A bright and spirited boy from Destiny Islands whose peaceful life is shattered when his home is destroyed by the Heartless, and finds himself in possession of a peculiar weapon called the Keyblade. As a hero chosen to battle the forces of darkness, Sora embarks on a quest to reunite with his friends and save all other worlds from suffering the same fate as his own.

General Tropes

• Adorkable
• All Your Powers Combined: Has access to all of the mobility options of the protagonists of Birth by Sleep in Kingdom Hearts II (the dodge roll only shows up in Final Mix, but it's otherwise intrinsic to him throughout the series). Aqua's cartwheel is hidden in Master Form, though.
  • Jack-of-All-Stats: In comparison to Terra, Aqua, and Ventus. He's not as skilled a mage as Aqua, as fast as Ventus or as powerful as Terra, but is superior to them in the areas they don't specialize in. He's also not as adept at using the Keyblade's full potential as a Morph Weapon and lacks technique and finesse, but is learning as he goes along. Also specifically has this as his stat distribution in Kingdom Hearts Three Five Eight Days Over Two.
• Always Save the Girl: Sora says himself that Kairi means more to him than anything else. This is very apparent after he impales himself with the Keyblade of Heart to release her heart, even knowing that this will open the Final Keyhole and the Door to Darkness. Then, when Naminé writes herself over Kairi and Marluxia threatens to kill her unless she breaks Sora's mind and remakes them as her puppet, Sora was willing to allow this to happen if it meant her safety. And when Saïx tells him he has Kairi, Sora practically begged on his knees to take him to her. Saïx refused.
  • Lampshaded by several characters, especially Donald.
• Anime Hair: Sweet Mother. His hair keeps its shape underwater.
• Badass Adorable: Especially in the first game (Haley Joel Osment's younger voice in the English version definitely helps). In the second game he's pretty much a Badass Adorkable.
• Badass On Paper: While he's still more or less of a badass of his own, to longtime fans of Disney his feats border on extreme in badassitude. To be precise, his Rogues Gallery consists of almost the entire Disney Villain pantheon, who have without exaggeration collectively inspired nightmares of children worldwide for nigh on three-quarters of century now. The games consist in part of Sora and co. beating them down spectacularly.
• Berserk Button: Most notably Kairi; he tends to get very irrational when she is threatened or in danger, even to the point of alienating his friends, which is a notable change for him.
  • On the subject of his friends: harming them will not end well for you. A number of villains have found this out the hard way.
• Beware the Nice Ones: Sora is a sweet and cheerful kid who wants to help anyone who has problems, even if he doesn't know them. He forgives those who want to reform themselves, he saves the universe, and his only wish is to reunite with his two best friends. Though, he's not called a "Keyblade Wielder" for no reason. To this date, he has slaughtered thousands of creatures of pure darkness who had the universe shaking with fear, thousands of the sneaky and cunning Nobodies, put down Xehanort's Heartless and Nobody, defeated the "Mistress of All Evil" and her associates — a few of them being the Greek God of the Underworld, the Boogeyman himself, and the captain of an undead ghost pirate crew which not even the Royal Navy of the British Empire could defeat, and in the second game, he ain't afraid to insult them, make fun of them, or tell them to go to hell.
• A Boy And His Dream Eater: Sora and Riku also develope quite adorable relationships with their starter Dream Eaters, Wonder-Nyan and Komouri-Bat, the first of which Sora ends up lovingly nicknnaming "Iita". Sora ends up keeping all his Dream Eaters for companionship in the end, when he decides to embark on a journey on his own.
