7th Heaven Turns 30: Ranking All The Camdens, From Least To Most Annoying

It's been exactly 30 years since "7th Heaven" premiered on The WB, and we remember it like it was yesterday. Like so many American families at the time, we gathered 'round the TV every Monday to catch up with the Camdens. We loved them, we cared about them — and just like our own family members, they annoyed the heck out of us.

In that spirit of familial love, we've decided to celebrate the show's big anniversary by ranking the Camdens from least to most annoying. For the purposes of this list, we're only including immediate members of the Camden family, so extended relatives are safe from our good-natured ire for now. At ease, Colonel.

Actually, we lied — we're also including Happy. That dog may not have been born a Camden, but she undoubtedly became born again through them, so it counts. Besides, did anyone else get an "and" credit at the beginning of every episode? Happy exists outside of the rules.

Read on for our breakdown of the most annoying Camden family members, and be sure to drop your least favorite Camdens in a comment below. Said with love, of course.

If there was ever a saint among the holier-than-thou Camdens, it was the mixed-breed terrier that Simon believed he prayed into existence — and who put up not only with his blood relatives, but with all the honorary Camdens that came and went during those late-in-run, best-be-forgotten seasons. (When you name a character T-Bone, you're telling us you've given up as a show.)

After essentially serving as Simon's shadow in the early going — and narcing on Matt when he brought home a joint — Happy faded into the background, presumably keeping a safe distance from all the mind-numbing melodrama that followed the reverend and his fam from room to room. Alas, Happy was forced into that cramped RV with Eric, Annie, and all the mooches that replaced their biological children as they embarked on a cross-country journey in the second series finale. (We're fairly certain she would've preferred to stay behind and have a church parishioner occasionally check in on her, but those prayers were not answered.) — Ryan Schwartz

The eldest Camden's most annoying trait might've been inheriting some of his father's sanctimony. Just kidding... it was refusing to make out with Mary to teach his sister a thing or two about French kissing. Actually, that was disgusting. More disgusting than delivering his other sister's baby while trapped in an elevator? We'll leave that for you to decide. (We really just wanted to make sure you were paying attention.)

Then there was running off with Heather on her wedding day, followed by an emotional affair with Heather when he was married to Sarah, our favorite Camden-by-marriage — not that charisma vacuum Kevin Kinkirk posed much of a challenge. But aside from nearly blowing up his own life a time or two (or three... or four), he was probably the least annoying member of the family. Aside from the dog. — R.S.

Look, next to Lucy or their mother, Mary is Mother Teresa — you know, if Mother Teresa dared to vandalize a school gym, dared to date teen father Wilson, dared to date Robbie, dared to steal money from the twins' piggy banks to pay her bills, dared to leave her husband and child without first alerting her cloying family, who would've shamed her to death, only to reconcile with said husband and conceive twins, also without telling the rest of the Camden busybodies. But like, 80% of those supposed crimes didn't warrant the way her own parents and siblings ostracized her. (As for the whole leaving her husband and child thing? She had an excuse: Jessica Biel was too busy being a movie star for a brief period in the mid-aughts to appear in Seasons 9 and 10.)

Mary did the sort of things a lot of teenagers and young adults do — but when you grow up in a house that reeks of moral superiority and Christian condemnation, you're gonna act out and steal a drinking glass from your local, teen-friendly watering hole. Frankly, we're annoyed she ever gave her judgmental family the time of day after she was shipped to Buffalo. She deserved better. — R.S.

Once you get past all that "Bank of Simon" nonsense — and that one week he decided he was super into gangsta rap — this towhead's biggest offense (at least in the eyes of God) was that he was girl-crazy. I mean, really, from the moment Deena gave him his first hickey, the opposite sex was all this kid could think about. By the time Ashlee Simpson showed up? Fuggedaboutit.

Thankfully, that whole accidentally-killing-a-kid-with-his-car thing got him out of the house at 17 and off to college, where he somehow turned out semi-normal. But we also have to dock him a few points for dragging both Rose and Haylie Duff into our lives. — R.S.

