History Main / ButYourWingsAreBeautiful

* Zelgadis Graywords of ''Slayers'' is a chimera, being a third demon and a third golem, giving him bluish skin with studded stones across his body, as well as wiry, stiff hair. Despite [[CursedWithAwesome the immense powers and stamina he gained]] as a result of his transformation, he hates his appearance and [[IJustWantToBeNormal spends most of his time between seasons searching for a cure]]. Most of the cast, Lina and Gourry included, don't find him unappealing at all (and he is rather handsome), and Amelia, who he is [[ShipTease somewhat attracted to]], finds his appearance "cool".

* Celty from ''{{Durarara}}'' is understandably ashamed of her lack of a head, but Shinra not only doesn't care, he thinks it's rather sexy. Of course, a missing head is a far cry from wings, but there's no accounting for taste I suppose.

'''Van:''' You and [[ClingyJealousGirl Merle]] are probably the only people who'd say that.\\
-- ''VisionOfEscaflowne''

** Magneto's opinion of Mystique gets brutally deconstructed in ''Film/XMenTheLastStand'' when she [[spoiler: loses her powers.]] Despite at least 20 to 40 years of mutual loyalty, Magneto immediately abandons her to incarceration or worse. [[BatmanGambit Unless he was planning on her
retaliation to further his plans, which worked]].[[/folder]]

* CharlesStross's ''[[TheLaundrySeries The Jennifer Morgue]]'': When half-[[HPLovecraft Deep One]] assassin [[spoiler:Ramona Random]] drops the illusion protecting her true, fishy appearance, she expects protagonist Bob Howard to be repelled. He's anything but.

* ''[[MazingerZ Shin Mazinger Zero]]:'' after Kouji finishes utterly ''trashing'' a ten-foot robot with his bare hands in front of his girlfriend Sayaka, he freaks out and asks her [[IAmAMonster if she was as terrified of that sudden show of inhuman ability as he was]]. [[http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/Shin_Mazinger_Zero_C01_34img.jpg Sayaka's response]] can be summed up as, "Hell no! That was both completely awesome ''and'' hot."

* In ''DetectiveConan'', it's revealed that one of [[TheWatson Dr. Agasa]]'s childhood friend's was a half-Japanese girl named Fusae Campbell Kinoshita. She was very self-conscious of her hair color; her fondest memory of her childhood is Dr. Agasa claiming that he liked her hair.

** He got pretty defensive about it in early arcs. Especially the one with that big, sweet, horse-faced hanyou whose home village abused him roundly. Clearly had a HalfBreedDiscrimination thing going on; just preferred the strong option to the powerless one.

* In OnePiece Chopper believes he is a monster, and is ashamed it until Luffy and co come along and find it TOTALLY AWESOME! SEVEN TRANSFORMATIONS! JOIN MY CREW! It helps that after he joins he realizes Luffy is much weirder than he is. But this leads up to him eventually being proud of being a monster, because of how it can help his friends, and because his {{nakama]] think it's cool.

* In ''TheWorldEndsWithYou'' fanfic, ''[[FanFic/ErisGame Eri's Game]]'', the titular character gives Shiki this saying [[spoiler:about being in her body]].

* In ''GoodLuckChuck'', one of the "one night stand" quickies Charlie has didn't want to bare her chest. At the end of the movie, we find out that she has three breasts. Of course Charlie's best friend, a cosmetic surgeon specialising in breast enhancement, goes completely wild for this when he finds out.

* The relationship between [[VorkosiganSaga Admiral Miles Naismith]] and [[SuperSoldier SGT Taura]] started out equal parts this and an inverted ScarpiaUltimatum (gallant young officer, suicidal CuteMonsterGirl, these things happen).

* ''Series/TheOuterLimits'' episode "Music of the Spheres" has aliens subjecting the whole of humanity to an EmergencyTransformation into bald golden-skinned creatures, so that they can survive an impending shift in the sun's radiation. The female lead's boyfriend still thinks she is beautiful.

* A large proportion of ''VisualNovel/KatawaShoujo'''s fan base frequently make statements to this effect.

