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Originally Posted by CliffFletcher
I’d go beyond “isn’t that compelling of a character.” As written this season, Ellie is one of the most unlikeable protagonists in popular streaming. Her sneering, reckless, tough-talking schtick just comes across as dumb and annoying. I guess they’re trying to make her super teenage-y. But everyone in my household - including my teenaged kids - hates the character. And the cringe dialogue she has to voice exposes Bella Ramsey’s limitations as an actress.
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Yeah, I just cruised through the last two episodes myself and it’s only gotten worse. The combination of her limitations as an actress and the writing is just hard to stomach and I find myself checking out whenever she’s speaking. Catherine O’Hara’s (her character) reaction to Ellie felt like it was bordering on the self aware: we get it, you’re so tough and clever, everyone else is the problem.
Then when she’s walking out, you could tell “OK, this is all you, this is the emotional reveal, Ellie is actually struggling and broken, show it” (which was obvious anyway) and Bella just did absolutely nothing with it.
I thought the scene with Joe’s jacket was bordering on something, but then the table cookie scene just wiped that and brought us back to cringe writing/bad dialogue and limited acting chops.
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Originally Posted by TrentCrimmIndependent
This season I keep thinking "what does she see in her?" around Dina's undying love for this character who's shown few if any redeeming qualities from what we've seen of them together.
Ramsay's Ellie worked a lot better in season 1. May have to watch and compare to figure out why that is. I'm going to guess it's because she shared the screen with Pedro/Joel most of the time and they balanced each other out.
It's no disdain for the actress either as she was wonderful in GOT. But perhaps in this case the casting was a miss.
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The sex scene after Dina’s been holding a gun on her while she’s sleeping was so abrupt and bizarre that I laughed out loud. The dialogue after was nonsensical and felt like the writers trying to explain why that happened and why their relationship made sense.
Ellie works well in season one because she has Joel. It’s their relationship that works, and it works because we’re given a strong why (Joel lost his daughter, and she is effectively a replacement) and then a build over the season that makes the relationship stand on its own. And there’s a clear distinction between them. Ellie’s role and personality makes sense as does Joel’s.
But now Ellie is playing that “leader of the pack” kind of role and it doesn’t make sense. There’s no season 1 Ellie to balance her or show her humanity. Dina is supposed to be that kind of? But it actually makes no sense why Dina isn’t the lead, she’s smarter, tougher and older/more experienced.
We’re basically stuck watching an emotion teenager with zero self awareness and a huge ego play tough. It’s exhausting.
I’ll finish the season but I’m hoping for a lot more of basically every other character. The scenes without Ellie or even just the ones where she isn’t doing the most talking have been the most interesting.