echo Disclaimer: The content in this article is solely based on the writers’ personal opinions.
Have you ever had moments when watching a movie, and you realise that the bad guy is making more sense than the hero? Or when you are catching up to your favourite Netflix series, and you can’t help but realise that the protagonist is becoming more unlikeable with each episode. Echo is going to cover our top heroes and villains in this article, and also share our most hated ones. We each have our own opinions, of course, so don’t get too offended or disappointed if your favourite hero ends up with a ‘nay’ rating!
Yay—– Howl Pendragon (Howl’s Moving Castle, 2004)
The first character to have the honour of receiving our very first yay rating would have to be the Japanese character, Howl from Howl’s Moving Castle!
This movie explores a world ripe with magic, where a young girl Sophie lives. After a misunderstanding with a witch aged her greatly, she would stay with Howl and eventually share many experiences together, before they fall in love. Howl is exuberant and dramatic, but at the same time, kind and charismatic. A large portion of the film takes great care in exploring the dynamics of Howl and Sophie, and the movie heavily invests in the bond the two share and grow over time. Fans and watchers around the world, Japanese and non-Japanese alike, adore and worship Howl (seriously, check out his fanart), not only for his looks; though they do play a large part, but also for how he is. First off, Howl is quite literally the peak representation of a person transitioning into adulthood. The embodiment of someone in their late teens to early twenties. He does dumb stuff, falls in love, can be vain and selfish, has emotional breakdowns and occasionally makes smart choices. He hasn’t figured himself out yet. This, and the fact that he is a wizard. I mean, who doesn’t like a good wizard!
Howl’s character strikes a perfect chord among audiences: he is just the right balance of mystery and pure-heartedness, such that his flaws turn into appeals. As the movie progresses, Sophie too helps him overcome these flaws.
(TLDR, Beauty and the Beast, but the Beast is hot)
Yay—The T-800 (The Terminator, 1984)
The honour of receiving our second yay rating would have to be given to the Terminator, played by Arnold Schwarzenegger!
It is not difficult to claim that The Terminator has been one of the most influential movies to date, and has brought rise internationally to one of the highly regarded actors in the film world. Arnold plays as a cybernetically enhanced android sent from the far future to eliminate a lady who would birth a potentially AI-destroying rebel (a very long story). As a quick summary, the Terminator is an android sent from the far future to kill Sarah Conner, while Kyle Reese, a human from the future too, tries to stop him. In the first movie of the franchise, Arnold plays a stone-cold killer with zero remorse or hesitation, his only goal and motivation is to track and hunt down his target. His acting was near perfect in this movie, flawlessly playing out his role as an antagonist and putting out one simple message: you can run, but you can’t hide. The Terminator wastes no scenes and movements: every action, every word he says is stiff and calculated.
Personally, I feel one of the reasons why the Terminator feels so imposing is simply because of Arnold’s influence. Not accounting for his imposing demeanour, Arnold is most well known for his past wrestling days and movies as the hero. He is NOT a man known for failure. Thus, seeing him play as an indestructible machine of death against humans raises the stakes incredibly high as well. Anything can and will happen. Nowhere is safe from his cold, metal hands.
Yay—Lady Eboshi (Princess Mononoke, 1997)
Bringing the grand total of Studio Ghibli characters focused on in this review to two, Lady Eboshi is a very different beast from Howl. From her looks to her role in the story, you’d be hard-pressed to find any overlap between them. Nonetheless, she manages to be magnificent in her own right as both a nuanced character and a villain.
If you’ve seen it yourself, you’ll know that Princess Mononoke is a film very concerned with grey moralities. The film is set in one busy corner of a vast, primaeval forest, thriving with spiritual life. Gods– lowercase gods, to be clear– roam among the trees as giant white wolves and enormous boars. They, along with the other animals, are the forest’s original inhabitants. But they are by no means its only ones.
Human civilization has been growing, advancing, and destroying the land of the forest to make room for their factories and homes. With every felled tree and murdered animal, the spirit life of the forest weakens, nature fading away as mankind conquers the land.
The animals and spirits of the forest are intelligent, cunning, and determined to defend their homes, even if they aren’t united in their philosophies of how to go about resisting the encroaching human development. Wolves assault their supply lines and boars stampede their construction sites. It would take a strong leader indeed to organise against the combined efforts of the forest’s original denizens.
Enter Lady Eboshi.
