>>93083911>>93084355>>93091011I feel like Malaya was kind of an example of overmanipulative writing. In Shortpacked, she was someone who didn't care about nerdy stuff in a setting where everyone was a fanatic. And they would fairly constantly push it on her, even though it was just a job for them. It became pretty apparent to me that her unlikability was manufactured in that sense. Also, Willis refused to really show what her interests were, until she started trying to get with Leslie and later Carla. And even then, liking a lady or having a robot sex kink aren't really interests.
People were genuinely mad that Malaya was talking to Leslie because *obviously* she's meant for Robin and Malaya is just a baddie. It was just familiarity.
Of course she was also abrasive and fickle, but I think you can do a character in that circumstance who has wants and needs that doesn't just come off as a bully.
And then when Malaya was brought into DoA, the base assumption that she's "a bad one" was brought over, and people really bought into Sal treating her like absolute shit for no reason. It took Sal calling her a cum stain or something like that for people to finally be like, "oh wait, Sal is being a huge asshole to this character for not much reason at all, and probably pushed her away from minute one."
It's kind of a similar technique he used with Roz. She showed up and was generally nice, and the cast liked her. However, Robin hated her so the fanbase was expected to side with the De Santo we know (even though she's a sociopathic asshole herself a lot of the time). And to top it off Leslie was like "I can tell she's phony unlike you my Robin." And instead of her just getting to exist as a character with differing ideas (she wasn't quite as much of a outspoken character in Shortpacked compared to DoA) she got put into a villain role without really doing much ground work.
