On Carrie Bradshaw and Frodo Baggins: The "She's the Protagonist So We Like Her" Phenomenon

I have watched a lot of Sex and the City over the years - probably every episode of the TV series and the two films - after having been forced to by various girlfriends and wife. I actually really enjoyed the series (although the films are atrocious, especially the second one, which is truly execrable - one of the worst, laziest, stupidest films ever made). It is for the most part smartly written, if highly formulaic, and I find the depiction of men in it genuinely fascinating; if you think female characters who appear in fiction and films designed to appeal to men are awful, unrealistic, two-dimensional stereotypes, then Sex and the City will quickly disabuse you of the notion that it's any different the other way round.

But the most intriguing element of Sex and the City to the neutral observer is the character of Carrie Bradshaw. Carrie Bradshaw is a horrendous person. She is materialistic, self-absorbed to the point of being almost monstrous, amoral and nihilistic - like the personification of everything wrong with 21st century consumer culture. It is completely absurd to imagine that men would be queueing up to date her - especially not supposedly nice guys like her erstwhile fiance (whose name I forget - I think it might be "ThatguywhowasinMyBigFatGreekWeddingandlooksabitlikeWaingrofromHeat"). The whole premise of Sex and the City, in other words - that Carrie Bradshaw is an attractive woman with a great personality who men would think of as being a catch - is completely and utterly false. And yet the series and films rely almost exclusively on that premise. Carrie Bradshaw is the protagonist, so we are supposed to accept that everybody within the fictional Sex and the City universe loves her  despite all the evidence before our eyes, which tells us in no uncertain terms that she is dreadful.

There are lots of examples of this phenomenon in film and literature - protagonists who are in fact intensely dislikable but who all the other characters mystifyingly seem to love. The main character in the Twilight films (I haven't read the books) is another great example: a moody, grumpy, sulking pain in the arse whose protagonist status means that, unaccountably, vampires and werewolves just fling themselves at her feet. There are plenty of others. Harry Potter is certainly on the border of this territory - what an annoying twerp that kid is; why do Hermione and Ron like him, exactly? (I may just be channelling my hatred of Daniel Radcliffe's petrified forest of wooden performances in the films, though, here.) Orloondo Bland's character in the Pirates films is slap bang in the middle of it. Although so, for that matter, is Kiera Knightley's. The Pirates films are an interesting example, in fact, in that it's not only mystifying why anybody else in the films' fictional universe likes the two main protagonists, but also baffling that they even like each other.

But this isn't just a problem for trashy YA novels and Hollywood flicks. Even the Great can fall prey to it. I am speaking, of course, about Tolkien and Frodo Baggins.

Why does anybody like Frodo? Well, we know the reason - it's because he's the protagonist. But he's fundamentally a pretty dislikable figure. In his defence, he has a lot to deal with. But he doesn't deal with it with particularly good grace. In Adam Smith's The Theory of Moral Sentiments, Smith astutely observes that our natural sympathies are aroused when we know somebody is suffering, but that it is quite easy for the sufferer to extinguish that flow of goodwill by being excessively morose. There is something odd about somebody who takes suffering with too much sanguinity, but we do admire a certain amount of fortitude and forbearance. If a sufferer too readily complains, we quickly start to find them irritating - even if we know that their suffering is real. What we like, in short, is an attitude that is appropriately serious but phlegmatic.

Frodo tips over into the territory of exhausting goodwill. He is excessively morose. He is an ingrate. He mopes. He shows no initiative. He is continually at pains to let everybody know that he is finding everything jolly hard work. He is a bit like a toddler who has been running around all day and now that it's time to go home suddenly realises he's tired and spends the entire journey grousing and complaining and asking to be carried. In short, he's a great big soaking wet blanket. But the other characters don't just merely put up with him. They love him. They are unflinchingly and unhesitatingly loyal.

Creating a sympathetic main character is hard work. If he or she is too perfect, or deals with everything too easily, the audience smells a rat. But it is so very easy to stray too far in the other direction and come up with somebody who is a pain the neck - who feels everything too keenly. As Smith well knew, human beings will tolerate somebody feeling sorry for themselves if it appears to be deserved, but that toleration can very rapidly turn into annoyance.