because why write your essay when there is fandom?

from mfirefly10, Reply with "Batman’s crying!" and I'll give you four fandoms. Write about your favorite character from each fandom.

and I got: Merlin, Dr. Who, Nikita, and Supernatural.

Merlin: Gwen! Once upon a time this would have been a difficult toss-up between her and Morgana, but these days Gwen is just the absolute best part of Merlin. Even if it's not constant or consistent, her development has been wonderful, and Angel Coulby is perfection. I just really really love this alternative vision of Guinevere as someone who is not bred to Queenship but will be perfect at it anyway. In a show like Merlin which does (at least some of the time, when its not killing off random knights with no discussion) take a very modern approach to a medieval-fantasy set show, having our Queen (and I always type Gween at first)-to-be as a commoner fills a certain voice/perspective need of the show, yes, but it is also just the best possible setting for Gwen's character to shine, I think, and that has certainly been the case since the first episode. I will never be unable to adore a character who is the center of drama and angst and yet is so sunshiney and optimistic and good.

Doctor Who: This is really tough, actually, because there has never been a main character on DW that I haven't loved, and I tend to fluctuate depending on season. If I'm watching S1-2, Rose and Nine and Ten are my faves; watching S3 Martha is undeniably the BEST EVER; in S4 Donna takes all of the prizes; and in S5-6 Eleven, Amy, Rory, and River make me have all the happiness in the world. Sooooooooo. I'll say the TARDIS is my favorite :D Cop-out, yeah, but she's always been an animate love of mine, and that only increased when we got Idris in The Doctor's Wife.

Nikita: I haven't watched any of S2 yet, though it's all recorded on my tv waiting, so this is based solely on S1, and in that case, my favorite is Jaden. Nikita and Alex are both flawless, and I adore me some Michael, Amanda scares the crap out of me in a good way, Birkhoff is presh, etc. But JADEN. Girl is screwed up like everyone else on the show, and yet has a harder time fitting in to the Division world of screw-ups. She's tough, and puts on an even tougher front to prove herself, and is convinced wholeheartedly that she needs the Division family to redeem herself from...whatever it was in her past that we never knew about. But she is not as cold as Percy, Amanda, etc, nor does she have the motivation or drive of Nikita and Alex. She has no one telling her it will be okay, no one to love her, and so she does the best she can to make Division proud and to make herself the best she can be and to survive. I miss her :(

Supernatural: lolz you think I'm going to say Castiel, don't you? And yeah, I could write odes to Misha's face/voice/perfection and to Cas' arc and to his relationships with Sam and Dean, with his family, etc. I could bring in the Novaks. I could try to think of coherent things to say and instead probably get lost on tumblr staring at pictures of his face.
But. Cas is the reason I watch (well- watched, as in, got into watching) Supernatural. Cas is the catalyst for a flurry of feelings that I never quite had when going through the early seasons, and for some actually really difficult introspection. Cas is the subject of so many hours of skyping garbled joy at l_a_r_m and flailing in agonized love. Castiel is perfection and my love and everything wonderful.

But my favorite Supernatural character is Ruby. I don't know how to explain it. It has a lot to do I think with the coincidence of her and Anna in the Heaven and Hell/I Know What You Did Last Summer two-episode arc of demon and angel sex and grace-trees and all that, because I adore Anna and I never got over the idea of Sam'n'Dean'n'Ruby'n'Anna('n'Cas) all there together. It has a lot to do with the inexplicable fact that despite all canonical evidence that she never really loved Sam, I still ship Ruby/Sam like burning. It has a lot to do with the fact that in both incarnations she was kickass, snarky, loved french fries, sort of saved a comatose girl once, so smart and driven, so AWESOME. I just love her, and I will never accept that she is gone, and I want her to come back.  Supernatural's vision of a world in which morality is problematic and often doesn't apply/exist, in which all characters have their dark places, constantly makes me fall hard for the 'bad guys,' and the fact that Ruby is both a heroine and a villainess just doubles my love for her, apparently. (See also: Anna's need to kill Sam, Godstiel)