#Or: a 3w4 projects onto a 2w3->8(disintegrated)

[suddenfossilfightersheadcanons]

not in the least! I absolutely love his character, in part because he's so damn needy. He's just above-average enough at most things to have a chip on his shoulder, so lives out his gifted kid burnout vicariously through Dina. He is dependent on her success, on Joe's success, on his heroes really being his heroes to justify his own not quite being as amazing. Every time he finds out the things he's idealised aren't as good as he thought they were, a little piece of his identity gets chipped away. He pushes himself because he doesn't know how to live up to the heroic ideals he learnt from TV, and if he can just fulfil them, he'll be able to feel like they're not degrading after all. He ends up estranged from Dina et al. because he can't grow out of his pride and envy until he accepts others' flaws. He's seeking redemption for his round 1 loss through Dina's success, for his being imperfect by making himself a martyr against ZZ, for his neediness by pushing himself away. He's trying so hard to be a good person but the pubescent dialectic that you can be a good person and a bad person at the same time hasn't kicked in for him yet. He fears second place so much more than Rupert, and I love how they contrast each other in that regard.

As far as I'm concerned, he's developed a surprisingly good relationship with Rupert, in that they share much of their insecurity in common, so don't have to act as if it doesn't exist around each other. Moreover, he's better at cleaning fossils and reciting fossil fighting trivia than Rupert, and that helps abate his inferiority complex. Around the others, however, he's notably cagey. It's going to take years to repair his relationship with Dina, and even then, the Cup has very much damaged it to the foundation.

Did anyone else fucking hate Todd in champions