History MotiveDecay / AnimeAndManga

* Naraku from ''Manga/InuYasha'' has changed motives so many times that eventually he was evil just for the sake of being evil. Initially, he wanted to use the Shikon no Tama to become a powerful full-fledged youkai, so his goal is getting all the shards of the Jewel. But then, he was somewhat driven by his lust for Kikyo and hatred for Inuyasha, both coming from his human heart, so his goal becomes getting rid of that. He succeeds in separating his physical heart and discarding his feelings for Kikyou, so now his goal changes to killing her. But it turns out he needs both his heart and feelings to do this so the goal becomes reabsorbing them, and when he does, he finally kills her. In the end, he succeeds in getting the whole Shikon Jewel, but he neither absorbs it nor does he wish on it, he just decides to use it to kill his enemies. Naraku himself admits he's not sure what comes next after he's done that. Yes, that's right - he spends ''over 500 issues'' of the manga trying to get the jewel, and once he finally has it, he's not sure what to do with it. Even worse, it's revealed later that he did make a wish on the Jewel but was not granted: to have Kikyou's heart.\\
One of the reasons for him changing his mind so often is that Naraku is really a collective entity of many {{Youkai}} and a human man called Onigumo, and spends much of his time attempting (and succeeding) at absorbing other youkai into itself, so it is reasonable to expect his personality and goals to change to a significant degree (it has even been a plot point on occasion), but to also be contradictory especially when it comes to Kikyou and the Jewel, since the youkai hate her but Onigumo "loves" her, and the youkai want the Jewel to become powerful and Onigumo wants it to have her. This is lampshaded when Naraku first separated his human heart (and thus Onigumo) from his body. Onigumo angrily complained that after selling his soul to the youkai, nothing went the way he had expected.

* Divine of ''Anime/YuGiOh5Ds'' starts out as some sort of VisionaryVillain, being the leader of a movement giving shelter to the repudiated Psychic Duelists, wanting to form an army with them to take revenge on all the people hating and shunning them, making the world a better place for Psychic Duelists. Though his plans got foiled by his sudden death. But [[AssPull miraculously]] he returned and CharacterDerailment did take the best of him. While he was always close to the MoralEventHorizon, but also had his goals and clearly shared more with Aki than just [[MoreThanMindControl mind control]], he suddenly forgot all about his earlier intentions, turned into a psychopathic dumbass, causing his own death with the most ridiculous EngineeredPublicConfession and got eaten by a giant lizard just in time to exculpate Aki from all guilt and before he was about to [[NotTooDeadToSaveTheDay kill the main character]]. However, Divine is such a ManipulativeBastard that he is subject to a bit of AlternateCharacterInterpretation; as it's hard to discern where his [[BitchInSheepsClothing facade of geniality]] ends and his actual feelings begin.

* Divine of ''Anime/YuGiOh5Ds'' starts out as some sort of VisionaryVillain, being the leader of a movement giving shelter to the repudiated Psychic Duelists, wanting to form an army with them to take revenge on all the people hating and shunning them, making the world a better place for Psychic Duelists. Though his plans got foiled by his sudden death. But [[AssPull miraculously]] he returned and CharacterDerailment did take the best of him. While he was always close to the MoralEventHorizon, but also had his goals and clearly shared more with Aki than just [[MoreThanMindControl mind control]], he suddenly forgot all about his earlier intentions, turned into a psychopathic dumbass, causing his own death with the most ridiculous EngineeredPublicConfession and got eaten by a giant lizard just in time to exculpate Aki from all guilt and before he was about to [[NotTooDeadToSaveTheDay kill the main character]].
** Divine is subject to a bit of AlternateCharacterInterpretation, on account of the fact that he's such a ManipulativeBastard that it's hard to discern where his [[BitchInSheepsClothing facade of geniality]] ends and his actual feelings begin. Does he truly care for Aki on some level, or is he just using false kindness to make her more and more emotionally dependent on him? Is his goal really to demand societal acceptance of psychic duelists and take revenge on those who shunned them, or is he just raising a personal army of {{Tykebomb}}s to do his bidding? Is he merely ruthless in pursuit of his goals, or is he an outright sociopath? Depending on how the individual viewer answers these questions, it's arguable that in his reappearance after [[spoiler:his apparent death]], he hasn't undergone MotiveDecay but has simply dropped all pretenses.

