History Main / DesignatedEvil

* Franchise/WonderWoman killing Maxwell Lord. Lord was busily trying to bring about small-scale Armageddon, had control of one of the most powerful beings on Earth, was using that control to have Superman beat Batman to death, and he himself said, while under the Lasso of Truth, that killing him was the only way to stop him. Despite this, everyone in-universe acts like Wonder Woman killed him in cold blood for jaywalking, and since DC has a fairly strong tradition of ThouShallNotKill, it's heavily implied we're supposed to think this of her too. Unlike other examples of this trope, Wonder Woman is absolutely candid about what she did, including the fact that she considered herself completely justified due to the extraordinary circumstances. And she is also willing- even eager- to stand trial for it. (She is acquitted.)
* ComicBook/ThePunisher seems to run into this occasionally, depending on how he's being handled and whether he's in his own book or not. Usually in his own book, he's taking out major drug and arms traffickers, mobsters, and other people that could quite possibly rate the death sentence anyway. Outside of his own book, just to make sure that his war on crime is Designated Evil, some writers actually have him killing ''white-collar embezzlers''. His Garth Ennis runs also doesn't help since while they are memorable he is being ridiculously ultraviolent when it comes to killing his targets that one might forget he usually just shoot criminals in the head.
* Inverted in ''ComicBook/ElfQuest'' during Rayek and Cutter's competition: Cutter isn't clever enough to win the trial of wits, and blusters through the trials with physical skills, except for the last one, where he cheats by using a "magic stone" (a magnet) to retrieve his sword from a crevice. Savah rules him the winner, because Cutter's discovery of its magnetic property was an accident... but that's not true at all. Cutter was the one to chip it off from a larger stone, and the only reason any of the Wolfriders even noticed the damn thing was that it ''pulls metal objects to itself and clings to them''. This is never mentioned and although Rayek rightfully complains that Cutter cheated, as the rules disallowed the use of magic powers and Rayek is a talented telekinetic, nobody cares what he has to say about it except Leetah, and even she doesn't stand up for his right to a fair contest.
* Franchise/{{Batman}}'s one rule of [[ThouShallNotKill never killing]], particularly where ComicBook/TheJoker is concerned, has been a long-standing case of this considering Arkham Asylum's status as a corrupt CardboardPrison, the fact that most of these criminals are ''well'' deserving of the death penalty at this point, and the fact that countless lives would undeniably be safer without him around. Even in scenarios where lethal force would be wholly justified for either a law enforcer or civilian, either out of self-defense or saving the life of a hostage or ally, it's treated as a MoralEventHorizon that Batman and his allies can ''never'' cross, to the point they've even intervened to SaveTheVillain by preventing police or military using legal lethal force. So much so that it's been analyzed in-depth both InUniverse and by fans, justified as a case of either HeWhoFightsMonsters or RousseauWasRight, and even challenged in ''WesternAnimation/BatmanUnderTheRedHood'':

* ''ComicBook/WorldWarHulk'': The decision of the Illuminati (Iron Man, Mr Fantastic, Blackbolt, Charles Xavier and Dr. Strange) [[ComicBook/PlanetHulk to shoot the Hulk into outer space]] is treated as an unforgivable crime and a terrible betrayal of a close friend, ally and hero. Except the impetus for the Illuminati's decision was the Hulk going on a rampage which killed about 22 people. This was also a period in which [[ComicBook/CivilWar2006 anti-superhero political forces were just LOOKING for an excuse to enact registration laws.]] Exiling him was being pretty lenient and arguably doing him a favor since "Leave Hulk alone" is one of the Hulk's catchphrases. That's not even getting into the fact that the Illuminati were innocent of planting a bomb in the ship Hulk was in, which was the reason for the Hulk's RoaringRampageOfRevenge in the first place.

* In ''Fanfic/FriendshipIsFailure, helping people who don't want and/or think they don't need help or helping people in a way they don't like is always treated like it's a crime against equinity. A couple of the paragraphs beneath are examples:

* In ''WesternAnimation/BatmanTheAnimatedSeries'', "[[Recap/BatmanTheAnimatedSeriesE11TwoFacePart2 Two-Face, Part 2]]", the title character of the episode decides to end Rupert Thorne's life, something painted as crossing the line. While it was more from feelings of Two-Face's personal vengeance than justice he sought back as when he saw himself as Harvey Dent, Rupert surviving has allowed him to be a KarmaHoudini who keeps causing problems in later episodes, [[Recap/BatmanTheAnimatedSeriesE12ItsNeverTooLate including in the following one]]. One could argue that Rupert's death might cause an EvilPowerVacuum and make things worse for Gotham but the series has never implied this as a possibility.

