Is Dora hopeless at domestic and practical matters because she's been spoiled and sheltered all her life, or is she actually mentally or developmentally challenged in some way, along the lines of Mr. Dick's simplemindedness if not quite to the same degree? After all, she seems genuinely frightened of anything outside her comfort zone, like housekeeping or practical matters, to the point that she flies into a panic when David even broaches the subject during their engagement. Later in their marriage, she really does try to improve as a practical housekeeper, but fails...which seems to suggest that it's not so much that she won't learn, but that she CAN'T learn. This could possibly be due to some limitation in her mental and emotional development.
If this is the case, is her father Francis Spenlow merely a stereotypically tyrannical father who disapproves of David as a suitor on financial and social grounds...or is he quite aware of Dora's limitations and knows she's in no way cut out for the realities of such a marriage as David could provide? After all, he doesn't fire David on the spot, he speaks reasonably to him and assures him he hasn't been at all harsh with Dora, he knows perfectly well that David's a hard and dependable worker who's trying to improve his situation after a setback, and he seems to have no poor opinion of David personally, inviting him to his home as a guest on several occasions. He does mention social and financial standing when he rebukes David, but that could be tied into this. He might figure that Dora will have to marry someone, since she needs someone to look after her and neither he nor his sisters will be around forever. But he might figure the ideal husband for Dora would be someone a little older and much more mature, with the patience and maturity to look after her as she needs to be looked after, and with the financial resources to hire and manage an army of servants so she won't be troubled with domestic matters she's not fit to take on. He may have known perfectly well that David Copperfield, for all his fine qualities, was not that person...and that even by the time he grew to be that person, there would be too much of a gap between his intelligence and hers, as David himself grew to realize and as Dora admitted on her deathbed. And the thing is, in this case, the so-called "tyrannical father" was RIGHT...they were both too young and immature and it was really not much more than a youthful infatuation.
Ensemble Dark Horse: Mr. and Mrs. Micawber, Steerforth, even Dora Spenlow, and a host of others. Many have noted that the least interesting character is Davey himself.
Among other instances, a lot of readers think Dickens' shipping of the Peggottys to Australia after Emily's fall from grace is unfair, but the book actually was a fair look at prostitution at the time (and that kind of thing really happened, too). Not to mention the local prostitute, Martha, is treated as a sympathetic figure. Her Only Friend Emily clearly cares for her, helps her to go to London and start her life all over again, and later she helps Daniel and David to find Emily again. Besides, even in their exile, both Emily and Martha's stories have happy endings (Martha gets married, while Emily lives a good life of caring for those in need), in an era when "fallen woman" characters were more typically killed off.
Mr. Dick is portrayed with an unusual amount of respect for a mentally challenged character in an older book, wherein such were more usually the ludicrous comic relief (this is the point of Aunt Betsey's repeated insistence that Mr Dick's actually a very deep and practical thinker, which would've amused contemporary readers much more than modern ones).
Hilarious in Hindsight: In the 1999 miniseries Mrs Micawber is played by Imelda Staunton, who treats David (played by a young Daniel Radcliffe) with great affection. Their next encounter is not so pleasant... The inverse is true with Zoe Wanamaker, wicked Jane Murdstone in this series but playing the Stern Teacher Madame Hooch in the Potterverse. Maggie Smith is stern and caring to Radcliffe's character in both.
The entirety of Steerforth and David's friendship is loaded with it, especially since in order to heighten the dramatic impact of Steerforth's ultimate betrayal Dickens gives David a number of unabashedly gushy rants that read exactly as though David has a crush on his older, handsome, hugely charming friend.
Uriah gets very touchy-feely with David, who for his part, is fascinated by Uriah's strange appearance. Once he compares Heep's reddish brown eyes to "two glowing suns", and another time, when Uriah has wormed himself into David's home, David gives in to an irresistible temptation to watch him sleep.
Jerkass Woobie: Yes, Rosa Dartle is a massive bitch, but in some interpretations a very tragic one as well.
The 1974-75 BBC adaptation featured two actors who would play major roles in Blake's 7 a few years later: Gareth Thomas as Mr. Murdstone and Jacqueline Pearce as Rosa Dartle.
The 1999 BBC adaptation features a number of actors who would go on to feature in the Harry Potter films:
So many! Like Mr. Mell being fired and humiliated, David being told that both his mother and half-brother died, Barkis' death, the revelation that Steerforth betrayed David and Ham via seducing Emily, and Dora's death.
In the 1935 adaptation, David, after finding his mother has married Murdstone and that he's furthermore been booted from his old bedroom near hers to a crappy, broken down guest room, tearfully reads his Crocodile Book, and then breaks down crying. It's hard not to feel for him.
Too Cool to Live: Many critics have complained about Steerforth's usurpation of the story.
Wangst: Emily's endless weepy penitence can drive a modern reader up the wall.
And Ham, after Emily left him for Steerforth. Even more so when he dies making an Heroic Sacrifice to reach a passenger signalling from a ship foundering in a storm. And especially when the passenger he failed to rescue turns out to be Steerforth.
