I realized that it was interfering with my enjoyment of the show, but somehow it didn't quite occur to me that it was also interfering with my liking for the main characters. I don't know why, really.

The kind of sad thing is that all they really needed was to keep more of Ellen and Jo in the show, as a counterbalance -- give Ellen one of Bobby's "helper" roles, for example, or a shared hunt, or something, and it would have reminded me that really, the characters aren't as hateful as I'd come to think.