I'm anti-Daria
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Archived from the IMDb Discussion Forums — Daria
reddragonhero17 — 11 years ago(November 16, 2014 02:14 PM)
The idea behind this show of high school life sounded interesting to me at first, but as I watched it, I'm glad I didn't really follow it. Why? I find the whole premise joyless, cold-hearted, and implausible. First of all the idea of a show centering on a teenager with attitude problems is not my idea of entertainment (and that this show completely glorifies it makes it even worse). In fact one episode in particular that hits a brand new low in bad example for young people is the episode "Ill" where the protagonist declares her parents as "less than stellar". What a "great" message to give to teens. Even worse, she spends the majority of the time complaining how things aren't to her "standards" which she believes gives her the right to treat almost everyone around her (including her own family members) like garbage makes it all the more joyless to watch. I had more fun and reminiscing with Saved by the Bell or even Boy Meets World which did show the ups and downs of high school, but with a sense of jovialness. Finally the idea of the minor characters (all of which I find dreadfully unfunny) all with startling stupidity is downright implausible (animated or not). If those students were really that dumb, they wouldn't have even made it to high school in the first place. As for the "condescending" teachers, I seriously doubt that would be realistic today. I can't identify with anything in this show since I was probably "lucky" or the high school I went to was actually a haven other than the usual things: narcissistic students, back and forth relationships, and bullying.
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Madam_Persephone — 11 years ago(November 28, 2014 06:37 PM)
I'm thinking you missed the part where everything is exaggerated. Lame teachers, clueless students, Daria's lack of esteem for everyone. It's the seed of the humor and it isn't for everyone. Still, I think the point of the entire show flew so above your head you didn't even know you missed it.
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reddragonhero17 — 11 years ago(November 28, 2014 07:22 PM)
Even if it was exaggerated, I still couldn't identify with it. I'm very selective of what I watch, since a lot of what gets shown is like a real life version of the Mirror of Erised, where it shows you what you want or what you make of life, but unfortunately, it can't really give knowledge or truth, instead one waists away and their sanity declines. As Albus Dumbledore told Harry Potter, "It does not do to dwell on dreams and forget to live". There are some things in this world one should not be laughing at and if I did something like that I'd be automatically ashamed of myself. Deliberate Cruelty to others whether physically or verbally is something I find to frown upon. Daria's selfish demeanor is something I see no reason to laugh at. As a matter of fact selfishness is a virus that's a serious issue in this world and I'm afraid this show is only fuel if not the spark to this virus. My advice is if you want respect from others you take the heat whether you like it or not. Expression of displeasure is normal but someone who finds virtually no joy in the world, what kind of entertainment is that really?
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RockinRickyRialto — 11 years ago(November 30, 2014 11:57 PM)
As a matter of fact selfishness is a virus that's a serious issue in this world
I would not call Daria selfish. Withdrawn, yes; bitter, certainly; but not selfish. There are plenty of episodes like Is It Fall Yet, where she tries to reach out to a troubled kid, that show that she does have a heart and a good set of morals. She's just stuck in a situation where she feels unappreciated for her talents and a bit bored, something many people who are or were in high school can relate to.
Besides which, a running theme in the final two seasons is that her introversion can actually be damaging and shuts her off from good things happening.
Talyn! You're fahrbot! -
haunt_freak — 11 years ago(March 31, 2015 07:37 PM)
Watch the episode "Boxing Daria".
ARE YOU A PARTY ANIMAL?
http://www.facebook.com/business.trip.film -
cmmosher — 11 years ago(December 12, 2014 10:32 AM)
I had a less then stellar time in highschool so I can relate more to the show. The show was airing on tv during the my last few years at highschool so I was experiencing the show while viewing life from the exaggerated reality of a teenager. Highschool was a suffocating time for me but I got over that and over my persecution complex. Daria working through her own problems was part of Daria's later series arc.
Also I think you missed the point of ill. Yes Daria realizes her parents aren't the best but she also understands that they still care for her and want the best for her. I don't know how your home life was but most people I know did not have perfect families and coming to terms with this is part of growing into adulthood. -
reddragonhero17 — 11 years ago(December 12, 2014 06:31 PM)
Well mine was not the best either, but still it's just inexcusable to treat your parents or siblings like garbage. In fact, this made me think of an episode of Supernanny where the eldest daughter of the family had a "Daria" attitude, only a little bit worse, she even said she wished her mother would die. Unlike the exaggerated Daria, the true reason behind her attitude (if not justifiable) was because her mother married and paid more attention to the younger new members of the family and thus felt like she was being pushed to the side. True becoming an adult is painful, but sooner or later one needs to show some maturity and apologize to whom they treated with disdain unjustly.
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yonskii — 11 years ago(December 13, 2014 01:09 AM)
I don't think you watched enough of the show. Daria never really treats her family like garbage. In fact she is shown to sacrifice a lot for them and shows true concern for their well-being. She is also shown to be friendly to every other student except the Fashion Club, and that is just because they are exaggerated versions of stuck-up popular girls.