* ''Series/{{Angel}}'':
** Gunn killing the professor that sent Fred to Pylea in "[[Recap/AngelS04E05Supersymmetry Supersymmetry]]". Not only was this portrayed as an evil act, but as him taking the evil onto his soul so that Fred wouldn't do it.
** Angel and crew's aquisition of Wolfram and Hart in the last season. Despite characters good and evil telling them that they would be corrupted and that it was proof that they had failed as heroes, most of what was shown was just the opposite. Angel fired or killed the firm's evil employees and maintained a very strict policy on not killing humans, he cut loose the firm's more sinister clients and benefactors, and one episode even showed Gunn using the company's resources and legal power to fight corruption and help people. This was made worse by Angel himself flip-flopping on the issue. One episode would end with him thinking that they had made the right choice, the next would show him thinking that doing good was nearly useless, and that he had given up all his principles.
** Angel letting [[spoiler: Drusilla and Darla snack on the Wolfram & Hart lawyers in "[[Recap/AngelS02E10Reunion Reunion]]"]]. It was a good indication that Angel was going down a darker path as it's generally something he wouldn't even think of doing, and he can be blamed for not sticking around to stop the two afterwards, but we're apparently supposed to fault him on principle for not saving a bunch of people who willingly and knowingly work for the personifications of evil who are responsible for much of mankind's suffering. Furthermore, Lorne directly states that it was going to happen no matter what Angel did, and the Powers just didn't want him around for it.
** Just prior to their joining W&H, there's the team fighting and ultimately killing Jasmine, which gets Lilah to come back from the dead to compliment them on destroying a perfect chance for world peace. Which rather ignores the fact that this peace would have come at the cost of all personal freedom, and Jasmine's immediate reaction to them ruining her plan was to try to destroy the world. Well, that's one way to get peace...
*** Not to mention that Jasmine had to [[spoiler:feed on humans in order to survive and keep her power]]. Of course, Wolfram and Hart probably doesn't have as much of a problem with that part.
*** Wesley actually calls her on all of this, which she dismisses.

* Jack Bauer executing [[spoiler: Dana Walsh]] toward the end of ''Series/TwentyFour'' was meant to show the audience that Jack had well and truly [[JumpingOffTheSlipperySlope Jumped Off the Slippery Slope]] in his quest for revenge, and everyone in-universe is absolutely horrified that Jack would do something so out-of-character as to kill somebody who was defenseless and surrendering to him. [[spoiler: This glosses over the fact that Dana was ''definitely'' not a helpless civilian; she was TheMole who'd committed several cold-blooded murders just that day. The sequence leading up to her death was a lengthy chase and shoot-out as she attempted to escape custody, and the only reason she was defenseless was because she'd just emptied a gun trying to kill Jack.]]

** When Sasuke is believed to have kidnapped the Eight-Tails Jinchuuriki Killer B and killed him, the entire Shinobi, especially Kumo-nin and the Raikage responds with an instant death sentence on him which objectively and to Naruto's perspective, is meant to be an act of cruelty that will trigger the start of CycleOfRevenge (Apparently, Shikamaru claims that if Sasuke dies, then Konoha will avenge his death and subsequently Kumo will avenge their deaths as well) and in turn war. But the problem is, Sasuke has basically attacked a very important figure of the cloud village and thus, they have every right to perceive him as a threat to the Shinobi world if he is not dealt with (It doesn't matter if B turned out to be alive, Sasuke would have still succeeded in kidnapping the Jinchuuriki if it weren't for B's quick wits). Not to mention that despite being a defector from Konoha, Tsunade did not lift a finger in trying to subdue Sasuke in any way besides aiding Naruto in making him return back to the village. Therefore if Tsunade does not handle Sasuke, then A will have no choice but to deal with the Uchiha himself. It doesn't help that when Naruto confronts the Raikage himself, he doesn't seem to care that his ''own freaking brother'' is under "Akatsuki" hands but rather care only about Sasuke and what would happen if they embrace the path of revenge. On top of that, when A learns Killer B is alive, he mellows out a lot, showing he isn't even doing it out of pettyness.

** When Sasuke is believed to have kidnapped the Eight-Tails Jinchuuriki Killer B and killed him, the entire Shinobi, especially Kumo-nin and the Raikage responds with an instant death sentence on him which objectively and to Naruto's perspective, is meant to be an act of cruelty that will trigger the start of CycleOfRevenge (Apparently, Shikamaru claims that if Sasuke dies, then Konoha will avenge his death and subsequently Kumo will avenge their deaths as well) and in turn war. But the problem is, Sasuke has basically attacked a very important figure of the cloud village and thus, they have every right to perceive him as a threat to the Shinobi world if he is not dealt with (It doesn't matter if B turned out to be alive, Sasuke would have still succeeded in kidnapping the Jinchuuriki if it weren't for B's quick wits). Not to mention that despite being a defector from Konoha, Tsunade did not lift a finger in trying to subdue Sasuke in any way besides aiding Naruto in making him return back to the village. Therefore if Tsunade does not handle Sasuke, then A will have no choice but to deal with the Uchiha himself. It doesn't help that when Naruto confronts the Raikage himself, he doesn't seem to care that his ''own freaking brother'' is under "Akatsuki" hands but rather care only about Sasuke and what would happen if they embrace the path of revenge.
*** Relatedly, Danzo officially removing Sasuke as a Konoha Ninja and putting his name in the bingo book is presented as a display of how evil Danzo is and how awful his reign as Hokage is going to be. But as explained above, Sasuke joined a terrorist group and kidnapped a man who was not only a foreign village's jinchuriki, but the brother of said village's Kage. Hadn't Danzo done that, it would have appeared as if Sasuke was still acting on Konoha's behalf, which in turn could have very much caused a war with Kumo.