30 Greatest Fictional Characters
(TV & Movies division)
Nos.15- Through 1

In case you missed last weeks column click here. That one goes over all the rules and everything, so here we go with the rest of the list:

15. Sgt. Bosco "B.A." Barackas - (played by Mr. T in "The A-Team") - What's interesting about this selection is that B.A. may not even be the most intriguing character on the A-Team, for one, I was always fascinated by what Murdock's deal was. Still, B.A. is the character that resonates the most, and he was played by Mr. Frickin' T for crying out loud.

14. Tyler Durden - (played by Brad Pitt in "Fight Club") - I guess technically I could have said, Tyler Durden/Jack played by Brad Pitt and Edward Norton, but you know what I mean, Pitt's the draw here. If you could create a character of yourself, with all of the balls you wish you had and none of the fear that inhibits you, who would it be?

13. Dr. Fraiser Crane - (played by Kelsey Grammer in "Cheers", "Wings", and "Fraiser") - The fact that this character has existed to some extent for close to 20 years on television is impressive enough, the fact that an extremely successful (and good) spin-off occurred after the second best sit-com in history ('Seinfeld' being #1) is even more impressive, and all of that lies on the character of Dr. Fraiser Crane.

12. Chow Mo Wan - (played by Tony Leung Chiu Wai in "In the Mood for Love" and "2046") - I could have easily just put Tony Leung in a Wong Kar Wai movie as a single character because he's basically playing the same brooding quiet mysterious womanizing loner character in all of Kar Wai's movies, but specifically Chow Mo Wan, represents the mysterious brooding loner fantasy in all men, to sit in dark restaurants pen in hand writing, drinking tea, smoking cigarettes, eating noodles, yet somehow attracting the most beautiful women in the world. He's so cool.

11. Jules Winnfield - (played by Samuel L. Jackson in "Pulp Fiction") - "It's the one that says Bad Mother Fucker." 'Nuff said.

10. Mad Max Rockatansky - (played by Mel Gibson in "Mad Max", "The Road Warrior", and "Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome") - It's hard to imagine how cool Mel Gibson used to be considering now he's crazy, and was in "What Women Want" but there was a time where Gibson, on the strength of the Mad Max character was the coolest guy in the world. Oh and for all the naysayers out there, Thunderdome's awesome.

9. Fox Mulder - (played by David Duchovny in "The X-Files") - I don't know if this is more Duchovny than the actual writing of the character of Mulder, but the balance of seriousness and deadpan humor makes Mulder, maybe one of the funniest yet hard to figure out characters ever and Duchovny's ability to somehow carry all of that throughout the series was remarkable. Also, the fact that it never seemed out of place for the brooding ultra-serious Mulder to have a porn collection that somehow put mine to shame, or a fascination with Elvis, or be able to throw great one-liners out there in dangerous situations really does show that Mulder was a brilliant character and Duchovny a brilliant actor. Even though near the end of it's run the X-Files started to get a little bogged down in it's own mythos and the last couple of season were pretty weak, I hope people don't forget that for 4 or 5 years there (seasons 2-6), The X-Files was absolutely the single best show on television, and in the days before the HBO Sunday night series, Fox's Sunday night was can't miss television.

8. Han Solo - (played by Harrison Ford in "Star Wars", "The Empire Strikes Back", "Return of the Jedi", and most importantly "The Star Wars Holiday Special") - From 1977 - 1989 Harrison Ford was in three Star Wars movies playing the 8th best character in movie/tv history and in three Indiana Jones movies playing the 30th best character in movie/tv history. Not a bad run.

7. Napoleon Dynamite - (played by Jon Heder in "Napoleon Dynamite") - What does Napoleon represent for us that we don't get out of the rest of this list which is admittedly mostly "cool tough guy" characters? That's the fact that Napoleon is the toughest and coolest of all of them. If you think about it, a lot of the other characters in this list, are using their "coolness" and "toughness" to hide something, some inner demon or pain that drives them to something, to seek out heroism, or to grasp that opportunity when it comes there way. And that's cool and interesting in its own way, but in the case of Napoleon you have the true hero, the man that is who he is, and is comfortable with that, yet frustrated with the rest of the world that doesn't get it. I think you can divide up people into two camps, people that get Napoleon and people who don't, and if you don't, well, you're probably not reading this, but stay away from me and continue running the country as you see fit, I guess.

