Pairings You Hate

beatnikchick300

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I tend to think it's a little more nuanced than that. She's clearly screwed up and that does tend to warp some people's emotions. I never felt that Helga was entitled to Arnold so much as too screwed up to show her feelings. Which makes that pairing worse because she loves Arnold enough to have an obsessive stalker's shrine to him, yet doesn't care about him anywhere near as much as keeping her tough girl reputation. There are so many episodes where she had the chance to to tone herself down and actually be nice to Arnold. Not romantically, just be a decent human being. She purposely puts up these walls, alienates Arnold, and then soliloquizes over why she acts that way out of habit. She sabotages her relationships out of fear that being soft will make her overly vulnerable, yet hates that it drives Arnold away. It's all on her why Arnold doesn't like her.

So I hate the pairing too, but not so much for the "it's a cliche" so much for the fact that it was intended that Helga screwed herself up and now she has to deal with it by never being able to bond a good enough relationship with the only person she actually likes.
Yeah, and another thing about her sad backstory is that Arnold was...basically the first person to show her any kindness; I think that with that in mind, the fact that she treats him so poorly makes her look worse, not better. And even Phoebe, her best friend, shows her kindness and undying loyalty, and yet Helga treats her terribly (even with a "Pet the Dog" moment here and there, such as in "Phoebe Skips"; even so, it's generally not a good idea to treat your best friend like a manservant (woman servant? Girl servant? Eh, whatever).

It's hard to feel sorry for a character who treats those who show kindness to her like something she scraped off her show (Arnold and Phoebe, in another dimension, could be her full-time Morality Pets; the only people she does show genuine kindness to, even with her "tough girl" image, and as you said, that does happen at times, but not nearly enough).
 

Drtooth

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As someone who kinda has mild mental problems due to childhood traumas (none thankfully from my family), there is a tendency to fear rejection and building walls to prevent anyone from getting close enough to wind up losing. What I find fascinating about Helga is she takes that to a very unstable extreme. There are two schools of thought on her, either her backstory gives her the excuse to act the way she does or the way she acts is a direct result of her backstory. Either she's using troubles with her family to excuse her having to act tough or she's acting tough because she doesn't really know how to behave any other way.

I see her as a character teetering on the edge of sanity. If she can just confront these problems and work through them there's hope. But if she lets it consume her, she's got a rough life ahead. So either the character comes of sympathetic, pathetic, or a cautionary tale either way depending on how things are interpreted. Either way, mental problems like that on a kid's show are a bit dark. And I LOVE darkness in these things.
 

ReneeLouvier

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Gosh, normally I wouldn't be responding to these things, lol. But, here we go!

  • Pearl x Garnet
  • Pearl x Greg
  • Kermit x Denise
  • Scooter x ANYBODY (He's my man!)
  • Rosalina x anyone (she seems to be an unattached character honestly)
Can't think of anyone else as anti pairings.
 

Drtooth

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I can't believe this is a thing.... who am I kidding... OF COURSE it's a thing. I'm just annoyed by it. But the whole Penguins of Madagascar shipping of any combination of the 4 main characters is just... yugghhhh... And there IS art of that. But I especially hate the Skipper X Hans pairing. yeah, I get the whole Foe Yay thing, but all the artwork of them is all... like a gentle romance, and I really think that's wildly out of character. It's not that I by any means mind same gender pairings, but at least make them n character or make sense.

Besides, I find Skipper would be too...well... conservative to bend that way. And Rico's just too psycho to be paired up with anything besides that discarded plastic doll he always carries around.

(that said, I'd say Julien is either gay, bi or omnisexual, as far as the TV-averse is concerned but that's just me).
 

Ladywarrior

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tooth, julien is dating a dancing lady bear if you go by the movies. XD
 

Drtooth

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Well aware of that.

But the movies and TV shows (and Netflix series by extension) are some confused distance from each other. All Hail King Julien could be seen as connected to the movies where as Penguins of Madagascar the series is said to be an alternate universe.
 

Ladywarrior

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i can name another one i don't like rorschach x nite owl. for one rorascach hates sex and anything related to it and second he's confirmed asexual.
 

beatnikchick300

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I can't believe this is a thing.... who am I kidding... OF COURSE it's a thing. I'm just annoyed by it. But the whole Penguins of Madagascar shipping of any combination of the 4 main characters is just... yugghhhh... And there IS art of that. But I especially hate the Skipper X Hans pairing. yeah, I get the whole Foe Yay thing, but all the artwork of them is all... like a gentle romance, and I really think that's wildly out of character. It's not that I by any means mind same gender pairings, but at least make them n character or make sense.

Besides, I find Skipper would be too...well... conservative to bend that way. And Rico's just too psycho to be paired up with anything besides that discarded plastic doll he always carries around.

(that said, I'd say Julien is either gay, bi or omnisexual, as far as the TV-averse is concerned but that's just me).
I really hate most of the pairings of Penguins of Madagascar, but the one that annoys me the most is Skipper/Marlene; it seems like the only reason people ship them is that he's pretty much the main character (or the leader of the four main characters) and she's the only female character who regularly interacts with them (which annoys me, too, but this thread is not really the right place to discuss my undying hatred of the Smurfette Principle). But that's actually the main problem with a lot of ships of the characters from that show in particular; they all seem so forced, and not making any kind of sense. It's just shipping for the sake of shipping.
 

Ladywarrior

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any pairings involving micheal myers from the Halloween series. Also freddy x Jason.
 

Drtooth

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I really hate most of the pairings of Penguins of Madagascar, but the one that annoys me the most is Skipper/Marlene; it seems like the only reason people ship them is that he's pretty much the main character (or the leader of the four main characters) and she's the only female character who regularly interacts with them (which annoys me, too, but this thread is not really the right place to discuss my undying hatred of the Smurfette Principle). But that's actually the main problem with a lot of ships of the characters from that show in particular; they all seem so forced, and not making any kind of sense. It's just shipping for the sake of shipping.
Besides. Skipper doesn't even know how to play Spanish Guitar.

Seriously. Skipper X Hans the Puffin stuff is excessive. I get the whole "they hate each other so much that they must love each other" bit, but... there's dA pieces where they have a family and everything.

Really.
 
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