Juniper Lee: Leila a Problematic Character?

[TuxedoKamen]

I'm going to apologize in advance. I'm sleepy, so parts of this may be a bit ... off. But I really wanted to make sure I got this out there before I forgot what I wanted to say.

So, I watched tonight's episode, and while it was wonderfully funny madness of hair and cross dressing dogs that actually deserves a lot more detailed discussion than I'm prepared to give right now, but I wonder...

Does anyone else feel annoyed by Leila?

Don't get me wrong. I think she's a cool character. I like that she's actually drawn in a way that's foreign enough to say "I'm not human," but not alien enough to make the fact that she can blend in believable. I also appreciate the detail they put into how she moves and fights.

But her presence irks me to a degree. We were told one of June's friends will find out the secret. How many here assumed--wanted--it to be human friend? We're far more emotionally invested in them at this point. And it would've required a real change of the status quo re: telling secrets to people who aren't supposed to know them.

So yes, if it turns out that Leila is who he was talking about, and not one of the characters I've spent the last two seasons falling in love with, I'll feel very let down.

But we got Leila, and so far one of her main functions seems to be to remove non-magical life/magical life conflict for June. In "Citizen June" she spent most of the ep looking for the demon thing so June would be free to run for President. To me, this sort of thing removes a lot of the best kind of conflict in the show: June having to actively balance both of her lives. With Leila in play, that doesn't seem to be nearly the same sort of problem it used to be. She's like a helper elf that isn't a con man.

Then there's the issue of just how capable she's turning out to be. Yes, they had the sense to make sure she doesn't approach June's level of power, but she can still hold her own in a battle. This also irks me. I want to watch June deal with these things. I'm not nearly as interested in Juniper Lee and Her Amazing Friends, especially when the Amazing Friend in question was just introduced two weeks ago and is eating up screen time that'd go to her other friends that, as I've said, have been around for two seasons and not gotten nearly enough showing. Then there's the matter of how she repeatedly showed June up just in this ep (I didn't see "Feets to Big," unfortunately.):

She can "smell evil" and pegs the purple thing as a fake right off. Note that for dramatic purposes not only does June not believe her, but she also become this frightening baby-talking version of herself that really doesn't make a lot of sense. The thing is cute, but not that cute. That whole stretch, IMHO, made June look like a complete idiot. And though she's made a few mistakes before, the one thing June is not ... is an idiot. Sure, Jasmine knows more than she does, but Jasmine's 69, and June's only been at this for about a year with a couple years to train.

The whole back to nature montage after the power went out. Yes, Leila should be used to doing without modern conveniences, but she was a virtual McGuyver. Not only did she have a solution for every situation, but by the end of the ep Jody, Ophelia, and Roger wanted to spend more time with Leila and June had become almost a third wheel. That she didn't seem to mind seemed off to me...this is the girl that normally flips out every few eps because she doesn't get to spend time with her friends. Where's the righteous indignation and jealousy she felt towards Ashley? I'm not saying June has to hate Leila. I just want an explanation for the difference.

And finally, the matter of Leila's essential otherness. June has to work her butt off to blend in. It causes problems for her and hurts her relationships with her friends (she made Jody cry in "Citizen June," and I don't think that just had to do with Jody being nervous about the election). She had to throw several competitions by order of Monroe to conceal her powers. (BTW, I agreed with Monroe on the necessity of this.)

But Leila gets to dig giant holes in the ground ... in about five seconds ... and bury meat and eat bark, and no one seems to think anything beyond "she's weird." That's almost buyable, if not for the speed at which she dug the hole. No one notices her leaving the school with all those books and raises the WTF alarm. Less easy to swallow because someone besides June should've noticed, but still basically plausible.

But June could've made it look normal if she'd won every event at the sports event thing. The "Leila Treatment" whereby Leila created enough force by waving her arms to blowdry Ophelia's hair with more force than a powered blowdrier is simply not physically possible for a normal 11 year old human. Suspension of disbelief only gets you so far. How did none of them catch on to the fact she's got super strength? Ophelia at least should've noticed. She's the shrewdest out of all the human friends. The only explanation I can think of is "plot hole for the sake of Leila's awesomeness," and as you might imagine I'm not entirely thrilled with that.

