User blog comment:Paul.rea/Teen Wolf News 090514/@comment-76.5.102.2-20140909221521

I respect this wiki, and all it does, and appreciate the dedication, but what you wrote above is exactly the reason I'm tired of quietly stomaching Teen Wolf. Jeff Davis got us invested in something: the whole show, the mythology, Scott and Stiles friendship, Lydia/Stiles, Sterek, there are dozens of reasons people start and people stuck around. And regardless of what you think of those reasons, everyone wanted to enjoy the show. And then, when we started to criticize and feel disappointed, and point that out, and commiserate...we're told we have a problem. And I'll be honest: I hated Season 3B and Season 4. But I wanted to be fair, and give Jeff Davis a chance, and not just hate to hate. I got into Teen Wolf for Sterek, but I knew it was never going to be canon, I just like their dynamic, I grew to like everyone else especially Isaac and Lydia, and Stiles' friendship with Lydia especially, and if Jeff Davis can still make it good while decreasing Sterek scenes, more power to him, that's fair, even if those scenes are fun. He kind of helped, with Lydia's development in 3A and 3B. But the writing quality nosedived. But I still stayed. And then Season 4 happened. Continuity and any semblance of mythological backbone desintigrated. Scott, the True Alpha, was a moralistic weakling for 90% of the season. Stiles became a bumbling, legitimately stupid, fawning character for the sake of doting on Malia all season, spent most of his time with her instead of all of the characters we've enjoyed watching him interact with for 3 Seasons, and meanwhile, showed almost (some, but barely) any effects from the Nogitsune. Derek was likable, but does what he always does, which is wander in and out when they need exposition or to remind you he's there, and then do vaguely sexy things with the latest woman in town, no offense Braeden, so at least we can see his abs, and then have a "dramatic" transformation or revelation in the end (killing Peter, hearing the Alphas, losing his Alpha, gaining his wolf). Lydia, who Jeff promised would do more with Stiles, was thrown in with the adults, gained new nonsensical abilities,  and then was paired up with Mason for the last episode, not even getting a reunion scene with all of her friends. Kira, who showed promise, just dropped out when they found writing useful things for her inconvenient, until they summoned her again. Isaac and side characters disappeared with the most haphazard explanations for why (I know Isaac's actor left, but the explanation was thrown in). Peter seemingly gave no shits about a daughter he was frantic about last season, seemed to forget that Derek stole his power or how True Alphas work, and was made the villain and nearly shot for the one crisis he in no way consciously arranged, while quietly teaming up with Kate Argent. After Kate conveniently got turned by having her throat slit, then escaped the hunters and was allowed to run wild for almost a year before anyone thought to mention it. I wanted to like Malia, I liked the idea of a strong, uniquely back grounded new female. But she was introduced as, at least at first, a convenient, though inappropriate, shoehorned in lay for Stiles at Eichen House, before disappearing while her supposed "life mate" nearly died from the Nogitsune, then reappeared for 2 minutes in the last episode. And she's "Peter's daughter," which would have been interesting if she had known about it, and her reaction when she found out wasn't "I don't care." She was "Cora 2.0": a second mysterious missing for several years female Hale who's background will be decided when convenient. But she had some potential. And then, in Season 4, she was immediately introduced as Stiles "girlfriend", because Jeff Davis wanted him to finally date, and she became a badly written, poorly developed, unpleasant person whose main contributions were to obsess over Stiles, make out with Stiles, boss Stiles around, annoy and be apathetic to all non-Stiles characters including her never shown father, "not care" about Peter, nearly die every other episode, and be sporadically useful for exposition and epiphany solutions, thus making Stiles incapable of things like opening a wine bottle or knowing what a key is. Unless they wanted her to be dependent, in which case, she couldn't control her abilities without Stiles kissing/hugging her (unlike Liam or Isaac, who slowly controlled themselves), who lay down and cried when Stiles left in episode 7, or lost the ability to track after bragging to the teacher that she could so Derek could help her, like episode 6. And the only help she got for her understandable but unpleasant cluelessness and abrasiveness was the occasional condescending "No no, Malia, humans don't do that" or placating kiss from Stiles. Until she suddenly became really caring, loving, concerned, and capable in episode 11-12. Try as I might, I don't like her, and got tired of people saying "She's perfect" and ignoring any and all issues with her. And since she was suddenly a blaring main focus this season, that made it hard to quietly ignore her. But I stuck it out, because again, maybe she'll get better, she could develop. And if you count a thunderclap of suddenly liking everyone, being able to fight, and saying "Go on without me Stiles" in the last episode...yeah, she did. Of course, she's still a smirking, arrogant  sounding, consistently apathetic and demanding girlfriend for Stiles who is frequently clueless until a main character spells something out for her, but credit where credit can be doled out, she got slightly better for 2-3 episodes, just not enough to convince everyone we should love her. And to be fair: it's not only Malia. All of the characters became flat this season, disappearing from episode to episode and reappearing wherever Jeff deigned to use them, be it for misguided fan service or a new epiphany, just to fill in a role, largely regardless of the behavior we saw from them for 3 seasons. They're Jeff's characters, so it technically isn't "wrong," but it feels cheap and haphazard.

So, yeah, fans are annoyed. And yes, we nitpick, and rant, and write criticisms of the show, obviously, because otherwise, we get other fans (not you, just in general) saying "Well, you just don't like Stalia because you're mean" or "Danny's just going to come back, no explanation needed!!" or "No, this season is awesome, shut up." We respond to fans who gush praise and say how perfect it all is and ask us why we don't, because that's frustrating, and we have reasons that we feel logical or defensible, that we want to communicate and/or discuss, about a show we want(ed) to like. We want to spell those out clearly, and since there are a lot of issues, it can get lengthy. And for that, we get told by other people, that we have mental issues. For interacting with a fandom we are part of, and many have been since the onset of the show. You're right, fans, tumblr, the Internet, it can get too up in arms. And yes, just because your community of Sterek, Stydia, or Stalia or other subset of friends agree with you, doesn't mean the rest of the fandom does. Point taken, I agree. But having others fans, followers, experts, you in this case, say things along the lines of "fans like that should see a mental health professional" because we are upset/annoyed/pissed off/vexed that that characters we like and have followed for 3 years seem erratic and cheapened, that Jeff Davis seems to get away with claiming to progressive while shuffling gay characters and women to the side when he doesn't want to deal with them, and that something we became invested in slowly degraded into what we feel are badly thought out, sloppily written, unappealing or unethical or undeveloped plots and cliches, having people, you included, say that is insulting, condescending, rude, almost laughable if it weren't so offensive, and, a large part of the reason those fans are pissed off and get defensive.