One for Sorrow

This is very late (10 days or so) as a reply but I had something to note about Peter. Peter, pre-betrayal, is described as chubby, short, a tagalong, and bad at duelling. Now, it's developed in fanon that duelling = brilliant (as in good, not necessarily intelligence wise, though the case can be made) so you can't really blame Rowling for that, but overall, she's created a very unsympathetic character. I mean, even his teachers thought he was sort of pathetic. On the other hand Sirius is described as intelligent (by the same teacher -- McGonagall -- that described Peter as hero-worshipping Sirius and James) and good looking (as well as likely monetarily well-off) and James is described as popular and rich. Honestly, from every thing we've heard about/seen of Peter, he's an annoying, sniveling little fat kid who, for some reason that certainly is never stated/shown in the books, Potter and Black both trusted with their lives (as well as, obviously, befriended). There's absolutely nothing positive to work with there. Despite being told he was a good guy, we never see how. It's never even hinted (in comparison to, say, Neville Longbottom who's chubby and untalented but also braver and stronger than everyone gives him credit for). Therefore, justifying him being friends with Potter and Black is... difficult at best and extremely awkward at worse. So, in my opinion, that's why he's so often left out of MWPP-era fanfiction.

Now, in regards to the other stuff. First, as you don't watch Buffy this might not make the most sense to you, but, well, Spike attempted to rape Buffy. The scene from Seeing Red in season six is enough to make you feel ill. A lot of the Spike sympathetizers jumped ship at that point. Personally, I prefered Spike as 'dark' because he was an interesting character then insomuch as he was undeniably a bad guy, he killed puppies and babies and liked it, and then he was this man (or unman) who was so completely, utterly, undeniably in love with his, well, creator (Drusilla). Spike is a character who's obsessed with love which is what ultimately leads him into getting his own soul restored but he's also a horrendously bad judge of character (Drusilla essentially treated him as a lapdog, while she was more interested in Angel and destroying the world, which is -- non-ironically -- exactly how Buffy treats Spike in relation to slaying and her 'real' friends/lovers). So, I find Spike an interesting and complex character myself but he didn't do bad things without motivation in my opinion. The Buffy-writers are making a point, yes, that having a soul does not automatically make you a good person, but it's well within Spike's entire character to do the things he did. So, I find myself debating both sides of the Spike characterisation, against those that make him 'evil' and against those who make him 'good'. He's neither.

Now, Draco doesn't interest me in the same way. I don't think he's done anything that needs to be redeemed. What he needs to be smacked (figuratively) into realising that idolizing his father as he does is a path that's going to get him into much more trouble than it's worth. [Though I agree with your other post that Draco is attracted to power and that, given the examples he has of power: his parents, Snape, Dumbledore, Harry; his parents (especially Lucius just given that Lucius is male and Draco is also therefore making the want-to-be-him desire more attainable in Draco's mind) are the best choice for idolization from his particular point-of-view. However, I do defend him in the same way, because he's neither good nor bad at this point in any recognizable way. He does bad things on occasion for reasons that are perfectly justifiable.

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