Board Thread:Character Discussion/@comment-24386552-20180204001624/@comment-25926288-20180204005825

Starting out, "Guys, let's respect the actress." There are ways to be constructive without being overly harsh and trivially spiteful.

I think Ella is okay, though Jace is stronger in key areas. The caveat: Ella/Jace as stagnated since the early portion of the first half. We could have the top Latina actress from movie fame and it wouldn't be much better.

Question: Has Ella done much since owning her name "Ella"?

Not really. She spouted exposition (which is Tiana's biggest issue as that's really all the character has done in most scenes). As for Jace, she stopped interacting with Victoria and is in a Sorta-Not Really Love Triangle.

So besides proactivity (one of the key areas that a protagonist should have), I think this season has characters given without much background and key pointers (direction) that help smooth the narrative. If I take Victoria, Ivy, and Jace and then the flashback youths...you'd think it was a different story as Rappy doesn't exactly mesh with the villainous Tremaine, or petulant Drizzy with the clingy Ivy, or generic Ella with the debbie downer Jace.

In the early interviews, it didn't appear that many of the actors and actresses knew where their story was going (or their backstory) and that hurts the execution even with the best of writing. You can see in those videos and in recent interviews that they don't really seem to know what to expect with their characters.

So, I think it's a mix of lack of fore-knowledge and preparation, screentime, and writing for the big 99%. Take Tiana: Like the actresses performance, but I assure you that at least 50 % of her limited screentime has been expositing. Even Rumple does that a bunch in previous seasons.