User blog:AustinDR/Is Lori A Bad Character?

Well, this was something that I didn't really expect to do. Originally, about a year and a half ago, I made a retrospect on Lori where I basically said while I didn't hate her, I ultimately found her kind of bland as she lacked any of the unique traits her sisters had, she was bossy, mean, and a control freak. However, with some of the later episodes, I found myself slowly drifting away from disliking her to actually kind of liking some aspects of her. While I still found her bland and slightly average, something eventually changed my mind.

To start with, Lori just rubbed me the wrong way because she can get downright vicious. The worst episode for her was definitely "Get the Message" where she flips out on Lincoln after he accidentally walked into her room. There is never a legitimate explanation for why she was acting spiteful; if Lincoln were to have, I don't know, broken anything in her room that was of value to her, then that'd make sense. Of course, I did make up an immature explanation in my mind for why she was acting cruel, but other than that, Lori literally had no reason to act like a jerk to Lincoln. I mean, I do love some privacy in my own room as much as the next guy, but I would never threaten to turn someone into a human pretzel for such a petty reason as that. That doesn't help her case when she deletes Lincoln's message stating that she has to deal with him on a daily basis, so she'd rather not respond to his messages on her phone. What the heck, Lori? What if something bad happened to Lincoln, and you refused to answer? I mean, geez, how more cold can she possibly be?

Skipping a rather obvious episode of the show that I hate with the passion of a thousand suns, let's get into Lori's attitude. Sometimes, Lori can be really egotistical and self-serving. In "Save the Date," she forces Lincoln on a double date with Bobby and Ronnie Anne, solely because Bobby broke up with her when he learned that Lincoln insulted her. Just that one scene where she's crying....my gawd. I was wanting to scream "SHUT UP!" at the top of my lungs when I saw this. I mean seriously. Lori is supposed to be the oldest, and yet here she is, having reverted to a crybaby. And then she starts throwing projectiles at Lincoln never mind the fact that he could get seriously hurt. While I love this episode, this episode made me come to a realization: if given the circumstance, Lori would most likely choose her boyfriend over her own flesh and blood. I don't know if the writers were intending that message, but it just struck a nerve with me so hard, I concluded that if Lincoln wasn't related to the family at all, she would have nothing to do with him. That bit of self interest is what made me despise Lori at that point. Really, Bobby doesn't deserve her: he's a nice guy. In fact, I'd rather he dated Leni - at the least, I'm sure that she wouldn't be motivated by self-servitude.

Really, in "Save the Date," I couldn't end up liking either Lori or Lincoln. Should I feel bad for Lincoln? I mean after all, he started the fiasco because he wanted to keep his school rep intact; that's almost as selfish as Lori's motivation for the double date. I'd totally understand that he did it because he didn't like getting teased, but when he finally began to bond with Ronnie Anne, he slips up and does it again. At that point, I couldn't like either character present. Oh, and then you get the satisfaction of hearing Lori cry again.

Other instances of Lori's self-serving nature is in "Driving Miss Hazy" where she deliberately sabotages Leni's chance at getting her driver's license. Now, many hated Lori in this episode because they somehow thought that she was trying to kill Leni when clearly she wasn't. Maybe she just thought she'd have a minor crash, and that'll be that. but of course, she doesn't think it through, at least until Lincoln points this out to her. At this point, Lori had gone down such a deep path, she became pathetic.

But that's what I like about her.

If anything, while I may not find her the most interesting out of the sisters, I can see where her motivations stem from: she's insecure about herself. Really think about it; all of her sisters have different quirks and talents, and what does she have? Other than golfing, not much. I see this as the reason as to why she takes her position as the oldest child in the family seriously...that's all she has. Really, because of that, she has this sense that she must be bossy as well as in control...if her position were to be challenged, she wouldn't be important anymore. That's the main reason as to why she did what she did in "Driving Miss Hazy;" she was worried that if Leni were to get her license, her services would no longer be needed. Sure, she did make requests to her siblings in return for driving them to wherever, but if one of her siblings learned how to drive, that system would crash and burn. Given her position in the family, Lori feels obligated to live up to the requirements predetermined for her, and if not, she will start to feel as though no one would need her for anything again.

Another thing I had noticed about Lori is that she strikes me as someone who wishes to grow up too fast. I should know: sometimes I work so hardly at a task, that some people often ignored me because I didn't have much of a humorous side. Well except the occasional snarking and deadpan sense of tone. It's not that I couldn't have fun; it's just that most people I interacted with didn't act their age. Anyway, one example of this is "Party Down." In that episode, Lori tries to throw an extravagant party for her and her friends, which goes as well as you'd might think. It's only until she started to hang out with her siblings that she actually was starting to have a good time. Another example is "Garage Banned" where she decides to move into the garage. It starts off well at first, but then she starts to realize that living by herself wasn't as cracked up as she'd thought it would be. She started to miss that sense of insanity in her life; while her siblings drive her crazy, it's what makes her life interesting. Really, the episode reminded me a lot of "Squidville" when I first saw it. Much like Lori, Squidward starts to miss his old life back at Bikini Bottom, because SpongeBob and Patrick gave his life purpose even though he gets irritated with them quite often. This also kind of goes back to that sense of obligation thing that I brought up earlier in how she actually started to miss doing minor tasks for her siblings.

Overall, those are my thoughts on Lori as of now. While she is average, I do like her because of how she is insecure because she feels that if the family no longer needs her, she has no further purpose, and how she tries too hard to be an adult when she should really enjoy the time she has left. Lori is a flawed character for sure, but that's what I love about her.