*** Must have been a lot of pretense and especially braincells to drop if he was intelligent enough to hide all those evil motives and sociopathy during the first one and a half arc, but all of a sudden completely forgot better not to insult the owner of a Jibakushin, which was in the near vicinity to boot.

* Toward the end of ''SpeedGrapher'', someone with the people skills and political savvy to become Prime Minister becomes an all-consuming openly megalomaniacal beast with nothing more important to do than indulge in evil laughter and pull grotesque faces. What makes this {{Egregious}} is that before he appeared to have a plan with substantially evil implications on the lives of real people, but that all degenerates into BondVillainStupidity just to terrorize a little girl he claims to worship.

* Don intentionally over the course of ''Manga/DeathNote''. Light Yagami's megalomania causes him to completely lose sight of his original goal ([[UtopiaJustifiesTheMeans to improve the world by removing its criminal element]]) and degrade into using the Death Note to [[AGodAmI become "The God of the New World" and destroy his enemies]]. He also turns from a ManipulativeBastard who carefully plans everything out into a CardCarryingVillain who is so sure of his own success that the very concept of his own failure seems to confuse him. Many a character points out that Light is little better than a serial killer by the end, but Light's so blinded by his pride that it takes [[spoiler:his impending death]] for him to catch on.

* Over the course of ''Manga/DeathNote'', Light Yagami's megalomania causes him to completely lose sight of his original goal ([[UtopiaJustifiesTheMeans to improve the world by removing its criminal element]]) and degrade into using the Death Note to [[AGodAmI become "The God of the New World" and destroy his enemies]]. Many a character points out that he's little better than a serial killer by the end, but Light's so blinded by his pride that it takes [[spoiler:his impending death]] for him to catch on.

* Haru, TheHero of ''RaveMaster'', had a pretty easy motive "I want to save the world". He keeps it up for all 35 volumes. It's the BigBad, Lucia, who can't seem to decide what his reason for fighting is (lampshaded once). When he first appears he claims to simply be after power, then he wants to prove his family isn't crazy (by taking over the world), then he wants to be a god, then he wants power again, then he wants to break some curse that was put on his family for [[NoGoodDeedGoesUnpunished stopping humans from going extinct]] by [[GottaKillThemAll making them all die after all]].

* ''MagicalProjectS'' Pixy Misa starts every episode ruining the balance of good vs evil (that's her purpose) but ends acting for the ''Evulz'' and more often than not ends vacationing (justified in that she is not actually evil but she just represents the repressed aspects of Misao and doesn't really care for her goals) instead of torturing Sammy and in one episode she ended having vacations instead of destroying Sammy.

** To be fair, his breakdown is largely precipitated by the death of his love interest Maua Pharaoh. Who was one of the more decent characters in the series. While she's on the "bad guys'" side, she's never shown to do anything morally reprehensible herself, which is saying something in a series where even a good number of the "good guys" former nazi-expys with questionable motives and war crimes on their rap sheets.

* Asuham Boone in ''OvermanKingGainer'' wants revenge on Gain for his sister, but is an overall good guy. Eventually his obsession as Gain continues leading the Yapan people to Yapan leads him to decide to freeze the world using the Overdevil. Its eventually revealed that Asuham's sister had a one night stand and Asuham overreacted.

* Jerid Messa from ''ZetaGundam'' starts off as an ambitious elite soldier (by mediocre Federation standards), and has the goal of one day leading the Titans forces, even if the only reason is for the power that such a position would provide. A number of situations in the series even make him a [[PunchClockVillain relatively good guy in everyday life]]. After one too many fights with the series protagonist, he has transformed into an individual completely focused on nothing but pure bloody vengeance.

