Ben-J-man
I'm not sure whether to post it here but I would like to provide a new quote for the page. It's from my own work my Warhammer 40,000 fanfiction Secret War (Which will probably be against it and fair enough) It's also sounds a lot like Paarthunax's in Skyrim but here it is.
I'm not a good person. So tell me what means more, Marcel? Someone who's inherently good, doing good? Or someone who's inherently evil doing good, despite their ingrained nature?- Attelus Kaltos, Secret War: Upon Blood Sands.
"The best way to lie is to tell the truth." Attelus Kaltos Check me out on FF.net https://www.fanfiction.net/u/1489301/Adrassil
Why do we have this own page of examples if we already have separate pages for different kinds of Antiheroes? Is it because some Anti-heroes fit numerous or none of the types listed on the Sliding Scale?
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Yes. Not all antiheroes fit into any more specific trope.
"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard Feynman
I feel like since all of these guys in the Examples have a residence in the sub-pages somewhere. On the flipside, this page is HUGE with its endless list.
So, should this be turned into an Index page, without examples?
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That would be a Trope Repair Shop discussion.
"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard Feynman
Why is Batman the example for this page? I know everyone on T Vtropes is into superior japenese anime and whatever, but come on. Batman is not an antihero in ANY way. He abhors guns, and if he was ever written otherwise, it was severely out of character. Choose Deathstroke, or Venom, or Punisher, or someone that's actually an antihero. It's not that hard.
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Check out the reasoning here- https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/posts.php?discussion=1303051115072373700
Also, "everyone on TVtropes is into superior japenese anime and whatever"? Way to throw an incorrect, aggressively categorical blanket. There are lots of people who enjoy not-anime, thank you very much.
@Azure Seas: Accusations (though accurate to some degree) aside, I'm gonna have to agree with the OP on this one.
Batman is NOT an Anti-Hero character. Maybe some iterations of the character have portrayed him as such, but those such examples are exceptions to his character archetype, not the rule.
There are countless other examples of true Antiheroes within this trope page, any of them will do.
Little hamsters, big adventures.
Doesn't change the fact that when most people think of the modern anti-hero, it's usually Batman.
"I'll show you fear, there is no hell, only darkness." My twitter
Look, just because someone doesn't like guns, it doesn't mean he's not an antihero. He can be excessively brutal and can employ almost villainous tactics. Given how one of his primary tactics is to beat his victims so badly that people will be less likely to turn to crime out of fear of ending up the same way, he's far from the Ideal Hero. He doesn't kill, but beatings to within an inch of his victims' life have always been fair game for him.
Not an antihero? He's brutally aggressive in his fights, he's antisocial, he's emotionally stunted, he can be very manipulative and underhanded, he's a lawbreaker, he's often mean, and he's brooding. These are very non-ideally-heroic traits. He's an antihero, and a textbook Byronic Hero, at that.
Edited by Lennik
How do you tell the difference between an Anti-hero and a Hero with faults? It seems to me that the majority of these characters are simply the latter. All heroes should have faults, right? To be a balanced character? So then where's the line drawn between heroes with faults and an anti-hero? I always thought an Anti hero was someone who was on the good side but kinda a jerk. As in kinda a jerk is their main state, not one they just visit (ie, Snape). Or else a hero who fails (Frodo) because they lack a heroic trait (endurance).
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No, all well-written heroes don't have to have faults. There's a reason we have the Ideal Hero trope and the Mary Sue trope as separate instead of one and the same. They aren't the same.
Edited by 69.65.249.116
I removed these examples because they're suspicious to me: they're cited to literary critics and historians, yet this page explicitly does not use the same definition of anti-hero as what's standard in literary criticism.
- Kaoru Genji, from Lady Murasaki's Tale of Genji, is considered by many scholars to be the Trope Maker.
- Older Than Feudalism: Odysseus is considered by some historians to be one of the first anti-heroes in literature.
I am not familiar with Genji, and can't evalutate that example due to the lack of description/explanation. But I don't think Odysseus counts. He doesn't have the bitter cynicism or traumatic past or angst I'd expect, and his amorality is probably more the result of Values Dissonance than author intent. He loved his wife, he killed his enemies, he was wily and cunning and strong and dangerous in battle, and he accomplished impressive deeds immortalized in song and myth. That seems to be what Archaic Greeks honestly liked in their heroes. And instead of disregarding society's expectations and ethics, he enforced them: don't steal a man's wife, don't violate the rules of hospitality.
Edited by ArcadesSabboth Oppression anywhere is a threat to democracy everywhere.
The entry under [1] is very biased towards the Cylons. The context of the show - namely that the Cylons murdered billions of humans, bringing humanity to the brink of extinction and is hunting down the few thousands who remain with extreme prejudice - is missing completely, making it seem like humans hate Cylons for no good reason.
Can someone more versed in the series balance the entry out somewhat? This troper has yet to see the fourth Season and does not know what, if any, factors come into play in that time.
A bunch of links to this page as well as this page itself talk about how there are different types ("Type III, Type IV") but they aren't here. Were they removed? If so, why, and should they possibly be brought back?