* Beast from {{Disney}}'s ''Disney/BeautyAndTheBeast'' certainly fits, at least for the fans; even outside of the FurryFandom, the general consensus is that the Beast's monstrous form is better and more attractive than his human form, so much so that it's easy to [[CompletelyMissingThePoint wrongfully declare]] the movie's [[BrokenAesop Aesop broken]], as a result.
** What's the difference between Beast's beast form and his human form? The one gets to show his face in society and in public, the other cannot. It's much better being an ordinary human, than an attractive beast!
** In a more traditional use of this trope his eyes are [[WhatBeautifulEyes consistently portrayed as being attractive]] and after his transformation back to human is how Belle recognizes him.
* ''{{Shrek}}'' has Princess Fiona, who'd been human by day/ogress by night, dismayed to find that upon the spell upon her being broken she's now [[spoiler:permanently in ogre form]]. And Shrek is more enamored with her than ever.
* Nonromantic example in ''WesternAnimation/TeenTitans'', in a fifth season episode showing how the team met. Cyborg's used to people being cruel towards him because of his robotic body, but when Beast Boy first sees him, he exclaims "Cool!" {{Justified}} in that Beast Boy grew up in the presence of another robot.
** Lets not forget the episode where Starfire turns into a chrysalis, her species own version of puberty apparently, and Robin chases after her, even after seeing all her weird changes. Later when he meets up with her again, he tells her he would have come for her even if she hadn't changed back to looking perfectly normal. Daww...
*** Inverted in the very same episode, when an alien tells Starfire she is beautiful, solely for the fact that said alien race's sole diet is chrysalis and more chrysalis.
* The Mutates eventually come to this realization in ''WesternAnimation/{{Gargoyles}}''.
* One episode of ''DragonTales'' took this literally where the main characters actually befriend a dragon who has no friends because she had oversized wings.

** On the flip side of this trope though, there can be people who are unable to make peace with their problem (be it minor or major) and having someone specially appeal to it can actually make them even more disdainful of their own body.

** He got pretty defensive about it in early arcs. Especially the one with that big, sweet, horse-faced hanyou whose home village abused him roundly. Clearly had a TragicMulatto thing going on; just preferred the strong option to the powerless one.

* [[WingedHumanoid Hawk]] in S.L. Viehl's StarDoc series is revealed to have a full-sized pair of wings, courtesy of part-alien heritage. How did he hide them, you ask? By strapping them down to his back, under his clothing, so tightly that he was in constant pain. The resulting crouched posture and uncamouflagable hump on his back caused the main character to assume he had a horrendous spinal birth defect instead. Upon finally being let in on the secret, a stunned and enchanted Cherijo utters this trope practically to the letter. (Then again, Hawk wasn't hiding his wings so much because he was ashamed of them as because they could get him in trouble with the [[HumansAreBastards Earth]] [[FantasticRacism government]]. [[spoiler:As if being a [[TransparentCloset closet]] [[StraightGay case]]—and having [[DepravedBisexual Rico]] take advantage of his feelings—wasn't bad enough.]])

** Magneto's opinion of Mystique gets brutally deconstructed in ''Film/XMenTheLastStand'' when she [[spoiler: loses her powers.]] Despite at least 20 to 40 years of mutual loyalty, Magneto immediately abandons her to incarceration or worse.
[[/folder]]

->'''Hitomi:''' And about wings...I really like them, Van. They're pretty.\\

The most common explanation is that the character believes themselves to be some kind of "freak", thinks HumansAreBastards, and is scared of being tracked down by a TorchesAndPitchforks mob and/or a MadScientist, [[ForScience for]] [[TheydCutYouUp obvious]] [[PlayingWithSyringes reasons]]. Sometimes it's justified when, say, a character now looks like the enemy or [[FantasticRacism another reviled species]], or their culture involves torching anyone with a tail. Only if these attitudes are consistent with the world they inhabit however - unless the point is that the character is being too pessimistic about people's capacity for tolerance. Sometimes they'll look for a "cure". Ironically, if they manage to remove the fantastic feature they [[FlowersForAlgernonSyndrome won't become happy]], and tend to feel like a BrokenAngel instead.

* In ''Film/{{X-Men First Class}}'' Magneto wins over Mystique and several of the other mutants by accepting and reveling in their mutations rather than preferring them to be mainline. Internal Categorization at its finest as he even prefers Beast with a more extreme mutation while Beast is self loathing.

*** They were also his two best friends. And Sephiroth hadn't gone off yet, since he was made by a different process and wasn't ''dying''. (Angeal and Genesis might have been a little more positive about the mutation if it hadn't come with a ''bitch'' of an autoimmune disorder.)