** Blue Cosmos from ''GundamSeed'' suffers greatly from this trope. Originally they were an environmental pressure group, but after Human genetic enhancement became possible they shifted their focus to preventing widespread genetic modification. After genetic enhancement did become widespread they became a militant/terrorist organization bent on killing anyone who had their DNA altered. When war finally breaks out between the genetically enhanced Coordinators and the natural humans of Earth Blue Cosmos begins artificially enhancing their own people to fight one on one with the Coordinators. Then it all turns out they were just a catspaw to Logos who do it for [[WarForFunAndProfit profit]].

* Ralph in ''SoukouNoStrain'' went from military golden boy to psychotic traitor [[spoiler:when he saw the atrocities committed [[PoweredByAForsakenChild to invent Mimics]].]] The trauma drove him insane, which may explain why his motives go from SetRightWhatOnceWentWrong to KillAllHumans.

* Divine of ''Anime/YuGiOh5Ds'' starts out as some sort of VisionaryVillain, being the leader of a movement giving shelter to the repudiated Psychic Duelists, wanting to form an army with them to take revenge on all the people hating and shunning them, making the world a better place for Psychic Duelists. Though his plans got foiled by his sudden death. But [[AssPull miraculously]] he returned and CharacterDerailment did take the best of him. While he was always close to the MoralEventHorizon, but also had his goals and clearly shared more with Aki than just [[MoreThanMindControl mind control]], he suddenly forgot all about his earlier intentions, turned into a psychopathic dumbass, causing his own death with the most ridiculous EngineeredPublicConfession and got eaten by a giant frog just in time to exculpate Aki from all guilt and before he was about to [[NotTooDeadToSaveTheDay kill the main character]].

** Misty wanted Ash [[YouOweMe to repay/replace the bike]] [[ThePreciousPreciousCar he inadvertently trashed in the first episode]], which is why she followed him around so much. Near the end of the first season, we find out that she actually forgot about the bike, and begins hounding Ash about it when he accidently reminds her. [[spoiler:Her bike was repaired before she left the show for May]]. Then again, soon after she first starts following Ash around she's doing so from behind trees, hastily mentioning her bike when she's found out. It seems to imply that she does like hanging around Ash but doesn't want to admit it so she uses the bike as an excuse so it makes sense that she'd occasionally completely forget about it.
*** Her ''overt'' goal is to be a Water Pokemon Master.[[note]]Her ''covert'' goal is [[TheGloriousWarOfSisterlyRivalry to get out from under her sisters' thumbnails]]. She seems to be able to accomplish this by staying with Ash until ''they'' decide to quit the Gym altogether.[[/note]] However, aside from a few episodes in Johto, [[InformedAttribute She never gets any chance to demonstrate any battling proficiency]] and her Kanto captures were more accidents than applications of knowledge.
*** The YouOweMe motive was referenced in the DVD commentary for the English version of the first movie. The director relates that, while they were trying to come up with an appropriate two-syllable translation for Misty's horrified reaction to Ash's apparent death, Misty's voice actress Rachel Lillis ad-libbed "my bike!"
** Also, Ash's goal was ToBeAMaster; that is, to become the world's greatest Pokémon Master (a Pokémon Master being a trainer who is an official part of the Pokémon League). Nowadays, this goal is barely referenced, and Ash seems to be going around fighting Pokémon battles for the heck of it. In Season 9, he was even offered the position of Frontier Brain, which would make him a Pokémon Master, but he turned it down.
*** We actually don't know if it would have made him a master. The definition has never been clearly defined.
*** His goal seems to be to be the grand champion of a major region (Orange Islands doesn't count, apparently). Then again, Ash seems more interested in the journey than the destination; he takes no shortcuts getting there and prefers to just travel the land instead of settling into some position of power. It's likely that "To Be a Master" was just an excuse from the start... Or it's his retirement plan.

