Ugly Betty:
I'm starting to see why this show was cancelled.
The characters are all paper thin and have almost no character development. I'm half way through season 3 and I'm getting fucking bored with them, their issues, and the subplots that are forgotten the very next episode.
Betty, the main character, for instance, is an idiot. Oh hey, I'm going to work as an assistant to the editor for a fashion magazine, despite not being fashion savvy, for two whole years. This magazine represents everything that ISN'T me, but I'm going to work here anyways because I'm an idiot. Only until sometimes spells out to Betty that by working in a fashion magazine, her writing credentials will be related only to fashion and that's not what her dream is and that her career is going nowhere. Instead of just getting a job at a place like the New York Post or something, she continues to try and fit a square into a circular hole. But noooooo, they can't do that, because after all, they've set up and developed these Mode characters, and just dropping them in favor for new scenery would alienate viewers, right? The problem with this is that the show continues on that same formula (ala Chuck, which is also feeling stale as fuck these days) without any change.
This is without mentioning that the show, while having interesting ideas, rarely takes them up. Here we are in a story that's revolved around the magazine industry, which is selling lower and lower each year, and rarely are these things brought up. It's just all glamor and it's so predictable. They have a lot of opportunities to relate modern events with the show's setting, but instead continuously bring up stupid drama or crappy rom com sub plots that are later completely forgotten. This was fine in the first two seasons, because the drama was good enough to back all of this up, but in the middle of season 3, almost no character has gone anywhere or truly evolved. I'd say Daniel has evolved the most, while Betty continues to be a fucking idiot (oh hey i'm going to move to manhattan even though i'm living on ramen). I actually enjoy almost every character on this show more than Betty, the title character. She is such a naive little princess that I can't help but hate/root her on at the same time.
