YMMV / Random Drama Series

• Alas, Poor Villain: Katie's elimination in Pahkitew Island can come off as this to people.
• Base-Breaking Character:
  • Out of the OCs, Angel seems to be the most divisive one; some people like her sweet and cheerful personality, while others find her way too bland and/or annoying.
  • Contessa also seems to be this to a lesser extent in All-Stars II; while it's common to see people sympathizing with her from what happened to her in Danger Island, it's also not hard to find people who thinks she should have gotten over it by that point. This reaction lessened down as the season progressed though.
  • While Kitsune is praised as a comedic and enjoyable character, there are others who think that she lasts as far as she does because of Plot Armor.
  • Sammy is seen as either a bland Mary Sue who gets too far in every season, or a relatable and sympathetic character who deserves to be in the final two.
• Broken Base: Harold and Scarlett being twin siblings in this adaptation is definitely divisive, some really don't like it while others don't seem to mind.
• Catharsis Factor: Considering what happened to Courtney in canon when she played into Chris's hands, there is something satisfying about her realizing that she's going too far in the Pahkitew Island finale and declaring that she's not playing Chris's game anymore.
• Draco in Leather Pants: Scarlett, who is portrayed in a much more positive light in contrast to canon, and how she is usually portrayed in fanfics, to the point where she was even part of the Heroic Hamsters in All-Stars. The author stated that their reason for doing that is that many fics ignore her human side, and her reasons for snapping at everyone is always "she's evil and that's it". Tropes Are Not Bad though, as many people enjoyed this take on her and were overjoyed when she won World Tour.
• Ensemble Dark Horse: Boy, there are many.
  • Ezekiel has Base-Breaking Character status in canon, here, he is by far one of the most popular characters from Revenge of the Island, to the point where people were even upset that he was removed from the All-Stars cast.
  • Dave (surprisingly) and Britney were incredibly popular in Pahkitew Island, despite the fact that they were the 5th and 6th eliminated contestants respectively.
  • Victor is another one, he's arguably the most well-liked out of the OCs, many people like him because of his gentleman and polite attitude, even Fangren, the author of the original Total Shuffled Island Series liked him.
  • Malcolm is this too, although not to the same extent of Victor, many people find him pretty entertaining and hilarious due to his constant injuries and were even sad when he was out early in World Tour. Many readers were extremely happy when he was revealed to be replacing Owen as Noah's race partner.
  • Although he was a major character in Revenge of the Island, Natasha is also this due to the fact that he is also just an OC, most people thought he was an awesome villain, to the point that there were even people rooting for him, even the author was pretty surprised by this.
• Growing the Beard: Although Island is by no means bad, it had an inferior writing quality and quite short chapters, with some of them essentially being the canon episode with a different cast. By the end of Island and the beginning of Action you can clearly notice an improvement in the writing, with the chapters becoming more descriptive and lenghtier, and the author adding more original scenes rather than just mirroring canon.
• Heartwarming in Hindsight: At the TV Kids Summer Festival 2021, Tom McGillis and Jennifer Pertsch announced that the 2 newest seasons of Total Drama will have p13 episodes each and the fourth generation cast will consist of 16 competitors of diverse range (including Black and Asian) and 2 who are LGBTQ+. Danger Island and All-Stars 2 have 13 episodes each, the former introduced 16 contestants and had Black (Contessa, Gary, Terrance, Victor), Asian (Britney), and LGBTQ+ members (Angel, Matthew and again, Contessa.)
• Ho Yay: Starting from Revenge of the Island, LGBTQ+ couples became canon with Angel/Bridgette. They were followed by Contessa/Olivia, Caitlin/Jen, and Steven/Tom.
• Jerkass Woobie: Olivia. Despite her being the Big Bad of season seven, her actions were the result of being raised by parents who only saw her as a meal ticket and never showed her an ounce of love.
  • Chris is a villainous, merciless asshole, but it was mentioned that he became the way he is now by Becoming the Mask. His facade of being ruthless on camera eventually overtook him and his good side disappeared.
• Moe:
  • Angel, a Wide-Eyed Idealist Nice Girl with an innocent, sweet and positive attitude. It makes sense when you realize she's an expy of Starfire.
  • Carly, a literal Shrinking Violet, who joined Total Drama in hopes of using her experience as immersion therapy for her pantaphobia. It's both admirable and endearing.
  • Contessa. Having had no friends before the show, along with her desire to be accepted, makes you wanna hug her especially after season seven when she becomes a woobie.
• Moral Event Horizon:
  • Thanks to Mal provoking her, Scarlett nearly crossed the line trying to kill everyone in Area 51. Invoked in universe when almost everyone refuses to trust her afterwards except for Sierra.
  • Mal himself had a moment a few chapters prior where he throws Duncan out of the plane, nearly killing him.
  • Natasha came close in the ROTI finale when he almost killed Lightning just to win the million.
  • Matthew pretty much spit on the line due to his Sanity Slippage in All-Stars. His returns over the next few seasons also fall under this.
  • Rebecca also crossed it in the Danger Island finale, where she cut Terrance's arms so he'd bleed in shark-infested water.
• Rescued from the Scrappy Heap:
  • As mentioned under Ensemble Dark Horse, Dave happens to be one of the most popular characters in the Pahkitew Island cast, mainly because of his slight case of Adaptational Nice Guy, his Odd Friendship with Geoff, and the fact that his relationship with Britney was handled much better than his relationship with Sky in canon.
  • While she's more of a Base-Breaking Character in canon, Sierra is very well liked in this series, mostly due to her crush on Harold being much less forceful than her one on Cody, getting together with Malcolm, her actually using her Total Drama knowledge and, most of all, her heartwarming friendship with Scarlett.
• Rooting for the Empire: As mentioned under Ensemble Dark Horse, it's not hard to find people who were rooting for Natasha during Revenge of the Island.
• The Scrappy: Rebecca; absolutely no one seems to like her, and even although she's a bit of a Hate Sink, and therefore was made to be hated, she comes off as much more despisable and unlikeable than Matthew, the designated Hate Sink of the series.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character:
  • Sam, Anne Maria and Max all got this reception due to being the first campers booted off in their respective seasons. The former two getting another chance in season nine made this a subversion.
  • Shawn seems to be a zig-zagged example: when Island was being written, the author realized that the plotlines left him as a background character and tried coming up with different orders, but anything where he lasted past "Phobia Factor" resulted in him winning. As such, Shawn was the first returning contestant confirmed to compete in Action where he did better but still lost halfway through. Then when the cast for World Tour was being selected, he was left out in favor of Malcolm and Tyler. This was somewhat averted in All-Stars: due to a serious counting error when planning out who would pick up who, Shawn didn't appear in the bonus clips, so the author rectified this by having him appear in "The Final Wreck-ening".
  • Jaxon. He gets eliminated early in both Pahkitew Island and his original canonical season, and even gets out early in season nine despite returning, making him the least focused on OC.
• The Woobie: Scarlett in World Tour. The poor girl is forced to deal with getting split from her twin, Mal's manipulation of her leading to her trying to kill everyone and even when she tries to redeem herself, no one outside of Sierra actually trusts her. At least she gets a bone in the end when she wins the season.