1. Alice in Wonderland/Through the Looking Glass ~ can't believe no one guessed this one ~ though i stand corrected that technically there is only one rabbit in the Alice books. My favorite character is The March Hare, whose name is "Hatta" (how many of you didn't know The March Hare has a name!) ~ It might be an odd character to choose, but I always loved him because he was crazy, but sort of 2nd Lieutenant to The Mad Hatter (whose name is "Heigha"). I always felt Hatta was an underappreciated character, and of course, much abused by the Queen of Hearts. While he plays only a small role in both books, he especially shines in Through the Looking Glass ~ i took his moniker in the LL forum for the first year that we were up and running.
2. Les Miserables ~ annabellissima got this one right: Eponine ~ of all the "miserables" I always felt she suffered the most. even valjean had happy moments and died a peaceful death. eponine was too good for silly marius and had such awful parents! i always swore i would write a book in her honor to even the score. again, my number 2 would be javert because i think he may well be one of the most brilliantly written characters in literature ~ ever.
3. Narnia ~ psalm23 got this one right: Aslan ~ too easy! i'm a leo. ha ~ ! I was deeply traumatized as a child when the White Queen tortured and killed Aslan ~ his sacrafice had an indelible impact on me.
4. The Marvel Universe ~ Johnny Blaze/Zarathos a.k.a. The Ghost Rider. Not only was he a self-sacrificing kid who made bad choices trying to save his adoptive father and, through a pact with the devil gone awry, turned into a flaming skull-headed "spirit of vengeance", but man, he rode a cooooool flaming chopper. i spent much of my childhood learning how to draw motorcycles. for my birthday more recently, my brother bought me an autographed original page of Ghost Rider art by Ploog ~ it's my favorite picture ever from the entire series (what are the chances with 81 issues out there?) Ploog even wrote Happy Birthday on it.
: D
p.s. the revised 90s version with dan ketch as the "new" Ghost Rider, an unsympathetic monster of a character, basically sealed my Marvel Universe boycott. yuck ~ what trash.
5. The Original Star Wars Trilogy ~ magdalene74 got this one: Darth Vader ~ how can you not love this guy? after three films of evil incarnate, he's redeemed in the end by his love for his son ~ that's pretty potent stuff! not to mention he's just really cool.
6. HBO's Deadwood (any watchers out there?) ~ guess no one watches this! probably for the best ~ hahahahaha. brad dourif is brilliant as Doc Cochran (who is my favorite character), a convicted medical body-snatcher, former army doctor, suffering from post-traumatic stress. Sadly underused in the series, but worth listening to everyone else cuss every other word just to see him for five minutes. he's the only moral center of the show and just wonderful. i think it's love.
7. Watership Down (is this too obscure?) ~ Blackavar and Blackberry are my 2nd and 3rd place characters respectively, but the number one slot goes to Captain Holly: bad guy turned good after being tortured by the Sandleford owsla. i loved this character so much i based a character on him in my Civil War trilogy named (wait for it...) Captain Holly! interestingly, aside from sharing a name, the two characters have absolutely nothing in common. not sure how that happened. ah well, the homage stands.
8. Final Fantasy Unlimited (the series) ~ not my favorite anime, but it certainly was fun to work on (and paid for my Wacom tablet ~ ha!) ~ though i don't usually like the silent loner, i thought the design on Kaze was pretty cool, so i pick him, even though he had the worst lines. his backstory of losing his sister added a nice tragic, tormented quality.
9. Alan Moore's From Hell (or Rumblelow's Casebook for Jack the Ripper) ~ no one plays Hunt the Ripper, huh? and i guess i've managed to refrain from yapping on the subject or else it would be very obvious that i have a rather purient passion for Prince Eddy, the Duke of Clarence. i think alan moore does a nice job capturing his waffly, confused naivete in the series. i'll spare you all the grisley details, but suffice it to say, i have a whole shelf on my bookcase dedicated to ripperology and the royal family and at the height of my Jack the Ripper years (long long ago), i purchased an actual portrait of him from a seller in new zealand and it hangs in my office. yeah ~ skeery. just to clarify, i don't actually think he was jack the ripper. it's just a game i amuse myself with. my first novel, an amazing piece of drek, was a Hunt the Ripper novel with Prince Eddy at the center in a bizarre way.
lemme alone, i know i was a weird kid ~ hahahahahaha. i'm feeling much better now.
10. Star Trek (the original series) ~ baranoouji got this one right: Mr. Spock ~ must be those ears. He always got the most sympathetic storylines too ~ getting shot, bit by the pancake monsters, losing his brain, the whole mating ritual thing, antagonism with his sick father, and ultimately getting killed in the second movie. you gotta feel for the guy.
~ ~ ~
there you have it ~ !
thank you all for playing!
: D