That last sentence is an understatement.

So Leila is using abilities and knowlege of the type June has to hide to make herself more popular. June could do this, but doesn't because it would violate the whole "Veil of Secrecy" thing she's supposed to be upholding. And she still gets stuck as the Princess of Flakes.

So it comes down to this. Am I the only one that's getting the feeling that Leila is veering heavily towards being a Mary Sue? That maybe she's already there, to some extent?

I realize this may have come off a bit harsh, but I felt like I needed to get this off my chest.

Thoughts?

[Mr. Ralph]

I'm going to apologize in advance. I'm sleepy, so parts of this may be a bit ... off. But I really wanted to make sure I got this out there before I forgot what I wanted to say.

So, I watched tonight's episode, and while it was wonderfully funny madness of hair and cross dressing dogs that actually deserves a lot more detailed discussion than I'm prepared to give right now, but I wonder...

Does anyone else feel annoyed by Leila?

Don't get me wrong. I think she's a cool character. I like that she's actually drawn in a way that's foreign enough to say "I'm not human," but not alien enough to make the fact that she can blend in believable. I also appreciate the detail they put into how she moves and fights.

But her presence irks me to a degree. We were told one of June's friends will find out the secret. How many here assumed--wanted--it to be human friend? We're far more emotionally invested in them at this point. And it would've required a real change of the status quo re: telling secrets to people who aren't supposed to know them.

So yes, if it turns out that Leila is who he was talking about, and not one of the characters I've spent the last two seasons falling in love with, I'll feel very let down.

But we got Leila, and so far one of her main functions seems to be to remove non-magical life/magical life conflict for June. In "Citizen June" she spent most of the ep looking for the demon thing so June would be free to run for President. To me, this sort of thing removes a lot of the best kind of conflict in the show: June having to actively balance both of her lives. With Leila in play, that doesn't seem to be nearly the same sort of problem it used to be. She's like a helper elf that isn't a con man.

Then there's the issue of just how capable she's turning out to be. Yes, they had the sense to make sure she doesn't approach June's level of power, but she can still hold her own in a battle. This also irks me. I want to watch June deal with these things. I'm not nearly as interested in Juniper Lee and Her Amazing Friends, especially when the Amazing Friend in question was just introduced two weeks ago and is eating up screen time that'd go to her other friends that, as I've said, have been around for two seasons and not gotten nearly enough showing. Then there's the matter of how she repeatedly showed June up just in this ep (I didn't see "Feets to Big," unfortunately.):

She can "smell evil" and pegs the purple thing as a fake right off. Note that for dramatic purposes not only does June not believe her, but she also become this frightening baby-talking version of herself that really doesn't make a lot of sense. The thing is cute, but not that cute. That whole stretch, IMHO, made June look like a complete idiot. And though she's made a few mistakes before, the one thing June is not ... is an idiot. Sure, Jasmine knows more than she does, but Jasmine's 69, and June's only been at this for about a year with a couple years to train.

The whole back to nature montage after the power went out. Yes, Leila should be used to doing without modern conveniences, but she was a virtual McGuyver. Not only did she have a solution for every situation, but by the end of the ep Jody, Ophelia, and Roger wanted to spend more time with Leila and June had become almost a third wheel. That she didn't seem to mind seemed off to me...this is the girl that normally flips out every few eps because she doesn't get to spend time with her friends. Where's the righteous indignation and jealousy she felt towards Ashley? I'm not saying June has to hate Leila. I just want an explanation for the difference.

And finally, the matter of Leila's essential otherness. June has to work her butt off to blend in. It causes problems for her and hurts her relationships with her friends (she made Jody cry in "Citizen June," and I don't think that just had to do with Jody being nervous about the election). She had to throw several competitions by order of Monroe to conceal her powers. (BTW, I agreed with Monroe on the necessity of this.)