• Celebrity Voice Actor: In English, he can see dead people.
• Character Tics: Putting his hands on the back of his head. He does it because of Ven's heart residing in his own.
• Charles Atlas Superpower
• The Chosen One: Though it turns out he wasn't at first.
  • The Chosen Zero: Some people don't believe it the first time they meet him, though.
  • The Unchosen One: Sora is the only character to claim a Keyblade without performing the Keyblade Inheritance Ceremony with a previous Keyblade Master. Aqua, unaware that she'd accidentally done it with Kairi earlier, considered it with Sora, but decided against it to prevent him from feeling the pain of fighting Riku if he gave into the darkness like Terra. It doesn't work. Ironically, his status as The Unchosen One is what leads him to becoming The Chosen One.
    • Specifically: The Keyblade originally meant for Riku changed its mind when Riku weakened his heart with darkness, instead making its way for the nearest suitable heart, Sora. Riku is able to use this to force the Keyblade away from Sora later on, though Sora proves his worth through his understanding of The Power of Friendship and definitively gains ownership over what was once Riku's Keyblade.
• Chronic Hero Syndrome
• Combination Attack: Sora's specialty is combining his powers with an allies.
• Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass
• Cute Little Fangs: His Halloween Town costume.
• Divergent Character Evolution: With a single character, oddly enough. In Chain of Memories, Sora has a vast array of special attacks that build off his basic spells and attacks in Kingdom Hearts, with emphasis on his Magic Knight style, and massive expansion of magic techniques, while physical attacks being simple three hit combos or the Awesome, but Impractical special attacks from the game. In Kingdom Hearts II, after having forgotten everything about Castle Oblivion, emphasis is on Sora being a Lightning Bruiser, with his main offensive abilities being finishers and combo enhancers that include a bit of Full-Contact Magic, everything under Multi Melee Master below, and slicing through skyscrapers (!), with magic still being powerful, but less useful and in less variety. Fastforward to 3D and Sora is back to Magic Knight.
• Deadpan Snarker: Grows into this as the series progresses. However, its mostly more of an impish, good natured ribbing and playful snark
• The Empath: The traditional signs of this are subtle, but definitely there. In keeping with his newfound role as The Messiah, it is explicitly stated that Sora's super-power is the ability to "connect his heart with anyone" — ie: he heals hearts and brings people together simply by being in their proximity. Presumably, this is what his primary role in the story would have been, had Riku not screwed up his own destiny and left Sora to become The Unchosen One.
  • Coded ramps this up a notch by the final level, with much talk about Data-Sora willingly accepting the pain of others.
• Expy: Of Sion Barzahd (The Bouncer) and Mickey Mouse.
• Fingerless Gloves
• Friendship Freak
• The Hero
  • Idiot Hero: Although he's not so much of an idiot as he is simply naive.
  • Kid Hero
• Heterosexual Life Partners: With Riku.
• Incorruptible Pure Pureness: While there are characters in the series whose hearts are more pure than his, there's darkness in every heart, after all. The light in his heart is still pure and strong enough that he was able to protect Kairi's heart, open a door in the Realm of Nothingness to the Realm of Light, and repair Ventus's fractured heart while he was a newborn.
  • Played with later, though. In 3D Xehanort takes advantage of Sora's purity and empathy and uses it to break his heart and force him into the darkness.
• Invisible Parents: But not neglectful. Sora's mom makes dinner, and Sora's dad cares enough to take his son and his son's best friend out to play when they were little. But...You never actually see them...
