User blog:AustinDR/In Defense of Lola Loud

OK, this is something I often get irritated with, and that is how some fans label Lola as a villain. I don't know if I'm saying this out of bias since I like Lola, but sometimes, I get the feeling that some of the hatred towards her is exaggerated. Is Lola annoying? Yes. Does she throw temper tantrums when she doesn't get her way. Oh yes, of course. Is she a tattletale or bratty? Believe me, she is. However, she is far from evil. While I do like to play with the idea of her being a sociopath without an iota of regret for what she does, but that was really only a gross exaggeration. If anything, I personally find Lola one of the funniest characters in the show given her love for the melodrama or how she makes some of the funniest facial expressions, some of my favorites being in "Patching Things Up." But calling her flat out evil? No, of course not (though on whether she has some early signs of antisocial personality disorder is up to debate).

If we're really willing to stretch that far, Lola can easily be categorized as an antagonist. An antagonist is not the same concept. An antagonist is a character who opposes the protagonist. A villain is a wicked character meant to be seen as evil. An antagonist does not imply that the character opposing the protagonist is villainous. I will agree that the two can be synonymous with each other, but for the most part, antagonist =/= villain. I would just like to say this: there are no villains in the Loud House. For the most part, the characters can act as jerks or bullies, but they are not evil and/or doing what they do out of malice. For instance, there's "Brawl in the Family." All of the sisters excluding Lily are the antagonists because they are trying to keep Lincoln from interfering with Leni and Lori's problem. Or in some of the episodes centered around Lynn, she functions as an antagonist. In "Space Invader" she (unintentionally) causes Lincoln to miss a few hours of sleeping among other things. In "Lynner Takes All," she competes with her siblings and when she felt that her winning streak was down, she steps it up a couple of notches. Or there's "No Such Luck" where she concludes that Lincoln is bad luck after she lost one game due to her superstitions. Really, in a lot of these cases, Lynn is far from evil. While she acts insensitive in some of these episodes (especially when it comes with bullying Lincoln; I just feel that's her way of showing that she cares), most of these incidents weren't done out of malice. Well, you could argue that the final one is an example of malice, but I feel that it's more misunderstanding than outright cruelty.

But, yeah, I don't believe that there aren't any truly evil characters in the show, namely because it's a slice of life comedy television series where the worst that could happen is the occasional fight. Going through a few examples...Tetherby. While Tetherby is by no means a great character, and he was one of the reasons as to why "Out on a Limo" sucked majorly...how much was it his fault? Yes, he did convince Lincoln to act like a rich snob, telling him to disregard his family, but Lincoln did have the choice to not listen to Tetherby's toxic advice. But he did; really, it's kind of like how some depictions of the Devil have Satan tempt the person into sin, but it's ultimately that person's choice. The manager from "Cereal Offender?" Yes, he banned the Loud family from the store, but keep in mind that the sisters wrecked the store, so he does have some justification for doing that. The Bratty Kid that took the last box of Zombie Bran from Lincoln? A jerk? Yes, but he isn't evil. That nurse from "Old and the Restless?" Also not evil; a control freak, yes, but she is by no means wicked. Really, any time that a character acts like a jerk, they are being antagonistic. If you're really wanting to go further, you can make the argument that the Exterminator from "Along Came a Sister" is the only truly evil character in the series, but even then you could make the valid argument that he's just doing his profession. So overall, that's how I feel on this subject; none of the characters are evil. They can act antagonistic, but they don't act out of malice.

(To be continued)