>>43688228Personally speaking, here's how I would have improved Ursula as an character: make her the daughter to Lila, an COTD who appeared in Battling the Generation Gap as an old rival of Johanna in the past. It's also worth nothing that they do share an mostly similar resemblance to each other, which would make the mother-daughter aspect far more realistic as well.
Here's why Ursula as Lila's daughter would have made her character far more deeper than being Harley 2.0 and petty towards Dawn for no apparent reason; by being the daughter of an former coordinator in the same vein as how Dawn is to Johanna, an foil could have been established between them, as two coordinators who share the same status but with widely different personalities, methods and ideals of coordinating albeit none less passionate. Now, if you're thinking: "But, isn't this just the female version of Ash vs Paul?", I'll give you that point, but hey it would be miles better than the random, underutilized rivalry that was present in the original DP.
Continuing on that front, here's how would Ursula's status as Lila's daughter alter her rivalry with Dawn; instead of being randomly salty at the latter winning the Wallace Cup for no apparent reason (she never really explains why she thought that way, nor did she ever show bias towards May, let alone fully comprehend the circumstances of her friendship with Dawn), Ursula will now have the added plot element of feeling guilty and letdown due to not being able to (in her own mind) beat Dawn and win the Wallace Cup for the sake of her mother, Lila. Hence, she would have a reason to start resenting Dawn and seeing her as an rival, rather than being bitchy just because the writers called for it. Then some twenty episodes later, when Lila meets up with Dawn and then loses against her in an contest, the former could have later told her daughter about it, which would lead to the latter wanting to avenge her mother even more.