• Japanese Pronouns: "Ore".
  • His newborn heart used "Boku", indicating that he was even purer and more innocent back then.
• Keet
• Knight Errant
• Leitmotif: Gets one — "Sora" — in the second game when he first awakens.
• Light 'Em Up: Most of Sora's special attacks are light powered, like Ragnarok, Ars Arcanum, Faith/Holy, and of course Trinity Limit.
• Man Behind the Man: Sora, Donald, and Goofy pretty much orchestrate each Disney Hero's success story, usually risking life and limb, while remaining more or less in the background.
• Master of Unlocking: He is a Keyblade wielder, after all.
• Magic Knight: In every game Sora is equally skilled in both swordplay and sorcery.
• Master Swordsman: Works hand and hand with Implausible Fencing Powers.
  • Could be justified, however, with a bit of Fridge Brilliance. While he was still asleep in that chamber, Roxas was using the Keyblade as a member of Organization XIII and probably raised his skills farther than what Sora could do in the first game. Then when he merged back with Sora, all of his skills were unknowingly transferred to Sora.
    • Distinct here, because he seems to be almost entirely self-taught.
• Meaningful Name: Sora means "Sky". Prequel character Ventus has a name meaning "Wind". Hmmm... To say nothing of the recurring line "There are many worlds, but they all share the same sky."
• The Messiah: Seriously. Name a person he doesn't like that's not a bad guy.
  • As of Birth by Sleep, this trope now applies quite literally to him.
    • Messianic Archetype
• Mind Hive: His drive system does not canonically function as this, despite what the in-game mechanics might imply. In addition, Roxas, Xion, Ven, and probably Vanitas are sheltering inside him.
  • Ven, Roxas, and Xion being inside of him is apparently going to be a major plot point in Dream Drop Distance. One of the recent trailers has Vanitas and someone who looks to be a younger Xehanort confronting Sora about "hearts other than your own!"
  "I'm everyone!"
• Motif: Crowns.
• Original Generation
• Personality Powers: Fittingly for The Messiah, his powers are Light, Heart, and Friendship.
• Planar Champion
• The Pollyanna: He keeps this personality up most of the time.
• The Power of Friendship: His mantra. It shows, too.
• Red Oni, Blue Oni: The red to Riku's blue.
• Red Mage
• Shipper on Deck: For some of the canon Disney couples. Watch his reaction when Mulan and Shang both get to be the Emperor's bodyguards. Donald teases it's because the couples remind him of him and Kairi.
• Shout Out: He can learn Cloud's Meteorain and Squall's Blasting Zone as Overclock Finishers in Re:coded.
• Shut Up, Hannibal!: Delivering several of those to both Maleficent, when she ranted a typical nothing can stop me now speech, and Xemnas, when he attempted to use The Victim Card. They both worked, much to Maleficent's rage and Xemnas's amusement.
• Signature Move: Trinity Limit.
• Smarter Than You Look: People tend to forget that Sora is extremely perceptive in the area of anything empathic and emotional and far more observant that he appears. He has a type of good natured wisdom that escapes a great number of other people
• Victorious Childhood Friend: To Kairi.
• Vocal Evolution: Haley Joel Osment was a few weeks shy of 14 when the first Kingdom Hearts came out in 2002, and was almost 18 when Kingdom Hearts II was released in 2006. The age difference shows, especially whenever he goes back to playing pre-KH 2 Sora.
• Weapon of Choice: He always has his Kingdom Key as his default weapon.
• Weapon Twirling: In general, but also specifically when imitating Cloud's victory animation at the Colosseum.
• Wide-Eyed Idealist: At first. He loses some of the "wide-eyed" as the games go on, but keeps the idealism.
• Would Hit a Girl: Spars with Selphie in the first level, fights Yuffie and Tifa in the Coliseum, and takes the female villains (Maleficent, Ursula, and Larxene) as seriously as the male ones.