Separating the man, the myth, the buzzkill from the disgraced actor who portrayed him is no easy task. Then again, the self-righteous reverend could do bad all by himself. Just ask anyone who had to suffer through one of his sermons, which seemed to serve only his immediate family and their first-world problems. (Or worse, when he let nepo baby Lucy step up to the pulpit in later seasons, as if his congregation hadn't suffered enough.)

Remember when he found marijuana in the house and threatened to drug test all of his kids — including 5-year-old Ruthie? And on the opposite end of the spectrum, he could never mind his own darn business when one of his adult children engaged in a little hanky-panky. But for all his bad deeds, his greatest crime might've been forcing the entire Camden clan to suffer through his Elvis-soaked fever dreams — which, yes, only took place in his mind, but even his own manifestations of his wife and children must've been divinely annoyed. — R.S.

As far as precocious TV children of the 1990s are concerned, few could hold a candle to Ruthie Camden. Those curls, that attitude — Shirley Temple had nothing on this little diva. Unfortunately, Ruthie was also Simon's little sister, and she fell victim to all of the usual annoying younger sibling tropes, from minor offenses like copying everything Simon did to more egregious crimes like "accidentally" destroying his science project. 

Ruthie became a different kind of annoying as she got older. We appreciated her developing an angsty, cynical mentality in the later seasons — it was a refreshing change of pace from the rest of the family's relentlessly sunny disposition — but just like her father, Ruthie loved poking her nose where it didn't belong, taking strong stances on various issues without knowing all the facts. We still have secondhand embarrassment from the time she circulated a petition to stop her teacher from getting "fired," only to find out that her teacher was leaving voluntarily due to a recent terminal cancer diagnosis.

If nothing else, Ruthie is the one who developed a love for George Gershwin and spread it to her family, meaning the entire musical episode — which belongs in the annoying TV hall of fame — is technically her fault. Case closed. — Andy Swift

If you have only fond memories of Annie Camden, you clearly don't remember her very well. On the surface, Eric's better half was a gold-star wife and mother, endlessly sacrificing her time and uterus for the ever-growing number of people living in her home who depended on her for absolutely every little thing. But let's not forget that Annie was also an OG Karen, a downright pioneer of the craft. There's a saleswoman in Glen Oak who's still in therapy after getting the business from Annie, a tirade that ended with Annie getting a round of applause from a gaggle of other Karens in the store. It was chilling. In another life, Annie probably would have made a great cult leader.

But like a fine wine, Annie didn't reach peak annoying until Season 10, at which point she made it her mission — as well as her entire personality — to sabotage Simon's wedding. Did his fiancée always have that look on her face like she just smelled a fart? Yeah, we didn't like her either, but you have to let it go at some point. Honestly, it's a shame that Annie gave up smoking weed all those years ago. It could have really mellowed her out. — A.S.

Middle child syndrome took human form in Lucy Camden, who was constantly on a very loud quest to find her place in the world. At one point, she even made her parents pay to send her to something called "Camp All By Myself," and she still spent the whole time calling home and bothering everybody. (Don't forget, this was still the era of landlines.) 

And where did she finally find her place? The pulpit, of course! Because if there's one thing Lucy needed, it was to be heard more. Eventually, dare we say miraculously, Lucy met her annoying equal in Kevin, whose monotone speaking voice and total lack of facial expressions would have absolutely earned him a spot on this list if we didn't limit ourselves to blood relatives. And Happy. — A.S.

On paper, we totally understand why the Powers That Be decided to spring a surprise pregnancy on Annie at the end of Season 2. In theory, by the time the twins were old enough to talk, they could seamlessly take the mantle of cuteness from Ruthie, who would no longer be a precocious child. It was an investment in the show's future, and we respect that. 

Unfortunately, the writers insisted on having Sam and David alternate between repeating one another and speaking entirely in unison, both of which gave their performances an undeniable "Children of the Corn" vibe. Sam and David simply didn't have what Ruthie had, but they get gold stars for effort. Actually, one star. They can share it. — A.S.