Total Drama Island: A Honest Opinion on Mike and Zoey

Akira500 wrote:

air30002 buddy, I completely agree on your opinion.

If for any reason there's any lingering doubt of just how disillusioned I have become with these two characters, then I hope their inclusion finally serves to put a swift end to that.

Yes, as I'm sure most have caught on in the past year, I now heavily dislike Mike and Zoey, the two characters who have been the most widely blamed for the downfall of the Total Drama series, and by all accounts it's for a very many VERY good reasons.

You really don't need to be a hardcore fan of this series to understand why these two are easily the most controversial characters in the entire franchise as of late. Introduced as part of the second cast during Revenge of the Island, during a time when the show was beginning to receive accusations of drifting away from its original tone and premise, Mike and Zoey were the main love interests focused on for that entire season. What do we know about them? Well, that Zoey is a lonely Indie Chick who despite being labeled as such seems to have no trouble making friends nor really shows much of her Indie traits anywhere onscreen. As for Mike, we know he suffers from Multiple Personality Disorder and signed up for the show against warnings not to, and that somewhere along the line literally all of his personality went over to his many alter-egos rather than to himself. And right off the bat, these two are head over heels in love as if they've been soul mates for life........And that's where any story of and between these two comes to a stop.

Between Revenge and All-Stars, these two spend the vast majority of their time not so much focused on the competition, but instead on preserving their romantic bond, a struggle that seems to surface in every little thing they do. Clearly just a cheap scam to sucker in younger viewers in keeping with the childish tone the show has recently been slammed for, Mike and Zoey become the primary focus of the series for two straight seasons, where their entire schtick is your tired and drawn out "Are they going to get together?" lovesick drama. After spending an entire season of playing his REAL-LIFE disorder for laughs and comedy with the plot demanding Zoey be too mind-numbingly naive to understand that Mike's got more going on than meets the eye, these two finally DO get together well before the season even ends. That would've been fine enough on its own, and that really should've been the end of it.

And then came along Total Drama All-Stars, aka "The Mal and Zoey Show".

The worst season of Total Drama and one of the worst animated series PERIOD owes a lot of its failure to the desire to repeat the entire romantic arc between these two word for word in a connect-the-dots fashion that slugs forth for the entire season once again. Instead of focusing on other returning characters or giving early boots in Revenge a second chance to shine, we get more of the same lovesick drama as Mike is now corrupted by Mal and essentially becomes dead weight to the entire season, and yet continues to be the main focus as we get tons of ridiculous scenes of him wandering imprisoned inside his mind in yet ANOTHER pathetic homage to Lord of the Rings, as well as Mal being playing up as the ultimate demon from Hell when in reality the most he does is break people's things and cake an extra helping of mousse into his hair. Through the entire scene, we get a bullshit buildup over how dastardly and evil Mal is when in actuality he's simply getting by through the power of plot contrivance, with every contestant new and old going down in increasingly ludicrous and stupefying ways just to edge him further to the finish as apparently nobody is smart enough to notice that this supposed nice guy is behaving like a fucking lunatic. All of this just contributes to his uselessness as a character and how much of a crappy villain Mal truly is, and only serves to further accelerate the ongoing virus of character derailment that has become a bloody and scarred staple of the series.

Worse yet, Zoey spends the entire season completely clueless to her own boyfriend's problem, apparently forgetting about his struggles with his disorder completely and instantly forgetting as many as a dozen warnings that Mike is *GASP* not himself. If her stupidity wasn't enough, it somehow does not prevent her from winning literally half the challenges in the season without breaking a sweat, setting a new winning streak that not even hardened and strategic competitors like Heather have seen, and sucking all of the suspense out of the season as it becomes clear that nothing's going to stop the writers from sending her to the finale too, no matter what it costs the infinitely more popular and developed players in her path to victory.

And all for what? For a fucking lovefest duel that pits two bland and styrofoam-stale competitors against each other just so we can see the two kiss and make out again when Mike finally regains control of his mind............BY MEANS OF A FUCKING RESET BUTTON.

Seriously, an entire season marred by character derailment and a massacre of the continuity and of every beloved element of the series just to see these two play out their childish romantic fantasies yet again for the second straight time, all at the expense of a returning cast who not only were derailed beyond belief just to advance these two to the finish, but were ultimately reduced to an afterthought as the majority of them are sent floating away to who knows where just so we can focus exclusively on them finally achieve their first kiss in a victory they neither earned or had to work for. And all by literally the press of a button that instantly wipes Mal from existence and leaves us with the knowledge that mental disorders are in fact not lifelong struggles, but can be solved with relative ease without any major hindrance or consequence to your life. What a truly down to earth message of false hope to be passing along to kids.

As a former fan of these two and their romance, I can say with full honesty I am extremely ashamed to have defended them as much as I did when this clusterfuck first aired and I have no desire to see any of this bullshit play out any further. The fans were correct when they said that Zoke was an overblown and uninteresting romantic plot tumor that only served to drag down the series, lending WAY TOO MUCH attention exclusively to two characters who in an effort just to appeal to children were made the main focus for two seasons. Needless to say, it was a foolish move that didn't pay off, and lent itself to the backlash that has cemented All-Stars as the new low point of the series.

I don't exactly hate Zoey, but I'm done defending her. If I enjoy Zoey in any capacity, it's mostly in fanon and fanart. As for Mike, I am all for his removal from the series, he has brought far too much controversy and is so far beyond redemption that there is literally no reason to waste anymore time with him. He's not funny, he's not entertaining, he's a piss poor role model for the younger crowd, and is as bad as a screenhog comes. I hope Mike never returns to the series, it's time for the series to get its act together, starting with the end of crappy ideas and subplots like these. And I don't have especially high hopes for Zoey's redemption who despite being a slight more likable is still a badly written character, and with the focus on her being equally damaging maybe it is for the best that she not return to the series for a long while more.

We're moving Forums to the Community pages. Click here for more information and updates.

Total Drama Island Forums

A Honest Opinion on Mike and Zoey

AC

AC