YMMV / Brody's Ghost

• Alternate Character Interpretation: Nicole- while she is ultimately a good-hearted person, was she really as great a girlfriend as Brody kept suggesting, or was she high-maintenance and difficult and he just put her on a pedestal? Brody's certain that their breaking up was all due to his faults, but Talia suggests the latter interpretation. Ultimately, however she is as a girlfriend, she and Brody are implied to live happy lives together after all the business with the Penny Murderer is over.
• Jerkass Woobie: Talia proves herself to be a real piece of work, despite technically being on Brody's side, but her life has been downright awful. First, she had to watch her father die from leukemia. Then two years later while she and her mother were recuperating, she ends up the victim of a Serial Killer, and got front row seats in an out of body experience to the monster choking the life out of her. After finally being able to move as a ghost, she had to watch as her mother went insane from grief. She then spent the next five years trying to get back at the Penny Murderer, to no avail until she met Brody. Little wonder she's the way she is.
• Nightmare Fuel:
  • All of the visions that Brody gets from direct contact with the Penny Murderer's possessions. They're creepy, disconnected images of decaying plants, dead birds, dead lambs, and other strange things.
  • The face that Talia pulls at the climax of the series, in conjunction with shattering all the windows in an area, is disturbing, displaying how enraged she is over Brody not strangling the Penny Murderer to death. Come to think of it, there are a few moments after the truth of her backstory comes out where Talia becomes cruel for the sake of her revenge.
• Tearjerker:
  • Talia talking about the cut flowers she saw while she was dying of leukemia in the hospital- comparing them to herself in how the water they were put in could only slow their inevitable death. She even cries a little while she talks about it. The fact that this of all things wasn't a lie, and was her remembering her father's death, arguably makes this moment worse.
  • In the second volume, Brody starts stalking Nicole in fear that his vision of her being killed by the Penny Murderer will come true. This has the obvious outcome in Nicole visiting him one day and telling him on no uncertain terms to knock it off. Considering how they finally left on good terms in the last volume, the confrontation- that ends with Nicole convinced Brody needs professional help and angrily storming off- is pretty sad to watch.
  • By the end of the series Brody's so done with Talia and her manipulative, selfish ways that when she tries to (somewhat) apologize for how much she put him through, he outright says he's only friends with her because she's the only friend he has and he's "taking what he can get." Most of the deterioration of their friendship is heart-wrenching in contrast to how they slowly warmed up to each other before the truth came out.
• The Woobie: Self-pitying as he is, Brody ends up having it rough. First, he's still on the tail end of a bad break up that he's nowhere near over. Then he nearly gets killed in a fight with a biker gang. After Talia finally convinces him to track down the Penny Murderer, he has to burn all but one of his most prized possessions to complete his training. Then, when it looks he's reconciled with his ex, he learns that the Serial Killer he's hunting will target her next. Naturally, he tries to look out for her to keep her safe, which backfires when he's caught, undoing all the progress they've made. His repeated efforts to safeguard Nicole results in him making enemies with the mob and the police, and despite managing to locate the Penny Murderer, his romantic rival gets all the praise due to Talia's manipulations, while he's left a fugitive. His friends step in to make things better at the end, but damn.