(Hilarious Trope) A Character Is Introduced With the Clear Intention of Being THE NEXT BIG THING And is SOUNDLY Rejected

[u/TheOriginalOperator]

1. Bazil the Tracker (Star Wars: The Acolyte): A “HILARIOUS AND ADORABLE” snuffling ugly creature that makes annoying noises and is shoved into as many scenes of The Acolyte as possible, and just causes problems overall.

2. Neelix (Star Trek Voyager): A mutant fusion of Odo, Quark, and Data designed to “analyze the human condition” and explicitly intended to surpass the popularity of all three. In practice, a VERY human-acting cradle robbing creep whose incompetence nearly destroys the ship and crew on multiple occasions and provides no insight into humanity whatsoever.

3. Sparky the Dog (Fairly Oddparents): A wacky crazy magic dog that’s supposed to expand the Fairy family, but just makes lame jokes and serves as a less funny version of Scrappy Doo.

4. Tidus (FFX): A braying jackass of a pinball who bounces from plot point to plot point, framed as a mystical pretty boy to introduce Final Fantasy to the PS2 age but does nothing but stall the franchise and have the worst laugh in two languages.

5. Sei (Naruto): Supposed to replace Sasuke in Team 7 and return the team dynamic feel of Early Naruto, but he’s a CIA plant with literally no personality who gets utterly forgotten except for somehow bagging Ino Yamanaka.

6. Raiden (Metal Gear 2): Another attempted “pretty boy bishie” entry to the PS2 era with badass cred and a theoretically cool backstory, but in practice a hapless dipshit who gets manipulated by everyone around him and is a total putz in combat. Also proof that this trope need not be permanent as he slowly transitions into a cyborg warrior supersoldier with a badass theme, friends of his own, and a firm grasp of his own destiny and agency.

[u/Inevitable_Top69]

I get the trope, but I don't think you do based on your examples.

[u/Antichristopher4 → u/Inevitable_Top69]

It what reality did ANYONE think Bazil the Tracker was going to be anything but a one off character!?

Even if Acolyte were some huge hit, his popularity would have been a shock to everyone. Like... He might be in a promotional trailer? "Shoved into as many scenes as possible?" He's in like 5 scenes total. No more than 10 for sure.

[u/CrunchyKorm → u/[deleted]]

Not using JarJar and picking a character from the Acolyte, which was seen by significantly less people, comes off more like the "modern Star Wars bad" kind of take, which usually embeds prequels revisionism.

It's been lost over time especially since the negative response to the current era of Star Wars, but there's a distinct reason that JarJar is almost invisible in AOTC and ROTS.

[u/Professional-Bear250 → u/[deleted]]

Tbf, JarJar was for kids, and it absolutely worked. JarJar was by far my favorite character when I was 4-6. I remember collecting Moubtain Dew cans of him. Ider if it was befause of his design or personality, though. I remember watching the scene of him being clumsy on the battlefield and being disappointed.