Hamlet: The Snarky Edition

This is a part of my essay for my Shakespeare's Tragedies exam. I thought it was pretty snarky.

(I also really wanted to make a reference to how similar Hamlet is to Harry in Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, but I wasn't that brave.)

Hamlet is arguably the most obnoxious tragic hero in Shakespearean lore: is he mad or isn’t he, is he going to avenge his father’s death or not, is he ever going to stop moping around and actually do something? If it was up to him, Hamlet probably would have stayed out of it. In the beginning of the play, he is simply a college student disheartened over his father’s death. If his father’s ghost had never appeared, he probably would have gone back to school, gotten some useless but impressive degree, gone back to court where he would have had a strong dislike of his stepfather but not enough do anything about it, married Ophelia, became king, and died an old man, seeing as how he didn’t have any jealous brothers to murder him. However, that didn’t happen, and he was forced to avenge his father’s death. Hamlet then spends next several acts alternating between pretending to be mad and moping about how awful his life is.