Wasted Potential Characters

[SecretStrategist]

When it comes to all forms of media and in your personal opinion, which character do you think had the most wasted potential in not being fully utilized?

For my personal example, I'll go with Gai Daigouji from Martian Successor Nadesico:

Despite his crazy and goofy personality, Gai does his best in wanting to be a hero and would eventually see Akito as both a good friend and great rival, especially as the two have a shared interest in the show Gekiganger 3.

Spoiler

Unfortunately, Gai gets shot at the end of Episode 3 and later dies at the start of Episode 4. It would've been real interesting to see on how his character would've progressed during the course of the story had he still be alive and thankfully, some Super Robot Wars games which has Nadesico in it can allow you to help save Gai from his original canonical fate.

So, in your own personal words, which character do you think had wasted potential in their respective media?

 

[Segadude113]

Tenten from Naruto. She was treated better in filler episodes but in the original manga she was practically ignored most of the way. Never understood why. It's not because it's shonen because Sakura and Ino and even Temari got way more attention in the manga. Tenten only gets one fight.

 

[Soma_Shotgun]

Wish he were in games I like. (Haven't played Command Mission yet, maybe that one is good. Not holding my breath tho)

 

[Tonberry]

Mitsuru "Marin Karin" Kirijo

She looks cool as hell (literal ice queen trope even in gameplay lol) and feels really mysterious early on, but gets promptly regulated to a walking exposition machine the further the story progresses with no interesting characteristics whatsoever. Her SLink also just woobifies her to the nth degree ("omg a hamburger is this what le poor people eat??? how quaint!!") and turns her into a charisma black hole.

 

[Bonkers225]

Gohan post Cell will always be a huge one

 

[Bakuma1997]

Joseph Joestar post Stardust Crusaders, ironically they bring him back for Diamond is Unbreakable to advance the plot yet the old geezer barely does something (Except saving the invisible baby)

 

[Scotty]

Blaze the Cat.

 

[Cardboardtubeknight Cardboardtubeknight]

Zelda, I mean what the hell makes her legend anyway

 

[Rox00]

Literally most of the Visored that's not Shinji from Bleach after the Arrancar arc, they pretty much vanish and barely get much use while getting jobbed hard during the TYBW arc (at least in the manga). Pretty much sucks cause they were my favorite group of the series due to a lot of things like their designs, how they fought, etc. So seeing them wasted like that blows. I know in the TYBW anime they get a little justice but man they deserved a lot more in general.

 

[RanmyakuIchi's icon RanmyakuIchi RanmyakuIchi]

Necalli from Street Fighter 5

He was hyped up as this great ancient evil and God of fighting that hunts strong fighters and devours their souls, and it seemed like he was being pushed as SF5's Akuma of sorts. He jobbed a few times then lost to Ryu and was never seen again.

 

[Tonberry]

Necalli from Street Fighter 5
View attachment 99210

He was hyped up as this great ancient evil and God of fighting that hunts strong fighters and devours their souls, and it seemed like he was being pushed as SF5's Akuma of sorts. He jobbed a few times then lost to Ryu and was never seen again.

Just goes to show that Street Fighter never really should have went for deeper storytelling. I think it always feels better when fighting games go for an action figure toybox approach and just have cool character interactions with a bit of story sprinkled around in endings etc. SF2’s ”storytelling” worked because they just threw every 80s action movie trope coupled with a few superohero-tier racial stereotypes in a blender and it came out wacky and great.

But those are just my two cents, I know it might be an unpopular opinion.

 

[Waffles's iconWaffles]

The entire cast of RWBY.

 

[AkiraSO4]

Necalli from Street Fighter 5
View attachment 99210

He was hyped up as this great ancient evil and God of fighting that hunts strong fighters and devours their souls, and it seemed like he was being pushed as SF5's Akuma of sorts. He jobbed a few times then lost to Ryu and was never seen again.

iirc he had a final boss design that was scrapped.

 

[χKai]

Never fills any sort of role or void in the story at any point, and never really does anything of significance after Dollet.
All he does is wind up looking like this

And what sucks is the fact that he really could have been part of the story still, rivalry or friendship aside he could have played some sort of role but instead fades into obscurity as everyone just doesn't really care about him anymore.

 

[Segadude113]

View attachment 99221
Never fills any sort of role or void in the story at any point, and never really does anything of significance after Dollet.
All he does is wind up looking like this
View attachment 99222
And what sucks is the fact that he really could have been part of the story still, rivalry or friendship aside he could have played some sort of role but instead fades into obscurity as everyone just doesn't really care about him anymore.

Because he's small potatoes compared to the witches.

 

[χKai]

Because he's small potatoes compared to the witches.

Well, no I know why.
It's because FF8 started as a melting pot, a hodgepodge mishmash of ideas, but since they were in a constant state of not knowing where the hell to go with the game's story (as well as simply not caring) he just didn't end up fitting into the events they settled on and was left without closure just like Laguna's arc.

 

[Segadude113]

Well, no I know why.
It's because FF8 started as a melting pot, a hodgepodge mishmash of ideas, but since they were in a constant state of not knowing where the hell to go with the game's story (as well as simply not caring) he just didn't end up fitting into the events they settled on and was left without closure just like Laguna's arc.

same thing happened when FFVII was being developed. Stuff got cut.