From Hero to Mentor

Everyone has a story to tell. For The Hero, it is their adventures in defeating the bad guys. They likely spent years training themselves in a particular set of knowledge and skills and so if they die all of that valuable information goes to waste.

So, often when they get older, they may find someone young and impulsive but filled with a great deal of potential. So they make the step towards finding a protege, possibly even Passing the Torch as they wish to retire.

Evidently this likely happens to all Mentor Archetype characters in some fashion, but examples should be ones we actually see happen.

Subtrope of Older and Wiser. While they're being a mentor, this character is frequently an Old Master. Compare Hero of Another Story and Master-Apprentice Chain. The Veteran Instructor is a more mundane, usually military, version.

---

Examples:

Anime & Manga

• Jotaro Kujo, of JoJo's Bizarre Adventure fame, undergoes this from Stardust Crusaders to Diamond Is Unbreakable, where he takes a backseat to let the new characters shine, while helping them in a few fights and with the investigation into Morioh's strange events.
  • Jotaro himself was already the benefit of this; while former protagonist Joseph Joestar was The Leader of the crew in Stardust Crusaders, it's made clear that unlike Battle Tendency he's not the main focus of the battles or the Character Development.
• My Hero Academia: All Might is still the number one hero in the rankings when the story begins, but he knows already that it's only a matter of time before his injuries take him out of the game for good, so he actively seeks out a protege and finds Izuku to pass his power on to. He then functionally retires to teach and eventually leaves hero-ing completely to focus on educating.

Comic Books

• In Strange Academy, former Runaways leader Nico Minoru, having suffered a considerable drop in power due to losing the Staff of One, now serves as an instructor for younger magic-users.
• The premise of Teen Titans Academy sees the original Teen Titans training a new generation of young superheroes.
• Wildcat started out as a street level hero and member of the Justice Society of America but as he aged he became more known as a mentor to younger heroes training Black Canary, Batman, Nightwing, Batgirl (Barbara) and others at boxing and street fighting out of his gym.
• In X-Cellent, Guy Smith, formerly the hero Mr. Sensitive, is forced to resurrect his old team, X-Statix, to deal with his evil predecessor Zeitgeist, who's Back from the Dead. With most of his former teammates now long dead, Guy is forced to turn to the next generation, training his former teammates' children. This is particularly awkward for him as one of those kids is the daughter of his dead girlfriend.

Fan Works

• One of the plot threads of 5 Years Later is Ben taking on students of his own in the form of the Orion Squad. Lula, an alien from the same species of his transformation Fastrack, is his most prominent.
• In The Archmage's Last Bow, Nova Shine becomes Equestria's latest Archmage, having previously been Princess Luna's Night Apprentice only a few years earlier in The Apprentice, the Student, and the Charlatan, and one of the first things he does is take on his own apprentice, Bright Gleam, a unicorn filly he had a brief encounter with in Apprentice's early chapters.
• Nier: Automata (RE)Birth: Thousands of years after the events of NieR, Emil is now a magic instructor to both Alexander the last human and Blue the Machine child.

Films — Live-Action

• The Mask of Zorro: The beginning of the film saw Diego's last adventure as Zorro. Twenty years later, when the man who killed his wife returns to California, Diego trains Alejandro to become the new Zorro.
• Examined in an interesting way in the Men in Black movies. The big reveal of the first movie was that Agent K wasn't looking to train a new partner, but was instead training Agent J to replace him. Thus in the second movie J was shuffled off to be the senior agent and known for neuralizing junior agents who failed to meet his standards.
• Star Wars:
  • Obi-Wan went from apprentice to Jedi Knight to having his own apprentice all in the same day. That apprentice eventually turned to the dark side and became Darth Vader. He later lamented that he was unprepared to be a teacher and regretted his brashness. With the original trilogy, we only get this mentioned in passing but with the prequels, we see how it actually happens. He then later mentors Luke after his adventures with Anakin and Qui-Gon had ended.
  • Similarly, Luke becomes a mentor to Rey in the final trilogy of the The Skywalker Saga after leading the Original Trilogy as its hero, passing on some limited knowledge of the Jedi ways to Rey and trying to explain his frustration with how broken it seems—but she still learns from him. Even after his death he continues to act as a mentor to Rey, returning to the physical realm as a Force ghost to convince Rey not to make the same mistakes he did.
  • After Luke's passing in The Last Jedi his sister Leia takes over as a mentor to Rey, training her in the ways of the Force in The Rise of Skywalker.
• Rocky Balboa has taken up the role of mentor a few times in the series. The first time happens in Rocky V, where he trains Tommy Gunn. However, Gunn becomes frustrated with both the pace of his training and his jealousy over being compared to Rocky, leading him to turn on his mentor and side with George Washington Duke. He becomes a mentor again in Creed, training his late friend and rival Apollo's son Adonis in boxing.