But Leila gets to dig giant holes in the ground ... in about five seconds ... and bury meat and eat bark, and no one seems to think anything beyond "she's weird." That's almost buyable, if not for the speed at which she dug the hole. No one notices her leaving the school with all those books and raises the WTF alarm. Less easy to swallow because someone besides June should've noticed, but still basically plausible.

But June could've made it look normal if she'd won every event at the sports event thing. The "Leila Treatment" whereby Leila created enough force by waving her arms to blowdry Ophelia's hair with more force than a powered blowdrier is simply not physically possible for a normal 11 year old human. Suspension of disbelief only gets you so far. How did none of them catch on to the fact she's got super strength? Ophelia at least should've noticed. She's the shrewdest out of all the human friends. The only explanation I can think of is "plot hole for the sake of Leila's awesomeness," and as you might imagine I'm not entirely thrilled with that.

That last sentence is an understatement.

So Leila is using abilities and knowlege of the type June has to hide to make herself more popular. June could do this, but doesn't because it would violate the whole "Veil of Secrecy" thing she's supposed to be upholding. And she still gets stuck as the Princess of Flakes.

So it comes down to this. Am I the only one that's getting the feeling that Leila is veering heavily towards being a Mary Sue? That maybe she's already there, to some extent?

I realize this may have come off a bit harsh, but I felt like I needed to get this off my chest.

Thoughts?

yeah i agree with everything you said. but sometimes change is good, but maybe they'll kill her off and juniper will unlock some amazing powers or something

[Marinite]

Just so all that writing doesn't go to waste, I can see where you're coming from. She's almost a Mary-Sue character from the way you put it, but I still like her, myself. It's a nice pace for June to talk to magical stuff about besides Rayray, Monroe, and her grandma.

[TuxedoKamen]

yeah i agree with everything you said. but sometimes change is good, but maybe they'll kill her off and juniper will unlock some amazing powers or something

I guess I should emphasize: I like Leila. As I said above, the detail put into her character is impressive. I just don't much care for the way she's being used. I certainly don't want her to die (not as if that would happen). Rather, I think she's a transient character, much like Kendra in Buffy. Only, again, without the death. At least, that's what I'm hoping.

I wouldn't mind if she were an Ashley-style guest.

[TuxedoKamen]

Just so all that writing doesn't go to waste, I can see where you're coming from. She's almost a Mary-Sue character from the way you put it, but I still like her, myself. It's a nice pace for June to talk to magical stuff about besides Rayray, Monroe, and her grandma.

I suppose I can understand that argument. Still, I was hoping (and still hope) that one of her human friends would be let in. It'd give her someone to vent to, and more importantly, force the show's dynamic to change in a way Leila does not.

I'm still optimistic: the season's not over yet. I'd love to see Jody or Marcus find out.

I was happy to see that Leila wasn't in "Out of the Past." She would've ruined its very personal "in the family" dynamic. Now we know they're not going to try to shoehorn her into every episode, so I feel a little better.

[Freedom Fighter]

But her presence irks me to a degree. We were told one of June's friends will find out the secret. How many here assumed--wanted--it to be human friend? We're far more emotionally invested in them at this point. And it would've required a real change of the status quo re: telling secrets to people who aren't supposed to know them.To be fair (and I saw "Feets Too Big" but missed "Citizen June," so I'm also going off of two episodes of Leela instead of three), that also came up in my mind after last week's episode, "Make Me Up..." I decided to not to mention it in my talkback reply because I also assumed she wasn't 'the one.'

Like I said, I like Leela too, but at the same time she's pretty much accomplished, personality-wise, everything June has in a much shorter amount of time. Save for getting a boyfriend/crush. But I'm really hoping Winnick didn't pull a 'red herring' on us.

She can "smell evil" and pegs the purple thing as a fake right off. Note that for dramatic purposes not only does June not believe her, but she also become this frightening baby-talking version of herself that really doesn't make a lot of sense. The thing is cute, but not that cute. That whole stretch, IMHO, made June look like a complete idiot. And though she's made a few mistakes before, the one thing June is not ... is an idiot. Sure, Jasmine knows more than she does, but Jasmine's 69, and June's only been at this for about a year with a couple years to train.Honestly, I see where you're coming from. Still, I account this more up to species differences. June, as a human girl, is prone to love cute things. Leela, as a bigfoot, doesn't have that luxury because she's used to living around similar looking creatures, i.e. her own species, aside from the occasional scaring of (intentionally or not) of other woodland creatures.