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The types actually refer to the Sliding Scale Of Anti Heroes. If you see something like that without a pothole, you should probably link it to that.
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Should we perhaps list the types here? Since it seems relevant and they're already mentioned, just not listed.
Edited by NorthernDruid
Should be perhaps mention that in literary criticism this isn't what Anti-Hero means at all?
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Totally agreed. It was mentioned previously, but someone felt the need to remove it. It is a sadness.
The problem is that the main article only describes Types III to V of the Sliding Scale Of Anti Heroes. The non-TV Tropes-and-generally-accepted-by-most-academic-sources-and-authorities-on-literature definition of antihero is "a protagonist with traits contrary to the archetypical hero." The article needs to be less specific. Some Troper should jump at the call to edit this article. Somebody should... Oh yeah, never mind. Be right back.
Edited by Brick3621
As written this is not an example — Richard is a Heroic Sociopath. If replacing give specific details for how Richard has become an Anti Hero over time.
- Richard of Looking For Group is another example of the Anti Hero, though his motives for helping the main hero seem to be out of pure boredom rather than anything else.
- Recent story development suggest some higher plan.
- More Heroic Sociopath than Anti Hero... and sometimes just plain Sociopath.
Heroic Sociopath is a very extreme type of Anti-Hero.
I'm a Troper!!!
Thoughts on why there are few female anti-heroes:
I think that in order to fit the trope well an anti-hero has to exist in a sort of gray area. He's unfit to become a regular hero or at least a redeemed member of society perhaps because of a Dark and Troubled Past but is not a Complete Monster because he never crossed the Moral Event Horizon.
The problem with a female anti-hero is that almost any crime is easily forgivable as long as it doesn't cross the Moral Event Horizon . Think of a male character who is or was a thief, mercenary, or assassin who doesn't kill innocents. Not a Complete Monster but he carries a certain stigma.
Now think of a female character who has the same resume. It's pretty hard to translate that stigma, especially if there's a romantic tie-in with a heroic character. The only way I can see one working off the top of my head is if a female character acts heroically but is Only in It for the Money.
Edited by Clay
I think we should have an Anti Hero index. It will include the following tropes, as well as a few others:
- Badass:
- Black-and-Gray Morality
- Blood Knight
- Byronic Hero
- Designated Hero
- Fatal Flaw
- Good Is Not Nice
- Heroic Sociopath
- Hero with an F in Good
- Jerk with a Heart of Gold
- Lovable Rogue
- Knight in Sour Armor
- '90s Anti-Hero
- Pay Evil unto Evil
- Sliding Scale Of Anti Heroes
- Token Evil Teammate
Who agrees?
Edited by ading I am the lone wolf. I do not lead or follow. Hide / Show Replies
Villain Protagonist are Not antiheroes.
You lack '90s Anti-Hero and Sliding Scale Of Antiheroes.
Should this page get the subpage treatment? After all, Anti-Villain did
Real Life: Steve Jobs, CEO of Apple. Revered by many as the second coming of Christ himself, but when you pay attention to his attitude towards customers (particularly over email), hear what he's like as a boss and observe the spiteful war mongering with any company who disagrees with him and he quickly becomes apparent as a bit of an a-hole.
A sympathetic treatment doesn't make a villainous character a hero.
- Hans Beckert, from M, is either a perfect Anti-Hero or a perfect Anti-Villain. He's a sympathetic childkiller.
Without any heroic character Craig does not appear to be an example. Bad behaviour or being disagreeable is not enough for this trope.
- Craig from South Park. He is implied to have bad behaviour, and is referred to as "the biggest trouble-maker" in his class by Eric Cartman. Craig seems to be one of the most stoic, gloomiest kids from his class, having a darker personality than the rest of the characters, being pragmatic, monotone and ironic. In the early episodes he was indifferent to everyone, constantly flipping them off. In the latter episodes, he is the leader of a gang who are social rivals with Stan, Kyle, Cartman and Kenny. Cartman frequently refers to the gang as "Craig and those guys".
- His assertiveness could also lead to bullying, because, when kids from their class bullied someone, Craig was usually the first who "gave the attack".
The characters appear not to be examples: most are not heroic, the heroic character is apparently a straight hero.
- 8-Bit Theater's main characters are anti-heroes to the point that "Designated Heroes" doesn't even begin to describe them.
- I'd say Fighter is probably more a hero than an anti-hero in that he wants to be a hero and seems to succeed in being a nice, good, righteous guy when he attempts to. However, his stupidity causes him to put up with pure evil Black Mage, amorally greedy Thief and morally detached Red Mage.
- Except Fighter, they're all really just pure evil. A requirement of being an anti-hero is doing heroic things, which the 8-bit cast hasn't done so far.
- I'd say Fighter is probably more a hero than an anti-hero in that he wants to be a hero and seems to succeed in being a nice, good, righteous guy when he attempts to. However, his stupidity causes him to put up with pure evil Black Mage, amorally greedy Thief and morally detached Red Mage.
Linking to a past Trope Repair Shop thread that dealt with this page: What types?
, started by Enlong on Oct 24th 2010 at 8:51:01 PM
"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard Feynman