Literature

• In Guardians of Ga'Hoole, Soren - one of the protagonists in the first six books - becomes mentor for his nephew Coryn, the main protagonist in the later books.
• Star Wars:
  • Star Wars Expanded Universe: After doing his part to help the New Republic defeat the Empire, Han Solo goes on to build a racing team and mentors a number of young pilots. One of the pilots he takes under his wing is a young woman named Greer Sonnel, and gets her a job with his wife when she develops a rare illness and is no longer able to race.
  • Star Wars Legends:
    • Luke goes from galactic hero who ended the threat of the Emperor and Darth Vader to a mentor who takes a number of Force sensitive people under his wing, founding the core of new Jedi who help rebuild the Jedi order.
    • Similarly, Wedge Antilles and Tycho Celchu go on to mentor a group of young, hotshot pilots who are selected to join Rogue Squadron. The lessons they teach their students enable them to survive during a time when most pilots are killed within the first few combat missions.
• Warrior Cats:
  • There's a variant where first series protagonist Firestar is the mentor of second series protagonist Bramblestar (though this takes place in the first series while Firestar is still the protagonist, and the training is complete by the time the second series rolls around.)
  • This happens with some of the medicine cats. The sixth arc's protagonist Alderheart is apprenticed to third-arc protagonist Jayfeather, while in the third series Jayfeather himself was mentored by second-arc protagonist Leafpool.

Live-Action TV

• A major aspect of Scrubs is the fact that the characters learn a lot about themselves and how to become effective doctors, thus in the later seasons, we see them rely less on the senior staff and instead become senior staff themselves. It is made most prominent in the last two seasons, where J.D. finds himself stepping into the same position his mentor did for him. This was hinted at as early as the first season when J.D. had to be a big brother mentor to a nervous med student and imitated the mannerisms of Dr. Cox.
• Kamen Rider Fourze: By the end of the series, Gentaro now works as a teacher in his school, and in Kamen Rider × Kamen Rider Wizard & Fourze: Movie War Ultimatum, he officially retires being Kamen Rider as he now guides new generation members of the Kamen Rider Club.
• Ultra Series:
  • Ultraman Leo: For most of the first forty episodes, Dan Moroboshi/Ultraseven returns as the titular Ultra's mentor and the superior of the show's attack team, MAC. Dan puts Gen into a marathon of Training from Hell to learn new techniques every time Leo gets beaten by the Monster of the Week. Leo himself, who had been through the worst tragedies and trials of his life would return in the Ultraman Mebius episode, "The Man Without a Home". Where he reminds the young Ultra and his allies about not relying on others while facing Alien Reflect. Mirai took Leo's advice and had to put himself into a similar training regimen to improve himself and eventually improvise his techniques. Later on, Leo would become Ultraman Zero's mentor during his exile from the Land of Light, and thus now part of the Master-Apprentice Chain that thoroughly developed Zero into one of the Land of Light's heroic Ultras.
  • Ultraman Zero himself, after many run-ins with Belial, would take a backseat and take the heroes that come after him under his wing whenever a bigger threat emerges. He trains Ginga and Victory to prepare for Etelgar, he and his father sparred with Ultraman Orb to unlock a new power to deal with Reibatos, he returns in Ultraman Geed to once again deal with the returning threat of Belial and guide the protagonist, Riku to a heroic path. And more recently he returns in Ultraman Taiga when he gives the titular Ultra his Plasma Zero-let to help him defeat a clone of his nemesis, and in Ultraman Z, mentors the eponymous Ultra and briefly fought alongside Geed against Celebro's Belial Fusion Monsters.
• Power Rangers: Tommy Oliver starts as the Green Sixth Ranger of the first season of Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers before becoming The Leader in the next two seasons along with Power Rangers Zeo and the first half of Power Rangers Turbo. He would return in Power Rangers: Dino Thunder as The Mentor and Cool Teacher for the teen rangers before becoming the Black Dino Ranger.