So I wouldn't necessarily call June an idiot in those situation... she was just doing what would normally come natural to her.

The whole back to nature montage after the power went out. Yes, Leila should be used to doing without modern conveniences, but she was a virtual McGuyver. Not only did she have a solution for every situation, but by the end of the ep Jody, Ophelia, and Roger wanted to spend more time with Leila and June had become almost a third wheel. That she didn't seem to mind seemed off to me...this is the girl that normally flips out every few eps because she doesn't get to spend time with her friends. Where's the righteous indignation and jealousy she felt towards Ashley? I'm not saying June has to hate Leila. I just want an explanation for the difference.

But June could've made it look normal if she'd won every event at the sports event thing. The "Leila Treatment" whereby Leila created enough force by waving her arms to blowdry Ophelia's hair with more force than a powered blowdrier is simply not physically possible for a normal 11 year old human. Suspension of disbelief only gets you so far. How did none of them catch on to the fact she's got super strength? Ophelia at least should've noticed. She's the shrewdest out of all the human friends. The only explanation I can think of is "plot hole for the sake of Leila's awesomeness," and as you might imagine I'm not entirely thrilled with that.

That last sentence is an understatement.

So it comes down to this. Am I the only one that's getting the feeling that Leila is veering heavily towards being a Mary Sue? That maybe she's already there, to some extent?

I realize this may have come off a bit harsh, but I felt like I needed to get this off my chest.

Thoughts?June probably thinks of Leela differently than she thought of Ashley. June could relate to Leela easier because of a closer relation in physical strength, intelligence, and age. The latter is very important, as June could probably think the younger Ashley was in the way, where as she thinks of Leela as an equal helper/sidekick.

As for whether Leela's veering towards being a Mary Sue... that very well might be plausible. I've yet to see a fault... not counting the getting adapting to living with humans, which they made to try and be hard for her but it wasn't so much at all. The telling sign right now is that is that Leela is June, but without the growing pains and responsibility.

Once she gets some character development, maybe she'll shake off the Mary Sue moniker... but she hasn't done anything to do that yet.

[Kagetsu]

Ashley? I must have missed that somewhere.

Leila is an interesting and likable character, but she has felt a bit redundant. Almost a plot device when they can't think of anything else. I never liked the idea that she is becoming more TeXianZe than June. When Leila's around, Junes bracelet doesn't ever go off. It's fun to watch June dodge blows that split rock and sommersalt around with a smirk, but the tag team idea can only go so far. And she has taken away alot of the "fitting in" tension away from June and her friends which was a large part of the show. Ray-Ray's part has gone way down since she arrived. Maybe she was a reaction to some negative opinion about him.

I never wanted any of Junes friends to know about her secret. That would have changed the dynamics too much. Leila is a fun and likable character, but has put a bit of a kink in the main story. :shrug:

(I too missed Citizen June. One of my complaints of this show never being on, it could be weeks/months before I see one I've missed)

[Kodra]

Ashley is a character from Season 1 Episode "Take My Life, Please". She was an adorably sugary sweet blonde who was in town looking for her Baguano beast. She couldn't find the Baguano as it went underground, so she stayed with June. She quickly became the hit of June's inner circle, as well as taking over the role of Protector. She all drew the attention of her little brother Ray Ray.

Really, it's not hard to to draw a lot of parallels between Leela (I refuse to spell it differently until solid evidence is presented) and Ashley. The main differences are:

Ashley had a lot of self confidence that Leela doesn't
June doesn't want to rip out Leela pretty blonde hair


It's the second one that bothers me the most. Leela is edging June out once again, yet she just lets it happen. Seems inconsistent so that the show can force in a new character.

