memes

Ah, uncle Iroh, everyone's favorite barely reformed war criminal.

This is why there’s that trope where the bad guy gets killed in the process of, or just after, getting redeemed. So the story can have its cake and not have to deal with any of the icky justice afterwards. How jarring would it be to have the bad guy turn around, save the day, and then the heroes still kill them or drag them off to a trial for their crimes? So justice has to be meted out by fate rather than having to complicate our heroes.

How many planets did Vegeta destroy that we didn't see? We saw that one that was such a casual fucking thing for him.

I mean if the villain's redemption is well written then typically the guilt from their past actions is the punishment for said actions, and their current actions are largely focused on atonement and reparation. That sort of thing often makes them even more relatable because while not everyone has killed another person, everyone in the world has hurt someone else at some point, maybe unintentionally, maybe unknowingly, maybe due to extenuating circumstances or their own trauma, or maybe because they were just a worse person at the time. Does that mean they are never allowed to be a better person and must eternally suffer for all the wrongs they've committed? Is it not better to encourage their goodness in the present than to forcibly drag them back to when they were bad over and over again for the sake of vindication? Does society really benefit from that sort of thing? And what if they end up saving more lives than they've taken? Something to think about.

hilarious how this guy became a meme. I hope he earns at least $1 every time someone posts a picture of his trying-so-hard-to-stay-awake face on the internet.

My biggest problem with Fairy Tail.

Never got over Gajeel beating Levy within an inch of her life, then literally crucifying her for the rest of the guild to find.

And then that's who people start shipping her with?! AND THEN IT BECOMES FUCKING CANON!?

Remember kids, it's easier to get forgiveness than permission.

This is why I like the Halo expanded lore. There's a lot of guilt and grudges when it comes to Thel Vadam in Halo. Dude led fleets that killed millions of humans. He just accepts that he'll never make up for it, no matter how much good he does for humanity after the war.

It also goes into how, even though he was manipulated by the Covenant, he'll never stop feeling guilty. But he's the only Sangheili leader that is 100% devoted to peace with the humans, so most humans aren't willing to take a shot at revenge.

Reminds me of Sylar from Heros. Man killed a lot of people. Like, a lot. If memory serves, he became a "hero" in the last 10 minutes of the last episode.

Just use the Dragonballs to revive them

So, from a meta perspective, no real people died or were harmed. And the things real people get from a story are not a direct one to one analog to what goes on in a story.

Stories let people process things without actually having to participate in them. The fictional characters are not real. The person reading is, and generally filters what they read through a lifetime of experiences, picking and choosing what to integrate into themselves. Watching media or reading books and liking things doesn't turn you into a bad person simply by exposure.

It's true a story can spread a dialogue, but acting like someone is a terrible sinner guilty of the most horrifying thought crimes because they like the bad guy in a story isn't really different in my mind that someone religious peddling nonsense like you'll go to hell if you merely think a thought that isn't in line with a holy book.

I think sometimes people raised in religious homes with all that guilt about thinking sinful things stop going to church, but sort of copy and paste the moral thought crime bullshit onto random things and pick that up as their replacement zealotry because it feels familiar.

I see it happening a lot in discussions of media with darker content.

Reminds me of Negan.

Thank you Fred Johnson!

The village of Nameks that Vegeta massacred, including children. And the planet of bug people he killed on his way to Earth with Nappa.

He didn't even become actually "good" until after he kills himself. Never atoned AFAIK

Accelerator's redemption arc made him my favorite character and you loser teenagers can get mad at me all you want

Teal'c.

Magneto was >!right!< a murderer

Cyclops was >!right!< done dirty twice

Quentin was a snarky jerk but technically right?

I absolutely love her character and her S5 arc, but Catra from SPOP be like