Recalling Daria
Click to viewA while ago, I finished re-watching the entire run of MTV’s Daria, after getting the new box set. I wasn’t too upset with the loss of the music samples that served as most of the series’ score: they highlighted some moments, but usually they seemed unessential. Pair that with my primitive urge to own copies that are officially licensed, and there was no way I was passing up this set.
Re-watching Daria reinforced its status as one of my all-time favourite cartoons and that of Daria herself is one of my all-time favourite fictional characters. Why do I love this show? The reasons are pretty typical: I was like an uncool version of Daria in my youth, and so I liked seeing someone like me around. On top of that, the show is very, very funny, and offers some biting mockeries of society and its silliness; all of this makes Daria interesting even after you’re out of high school.
Daria-the-character not only validates geeky loner girls the world over, but she is also complex and well-crafted. She is allowed her moments of vulnerability, and not to make her more palatable to male audiences or to imply some kind of sexy helplessness--it’s just because she’s written well.
However, I knew I was heading for a certain snag as the episodes counted down: I’ve always had an ambivalent relationship with seasons four and five of the show, in which the writers tried a new direction by introducing a new character, Tom, whose relationship with Jane brought out the worst in Daria before Daria ended up going out with Tom (!), as well as some expansion of the secondary characters, and greater attempts to showcase Daria’s flaws.
These things apparently split the fandom (which I was never active in), but my feelings at the time were pretty muddled. When this DVD release was announced, my biggest worry was whether my half-negative feelings towards 4/5 meant I was unable to accept change. For all I claimed to embrace imperfect characters, perhaps I couldn’t handle a character that I deeply identified with, a heroine of sorts, being taken to places I didn’t want to go.
Today, I’ve hardened a little bit more. Daria never did make the main character invincible; pre-season four there were plenty of episodes that delved into her failings, and I was accepting of them. Episodes like “Through a Lens Darkly” (exploring her anxiety about vanity when she’s receptive to compliments on her contacts), “See Jane Run” (exploring Daria’s worries about her friend selling out and not having much time for her), or “Quinn the Brain” (when Daria feels her identity is threatened by her sister’s underserved popularity as a pretentious poet), or Daria’s awkward crush on Trent Lane, served to flesh her out rather than detract from her appeal.
At times, this makes season 4/5 seem not like growing the beard, but hastily sticking one on with spirit gum. Several episodes seemed to be trying too hard to show Daria as an imperfect person, pushing her into being straight-up unlikeable, with fewer chances for her to put them on trial in the same way. It came close to trite moralizing about Daria being so mean to all those nice people, as a few viewers have done on sites celebrating the series’ release.
This happened frequently with Tom, who was a good match for Daria, but at the same time, was called out by Daria much less often than he called out her, either directly or indirectly. People in love do challenge each other, but honestly, it’s kind of creepy when these things are so one-sided. Sometimes the portrayal of Daria got so bad I wondered why Tom would keep putting up with her sudden declarations of break-up over trivial arguments, or other examples of Daria’s difficulties.
Tom was also a character I never quite warmed up to. No, I was never a Trent/Daria shipper: I accepted that The Crush rounded out Daria’s character, but Trent would have made an awful boyfriend, and I’m glad Daria realized that, unlike so many other media where female characters are expected to fall for and support shitty guys. However, Tom doesn’t seem quite “right” as a character. He never blends entirely with the rest of the cast, perhaps the curse of all late-comer characters in television, but his acting and mannerisms almost seemed to come from a different series.
The last half-hour episode of the series “Boxing Daria”, also tried to tie Daria’s usual personality to at least some kind of personal issues, as she remembers her parents fighting about her in the past, and then comes to realize how hard it must have been for her parents to raise her. They do reassure her that they respect Daria’s principles, but the implication that the qualities that drew viewers to Daria might be a source of stress and negativity is still jarring.
I would really like to hear how most of the other fans who view Daria as a personal symbol view that perspective on her character. There are admired character types worthy of critique, but with characters like Daria being so rare, it feels like a low blow even when the ending of the episode, and the final movie, Is it College Yet? reassures us that Daria is a positive character at least in part.
In these seasons, Daria always bounced back from this to retain some of the aspects that drew me to it, but the alterations made in the last two seasons still feel like a sudden turn rather than natural growth. The idea of shaking up Daria’s world and making it deeper is a good one, but the execution was not as elegant as it could have been, and the seasons that came before it were hardly shallow.
This series is one of my favourites, and did it have to be a cartoon? Yes. While there are no fantastical elements (except for a few “gimmicky” episodes here and there), Daria’s broad caricatures and parody of modern society work better, as things like this do, in animation. Conversely, Daria is also not what some think of when they think of “American animation”, since its humor is not as broad as other American comedy cartoons and includes more pathos than other series, not to mention that it’s female-centered.
Daria and Daria aren’t perfect, but they’ve been a major part of my nerdom for years, and it’s easy to see why. I’m glad they finally made it to DVD.