When our protagonist, Ashitaka, stumbles upon her fortress settlement of Iron Town, it becomes clear quickly that the main reason the humans have been doing well is the leadership of one very ambitious lady. Lady Eboshi is as sharp as she looks, making sure her town is both profitable and well protected. She personally ventures out on supply runs with the guards and packmen under her, directing her riflemen with military efficiency when they’re ambushed by the previously mentioned white wolves.
She’s coldly pragmatic, but not without any warmth. She makes hard calls in tough situations, but she’s no dictator. She genuinely cares for her people, and arguably has done no wrong in her actions. The forest may perish due to her efforts, but so what? Is it really such a bad thing for humans to stake a claim on the wealth of resources the forest has to offer? She’s not a monster. She doesn’t delight in the death of animals—aside from an unwise obsession with hunting down the Great Forest Spirit, who’s considered the true God of the forest, but that’s a long story—and she only means the best for her people. She’s a villain only in the eyes of the spirits and creatures of the forest, which Ashitaka is aligned with due to his personal beliefs.
Lady Eboshi is a fantastic presence onscreen, single-handedly twisting the thematic conflict of the film from a simple ‘Nature Good, Humans Bad’ narrative to a more nuanced, more interesting meditation on mankind’s relationship with nature and violence. She’s intimidatingly good-looking, well-spoken, and also has the combat capabilities to throw down with San, the feral wolf-girl who serves as the film’s deuteragonist! She’s the whole package—strongly motivated, well-dressed, and great with a katana.
Lady Eboshi pictured here throwing hands with a feral teenage girl raised by wolf-gods
Nay—Chun (Big Fish And Begonia, 2016)
Moving on to the nay ratings, our first nominee is from an obscure animated movie containing breathtaking illustrations that are brought to life by fluid animations. Although the movie definitely catches your eyes with its wanderlust scenes and vivid colours, the storyline, on the other hand, is like night and day. Introducing the core reason why the movie is deemed as fruitless: our character ‘Chun’ from ‘Big Fish & Begonia’.
A harmless non-human ‘girl’ gets to see the magnificent world of humans in the form of a red dolphin for a week. She then encounters a human which saved her from fishing nets, however he drowns while doing so. Chun then bargains with the Soul keeper who exchanged half of Chun’s life for the resurrection of the boy, Kun, in dolphin form. Chun takes Kun back into her mystical realm to care for him before he can become human again. Doing so brought dire consequences to her world, erupting phenomenons never experienced. Due to Chun’s actions and strong-headedness, she led her family and friends to danger and death.
Chun’s selfish and irresponsible ways not only irked audiences but evoked hatred towards the film that heated reviews were left online. Chun showed no remorse and mercy towards her fellow peers which further amplified our anger. The 2016 film was way ahead of its time for visuals but the lack of character development and, frankly, personality from Chun had led the movie to its demise. This film is definitely not worth anyone’s 1 hour and 45 minutes unless you could care less about the plot. We certainly aren’t up for rewatching this movie!
Nay—Myne (The Rising of the Shield Hero, 2019-present)
Our last nay rating for the day would be the infamous anime character: Myne. Or also canonically referred to as the slur ‘Bi***’. Originating from the popular anime ‘The Rising of the Shield hero’, she is one of the most hated characters in the anime world. Myne is a great representation of the idiom ‘a wolf in sheep’s clothing’. At first, she appears like an innocent doll; emerald-green eyes and soft facial features. She’s every man’s ideal woman. Except, beauty can only conceal a person’s identity so far before their true nature starts to reveal itself.
Betrayal is Myne’s middle name. She wrongly accused our protagonist of sexual assault after him caring for her. She continuously spread lies and self-victimised herself by crying ‘crocodile tears’ to garner supporters. Throughout the episodes, our frustrations grew by a notch. Finally, when she was confronted with solid evidence, she still had the nerve to lie in other character’s faces — a futile attempt at gaslighting. The anime perfectly captures annoyance into a single character and we must applaud the creators. It is a great ability to be able to evoke such anger within us and other audiences.
Therefore if you need an anime to make you feel something other than a good cry, this is the one for you. But if you have high blood pressure and cannot tolerate anymore irritation from reality, it is better to pass on this show.
All in all, these are our own personal ratings and opinions of characters that we love and hate. Nothing should be taken for granted, nor as an insult, as these are all in good fun. And if you haven’t checked out the movies above, feel free to do so! Whether to just watch and enjoy, or to just trash talk with friends, the world is your oyster.
Written by: Junn Yin, Scarlett, & Ryan
Edited by: Tisyha