6. Ripley - (played by Sigourney Weaver in "Alien", "Aliens", "Alien 3" and "Alien: Resurrection") - The highest ranking female character on the list Ripley is another great combination of character and actor. The fact that the Ripley character evolves so much throughout the series, and is just so damn tough easily puts her on top.

5. Snake Plissken - (played by Kurt Russell in "Escape from New York" and "Escape from L.A.") - Misanthropic, criminal bad-ass Snake Plissken edges out "Big Trouble in Little China's" Jack Burton if only because Jack's so incompetent. There's so much metaphorical stuff going on in both "Escape from" films that I'm barely smart enough to get it, and certainly not smart enough to write about it, but Snake basically is us, and America, is well, basically America, and the shit that Snake is being put through is basically the shit that America puts us through, only Snake's smart/self-aware/indifferent enough about all of it to kick as much ass as possible on his way through it all. And can't we all learn something there?

4. Dr. Who - (played by William Hartnell, Patrick Troughton, Jon Pertwee, Tom Baker, Peter Davison, Colin Baker, Sylvester McCoy, Christopher Eccleston, and David Tennant in "Dr. Who" the TV Series, and of less importance also played by Pual McGann in the TV movie - "Dr. Who: The Enemy Within", and of even less importance also played by Peter Cushing in the two movies "Dr. Who and the Daleks" and "Daleks' Invasion Earth: 2150 A.D.", these are considered non-canonical Dr. Who pieces, mainly because this Dr. Who is a human and not a Time Lord, and he is, quite humorously referred to as "Dr. Who" instead of "The Doctor", of even less importance, but to be a complete-ist about it, Dr. Who was also played by Rowan Atkinson in the spoof "Doctor Who and the Curse of Fatal Death" and also Richard Hurndall who played the role of the first doctor in "The Five Doctors" after William Hartnell's death and Edmund Warrick who filled in for William Hartnell in the episodes, "The Dalek Invasion of Earth" and "The End of Tomorrow", and Tommy Laird who stood in for Patrick Troughton in a few shots of episode four of "Seeds of Death.") - Now after all that I'm not going to go into why Dr. Who is the fourth greatest character in TV/Movie history, because if you would get it, then you already now why, and if you don't know why, then you're never going to get it.

3. HAL - (played by Douglas Rain in "2001: A Space Odyssey" and "2010") - I could probably write an entire book about why HAL is not only one of the most intriguing characters, but also one of the most important. Decades before the idea of trans-humanism and the philosophical implications of our reliance on machines being very apparent, those two incomparable geniuses, Stanley Kubrick and Arthur C. Clarke, were already exploring the question of what is consciousness, what is humanity, what is soul? The exploration of all these ideas in "2001: A Space Odyssey" is one of the many reasons why it's the best movie ever made.

2. John McLane - (played by Bruce Willis in "Die Hard", "Die Hard 2" and "Die Hard: With a Vengeance") - Here's something you might not know. The character of John McLane was actually first played by Frank Sinatra· sort of. See, Die Hard was based on the novel "Nothing Lasts Forever" by Roderick Thorp, which was a sequel of his novel "The Detective" which had been made into a movie in 1968 starring Frank Sinatra as Det. Sgt. Joe Leland. For the filming of "Die Hard" Joe Leland morphed into John McLane, "Nothing Lasts Forever" became "Die Hard" and a film icon was born. John McLane is the everyman, the hero, the cowboy, the anti-hero, the lover, the fighter all rolled into one. He shrugs off pain, throws himself into danger, and defeats evil Germans. Sort of like Dwayne Wade. Yippee-ki-yay.

1. Ashley J. Williams - (played by Bruce Campbell in "The Evil Dead", "Evil Dead II" and "Army of Darkness") - Where could I possibly begin with Ash, the greatest character in TV/movie history? Words can't do Ash's greatness justice. Here's a man who fights evil spirits, travels through time, and maintains great hair throughout the process. Not to mention the fact that he's played by our generation's greatest actor, Bruce "the man" Campbell. Hail to the King baby.

Take a look at #30 - #16