...

To be fair...

Spoiler

The war is a tool, just like all of his soldiers and allies. His true goal throughout the series is to make the world safe for his sister. He is just using the war to make that safe world a reality. The war has no purpose beyond that. If he had let her get abducted and not responded, it would have totally out of character.

 

[cojo965]

Oo, oo, got another one, Larry, from TellTale's The Walking Dead. Dude, you have a fucking heard condition triggered by stress, priority 1 should be chill the FUCK out. Oh great, now you've had a heart attack and my best friend has brained you with a salt lick, well done.

 

[Resetti's_Replicas]

"Tio" Hector Salamanca from Breaking Bad. I can't fathom why he'd pass on the chance to implicate Jesse and Walter, I know he has some stupid code of honor, but it's so important that he won't avenge his nephew's death and just ring the damn bell?