My 50 Favourite TV Characters – Part 4

20. Chief Clancy Wiggam

Series: The Simpsons (FOX)
Voiced by: Hank Azaria

The Simpsons has a lot of stupid characters, yet somehow they manage to make each character unique in their own stupidity. And one of my favourite stupid characters is Chief Wiggam. He makes me laugh probably 98% of the time he’s onscreen.
“Bake him away toys.”

19. D’Angelo Barksdale

Series: The Wire
Portrayed by: Larry Gilliard Jr.

In the first season of The Wire we are introduced to the Barksdale crew of drug dealers and D’Angleo is the character who anchors the audience within this group is D’Angelo. He’s a drug dealer who always has doubts about what he’s doing and seems to generally be a good person stuck in a crappy world. It didn’t take long for him to become my favourite of the Barksdale crew.

18. Toby Ziegler

Series: The West Wing (NBC)
Portrayed by: Richard Schiff

Toby is gruff, grumbling, and moody, yet he’s also brilliant and one of the smartest members of the presidents staff. He’s an unorthodox character for network TV which may be one of the reasons he’s so endearing. Toby may be hard-edged, but he always lets out a little of his soft side now and again to remind us that he is a man of depth and emotion like everyone else.

17. James ‘Sawyer’ Ford

Series: Lost (ABC)
Portrayed by: Josh Holloway

Sawyer is the character on Lost who has probably shown the most growth throughout the run of the series. He began as the redneck conman who was always sowing distrust and causing everyone problems. During their time on the island however, his relationships with the other characters grew, and he became less selfish and more courageous, and by the last season he was almost a whole new person. And that’s to say nothing for the fact that he’s one of the wittiest and funniest characters on the show.

16. Dana Scully

The XiFiles (FOX)
Portrayed by: Gillian Anderson

When I first started compiling this list, I wasn’t even sure if Scully was going to make it. But the more I thought about it, the more I realized that not only did she need to be here, she needed to be quite high up the list as well. As the counterpart to Mulder on The X-Files, one of my all-time favourite TV shows which I was obsessed with in high school, Scully became very familiar to me. She was a complicated person really, fighting to hold on to the scientific beliefs she held while being bombarded with unexplainable phenomenon. And her relationship with Mulder is still one of the deepest and closest in television history.

15. Kara ‘Starbuck’ Thrace

Series: Battlestar Galactica (SCI-FI)
Portrayed by: Katee Sackhoff

When I first watched the Battlestar Galactica miniseries I thought it was incredible; with the exception of Starbuck. I first thought that her character was just a stereotypical tomboy trying to act tough all then time. Yet this wasn’t the case; Starbuck is tough to be sure, but not in a way which denies her feminine side. There are a lot of facets to her personality and she is now my favourite character of this great series.

14. George Costanza
aka Art Vandelay

Series: Seinfeld (NBC)
Portrayed by: Jason Alexander

George is truly one of the TV greats. He is despicable and unbelievable, neurotic and paranoid, yet Jason Alexander still makes him a personality we want to keep watching.All four of the Seinfeld characters are self-centered in their own way, but George takes it to a whole new level. We are constantly awed by the ways he can disgrace himself and scheme to try to get what he wants.

13. Desmond Hume

Series: Lost (ABC)
Portrayed by: Henry Ian Cusick

With Lost characters I’m usually partial to the originals from the ill-fated Oceanic 815 flight. Yet Desmond is different; we don’t get introduced to him until the 2nd season, and he doesn’t really become part of the group until the third, yet he always feels like a regular. His centric episodes are always interesting and usually some of the best the show has to offer (Live Together Die Alone, The Constant). he is the true romantic, never giving up his quest to get back to his true love Penny.

12. President Josiah Bartlett

Series: The West Wing (NBC)
Portrayed by: Martin Sheen

Bartlett is the president we wish we could have; brilliant, courageous, empathetic, and with a genuine desire to do the right thing. He is untouched by corruption and does not cower easily. He has been faced with many difficult decisions, and these decisions have defined him as a person and a president. He is a president who remains strong despite all his struggles, whether it be threats from other parts of the world or his own ailing health.

11. Alex Krycek

Series: The X-Files (FOX)
Portrayed by: Nicholas Lea

The ultimate love-to-hate character. Krycek began as Mulder’s partner in season 2 and was soon revealed as a double agent. He has always played a role int he large conspiracy arc stories throughout the series’ run and is always an interesting addition to these stories. My adrenalin rises each time he pops up wanting to see Mulder and Scully get the better of him, but also wanting him to survive so that we can get more Krycek in the future. He is Mulder’s foil and is one of the best reoccurring characters of any TV show.