*** Well, that is complicated by the fact that 'monster' (said in English even in the Japanese audio) is a technical term for the various mutants that experimentation and mako pollution cause in the setting, so what Zach says is correct. But when Angeal uses it he's giving it a distinct moral weight, as the English 'monster' and Japanese 'bakemono' normally carry, and it's that sense Zach is attempting to deny. Given his beloved mentor is saying things like "well, don't monsters usually want either world domination or revenge?" he's got reason to argue the point.
** Angeal ultimately goes into one of the ''ugliest'' OneWingedAngel forms in the series in the effort to get Zach to [[ICannotSelfTerminate off him]]. He does so, but he stays pretty pro-wings for the rest of the game, including asking to borrow Angeal's in a hallucination before breaking out of Hojo's mako tank, and when being absorbed by the Lifestream at the end, when it appears Angeal's ghost came to pick him up.

** On the flip side of this trope though, there can be people who are unable to make peace with their problem (be it minor or major) and having someone specially appeal to it can actually make them every more disdainful of their own body.

-->'''Police Officer:''' Hey, keep your big nose out of this, ''one-eye''.\\

* In ''{{Kuroshitsuji}}'', Madame Red ''hated'' her red hair... until Earl Phantomhive (Ciel's father) told her he liked it. That it was beautiful, and really suits her. Unfortunately for [[UnrequitedLove her]], he still chooses to marry her older sister...

* For Ciel from ''{{Tsukihime}}'', her [[{{Immortality}} immortal body]] (being a mix of types II and III) causes her to feel deeply ashamed of it (in general, not of just a single specific feature) until Shiki tells her how beautiful she is in her route. Given, it's a bit of stretch, so it may not count.

* ''ElGoonishShive'' had a mild case. Grace worried about her "monstrousness", until she discovered that the only reaction Sarah and Elliot ever show is blaming Tedd (due to [[BalefulPolymorph specific experience]]), while Tedd ogles her in hybrid form even more eagerly than in human form. Even after the remark about "[[http://www.egscomics.com/?date=2002-05-09 furry fetish and a half-cat girlfriend]]" she [[http://www.egscomics.com/?date=2007-02-14 had a fit of concern]] about her three-tailed omega form. As if there ''could'' be any problem.

* Short-term in Princess Ai: at the end of volume 1, Ai begins to grow wings, and thinks they're hideous. And yeah, the initial sprouts aren't that attractive. But her boyfriend, Kent, insists her wings are beautiful. A volume later, and her wings have grown, BeautifulAllAlong has kicked in, and the wings take a back seat to other, more pressing issues, like stopping a race war in her homeland.

* [[WingedHumanoid Hawk]] in S.L. Viehl's [=StarDoc=] series is revealed to have a full-sized pair of wings, courtesy of part-alien heritage. How did he hide them, you ask? By strapping them down to his back, under his clothing, so tightly that he was in constant pain. The resulting crouched posture and uncamouflagable hump on his back caused the main character to assume he had a horrendous spinal birth defect instead. Upon finally being let in on the secret, a stunned and enchanted Cherijo utters this trope practically to the letter. (Then again, Hawk wasn't hiding his wings so much because he was ashamed of them as because they could get him in trouble with the [[HumansAreBastards Earth]] [[FantasticRacism government]]. [[spoiler:As if being a [[TransparentCloset closet]] [[StraightGay case]]—and having [[DepravedBisexual Rico]] take advantage of his feelings—wasn't bad enough.]])

* In RobinHobb's Liveship Traders trilogy, there's a mutual version of this: the people from the Rain Wilds are deformed by the "strangeness" that runs down the river. Reyn Khuprus hides his face from Malta Vestrit, who is horrified the first time she sees him unveiled, because [[spoiler:she's ashamed of the "scar" on her forehead from a previous head injury]] which turns out to be [[spoiler:a scaly red crest, a sign that they're both becoming Elderlings as a result of their association with [[OurDragonsAreDifferent Tintaglia]].]]

** Again, Ben has a lot of issues about his appearance. Being turned into a giant rock-monster will do that to you.

* PlusAnima are discriminated against because of their partial animal-like features. Some kids hate their anima, some like how useful it is but are self-conscious about the scar-like marks it leaves, etc; and then there's some people who think an anima is the coolest thing since sliced bread (looking at you, Cooro) and make this trope come into play a few times. (However, interestingly, it does ''not'' apply to the main character, who has black wings and is often called an angel of death, but has [[AngstWhatAngst zero angst]] about it [[spoiler:until the last volume, anyway]].)