Tropes Applying to Sora in Kingdom Hearts and Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories

• Achilles Heel: Disarming Sora of his Keyblade leaves him mostly powerless, though Sora seems to have wised up to this weakness in II and has learned to work around it.
• The Apprentice: To Merlin for magic. While it's not explicit, Merlin gives Sora training after Donald hands him his first spell, and continues to keep an interest in his development. There's no one to teach him about the Keyblade, unfortunately. That is, until Yen Sid takes over in Kingdom Hearts 3D.
• Back from the State of Being a Heartless: This requires multiple sequels to explain the repercussions of.
• Mighty Glacier: Was this in Kingdom Hearts, attacking with slow and brute Keyblade swings.
• Giving the Sword to a Noob: Its lampshaded by Leon.
• Heroic Sacrifice: Unlocked his own heart with the Keyblade of Heart to save Kairi.
• Hidden Depths: Lazy, goofy, and a bit of a ditz (Nomura compares him to a humble country bumpkin), but has a powerful heart and an innate understanding of light and darkness, as well as an adventurous streak and the determination to take it to the stars. He can also be contemplative and philosophical, when no one is looking. He also hides fears and doubts that are powerful enough to take form and hides multiple personalities within his Heart.
  • On another note, his Drive Forms from Kingdom Hearts 2 are his hidden depths made manifest, regarding combat and power.
• Hot Blooded: Quite a bit, when provoked. Though this side of him rarely shows, except when Naminé is threatened in Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories. Usually, though, Sora's very mellow.
• Lazy Bum or Brilliant, but Lazy: In the first game, particularly. He's insanely hesitant about his relationship with Kairi, and just seems to laze around, content with everything as is. While he has a zest for adventure and grows into exploration and Heartless-killing, he'd really rather just have Riku and Kairi (and Donald and Goofy) back home with him on Destiny Islands. He's slowly growing out of it and acknowledging his greater responsibilities towards Terra, Ven, and Aqua.
• Unskilled, but Strong: In the beginning all he had was the power of the Keyblade and his determination(which also strengthens the Keyblade). Hes getting better but does not have a full grasp of the Keyblades poweres or higher end magic abilities.
• Unstoppable Rage: Perhaps Sora's most overlooked aspect of his personality, as it appears mostly in Chain of Memories. Sora is truly a nice kid almost all of the time, but when he is truly angry, it is definitely a sight to behold. Larxene and Vexen both fell victim to this when they pushed him into it, though he didn't kill Vexen... the poor guy got offed in a much more painful manner by Axel.
• Unwitting Pawn: Spends about as much time enabling the Big Bads' plans as he does derailing them. Particularly in Chain of Memories.

