The Bubble was jam-packed with celebrities and crazy happenings, from showing the unbearable boredom of quarantine to shooting a woman's hand off as she was running away. While this kept the pace constantly moving forward, it also meant that many characters didn't get enough screen time.
While Carol had the central arc of the film, realizing with horror the kinds of conditions they were trapped into and trying to escape them, there were several other arcs that fell a little flat because they lacked enough time to feel suitably compelling. Which characters really needed more development in the movie?
The MoCap Dragon Guys
The mocap dragon characters were side characters with some serious main character energy in this film. Not quite actors, not quite crew, they came in as comedic relief to break up the rest of The Bubble. While a comedy doesn't usually need that sort of break, these characters were refreshing and interesting to watch and could have been used a little more often to break up the mad action of the rest of the movie.
As the movie itself says, the trials and tribulations of absurdly rich celebrities are not the most compelling storylines. Especially during the pandemic, the idea that everyone was going through the same trials was put to the test, as money made it so that the rich could pretend the pandemic didn't even exist. Though the actors might not be as rich as the studio head, they are still unsympathetic in a lot of ways, which caused side players like the mocap dragon guys to be so much more interesting.
The Hotel Staff
If the Covid-centric plot of The Bubble can be boiled down to one main conflict, it was between the actors being put in increasingly inhumane conditions, and the studio forcing them into those conditions. But the hotel staff also had a role to play in that conflict and were surprisingly absent from the majority of the movie. The audience gets one scene of them all hanging out together, discussing how great it is for them that the film keeps getting extended, but the story never expands on that idea.
It would be nice to see more from them. Show them directly profiting off of the film's extensions, but also dealing with their own struggles. The hotel staff was oddly excluded from the pandemic side of the plot, despite being frequently blamed for new cases. They could have made for an interesting parallel to both the celebrities and the studio, showing people who benefit from the continued production, but who do so for basic survival, rather than to line already gilded pockets.
Anika
Anika was an interesting character in The Bubble, trying to convince celebrity womanizer Dieter to fall in love with her. It was a deviation from the central plot of the movie and didn't seem to have much substance given the amount of time it had. Had Anika had more screentime, perhaps audiences would understand why she wanted to seduce Dieter, and how far she had gone to get her goal.
Did Anika join the hotel staff with the explicit purpose of making Dieter fall for her? Was it just a lucky coincidence? Anika had the potential to be a true rom-com heroine if she had only been given more time and motivation for her seduction, which would have provided an interesting reason for Dieter to want to stay working on the film.
Lauren and Dustin
The on-again-off-again dynamic between Lauren and Dustin parodied all of the celebrities who get married and divorced repeatedly in the real world. It's no secret that co-stars often end up dating, so seeing that dynamic in a little more detail could have given some interesting commentary on the way relationships work in the movie industry.
Their adoptive son mostly seemed to exist to show off how bad of a father Dustin was, consumed by making the movie-within-the-movie Cliff Beasts more successful, but it fell a little flat, as the very realistic broken family was only played for laughs. Seeing the two grow closer or apart during their forced time together would have been an interesting plot that could have made the movie as a whole stronger.
Sean Knox
It was very well established in The Bubble that Sean was running a cult, but that plotline dropped away immediately after he admitted to not having written his own book. But author of the book or not, he was the figurehead of an entire lifestyle brand, and it could have been interesting to see him have to wrestle with his position in his cult during a global pandemic.
If there had been more time for his character, maybe showing him indoctrinating another character into his cult and then being unable to keep up with the chaos of the world and the studio's actions, then maybe that beat would have hit home more successfully. As it was, he ended up being just another one of the many characters in the film who were introduced as being quirky and potentially dangerous before being largely ignored for the rest of the story.
Howie Frangopolous
Howie's character had the least amount of screen time of all the actors, and his contribution didn't come across as necessary. But perhaps more screen time could have fixed that, because despite his lack of screen time, he made a big impression. Howie was supposed to represent a person who couldn't handle the realities of quarantining and remaining safe during the pandemic, which had the potential to send some really interesting messages to the audience.
Unfortunately, he mostly seemed to have a meltdown out of nowhere, disappearing for the majority of the film without facing any of the physical or financial consequences other characters dealt with. The character then came back in the end to shoot Mr. Best, which came out of nowhere, but what happened before and after those two events is utterly missing from the movie. It would have been useful to the character and the plot to give him more time to show the pressure of quarantine getting to him, and the realities of life beyond the bubble after his escape.
Krystal
Of all the characters present in The Bubble, Krystal seems to be one of the ones with the most screen time, second only to Carol. However, that doesn't mean she wouldn't benefit from a little more time to develop her character. Krystal was the young TikTok star brought into the franchise to try to bring in a new audience, and while there was a brief reference to the pressure she dealt with being an internet celebrity, it would have been interesting to see that developed more.
Her relationship with her mother seemed to be based on her successes, rather than being an innate family dynamic, which led to her desperately needing someone (Carla) to connect with. Giving just a little more time to the character would have made audiences better understand her friendship with Carla beyond them both being young, and would then make Carla's eventual betrayal that much more effective.