* ''Anime/{{Pokemon}}'': Brock's life goal was to be a great Pokémon breeder. You'd never know it nowadays. He finally left the show becoming a Pokémon '''doctor'''.
** Misty wanted Ash to repay/replace the bike he inadvertently trashed in the first episode, which is why she followed him around so much. Near the end of the first season, we find out that she actually forgot about the bike, and begins hounding Ash about it when he accidently reminds her. [[spoiler:Her bike was repaired]] before she left the show for [[SuspiciouslySimilarSubstitute May]]. Then again, soon after she first starts following Ash around she's doing so from behind trees, hastily mentioning her bike when she's found out. It seems to imply that she does like hanging around Ash but doesn't want to admit it so she uses the bike as an excuse so it makes sense that she'd occasionally completely forget about it.
*** That nearly-forgotten motive's referenced in the DVD commentary for the English version of the first movie. The director relates that, while they were trying to come up with an appropriate two-syllable translation for Misty's horrified reaction to Ash's apparent death, Misty's voice actress Rachel Lillis ad-libbed "my bike!"

* BigBad Akihito Kayaba of ''SwordArtOnline'' has literary ''forgotten'' his motive half ways into his development of a floating castle survival game scheme.

* Naraku in ''Manga/InuYasha'' has changed motives so many times that eventually he was evil just for the sake of being evil. Initially, he was driven by his lust for Kikyo and hatred for Inuyasha, both stemming from his time as a human. Once he got over that, he wanted to use the Shikon-no-Tama to purge his human self and be a full-fledged youkai. And once he did that without the jewel, he was evil for the sake of evil. The jewel is supposed to grant wishes, and when Naraku finally gets the jewel, he decides not to wish on it, but just to use it to kill Inuyasha. Naraku himself says he's not sure what comes next when he's done that. Yes, that's right - he spends ''over 500 issues'' of the manga trying to get the jewel, and once he finally has it, he's not sure what to do with it.
** Doubly justified. For one thing, Naraku is a sort of collective entity that spends much of its time attempting (and succeeding) at absorbing other Youkai into itself, so it is reasonable to expect his personality and goals to change to a significant degree (it has even been a plot point on occasion). On the other hand, from the start Naraku has been established as the distilled evil of a multitude of Youkai, which just happens to have a little connection to a deceased human. He carried some memories and drives from that human for a time, but got over them eventually.
** This trope was actually lampshaded when Naraku separated his human heart (and thus Onigumo) from his body. Onigumo angrily complained that after selling his soul to the demons, nothing went the way he had expected.

** Misty wanted Ash to repay/replace the bike he inadvertently trashed in the first episode, which is why she followed him around so much. Near the end of the first season, we find out that she actually forgot about the bike, and begins hounding Ash about it when he accidently reminds her. [[spoiler:Her bike was repaired]] before she left the show for [[SuspiciouslySimilarSubstitute May]].

** Misty wanted Ash to repay/replace the bike he inadvertently trashed in the first episode, which is why she followed him around so much. Near the end of the first season, we find out that she actually forgot about the bike, and begins hounding Ash about it when he accidently reminds her. [[spoiler: Her bike was repaired]] before she left the show for [[SuspiciouslySimilarSubstitute May]].

* Ralph in ''SoukouNoStrain'' went from military golden boy to psychotic traitor [[spoiler: when he saw the atrocities committed [[PoweredByAForsakenChild to invent Mimics]].]] The trauma drove him insane, which may explain why his motives go from SetRightWhatOnceWentWrong to KillAllHumans.