Tropes Applying to Sora in Kingdom Hearts II

• Ain't Too Proud to Beg: Via Hannibal Lecture.
• Awesomeness by Analysis: Sora's fighting style is completely self taught. This doesn't stop him from being one of the most powerful and skilled fighters in the Kingdom Hearts verse, with relatively little practice. Sora's merging with Roxas, who had close to a year to develop his skills, near the beginning of Kingdom Hearts II may have contributed to his growth in skill.
  • The Keyblade itself is implied to have a mind of its own, so it's presumed that that helps smooth things over.
  • Considering the characters from BBS had to be trained in it while Sora just wings it the whole time... Wow Sora just wow!
    • This is even more impressive when you realize that Sora still doesn't actually know the full potential of the Keyblade, mostly using it as a simple melee weapon and only really knowing how to utilize a couple of its non-combat related skills. This means he's basically been doing his journey on Hard Mode without realizing it this whole time.
• Bash Brothers: With Riku at the final battle with Xemnas and/or when using Eternal Session with him.
• Beehive Barrier: Sora's Reflect spell manifests like this and is borderline a Game Breaker.
• Lightning Bruiser
• Casting a Shadow: Sora's Anti Form's combo finishers are of the dark element. In fact, his Dark Void looks like a dark version of Ragnarok. Also, Sora's Dark Cannon when in Eternal Session with Riku (although that may be mostly Riku's doing).
• Cutlass Between The Teeth: Wields the Keyblade like this in his lion form when in the Pride Lands. Surprisingly, it works just fine.
• Cutscene Incompetence: He can mow down 1000 Heartless with ease, but you'd never know it watching some of the scenes.
• Cutscene Power to the Max: Kingdom Hearts II. The triangle button goes from being a vestigial button used only for magic shortcuts to being the button you use to jump hundreds of feet, teleport to deflect arrows by kicking them (via Flash Step), and throw skyscrapers at dragons. Of course, you don't actually have control over any of this beyond initiating the cutscene.
  • Naturally, this led to the Fan Nickname of Sorangle.
• Dual Wielding: Figures out how to do this during Kingdom Hearts II. Roxas, Xion, and Ven probably helped. Promotional materials typically give him Oblivion and Oathkeeper when Dual Wielding like Roxas.
  • Roxas can help even more; during his battle, you can steal his Keyblades. i.e., Triple Wielding.
• Flying Weapon: Sora moves his Keyblade(s) with magic when in Master or Final Form, as well as when he steals Oblivion and Oathkeeper from Roxas.
• Hyper Competent Side Kick: In Kingdom Hearts II, while assisting various Disney Heroes on their own turf, Sora tends to play second banana. However, he will be doing most of the work dealing with the Disney Villains and beating back the Heartless.
• Multi Melee Master: Though in most of Kingdom Hearts and Kingdom Hearts II Sora is restricted to his Keyblade, at various points in the story, he makes use of staves, shields, swords, claymores, scythes, water clones, some sort of spear, and cards as effective melee weapons. In addition, he can also switch between dual-wielding Keyblades, levitating both Keyblades, levitating one Keyblade while holding the other one normally, levitating two Keyblades while holding another one normally, dual-wielding while holding one Keyblade in a reverse grip, wielding a Keyblade by his fingers, or just using the Keyblade normally.
• Spam Attack: In Kingdom Hearts II Sora's fully upgraded combos are incredibly long and fast, and consist mostly of variations on "smack it with the Keyblade". While you won't get a boss to sit still long enough to just take it, even more efficient shortened combos fall into this trope.
• Spanner in the Works: In both games, Sora ends up derailing every single plan involving him. In Kingdom Hearts II, DiZ even makes note of how all plans he had for Sora fell apart once Sora got awakened. He essentially starts the game by derailing someone else's destiny.
• Super Mode: His Drive Forms in Kingdom Hearts II complete with Multiform Balance:
  • Valor Form: Channels Goofy's power, can't cast magic at all but gains a huge boost to speed and attack power via Dual Wielding, doing more damage per hit and hitting more times.
  • Wisdom Form: Channels Donald's power, glides around and can use magic while moving and in quick succession. Instead of normal swings, the Keyblade fires barrages of energy orbs.
  • Master Form: Channels Mickey's power, moves and attacks quickly and magic powers up, but neither power up is as strong as the two forms specializing in them. Includes a Spin Attack as a finisher and one keyblade used as a Flying Weapon.
  • Final Form: Channels Roxas's power, moves and attacks very, very fast, using long light-themed combos two flying keyblades and powerful magic. Sora glides through the air and is virtually invincible.
  • Anti Form: A "dud" form that occurs randomly when Sora enters drive form. Symbolizes the darkness in his heart. Discards the Keyblade to furiously scratch and claw at enemies. Decently strong, but locks all commands and Sora cannot heal himself.
  • Limit Form: Channels his own power to re-learn his abilities from Kingdom Hearts, including Ars Arcanum, Ragnarok, Sonic Blade, Strike Raid, and Dodge Roll.
• Sympathy for the Devil: Averted. Sora frequently called out Organization XIII whenever they feigned emotions. He does show some sympathy to Xemnas when it looks like Xemnas is fading away, though... and then Xemnas comes back and tries to kill him and Riku again. Naturally, Sora expresses no sorrow after Xemnas dies for real.
• Take Up My Sword: He was given the Star Seeker keychain, retaining the memories of Yen Sid's and Mickey's old Keyblade and allowing Sora's Keyblade to take its form, in a symbolic portrayal of the trope. Ven's heart hiding within Sora allows him to use Ven's own Keyblade, although this was unintentional.
• Took a Level in Badass: After re-merging with Roxas.

