Most useless protagonists (a discussion of Good Omens)

[Abomination]

Except that's not what happened. Crowley didn't screw anything up, he wasn't the one who gave the child to the wrong parents. He gave the baby to the nuns, like he was supposed to, and the nuns gave the baby to the wrong parents. Crowley being lazy about his job and not really being a "bad guy" doesn't factor into this at all. Crowley not being there wouldn't have changed the outcome in the slightest. Had he been written out of the story and a different "competent" demon been given the task instead nothing about the main plot would have changed.

Crowley did not engage in ANY fact checking or confirmation. He was the one who convinced the nuns that the baby needed to go to the different room, the room that he established by speaking with the British guy outside the convent.

Crowley screwed up. He showed up, didn't really care, assumed the British guy was the diplomat, and told the nun to take the baby to the wrong room. The nuns followed his orders, his orders were wrong, Adam got put with the wrong family, and then Crowley became the nanny to the RIGHT family and didn't recognize that the diplomat looked different to the person he spoke with outside the convent.

It's a comedy of errors and the child was raised without influence from either side, foiling the plans of the devil and the angels. The angels didn't get the big fight they wanted, the devils didn't get their antichrist, and humanity survived on its own merits.

 

[Fieldy409_v1legacy]

You know what? I agree they didn't really do much when I think about it besides give the antichrist a pep talk. You're 100% right but I also don't care, I loved it and that doesn't ruin it for me.

 

[Agema]

My main problem was just that Aziraphael was so sodding useless; Crowley at least sort of gets stuff done. There's only so long you can watch a character be a bumbling fool who fails to take substantial action.

 

[Palindromemordnilap_v1legacy]

Plot unaffected is very much the correct term. If you wrote the characters out of the plot nothing would change and Adam would still grow up the same way. If they have no impact on the plot then they are irrelevant to the plot, and if they're irrelevant to the plot then why are they there?

If the characters are not involved with the plot then why are they part of the plot? Why is there any focus on them if they don't actually do anything? If you can write them out of every scene that they're in without any effect on the plot then why are they the main characters?

Why can't that be the only plot of the show and not even have anything about the end of the world? The only good part of the show is Crowley and Azeraphile hanging out, why does the end of the world have to factor in at all if the main characters actually have no impact on it? The show would be a hell of a lot better if the end of the world was just the backdrop of the show and not the plot of it.

Do you see how your point shifts there, dude? You go from "these guys are pointless! They don't affect the plot" to "I love these guys, their plot is great" within the space of three short paragraphs. Can't help but feel like you're moving goalposts here just to look like the cool edgy dude who doesn't like the current popular thing

The point doesn't shift at all, I specifically pointed out that if you completely wrote them out of the story the plot actually wouldn't change at all because their involvement is completely unnecessary and never pushes the plot forward and they are therefore useless. I don't love their plot, I like their character interactions. Do you actually know what a plot is?

Then I'm going to ask you the same thing I asked you in my first post: So? So they don't interact much with the Adam plot, which you apparently didn't care much for anyway, why does that matter? They have their own plot running alongside where they try to cover their mistakes and friendship, coerce their coworkers through various means and avoid being outright killed. Why does it matter that it only occasionally intertwines with Adam's plotline?

 

[Drathnoxis]

My biggest problem with the show was mainly that it wasn't funny. It was obviously trying to be quirky and funny and nail that Pratchett tone, but it just didn't work for me. I don't think I laughed once. I thought the acting was pretty flat from most characters and the writing didn't do anything for me. Things just sort of happened and then resolved without any real conscious effort by anyone involved. For some reason the witch hunter and the witch had to have sex during the end of the world because it was written down and I don't get what that had to do with anything, but I suspect I'm supposed to find it humorous or maybe arousing? I don't know so much of it just came across as "lol so random!" to me. I'm struggling to think of a single character I enjoyed, but they were either complete nonentities or just awkward. The effects were pretty good and I quite like the intro animation, though Crowley's eyes kind of bugged me through the whole show.

I'm curious if the book might appeal to me more. I'm a pretty big fan of about 80% of the Discworld series (though anything Pratchett wrote with a female protagonist is kind of lousy. For some reason he couldn't write a woman who wasn't a nearly perfect busy body Mary Poppins ripoff)

Also like, who the heck was the delivery guy? This is the most dedicated delivery guy in the history of the world and I don't understand why. Why would he kill himself because the customer requested it. How much does he actually know? He doesn't make any sense to me, and it takes me out of the story.

The show would be a hell of a lot better if the end of the world was just the backdrop of the show and not the plot of it.

That actually would have been pretty great. A show that just incidentally involves the end of the world, but doesn't really concern itself with it.

 

[Drathnoxis]

For those who have read the Neil Gaiman book is it any better or does the show follow it pretty closely?

I just finished reading the book. It follows the show pretty closely if I remember correctly. The show added some jokes, the other angels, and that bit at the end where Crowley and Aziraphale do the whole switcharoo to avoid punishment (probably just to give those two a bit of success to their names). Honestly, I liked the book better mainly because I didn't find the humour as cringey in written form. It still wasn't super funny, but I found it unpleasant.

One part that really stuck out to me was the bit where Hastur comes out of the phone as maggots and there's a really graphic description of tunneling under all the telemarketers flesh and multiplying and killing them all horribly that was really out of place in an otherwise lighthearted and extremely silly story. It was really quite gross.

All in all, it's really not so much a story but a series of jokes and humorous digressions that form the rough appearance of a plot. Nobody really matters except Adam, and anything anybody else ended up doing could have been accomplished more easily by Adam anyway. The only thing that mattered was that the nuns screwed up, and that Adam's friends were there so he remembered what he wanted to be. Crowley and Aziraphale were there for exposition, really. Just to give a viewpoint from individuals that actually know why all the crazy stuff is happening and how the metaphysics of the whole system work. I don't think they are presented as much of the main characters in the book though. I would estimate only around a third of the page count is focused on their activities. Although they may still get more than any other character, so who knows. There are a lot of meaningless digressions.

All in all not the best Pratchett book I've read, but not the worst either. I've never read any of Gaiman's stuff so I don't know how it measures up in that respect.

 

[jademunky]

Can you think of any other protagonists in any other media who are as completely pointless?

This happens in any type of religious fiction (which Good Omens kinda is and is kinda not).

If you ever read the Left Behind series (which you should not do), the characters are all passive observers for what they know is just divine theater.