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cmmosher — 11 years ago(December 14, 2014 07:00 AM)
after reading your post I pulled out my Daria set and watched a few episodes (ill was one of them) and like the other poster who's responed said Daria doesn't out right hate anyone. One of the better aspects of the series is that eventually Daria eventually makes few less then moral choices and the show through Jane calls Daria out on this and as a result Daria is forced to soften on how she views other. Also Daria is often shown as missing out on life because of her feelings of moral superiority and that she would get more out of life if she accepted others more. It's also my preference to have morally flawed characters so this show is my speed more then something like Boy Meets World which I enjoyed back in the day but I don't have a desire to revisit like I do Daria.
I can understand that not everyone will like the show but I just don't think your veiws of the show take all aspects of Daria character arc through the series into account. There are subtleties in the show that address that your issues but I would not ask someone to sit through 5 seasons and two specials just pick up on these. -
reddragonhero17 — 11 years ago(December 14, 2014 11:00 AM)
Alright, maybe I did miss some growing up aspects, but that still doesn't change my opinion on this. Especially when Daria and Jane did the "Look back in Annoyance", it almost looks like they carried the same negative attitude, and that's the reason I can't support this show. On the other hand, what you guys did mention made me think of some movie of high school, "The Breakfast Club" where everyone confesses their own weaknesses and insecurities. But to totally top it all off (I know I'm going off a bit, but this is relevant) one episode from "The Real Ghostbusters" (Ragnarok and Roll) gave this great message of dealing with life's hardship's during its climax where one character admonishes his friend for nearly destroying the world:
"You've thrown everything away because the world hurt you. Well look at me, yes I'm small, I'm twisted, and I'm ugly, but at least I'm still human. Nobody ever said the world was an easy place, nobody ever said you wouldn't be hurt. If you weren't sufficiently loved it's your own fault not the world's!" -
cmmosher — 11 years ago(December 14, 2014 03:38 PM)
Cheers for the Ghostbusters reference, its a much better show then one would expect a movie spin-off should be. But I looked up the episode you brought and I would argue there is a difference between being an arrogant teenager who feels that they are above the suburban world and the Ghostbusters character who tries to bring about the apocalypse because of a broken heart.
Anyways different people have different tastes and I completely understand that Daria isn't the show for show for everyone.
Spoilers
Incidentally the show's final episode does have Daria and her parents acknowledge that Daria has been a difficult child to raise but they also say how important they are to each other. I like the show because it deals with the fact that life isn't always prefect and that sometimes even our hero isn't always perfect. -
bravelikethelion — 11 years ago(December 29, 2014 04:24 PM)
I get that Daria's attitude can rub some the wrong way, but for what it is worth, her exaggerated aloofness and "am too smart for this" boredom were called out at times. She wasn't presented as always being right all the time, just like even the Britney's, Kevin's, and Fashion club people of the show were given human/likable qualities at times. Since the show is basically from her point of view, it is going to have that teenage sardonic, outcast feel to it. So if that doesn't float one's boat, you may not like the show.
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blondiebear_17 — 11 years ago(December 30, 2014 07:31 PM)
You had to kind of be one of those angry outsiders in high school to get it I guess. I mean obviously Daria is very defensive judgmental and kind of rude but she has a lot of reason to be given her environment and the people around her. Daria is never painted as perfect herself people constantly call her out on her crap when she is being hypocritical Jane her mom Jodie Tom and even Quinn and Brittany can be really inciteful sometimes when it comes to enlightening Daria on how she can be wrong about stuff. Daria is just refreshing because I think it does a good job of showing what it is like when you are not quite like all the other kids your age and how that can make you come off as a little bitter and jaded. I mean at that age lots of kids think they are smarter than everyone else and that nobody gets them so I can see how this might irritate you but for some people it's real. I think even with how exaggerated the characters are and it being animated that Daria is about 1000xs more realistic than Saved By The Bell or Boy Meets World. I liked BMW as a kid but it was too campy for me to take too seriously as an adult and SBTB is basically a Saturday morning cartoon. I relish in Daria's indifference to the people around her but that is because when I was in high school I felt like everything was way too political.
RIP Cory Monteith your fans miss you dearly -
reddragonhero17 — 11 years ago(January 02, 2015 06:25 PM)
You raise some good points how some teens gather that superiority complex issues and that's what rubbed me the wrong way about this show. I wasn't exactly and angry outsider, I did have some friends that I hung out with both in and out of school but I was a little disappointed more with the freshman than the seniors. Of course no student has ever had that "perfect" high school life and mine was no exception (bad grades, demanding sports, parental pressures and bullying the last one was the biggest). I can give Daria some good points however that a least she never bullied and the Scholarship report and graduation speech did exactly make me not completely dislike her or the show, it just still couldn't get me to become relatable to it nor a fan.