Tropes Applying to Kingdom Hearts Dream Drop Distance

• Casting a Shadow: Sora in the Nightmare Armor however has no qualms in using the powers of darkness.
• Combination Attack: Sora's Link Action's with his Dream Eaters is this including Unison Rush, Comet, Ragnarok, Chaos SnakeRainbow Prism, Wonder Jamboree and of course Trinity Limit.
  • Horse of a Different Color: Lots of Sora's Link Action Combination Attack involve him using a Dream Eater as a noble steed.
• The Dark Side: Word Of God said that his Anti-Form is a proof that all the events are taking their toll on him, and the fact that he's possibly sharing his heart with a crazy psychopath, among other people, probably isn't helping him. And after a Mind Rape courtesy of Xehanort he nearly falls into darkness only to be saved by Ventus gifting him with his Keyblade Armor, unfortunately that didn't keep the armor itself becoming corrupted by Sora's nightmare.
• Decoy Protagonist: in 3D he ends up in comatose at the end of his story. Riku has to save him.
• Elemental Shapeshifter: As the Nightmare Armor, Sora can turn himself into an inky mass of darkness.
• Empty Shell: When his heart is asleep Sora acts like one and his nightmares spawn monsters and even take over his body.
• Final Boss: In 3D as the Nightmare Armor
• Instant Armor: Ventus gives Sora his.
• Knight Fever: Sora's Knight Erranting earns him an official knight's title this time around!
• Le Parkour
• Reality Warper: Reality Shifts which uses the powers of the Dream World's themselves to do unique attacks.
  • Slings Shot: The Reality Shift of Traverse Town which shoots a confetti filled projectile.
  • Holy Rope: The Reality Shift of La Cité des Cloches which you grind into enemies upon chains of light.
  • Code Breaker: Reality Shift of The Grid giving you the ability to program enemies to turn against each other.
  • Popping Bubbles: Reality Shift of Prankster's Paradise giving you the ability to launch bubbles at the enemy as well as trap them in one and smash them into the floor.
  • Wonder Comic: The Reality Shift of the County Of Musketeers, after preforming in an interactive comic sequence you unleash an team attack with Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck and Goofy.
  • Fantasmic: The Reality Shift of the Symphony of Sorcery, after a Rhythm Game unleash a Deadly Fireworks Display on the enemy.
  • Mirage Split: The Reality Shift in The World That Never Was has Sora and Riku combining light and dark themed keyblades into one huge one then swinging it together.
• Reverse Grip: When fighting as the Nightmare Armor.
  • Though, only half the time. The other half, he is in his usual battle stance. This might be meant to show, that not only Sora's, but also Ventus' heart was trapped within the Nightmare Armor after the later saved the former from oblivion.
• Shout Out: The graphics of the Nightmare Armors darkness attacks look like the ink blot attacks straight out of Epic Mickey.

Sora's best friend and rival. His desire to see something greater beyond his tiny, secluded island home led to him being seduced by the forces of darkness. But once he realizes the harm he's caused, he begins working in the shadows to assist Sora in whatever way possible. He's actually the original owner of Sora's Keyblade, but has to work to get his own when the Keyblade decides Sora is more fit.

