Basic Trope: A character realizes that being evil is an extremely unpleasant fate.
- Straight: After years of committing evil to get what he wants, Dracone comes to realize that his life of crime only made him more miserable.
- Exaggerated: Dracone feels that being evil, doing everything that is evil for the sole purpose of doing evil is traumatizing him enormously.
- Downplayed:
- Dracone lives a villainous life, and is slightly shaken by it.
- Dracone realizes that being a Jerkass sucks.
- Justified:
- Doing evil means that Dracone has driven away everyone that cared about him.
- Dracone had honorable intentions going in, but lost sight of them along the way.
- Dracone fears that he will be punished for his crimes, but that was the consequence of committing it anyways.
- Inverted:
- Subverted: While Dracone is suffering emotionally, he eventually forgets about it and continues to enjoy getting a kick out of doing evil.
- Double Subverted: He's a Stepford Smiler tormented by nightmares.
- Parodied: Dracone's world went on a downward spiral after he turned left on a red light.
- Zig Zagged: Sometimes, being evil sucks, but sometimes, being evil rocks.
- Averted: How being evil feels is never brought up.
- Enforced:
- The author wants to do a "Reap what you sow" aesop.
- The Author opposes the idea of evil being portrayed as glamorous, so the author shows the horrific consequences of villainy for both the villain and their victims.
- The video game designer uses Video Game Cruelty Punishment.
- Lampshaded: "Enjoying your evil life, Dracone? Because you don't seem so happy about it."
- Invoked:
- A group of heroes knew that Dracone enjoys doing evil, so they come up with a plan on telling him that being evil has consequences.
- A group of heroes knew that Dracone enjoys being evil, so they allow him to be that way until he lives with the consequences for the rest of his life.
- A group of heroes want to make sure that Dracone doesn't enjoy doing evil by beating him senseless for all of his crimes.
- Defied: "Oh, dear. I seem to be depressed. Minion! Fetch me some Hookers and Blow! That should cheer me up..."
- Exploited:
- See "Invoked 1" except the heroes want him to make an instant Heel–Face Turn.
- Emperor Evulz deceives Dracone into thinking that evil is the easy way of life only for the sake of watching him suffer the results of his deeds.
- Discussed: "After all the horrible things you've done, after all you've put everyone who has had the ill fortune of being in your vicinity through, just why are you coming to us asking for redemption and a chance to join our side? What makes you think we want to have anything to do with you?" "I can't make you understand, nor do I expect you to, but let me put it like this: the realities of the life I chose and the people I surrounded myself with made for worse enemies than you or anyone else could ever be. Villainy is a losing game. I can't take back the things I've done, I can't erase the guilt I feel every day, and I can't lift the weight of the consequences that I earned. What I can do is work to fix the damage I've done. It's all I have left - the path I took cost me everything else."
- Conversed: "Why can't the writers just turn Dracone good for a change if being evil is horrible?"
- Deconstructed:
- Because Dracone realizes that being evil is destroying his life, he quickly tries to stop doing evil, only to realize that no one, including the heroes, will ever forgive him for the evil he has done. After all, the moment Dracone crossed the boundary, he can't turn back from it. Once Dracone realized that as well, he takes his own life out of despair and guilt.
- Dracone has suffered the repercussions of being evil that this has made him completely lose his grip in reality, making him worse than he ever was.
- Dracone finally accomplishes what he set out to do, only for him to realise that all the atrocities and compromises he committed were not worth it in the end, and he will never find peace.
- Reconstructed:
- Realizing he will never be redeemed, all Dracone can do from now on is inform other people that the path to villainy isn't worth it.
- Alternately, after constantly losing and turning into an Ineffectual Sympathetic Villain, Dracone throws his hands up and changes sides, performing a Heel–Face Turn.
- Even if Dracone suffered the consequences of his actions and is unable to change what he has done, he decides to do good unto others. While it may not change some people's minds about him, he doesn't care as long as he's doing good to benefit society.
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