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blondiebear_17 — 11 years ago(January 03, 2015 09:23 AM)
Yeah, that sort of superiority complex does bug people which is why people hate characters like Juno Maguffin and April Ludgate too although Daria is not putting on as obnoxious or immature a front as them. It is an act as much as it is real. Daria uses apathy and snark as a defense mechanism to keep from getting hurt. Daria herself has said more or less on many occasion that she rejects people before they have a chance to reject her. You really get to see how vulnerable Daria can be near the end in Boxing Daria when you see flashbacks of her childhood. Daria was withdrawn when she was a kid because she couldn't understand the other kids or get along with them because she liked reading on higher levels and not the games that they did. She had to go to counseling and her parents really butted heads on how to approach it and it caused fights between them because this added more stress to their workload at the time they were both working really hard to provide for Quinn and Daria I am guessing that kind of thing can be traumatic for a kid. Daria started to retreat into her own world by crawling into a refrigerator box in her room. By the end of it I was glad that Daria realized she needed to appreciate her parents more and that she had been oblivious to their feelings and ungrateful for a long time. Wish the moment had been even bigger but I guess they didn't want the episode to get too wishy washy. I am actually okay with Daria just being a smarter than everyone else snob but she has a lot of different dimensions to her.
RIP Cory Monteith your fans miss you dearly -
bravelikethelion — 11 years ago(January 04, 2015 09:55 AM)
You know, I rewatched Boxing Daria and I was really impressed how they tackled the issues of Daria's apathy and isolation. Considering the show was originally such a broad satire on high school and the suburbs, it really grew in to a nuanced, insightful show. I like that nobody in that episode was either the good or bad guy, and we really got to see that, at their best, Daria's parents truly loved her and learned to accept her (while still trying to encourage her to spread her wings and learn from her mistakes). I think this would be a good episode to see for people who are turned off by early Daria's more cynical undertone.
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TRhett — 9 years ago(April 27, 2016 08:30 PM)
it really grew into a nuanced, insightful show.
Yes, it did. Let's face it - high school is an easy target, so satirization of high school has to be REALLY sharp (Buffy springs to mind), or it falls flat. Like most broad satires, it took them a while to find the right "balance" for this show. By now, everybody knows that animation is a double-edged sword . . . it allows for greater absurdity and humorous exaggeration, but it can also make it easy to go too far with the characterizations and situations. Personally, I thought this was a GREAT show (and I was about as far as you can get from being a high school "outsider"), but I can certainly see why it wouldn't be to everyone's taste (like King of the Hill). After reading some of these comments, it became obvious that a LOT of people either missed the point entirely, were "rubbed the wrong way" by the characters (but apparently weren't by Beavis or Butthead???), or just didn't want to see it (in which case, why bother watching?). I saw a comment somewhere about what this show would be like if it were done today. That WOULD be interesting . . . seeing as how critics wet their pants at every TV show about an "outcast" of some sort today (I thought if I read one more thing about how monumentally, stupendously brilliant "Breaking Bad" was, I was going to lose it). -
Daria_McCloud — 9 years ago(July 28, 2016 03:52 PM)
Daria uses apathy and snark as a defense mechanism to keep from getting hurt. Daria herself has said more or less on many occasion that she rejects people before they have a chance to reject her.
I was like that in high school. Not as snarky as Daria, but I did tend to keep my distance from others out of fear that I would get screwed over if I let my guard down. I'm still like that sometimes, actually quite a bit, and my teenage years are way, way behind me. -
Caffeine-Free — 11 years ago(January 04, 2015 10:29 PM)
I struggle with this thread because it's clear you did not stick with it long enough. If you were to watch the entire series, including the movies, you would see that Daria is not portrayed to be a hero and her initial outlook is not totally celebrated at the end. There are many consequences to her attitudes and some bad choices, and a lot of growth with her character as she makes mistakes and as her friends and family call her out for her rigid, unattainable and sometimes hypocritical perspectives on life. Ultimately she softens a lot to the people around her. She maintains her individuality but without some of the pride she had before that made her so surly.
She just doesn't like highschool, and the system of their school which rewarded airheads and patronized and ostracized smart kids. The principal is totally shady and corrupt, and all of her teachers are unstable though some are well-meaning. I think she respects that but overall they're not really adept at teaching and guiding the students, something that is not unusual to a public school and to a good student like Daria would be a natural frustration. She doesn't like pop culture, mass media, etc. for its devastating influence on youth, which is totally valid and gotten even worse since Daria's time on the air.
There is a lot of substance when you go through it from start to finish. The thing you note about her family are addressed and she is humbled in one classic, moving episode to remember and realize that she was a difficult child to raise with her antisocial behavior and appreciates how her parents stood by her. How they allowed her to be who she is but she realizes she took her cynicism and bitterness toward them too far. Daria and Helen (her mom) have several moments where they grow closer as Daria finds she needs her valuable counsel and support, and Jake is her dad who is a basketcase due to having an abusive father and passive mother, but Daria and him bond too because in some ways they are really similar characters where things are always going awry for them. They really help each other out in a few episodes and those are touching episodes. Her sister she struggles with early on because she knows that Quinn is a good and smart person, but allows her shallow, peer pressuring friends to control her, which of course Daria does not believe in. But eventually I feel she understands Quinn more, and they also learn from each other. Quinn too has a very substantial story of growing up.
If it isn't your sense of humor or just not your thing, no problem. But again, if you really watch it start to finish you may see that it was done really, really well in how the characters and tone progress.