How do you write a jerk without overdoing it?

Revisiting Fosters and I'm kind of amazed at how genuinely sociopathic Bloo gets in later seasons.
What went wrong?

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Give the character proper motives and justifications instead of write him/her to be a needless asshat just cuz. It also provides potential for growth.

Just make them selfish. Don't make them go out of their way to be antagonistic, just have them be inconsiderate and self-centered.

DO
>Give them a sad backstory
>Let them become less of a jerk over time
>Have them receive karmic retribution often, especially if they do something from the DON'T list
>Have a bigger jerk be around in the main cast

DON'T
>make them go full retarded
>have them responsible for actually killing people or animals, whether by intention or not unless that character is an extra or a bigger jerkass
>almost or always avoid karmic retribution for their actions

Good examples:
-Wolverine
-Rocket Raccoon
-Carl Brutananadilewski
-Eddy
-Squidward

Bad examples:
-Bloo
-Peter Griffin
-Homer Simpson

People don't care about jerk characters if the things they do are legitimately funny.
Also never forget that they are friends for a reason,Bender was a jerk but he really cared about Fry.

Every few episodes you give them a relatably sad moment of introspection about some insecurity they have, revealing some good intention.

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I will legit drop this show if Rick doesn’t go through any positive changes in S4. Sick of this guy always being right.

where do you stand on Roger Smith from American Dad?

Roger doesn't become less of a dick over time (status quo is god) and there isn't really a worse dick in the main cast, though he and stan play off each other, but i'd still say he's in the good category since he gets plenty of Karma and somewhat of a sad back-story or at least an understandable one.

Reminder that Mac created him and has these personalities inside him

Make him a genuinely good person. You can be a jerk and be a good person.

Foster's happened in the awkward years before the jerkass main character rose as one of the most popular templates for any type of show. They clearly didn't know how to balance it properly and he's really difficult to like, even at the beginning

there's lots of way
in It's Always Sunny the gang only causes more trouble for themselves by their antics
in Billy & Mandy none of the characters are redeemable and the situations are usually so farfetched that it doesn't feel unfair to anyone
in Futurama Bender's general sociopathy is tempered by moments of genuine feeling, he's also occasionally faces comeuppance

This is only a problem when you have a jerk that never gets what they deserve and makes more-or-less decent characters around them suffer

Look at Biff Tenon

By giving him a large amount of other qualities besides being a jerk

>Alien with lots of weird powers/physical traits
>Effeminate (usually)
>Pansexual sexual deviant
>Juvenile/Narcissistic/Whiny
>The endless potential of personas
>SOMETIMES a jerk

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He has some satisfying moments. I loved the scene where he's crying for God to save him when he's about to die in the void. Also when Toxic Rick ends up being the only part of him that loves his family. Made me actually like his character a bit. He's fucking pathetic.

Depends on the sort of jerk your going for.
If you don't want a redemptive jerk, give them enough karma to match their actions, and that usually the pain they experience can be tied back to consequences their own actions.
The fun ones are the Jerks that make you think "Ouch, that looks painful. I feel kind of bad for him. Oh wait, no, he did deserve that".

Look at the Looney Tunes jerks who could end their suffering at any point if they just used their common sense or let go of their ego

OR make a world of jerks and idiots, with your Jerk somewhere in the middle and the bigger assholes and idiots up on top.
You can even add some sympathy then when all the lower status Jerks contemplate how utterly trapped they are.

most of the time, have the character's jerk qualities help the plot along and enable cool shit instead of hinder it. say for example, the gang is talking about possible actions to take, and she voices the mean thing that needed to be said. 'why not drop him in the pit of eternal murderdemons? he betrayed us'

jerk characters can be great because they usually take things into their own hands

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Be a dick in real life and write characters like autobiography. Worked for me.

They kinda fucked up Cricket’s life and that Mexican family

>Yea Forums is full of niggers who can't appreciate unsympathetic characters nor a writing that isn't blandest vanilla shit
I shouldn't be surprised but I am.

Yeah there's a good reason this place is called 4eddit in general and Yea Forumsmblr in particular.

i recall some of my favorite cartoons had something like this yeah.
even better if they have like one friend who isn't a jerk and is genuinely nice but always naive, and when one of the big jerks messes with him, the jerk friend goes ballistic to get back at them for his friend