Video Games

• Assassin's Creed: This is basically Ezio Auditore's Character Arc throughout his trilogy and supplementary media. He starts out as a hero out to avenge his family and to foil a Templar plot but slowly grows into the role of the Mentor (which is an official title) of the Assassin orders across the Mediterranean. By the time of Assassin's Creed: Embers, his assassination days are clearly past, but he still mentors select students on occasion.
• Devil May Cry: The series' original protagonist, Dante, isn't the one in control at the beginning of Devil May Cry 4. That honor goes instead to a new hero, Nero. Dante is mostly pursuing his own goals through most of that game but upon interacting with Nero, shifts more into a mentor trying to subtly push the new hero into the forefront. In the supplementary materials or spin-offs such as the Deadly Fortune novel, Dante even helps Nero set up his own branch of the Devil May Cry demon-hunting business, and as of Devil May Cry 5, Nero runs his (alongside a driver/mechanic partner named Nico) as a mobile version operated out of a van. This relationship goes even further in the latter game where Nero is desperate to live up to Dante's legacy; dialogue lines has Nero wanting to prove his worth in helping to defeat Urizen, even if Dante initially tells him to stay back. Eventually, Dante has to travel to the Underworld (alongside his brother Vergil) to sever the Qliphoth and leaves Nero in charge of defending humanity on Earth.
• Final Fantasy X has Auron play with this. He was a guardian to Braska, the High Summoner, and is helping Braska's daughter Yuna complete her own pilgrimage to become the next High Summoner. To this end, Auron also recruits Tidus into the fold, since Tidus is the son of Jecht, another of Braska's guardians. The whole time, Auron is passing on knowledge about the world of Spira, how things work, and why things need to change, doing all of this to make sure that Tidus can succeed where he failed. It's later revealed that Auron was Dead All Along, an unsent spirit and a tortured soul seeking rest. The whole affair with Tidus and Yuna was one long Batman Gambit to ensure that the Eldritch Abomination Sin died and stayed dead instead of always coming back after a time.
• The Galaxy Angel trilogy stars Tact Mayers and the Moon Angel Wing, who are at the forefront of the conflicts faced by the Transbaal Empire against Eonia's rebellion and later the Valfask. When the Galaxy Angel II trilogy rolls around, Tact becomes the mentor and commanding officer to the new protagonist Kazuya Shiranami, and some of the original Moon Angels take to train their successors in the Rune Angel Wing personally.
• Grimms Notes: Shane is one of the main characters in the first chapter of the game. After the Time Skip that leads to the second chapter, she becomes Tim's mentor and adoptive mother.
• Honkai Impact 3rd: In the special story "A Post-Honkai Odyssey", which takes place 8 years after the end of the battle against the Honkai, one of the protagonists Raiden Mei has become a Living Legend and has taken the path of mentoring young anti-Honkai squad members, primarily the "main character" and Carole Peppers.
• Inazuma Eleven: Mark Evans is the captain of Raimon Jr High's football club and the main protagonist of the first three games. In the ''GO'' trilogy, which takes place 10 years after the third game, he returns as the new coach of Raimon and acts as a mentor towards the new main characters, particularly the new main protagonist, Arion Sherwind.
• John "Soap" MacTavish becomes this over the course of the original Modern Warfare trilogy, being a regular SAS operative and player character for much of the 1st game before becoming a non-playable squad leader in Modern Warfare 2 and 3, alongside his own mentor, Captain Price.
• PAGUI have the protagonist, Huo Wang, returning in the sequel as a Kid Hero All Grown-Up and a mentor to the new main character, Tsui-Lin. While standing by the sidelines for most of the game, Huo has a few Big Damn Heroes moments in the sequel and resumes playable status in the last level.
• In Persona 4: Arena, Aigis helps her robot "sister", Aigis, assimilate into civilian life- something Aigis once did herself.

Visual Novels

• Ace Attorney has the eponymous character, Phoenix Wright himself. Having been taken down by a colleague he plans his triumphant return for 7 years while searching for someone who could help him fix the law. That person turns out to be Apollo Justice, the apprentice of the colleague that got Phoenix fired. Not holding back in any capacity, Wright turns Justice against his former mentor and assists him in taking the man down, operating as a defense counsel while still being DISBARRED. Then, through further examination and some behind of the scenes meddling, Phoenix dismantles his enemy's backup plans. It takes him a year to regain his attorney's badge. In the meantime, he still teaches Apollo and finds a new trainee: Athena Cykes. The next years see Phoenix still be The Hero from time to time, but he largely operates as a tutor to his young subordinates, and is lucky enough to see Apollo reach his level of skill.

Western Animation

• Bruce Wayne becomes the mentor to Terry McGinnis in Batman Beyond as Terry becomes the new Batman. While Bruce does keep a strong presence as Mission Control, the series keeps a strong focus on Terry, and in a few episodes, Bruce has little involvement.
• This was the focus of Kung Fu Panda: The Paws of Destiny where Po graduated from Dragon Warrior to Dragon Master and became the teacher to four young pandas- Bao, Nu Hai, Jing, and Fan Tong- helping them become a new generation of kung fu heroes as the Four Constellations.
• Star Wars:
  • Star Wars Rebels:
    • Veteran Jedi Kanan Jarrus serves as a mentor to Ezra Bridger, training him in the ways of the Force.
• ThunderCats (1985): Even though he passes away during the Thundercats' journey to Third Earth, Jaga often returns as a Spirit Advisor to mentor Lion-O as he deals with being his role as Lord of the Thundercats and having aged to adulthood during his time as a Thunderan Popsicle.
• Winx Club: Bloom begins as a naive girl who needs to learn a lot of magic and where she came from and becomes a heroic warrior and leader over time. In season 4 Bloom develops into a mentor for Roxy, another fairy raised on Earth who unexpectedly learns that she has magic. Because Bloom has been in Roxy's shoes before, she's well-suited to help her adjust to being a fairy.

Real Life

• It's been said that one of the reasons Japan lost air power in World War II is because they kept their ace pilots flying, racking up kills until they were shot down or decided to pull a kamikaze move, while the US brought theirs back home to serve as Veteran Instructors to new pilots.

---