Colin's Character Development - A Rant (lol)

Allow me to rant about this for a bit guys. I personally liked Colin's arc in S3, the one related to toxic masculinity (not the hero complex one). I can't say I really cared about Colin in S1 & S2 other than the fact that he seemed like a nice guy but that's about it. S3 changed that for me, I felt like he actually had an arc and was allowed to be a bit messy other than just being your typical good guy.

Colour me shocked when I found out this is quite different to some of the fan opinions on Colin lol. Idk why some segment of the fandom refuses to acknowledge that there was an arc here at all and simply dismiss it as Colin suddenly being a rake and hating him for it (which in and itself so weird because all these guys are rakes).

I was a bit surprised by ep 1 as well and his change but by the end of ep 1 it was made clear it was all an act. Which I could buy into very easily because he wasn't a rake in S1 and S2. But I am still shocked that people use this exact same reasoning, the fact that he wasn't one in S1 & S2, to hate on him in S3 when I am like but that's the point?? They showed us this already. Did I cringe at the flirting montage? Absolutely lmao. Like he couldn't even flirt properly without giving me second hand embarrassment so ofc he is no rake! I also got a good chuckle at his expertise in teaching Pen to flirt which I was like brooo you can't even 😂 But I thought it was endearing hahah like he was experimenting.

They also continue to show us this arc progressing through characters like Eloise and LW calling out his personality transplant, Colin's journal entry in ep 2 then Colin's conversation with his lord "friends" in ep 4 where he literally tells them how this is all meaningless and is hoping to connect with them thinking isn't this meaningless for you too? Where he gets immediately shut down. This arc then comes to an end with Colin rejecting his lord friends in ep 4 and going after Penelope who he has deep emotional connection to leaving his fake rake persona behind. I was completely on board with his arc I don't see the issue at all.

Now his hero complex arc (in S3 part 2) is debatable to me because even though I understand what the writers were trying to do I genuinely didn't see this as a problem that he needed to overcome. I didn't feel like his desire to protect Penelope was inherently toxic. Sure he likes playing her hero, when he saved her from Cressida in S1, then uncovering Jack's scheme in S2 and helping her out with finding a husband in S3. Like are these things truly bad? Did they really have to sideline him so much in the last ep of S3 to let Pen deal with LW fallout to the point where I was watching S3 ep 8 constantly yelling "where the hell is Colin"? I don't think so lmao. But I still understand what the writers were trying to do and I am not going to reject it completely.

So anywayyy this is a very long winded way of me ranting about the rake criticism of Colin because I'm mostly like.. bro is not a rake. We agree, the show agreed, Colin agrees, like all of us are on the same page actually 😅

He tried to be a rake for a hot second in S3 only to get married by the end of it. He experimented didn't work and went back to who he always was. That's how I saw it. And I feel if he didn't have this arc then he wouldn't have had a story at all in S3 so I'm glad for it 🤷🏽‍♀️