Kodra

[TuxedoKamen]

Leila is an interesting and likable character, but she has felt a bit redundant. Almost a plot device when they can't think of anything else. I never liked the idea that she is becoming more TeXianZe than June. When Leila's around, Junes bracelet doesn't ever go off. It's fun to watch June dodge blows that split rock and sommersalt around with a smirk, but the tag team idea can only go so far. And she has taken away alot of the "fitting in" tension away from June and her friends which was a large part of the show. Ray-Ray's part has gone way down since she arrived. Maybe she was a reaction to some negative opinion about him.

Redundancy is a great way to put it. Every character on this show seems to have a specific literary purpose or otherwise unique traits. Leela just seems to overlap too much with June. If Leela were to disappear tomorrow, the show dynamic wouldn't change, as she's not that unique in what she does, but if Ophelia, Roger, Ray Ray, Dennis, Jodi, or Marcus were gone, something would be lost.

Great catch on the bracelet not going off. I've noticed this too. If the bracelet signifies disturbances, and Leela's presence mitigates those disturbances or helps to do so, one begins to wonder if maybe, on a subconscious level, June is so happy about having Leela around because it gives her more free time. You saw how veheminently June yelled at Leela when she tried to leave in the comet ep: it seemed a lot more about June's desires than anything Leela actually wanted.

June fighting and working alone is so great because it's this "one person against the world" vibe combined with the tensions of leading a double-life. And those tensions are to me one of the best parts of the show. One of the reasons Leela originally irked me so much (even before I saw her for the first time) was because I feared they would end up using her to mitigate those tensions--and I was right to some degree. The double-life quandary and the difficulties June has to go through to manage things are part of what make this show so much better than the average preteen hero cartoon. I'd hate to see them disappear completely.

I'm loathe to think Leela is a reaction to the supposed Ray Ray hate. I absolutely adore Ray Ray. As I said in another thread, he acts just like you'd expect an eight year old boy to act in the situations he gets in: crazy and loving it with no real thought to danger or consequences. And the Ray Ray/June dynamic is just so awesome because it's so rare for cartoons to have siblings that actually like each other as opposed to the standard love/hate relationship (June gets exasperated with him sometimes, but you can tell she genuinely adores him--she lets him hang out with her friends and spends huge swaths of time with him, after all). And it's fairly obvious Ray Ray worships the ground she walks on, and not just because of her powers. I'm really hoping that dynamic doesn't suffer long term for the sake of fitting Leela in .

I never wanted any of Junes friends to know about her secret. That would have changed the dynamics too much. Leila is a fun and likable character, but has put a bit of a kink in the main story. :shrug:

To be clear, I only want *one* of June's friends to find out. Having them all find out raises the spectre of a Buffy-style "Scooby Gang" situation, which doesn't really make sense for this kind of show. In Buffy the gang was eventually trained well enough that they could handle minor vampiric theats and contributed via other skills--it'd be rediculous to see Jodi, for instance, try to take on a troll, and none of the others have any skills useful to the TXZ trade, at least for now.

Without getting into a discussion of who I think it should be, letting one person in fits along the lines of the "double life" tension: whoever it is has to decide if they really want to be June's friend (pretty damaging for her if they don't) and if they do, they have to learn to handle the secrets and lies. Whoever it is will by necessity deepen their friendship with her, and also be able to act as a hook in the normal non-magical world, to bring June back down to earth when she gets too caught up in stuff. Monroe, Ray Ray and Jasmine can't do this as they're not really native to the human world (Ray Ray's been in too long to not consider himself part of the magical community) and none of them likely really and truly understand the stress her double-life puts on her in terms of healthy socializng, etc. One of her friends would be in a better position to help her maintain a good balance between magical and nonmagical life because he/she would understand better where she's coming from on certain issues.

And at least this way it'd be assured that at least one of them wouldn't get fed up with her flakiness and abandon her, which is critical for her mental well-being. Jasmine's fine with immersing herself in the magical world. June doesn't want to, and can't, do that.