** Divine is subject to a bit of AlternateCharacterInterpretation, on account of the fact that he's such a ManipulativeBastard that it's hard to discern where his [[BitchInSheepsClothing facade of geniality]] ends and his actual feelings begin. Does he truly care for Aki on some level, or is he just using false kindness to make her more and more emotionally dependent on him? Is his goal really to demand societal acceptance of psychic duelists and take revenge on those who shunned them, or is he just raising a personal army of {{Tykebomb}}s to do his bidding? Is he merely ruthless in pursuit of his goals, or is he an outright sociopath? Depending on how the individual viewer answers these questions, it's arguable that in his reappearance after [[spoiler: his apparent death]], he hasn't undergone MotiveDecay but has simply dropped all pretenses.

** Tobi is actually a subversion. We are initially led to believe that he is actually Madara Uchiha, the real one of which rather did come in this flavor. With the revelation that he's actually [[spoiler: Obito Uchiha, a childhood friend of Kakashi's, we learn that his sole motivation is to destroy the world because he thinks it's not real after [[TheLostLenore the girl he liked died]], because [[InsaneTrollLogic a world where something bad can happen to the girl he liked can't possibly be real]].]]

* Suzaku Kururugi in ''Anime/CodeGeass'' starts off as a heroic upstanding fellow, who wants to change the [[TheEmpire system]] from the inside. After the [[spoiler: death of Euphemia at the hands of Lelouch]], he more or less seems to go temporarily insane, leading to a justified battle with the MagnificentBastard Protagonist Lelouch. However, in the interim between both seasons going well into R2, not only has he become a {{Jerkass}} of ridiculous proportions, he has sold out his old best friend for a step up the power ladder, and his goal of changing the system from within has degraded to making his own homeland a better place (effectively giving the rest of the enslaved Areas of Britannia the middle finger). [[spoiler: He does eventually realize that prioritizing means over ends ''really'' doesn't pay off after a couple of MyGodWhatHaveIDone moments and proceeds to team up with Lelouch to save the world and [[TheAtoner atone for his sins]].]]
** The Black Knights undergo a similar one in R2 19 when they [[spoiler: intend to sell out Lelouch to Schneizel]] in exchange for Japan, at the expense the rest of the world represented by UFN, for which the BKs made up the primary military force, and their fight against Britannia's dominion of the world, and there was no actual guarantee that Britannia would keep their hands off of Japan once and for all. (And their own ally Kallen was nearly caught in the crossfire.) None of this went very far at all, given that Lelouch was whisked away by Rolo in a [[spoiler: HeroicSacrifice]] the moment things started to go south, and Xingke and Kaguya would soon catch Ohgi trying to cover the whole thing up.
** After the aforementioned event in addition to [[spoiler: Nunnally's apparent demise]], Lelouch, who prior to the betrayal had actually assembled a legitimate front in the UFN to battle Britannia, now decides to go it alone, [[TheUnfettered abandoning all personal inhibitions]] and willing to use his geass on anyone and go to even more drastic extremes, including making {{Faceless|Goons}} SlaveMooks out of his new army, detonating the world's biggest energy reserve [[InferredHolocaust and apparently causing more death and destruction than he did during his rebellion pre-betrayal]]. The latter (or former technically) was at least somewhat justified because of [[BlackAndGreyMorality the opposition he faced off against]]. It's not that he became evil per se; the plot justifies it as [[spoiler: him centering the world's hate around him for world peace]]. However, given the leading circumstances and the plausibility of such a plan (and Lelouch's own admission that it was a gamble), it all seemed like a convenient [[DeathSeeker death wish]] for him. The aforementioned fact that causing worse, unnecessitated destruction was a path to atonement, even as a mask, when it is even noted in side materials by Lelouch that there are other methods, makes it seem more a case of {{Designated|Evil}} than NecessarilyEvil.
** Charles being a WellIntentionedExtremist reveals him to be worse than Lelouch and Suzaku combined in this regard. He conquered most of the world [[spoiler: just to take control of the Thought Elevators scattered around the globe, allowing him to get to the World of C to destroy "God" and kill free will itself]].

