The Untamed Meme... Day 30
(Catching up because I took a couple of days for studies... I have two to go :)
30. Most overrated character
Again, it's different answers for in and out of universe. The former? It's got to be the Jiang parents, both of them. Jiang Fengmian is, it appears, a respected Sect Leader and gets on well with his peers, but he has all the charm of stale porridge and the familial skills of a dishrag. And Madame Yu is claimed to be a badass, okay she may walk the walk and all, but she's actually only the strutting empty shell of a badass, not so much because of her spitefulness and appalling parenting 'skills' but also because of her sheer stupidity as a leader. She lets her emotions and her hatred of her Sect's Head Disciple/best fighter manipulate her into pretty much throwing away their best asset in the face of war (and this after neither of them, it appears, made much effort to prepare for an attack they must have known was coming). All Madame Yu did was snap and snarl and hiss at the boy she hated, which was a lot of help when the time came... not). They are both failures on pretty much all grounds.
Out of universe aka for me as audience? Another Jiang and I'm sorry to say, one that pretty much the entire fandom except me idolises (mind you, I like her, at least the way I see her). Jiang Yanli is sugar-sweet and so pretty and loving and all that. And yes, she has a few moments where she shows a bit of backbone but honestly, they are rare and for most of the time she is the human equivalent of a fluffy knitted bedjacket. And there is nothing wrong with that. But the quietly steely-spined and incredibly insightful queen that fanon shows? Nope, don't see it.