She’s the devil.
Even the most sadistic, cruel and evil characters in film history have some redeeming qualities.
For example, Darth Vader realised the error of his ways in Return of the Jedi as he renegaded on the dark side of the Force and killed The Emperor. Let’s overlook the fact that on this road to redemption, the Dark Lord of the Sith slaughtered thousands of innocent people, killed young Jedis and was complicit in creating a weapon that destroyed entire planets.
Elsewhere, Hannibal Lecter murdered people and ate them, but that pesky devil ultimately decided to hunt down and murder the truly nasty people i.e. Ray Liotta’s character in Hannibal and Dr. Frederick Chilton in The Silence of the Lambs.
It’s also possible to empathise with other heinous characters.
For example, you could argue that Thanos in Avengers: Infinity War was solely interested in bringing balance to the universe. On that note, it’s possible that Nurse Ratched from One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest was only trying to maintain a level of order that’s being threatened by an unruly convict. The list is endless.
Villains are the most complex and memorable characters in some films – classic case being The Joker in The Dark Knight – but there are certain characters that are just too sadistic to even speak of.
Of course, we’re talking about melts.
You could like a villain, but a melt has absolutely zero redeeming qualities.
Think of Walter Peck from Ghostbusters, Percy from The Green Mile, Billy Zane in Titanic, or the emo version of Peter Parker in Spider-Man 3.
Basically, these are characters that are so loathsome that they will burrow under your skin and stay there forever.
On that note, Summer from 500 Days of Summer is the biggest melt in cinematic history.
Anyone that has seen Marc Webb’s film can read the plot in their own way but here’s our take on things.
There’s absolutely no denying the fact that Tom (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) has to shoulder a large chunk of the blame throughout the course of that film.
Summer always said that she wasn’t the marrying type and despite hearing this, Tom stupidly projected all of his unrealistic dreams and expectations onto a girl that was flakier than the flakiest Flake that was ever flaked.
Aside from this, he frequently put Summer on a pedestal as he constantly tries to make her conform to his bullshit idea of a relationship.
Not clever.
On the other hand, Summer knew that Tom wasn’t an ideal fit, continued to date him, and ultimately broke his heart. To compound things, she completely flipped her entire belief system in the space of a few weeks.
Summer was always flaky but her decision to get engaged is the biggest ‘two fingers’ that she could ever give to Tom. He wasn’t perfect, but he deserved better. Who gets engaged a few weeks after ending a serious relationship and goes against everything that the stood for in the process?
During the course of their relationship, Summer was adamant that true love didn’t exist but weeks after breaking up with Tom, she’s engaged.
Tom’s approach to dating was incredibly naive and dumb, but at least he was consistent. On the other hand, Summer was a melt.
This being said, Joseph Gordon-Levitt has re-opened the whole debate after he responded to a tweet which implied that Tom was at fault for the couple breaking up in the film.
‘Watch it again. It’s mostly Tom’s fault. He’s projecting. He’s not listening. He’s selfish. Luckily he grows by the end.’
Despite starring in the film, he’s 100% wrong.
Yes, this is the cinematic hill that I’m prepared to die on.
Watch it again. It’s mostly Tom’s fault. He’s projecting. He’s not listening. He’s selfish. Luckily he grows by the end. https://t.co/lEJ8uXlpJw
— Joseph Gordon-Levitt (@hitRECordJoe) August 6, 2018
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