From the moment Cousin Oliver suddenly joined “The Brady Bunch” in 1974, television viewers have remained skeptical anytime a new cast member joins a show. Sometimes, a new character invigorates a series, like when Danny DeVito’s Frank Reynolds joined Season 2 of “Always Sunny,” but more often than not, the new character starts to feel like a Poochie.
Poochie was a short-lived character on “The Itchy & Scratchy Show,” a cartoon that exists within the world of “The Simpsons.” In one of “The Simpsons'” most meta storylines, the “Itchy & Scratchy” writers suddenly decide to add Poochie, a dog “with an attitude,” onto their show: Fans hate the new character so much that the writers kill him off by the end of the week.
“Poochie died on the way back to his home planet,” is now an iconic, oft-quoted line among “Simpsons” fans, but sadly not every real TV show with their own Poochie cut their losses so soon. This is a list of five characters who were incompetently added to a beloved TV show, all of whom stayed far past their welcome.
Scrappy-Doo (Scooby-Doo and Scrappy-Doo)
You’d think it’d be impossible for audiences to hate a puppy, and usually you’d be right. But the combative, loudmouthed Scrappy-Doo was so annoying, fans hoped the gang would abandon the pup on the side of the road. The “Scooby-Doo” writer who introduced the character, Mark Evanier, would later remark on his blog, “There are some folks out there who, given the choice of seeing the execution of Osama bin Laden or Scrappy-Doo, would opt for Scrappy and wonder why you even had to ask.”
The initial response to Scrappy was a bit more complicated at the time, however, than how “Scooby-Doo” fans today might remember it. Franchise creator Hanna-Barbera added Scrappy as a way to boost the show’s struggling ratings, and the gambit seemingly succeeded. The problem was less Scrappy himself and more how the show overdid it trying to cash in on his success. By the next season the show had completely dropped Fred, Daphne and Velma and recentered the whole series around Scrappy.
Today, Scrappy is far and away the most hated character in the franchise. In the 2000s, he was so disliked, James Gunn wrote him in as the secret villain of his live-action “Scooby-Doo” movie. The 2002 movie was not a hit with critics, but few of them complained about Scrappy being depicted in such a mean-spirited manner.
Adric (Doctor Who)
“Doctor Who” is a show that constantly switches up its cast. Not only is the titular character an alien who shapeshifts (and is thus played by a different actor every few seasons), there’s a revolving door of companions who typically stick around for one to three seasons. Fans often like to rank their most and least favorites, but there’s one that always seems to land at the bottom of the list: Adric (Matthew Waterhouse).
One of the show’s rare child companions, Adric is arrogant and condescending, and his actor is often accused by fans of giving a poor performance. For many Whooctor’s (Tom Baker’s) seven-year tenure, which is damning because the Fourth Doctor is easily the most esteemed Doctor in the show’s original run
Adric survived the Doctor’s transformation into the Fifth Doctor (Peter Davison), but was blown up in the Fifth Doctor’s first season. What was particularly disappointing is that Adric did show signs of growth; he could’ve had a great arc where he overcame his many flaws, but the show cut that story short. Without seeing the cool Adric that could’ve been, fans can only judge the annoying Adric that was.
Zoey Pierson (How I Met Your Mother)
Ted Mosby (Josh Radnor) <a href="https://www.tvline.com/2082921/how-i-met-your-mother-couples-ranked-worst-best/” rel=”nofollow noopener” target=”_blank”>has a lot of serious girlfriends in “How I Met Your Mother.” Fans liked most of his love interests (like Robin, Victoria, and Stella before Season 4), while others (such as Karen and Jeanette) were intentionally terrible. The odd one out is Zoey (Jennifer Morrison) in Season 6; she’s supposed to be someone the audience roots for, but she’s far more annoying than the writers intended.
Zoey spends the entire season actively trying to sabotage Ted’s career, all to save a building that she herself admits has become a total dump. The show tries to depict this conflict between them as a “good people can disagree” sort of dynamic, but no: This is an irreconcilable difference and it’s hard to believe that Ted ever thought this relationship could work.
Making her more frustrating is that by Season 6, fans were getting restless. Everyone’s patience for another one of Ted’s doomed romances was at an all-time low, and “HIMYM” spent nearly the entirety of Season 6 on this one. Later seasons of the show would happily point out that Ted and Zoey were a terrible couple, but that doesn’t make their Season 6 romance any more enjoyable. At least we got to meet the Captain (Kyle MacLachlan), so it wasn’t a total bust.
Kennedy (Buffy the Vampire Slayer)
The timing of Kennedy (Iyari Limon) joining the “Buffy” cast didn’t do her any favors. She appeared the first season after Willow’s (Alyson Hannigan’s) long-term love interest Tara (Amber Benson) died, which was also the final season. It was too soon for audiences to get on board with Tara’s replacement, and there was not nearly enough time left for Kennedy to win skeptical fans over.
It didn’t help that Kennedy and Willow lacked chemistry, and the way the writers wrote her (making her a younger, extra quippy version of Buffy) just came across as arrogant and off-putting. The episode where she and Willow start dating is so weak, it’s one of the most skippable “Buffy” episodes.
If there had been a Season 8, maybe fans would have changed their minds on Kennedy, similar to how audiences warmed up to Dawn (Michelle Trachtenberg) after her controversial sudden addition in Season 5. But with the show ending at Season 7, Kennedy is just a sour note at the end of another otherwise great show.
Randy Pearson (That ’70s Show)
Josh Meyers does a great Governor Gavin Newsom impression on “Jimmy Kimmel Live!”, but in 2005, he was not equipped to replace the lead of “That ’70s Show.” The show’s main character, Eric Forman (Topher Grace), left at the end of Season 7. All of a sudden, Meyers was introduced as Randy and basically took Eric’s place.
Not only is Randy’s instant popularity with the gang unconvincing, fans didn’t appreciate how he completely took over Eric’s life. Why is this stranger dating Eric’s long-time girlfriend and hanging out in his basement all day? The series tried hard to convince audiences that Randy was the coolest, most charming guy ever, but all it did was make him come off boring at best and insufferably smug at worst.
In a 2022 interview with the Quantum Leap podcast, Meyers actually acknowledged some of the fan backlash to his character. “I did the last season of ‘That ’70s Show’ that a lot of people really don’t like me because of,” he said. “[Fans] were like, ‘You stole Eric’s girlfriend,’ and I was like, ‘No, no, no, Topher Grace went to go be in ‘Spider-Man’ … I just got a job, like, Donna’s not a real person.”
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