(I too missed Citizen June. One of my complaints of this show never being on, it could be weeks/months before I see one I've missed)

Tell me about it. The timeslots for this show absolutely suck.

[TuxedoKamen]

To be fair (and I saw "Feets Too Big" but missed "Citizen June," so I'm also going off of two episodes of Leela instead of three), that also came up in my mind after last week's episode, "Make Me Up..." I decided to not to mention it in my talkback reply because I also assumed she wasn't 'the one.'

"Citizen June" was great--I hope you get to see it soon. But yeah, "Make Me Up..." was the ep that really cemented this in my mind, but I didn't want to bring it up in the talkback--I didn't want to distract from the discussion of what is actually a rockin' ep. The hair jokes alone were classic.

Like I said, I like Leela too, but at the same time she's pretty much accomplished, personality-wise, everything June has in a much shorter amount of time. Save for getting a boyfriend/crush. But I'm really hoping Winnick didn't pull a 'red herring' on us.

Red herring? You mean saying what he said in the interview/presentation thing and then giving us Leela? Or something else?
And yes, Leela's not only matched June's personality advancement over two seasons in *three episodes,* but she also seems just, if not more, popular than June with her immediate circle of friends after "Make Me Up..." That alone sort of blew me away...and not in a good way.

Honestly, I see where you're coming from. Still, I account this more up to species differences. June, as a human girl, is prone to love cute things. Leela, as a bigfoot, doesn't have that luxury because she's used to living around similar looking creatures, i.e. her own species, aside from the occasional scaring of (intentionally or not) of other woodland creatures.

So I wouldn't necessarily call June an idiot in those situation... she was just doing what would normally come natural to her.

Idiot wasn't the right word to use--I knew I'd screw something up trying to write that when I was tired. I realize June is species-wise predisposed to act as she did. But character wise it just seemed strange. I've always thought of her as more tomboyish. She obviously cares about her appearance ("Picture Day") and boys (anything revolving around Marcus and especially "Dream Date"), but aside from swooning over Marcus, she's always been rough and tumble and suspicious of magical creatures in general so it just took me by surprise. What really got me and made me choose the word idiot (again, an unfortunate choice) was that she ignored Leela's warning even after experiencing Leela's ability to "smell evil" previously. She paid it no heed because "look how cute he is!" That just seemed so un-June to me. Did the braclet go off when the pod thing crashed or not? If it did and she didn't suspect something, that doesn't seem right at all. Braclet == trouble.


June probably thinks of Leela differently than she thought of Ashley. June could relate to Leela easier because of a closer relation in physical strength, intelligence, and age. The latter is very important, as June could probably think the younger Ashley was in the way, where as she thinks of Leela as an equal helper/sidekick.

You make an interesting point, though Ashley was only a year younger than June. Now, Leela's not as ... um ... pink. That probably has a lot to do with it. But I'm still surprised that in "Make Me Up" she wasn't more upset when Leela monopolized her friends. Then again, she encouraged it. As I said in my last response, I'm honestly starting to wonder how much June is trying to keep Leela around so she can use her. IF she *is* doing that, that's not a good thing either.[/QUOTE]

As for whether Leela's veering towards being a Mary Sue... that very well might be plausible. I've yet to see a fault... not counting the getting adapting to living with humans, which they made to try and be hard for her but it wasn't so much at all. The telling sign right now is that is that Leela is June, but without the growing pains and responsibility.

Once she gets some character development, maybe she'll shake off the Mary Sue moniker... but she hasn't done anything to do that yet.

I've emphasized that last bit cause it's a perfect summation of the situation. Put simply: June is supposed to be June. No one else. The fact we're having this conversation proves that something (inadvertently or otherwise) appears to be going off the track.

Character development for Leela is a must at this point. She's just too ... perfect right now. Either that, or if (and I genuinely suspect this might be the case) she's a transient character like Kendra on Buffy: she was a slayer that equalled or surpassed Buffy in a lot of ways but eventually left the show. Buffy learned a lot from having her around and was better for it in the end. If the show did that, that'd be awesome.

Only, of course, without the part where Kendra died. I like Leela too much to want her dead. :)