* [[Manga/FullmetalAlchemist Roy Mustang]] starts out trying to become the best damn leader in the world, but it starts to go wrong when he faces Envy, [[spoiler: who killed Hughes]]. Fortunately, Hawkeye helps him out. [[spoiler: With death threats.]]
** A better example would be the BigBad -- he originally started out as [[spoiler: a lab experiment who couldn't survive outside of the tiny flask it was created in, and caused the end of an ancient civilization to gain a human body of its own]]. After that, it starts an elaborate AncientConspiracy, sealing itself in a dark underground hideout, preparing for the day it can [[spoiler: absorb God]]. Van Hohenheim even points out that it's essentially back where it started.

* Far in the backstory of ''Lightnovel/FullMetalPanic'', Amalgam was founded with good intentions. They actually played a key role in the defusing of the Cuban Missile Crisis. Unfortunately, they were founded shortly after WWII and the main story takes place in the 90s. In the roughly 50 years between its founding and the main story, virtually all of its members had retired and been replaced by people who had different goals and used the organization to achieve those goals instead of the ones set forth by its founders. [[spoiler: [[CreateYourOwnVillain In the end, Mr. Mercury, the last member of the original council, was forced to create Mithril in order to stop his out of control creation.]]]]
* Over the course of ''Manga/DeathNote'', Light Yagami's megalomania causes him to completely lose sight of his original goal ([[UtopiaJustifiesTheMeans to improve the world by removing its criminal element]]) and degrade into using the Death Note to [[AGodAmI become "The God of the New World" and destroy his enemies]]. Many a character points out that he's little better than a serial killer by the end, but Light's so blinded by his pride that it takes [[spoiler: his impending death]] for him to catch on.

** This is partially justified by the corrupting influence of the Death Note itself, and borders on HeWhoFightsMonsters

* This sort of thing happened across international lines as part of FourKidsEntertainment's dub of ''Anime/YuGiOh''. They usually played down the sympathy-inducing backstories of the villains and made them more evil. Pegasus' goal was the same (to bring back his lover Cecilia) but the methods were more ruthless. In the original, he needed to defeat Yugi so that he could gain control of Kaibacorp's technology and create a ''hologram'' of Cecilia to live with. In the dub, he wanted Yugi's Millennium Puzzle and all Millennium Items so that he could bring Cecilia's soul back and infuse it into the hologram. It's said in the dub that in doing so, he could inadvertently destroy the world. Although probably unintentional, this motive shift actually makes sense in the long run, as the seven items together DO open the door to the afterlife (where Pegasus could get Cecilia's soul) and also unleash the power of Zorc Necrophades into the world, which could indeed destroy it against Pegasus's wishes (this is Yami Bakura's intentional goal.)

** Tobi is arguably a case of this as well, though it's possible it'll be averted if the author decides to explore his motives more. It's helped by the fact that TheReveal [[spoiler: that he was Madara was in fact him lying, as shown by another reveal, thus tangling his motives back into the "who is he?" argument again. He has, for now, settled on saying he's "nobody"...]]
*** [[spoiler: Tobi has been revealed to be none other than Obito Uchiha, a childhood friend of Kakashi's, who was in fact carrying out the real Madara's plan. His motives can be summed up as wanting to create a [[UtopiaJustifiesTheMeans utopia]] where TheLostLenore is alive. His motive seems to be pretty static, though YMMV (to say the least) on the motive in general.]]
** With Kabuto people aren't even sure if he ''has'' a real motive for working with Tobi or what his future plans are at all. It's all EpilepticTrees with him right now. Recent chapters showed Kabuto as suffering from a lack of identity stemming in part from his orphan status, and wishing to acquire an "identity" for himself through means similar to Orochimaru's immortality hunt: get every jutsu possible.

* Over the course of ''Manga/DeathNote'', Light Yagami's megalomania causes him to completely lose sight of his original goal (to improve the world by removing its criminal element) and degrade into using the Death Note to destroy his enemies. Many a character points out that he's little better than a serial killer by the end, but Light's so blinded by his pride that it takes [[spoiler: his impending death]] for him to catch on.