Younger: 5 Reasons Quinn Was Wasted As A Villain (5 She Was Just Right)

Quinn Tyler occupies an interesting position in Younger – she’s the closest thing the series has to a villain in the final seasons, but she’s not a pure ‘bad guy’. There are definitely times that she seems like a baddie; she lies to Liza and sets her up, she can be mean, self-serving, and ruthless, and she sees people as easily manipulated… but she has some soft moments, too.

In her relationship with Charles, she can be kind and loving, and even vulnerable. Is she really the big bad of the Younger world, or a sympathetic character who is set up to look bad – and did the show waste the opportunity to really make her a glorious villain, or get the balance right?

10 Wasted: Didn’t Get A Good Send Off

Quinn barely even gets a final scene, which was a waste. Her final moments are when she is snapping at Charles about missing the flight, and then she pops up via email to try and send over the Inkubator investor pitch. It was a deeply unsatisfying ending, and at the very least, fans deserved to see the moment that Charles broke it off. If Younger wanted to play her up as the villain, this would be a perfect opportunity to show her comeuppance, and instead, she just quietly drifts off-screen.

9 Perfect:  She Gets A Not-Unhappy Ending

Quinn ends the series much the same as she was when she first appeared in it – rich, single, on a beach somewhere sipping cocktails and planning her next move. It’s not a happy ending, but it’s not a terrible one, either – this is a dream for many people! If she had been built up to be a bigger bad, it would have been unsatisfying to see this, as fans would have wanted a more significant comeuppance. By not making her a pure villain, her ending is unremarkable, and leaves space for bigger changes in the lives of the main characters.

8 Wasted: Wasn’t Believably Consistent

Quinn had the potential to be either a great villain, or a great redemption story, but one of the more frustrating aspects of the character is that she ends up as neither. Especially in the final season, it often seemed as though the series just wasn’t quite sure what to do with her, especially at the end.

She spent most of the season being increasingly loving, kind, and sweet with Charles, just to snap back into her original mean self just in time for him to realize he should be with Liza. It didn’t seem particularly believable, and the character lost out as a result.

7 Perfect: Her Kind Moments Had A Bigger Payoff

The upside to her often inconsistent characterization was that the twists in her behavior had a bigger impact by virtue of being truly unpredictable. When Liza believed that Quinn was about to announce another run for office, using Charles and his family as props, the reveal that she wasn’t was huge – and really threw a spotlight on Liza’s own beliefs about Quinn. Her moments of vulnerability meant more because it was never entirely certain if they were real, and fans got more invested than they would have if she had been obviously playing Charles.

6 Wasted: Didn’t Seem To Exist Outside Empirical

Quinn had great potential, but was very obviously a side character – as evidenced by the fact that she essentially only existed in reference to the Empirical crew. The parts of her story that were revealed were brought up in order to strengthen a connection or comparison to Liza or Charles, and she would have been better as a villain (or a redeemable character) had she been given a little more breadth as a human.

5 Perfect: Not Everyone Needs To Be A Main Character

On the flip side, not everyone needs to be a main character. Quinn exists in the series in order to provide romantic competition for Liza, and to create conflict and possible drama with both Empirical and some of the offshoot career choices Liza and Kelsey face.

And as that, she works perfectly. Had she been pushed more into the spotlight, given a fuller backstory, and turned into a deep and complex villain, it would have drawn focus from the real main characters.

4 Wasted: Bait And Switch Drama

Even without being a vitally important or fully developed villain, Quinn still had some wasted potential with her bait and switch storylines. After her fake ‘next run for office’ move on Liza was revealed, for example, it would have been fantastic to see this double down – for her to actually run, but without Charles, or pull some other big stunt. Her storylines were rarely as big as her attitude (or her budget) and there was definitely space for more there.

3 Perfect: Kept Fans Unsure Of Her Next Move

The final two episodes kept fans on the edge of their seats with huge twists – and those wouldn’t have been possible if Quinn had been either a straightforward villain or redeemed character. Had she been clearly ‘bad’, fans would have expected Charles to leave her, and had she become truly ‘good’, they wouldn’t have wanted him to. But as a mid-range character, it was left uncertain if she would actually be Charles’s endgame, and the twist had all the impact it should have.

2 Wasted: Impossible To Really Love Or Hate

By the end of the series, fans were clearly rooting for the vast majority of characters. Even those who started out more unlikable (like Diana, or even Redmond) became charming and easy to root for as time went on, but Quinn continues to occupy a strange middle ground. It’s hard to truly root for her, despite her final season (and especially when she seemed to revert to her original, mean, self in the end), but it’s hard to truly hate her, having seen her soft side. The result is unsatisfying, for a show where the majority of the characters are clearly good or bad.

1 Perfect: Realistically Complicated

Younger is far from a realistic series, but Quinn may be one of the most realistic characters, and that’s what makes her shine. While others fall into stereotypes or are (charmingly) exaggerated, Quinn could have worked as well in a serious drama as she did in Younger‘s fluffy, high-fashion world. She felt nuanced, and as she started to become softer with Charles, but maintain her ruthless manipulations in other areas of her life, it made her one of the most interesting characters in the last season. It made her stand out, and sometimes that didn’t work, but at other times, it made her more interesting than almost anyone else.

About The Author

Rose Graceling-Moore
(1516 Articles Published)

Rose Graceling-Moore has been writing about film, TV and comics since 2013, when she began writing for a local print magazine in Vancouver, BC. Since then, Rose has written for Horror Honeys, Moviepilot and Quirkbooks as well as Screenrant, increasingly focusing on comic books and live-action comic adaptations, as well as diversity and representation on screen. Rose also co-hosted the DC Movies Podcast, and has guested on other nerd and entertainment podcasts over the past five years.

Rose’s love of comics began all the way back in the early ‘90s, when she discovered the X-Men while living in Africa (where there wasn’t a whole lot to do but read!), and since then has had an on-again, off-again love affair with not just Marvel, but DC and indie comics as well. You can follow her on Twitter: RoseMooreWrites for tweets about comics, movies, and more.

More From Rose Graceling-Moore