Well. A good writer who cares for Xander might on some occasions write a cardboard Xander, just because oops, they weren't juggling all their fruit as well as they should've been, and they were too focused on the Tara/Willow action. But that cardboardness is often not the same as if they secretly hate Xander. That was careless writing of Xander, not the careful, fair, really serious attempt at writing Xander when the author hates Xander.

I'm talking about the negative vibe I get when I read the latter. redbrickrose mentioned below about how defensive you can get about a character, how you get to where you don't *want* to hear that other people don't like her. It's not quite the same as hearing the characters' faults, or the 'ships' failings. I feel like I'm pretty aware of the characters' I love flaws, and I often love them because of their flaws. But when someone is portraying a character they don't like, and they are doing it with good writing, and with decent characterization, and a firm foothold and canon and everything else, and yet it's coming through that this person hasn't looked at the character the way I do and seen what I do in both her flaws and assets, that this person actually dislikes my character--that makes my gut twist.

That negative vibe can come through in a variety of ways--just a lacklusterness, or a 2 dimensionalness, which you mention. kita0610 described it below as the character feeling just a little off center, just not quite right--too something, or too something else. The somethings all being characteristics the character has in canon, but to me it's not who they are, and the author is missing what makes this character special, why this character is so important to me. I find that offness a lot more disconcerting than seeing a character openly bashed. I hoped that makes sense.

Well, I wanted to read Irish Rose long before I friended you; it always sounded interesting to me. So, some day I will--and I'm looking forward to it!