General Tropes

• The Ace: Lampshaded by Sora on ocassion.
  • Always Someone Better
  • Broken Ace
• Adorably Precocious Child: In Birth By Sleep.
• Aloof Big Brother: To Sora, though they're not related.
• Badass
• Bishōnen: Look at those fangirls Squee.
• Black Knight: Sans the armor but he fits the sympathetic version of this to some degree in most of the games, having a sword forged out of darkness and being very strong, not to mention that most of his signature moves are dark-based in nature even when having regular skills in Dream Drop Distance. His sword Soul Eater is even a Shout Out to the Dark Knight class of Final Fantasy.
• Black Magic/Casting a Shadow: All his signature attacks are darkness-based, such as his Dark Firaga, Dark Break/Helm Split, Darkstorm, Dark Shield, and of course, the infamous Dark Aura.
• Celebrity Voice Actor: David Gallagher, who you probably remember as Simon from 7th Heaven.
• Charles Atlas Super Power
• Child Prodigy: In Birth by Sleep, anyway. That is one incredibly perceptive and philosophical five-year-old.
  • Four-year-old Sora even acknowledges it.
  "I don't know Riku, you say some weird stuff sometimes, but I'll try it!"
  • Though, he was probably only trying to cheer Sora up by making a pun with his name, which is pretty obvious in the Japanese version, where Sora's name and the word "sky" are absolutely interchangable. What he said pretty much amounts to "Maybe you are sad, because you are the sky everybody is praying to." And he probably also didn't know how right he was about this.
• Dark Is Not Evil: After his Heel Face Turn.
• Deuteragonist
• Expy: Riku is The Lancer to his best bud Sora. Riku competed with him in everything due to being envious of Sora's personality as well as a slight Love Triangle between the two for Kairi. He becomes a Rival Turned Evil, but eventually recovers. He then spends his time throughout the sequels as The Atoner. Realizing his flaws and confronting Ansem, Riku finally accepts his inner darkness and grows stronger from it. Sounds a lot like Kain, eh?
  • This very well may be deliberate, seeing as interviews regarding Dissidia show that Nomura is a pretty big fan of Kain.
• Face Heel Revolving Door
• Flash Step: It becomes Teleport Spam when he's a villain, though.
• Green Eyes
• Heterosexual Life Partners: With Sora. Or at least, this was what Nomura intended. As this VG Cats◊ comic mocks, Sora seemed more emotionally impacted by his reunion with Riku in II than he did by his reunion with Kairi, even if it is justified.
• Japanese Pronouns: "Ore".
• Jumped at the Call: Way too early, and it proved to be his downfall.
• Laser-Guided Karma: And how. Riku's bargain with Ansem for power in the first game proves to have devastating long-term consequences for him, both mentally and physically, even after reverting back to good at the end of the first game.
• Leitmotif: Has one, "Riku", in the second game.
• Lightning Bruiser: His general fighting style is striking fast and hard, but he has rather poor magic skills, only having his Dark Firaga and Dark Shield, and and a Cure Potion for spot healing. Dream Drop Distance finally gives him more varied magic and standard Cure spells at last.
• Long-Haired Pretty Boy. In all games except Dream Drop Distance. in which his hair is whittled in length.
• Meaningful Name: "Riku" is Japanese for "Land". Prequel character Terra means "Earth". The connection between the two is Keyblade succession, not to mention possession by Xehanort...
• Mike Nelson, Destroyer of Worlds: Destiny Islands. Oops.
• The Not-Love Interest: Unless you take a third option.
  • Though the end of the first game implied a I Want My Beloved to Be Happy.
• Original Generation
• Personality Powers: Wields darkness and is brooding.
• Red Oni, Blue Oni: The blue to Sora's red.
• The Unchosen One: Had to go through a lot to get a Keyblade again, and even then, his obtaining of one wasn't very conventional; he managing to transform his sword into one. (Word Of God claims Keyblades manifest in strange ways, citing Kairi's as an example)
• Take a Third Option: As of Chain of Memories he's basically the unofficial Most Triumphant Example with his ability to wield both light and dark in near perfect harmony. And coins the term "Road to The Dawn" For the path he has chosen, Which as most characters in the series with knowledge of Light and Dark say was impossible until Riku.
• Take Up My Sword: In a way; Terra performed a Keyblade Inheritance Ceremony with Riku, allowing him to use the Keyblade, but the Keyblade destined for Riku abandons him for Sora when he opens his heart to darkness, forcing him to earn his own.
• The Rival
• Signature Move: Dark Aura.
• Sleeves Are for Wimps: He only wears them when he's in Dark Mode or wearing the Organization cloak.
• Vocal Evolution: Over the course of the series.
• Weapon of Choice: The Soul Eater sword from I to the last part of II. From then on, he wields the Keyblade Way to the Dawn. However he didn't discard Soul Eater for Way to the Dawn, but actually Soul Eater became Way to the Dawn.
• Yin Yang Bomb: Although his use of light magic and skills is extremely limited. He finally picks up the pace in 3D although he still favors darkness by a wide margin.

Tropes Appearing in Kingdom Hearts and Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories

• Anti-Villain: Type III when working with Maleficent, until he Took A Level In Jerk Ass and pretty much lost himself in darkness.
• Attempted Murder of the Hypotenuse: Clashes with Sora in the first game, partially out of his obsession with being the one to save Kairi (not so much out of love as out of his own Maleficent-fueled arrogance), which leads to...
• The Atoner: From Chain of Memories onward.
• The Chosen One: Until he screwed it up. As of Dream Drop Distance he's back on track though, Yen Sid appointing him a Keyblade Master while Sora has yet to officially earn the title.
• The Corruptible
• Deal with the Devil: Multiple, when he was a villain.
• Glass Cannon: All of his skills are offensive-based magic and in every game he's been playable in Riku had no healing magic of his own, so he needed to rely on either support cards in Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories or potions in Kingdom Hearts II to restore his health.
• I Just Want to Be Special: Riku, who's spent his entire life — literally ever since he was a toddler — dreaming of adventure and power, is utterly convinced his destiny absolutely must lie beyond his little island town. When his best friend, Sora, turns out to be the hero instead, it gives Riku his Start of Darkness.
• Love Triangle
  • Hopeless Suitor
  • I Want My Beloved to Be Happy: "Take care of her."
  • Love Makes You Evil: Joins the Dark Side in order to save Kairi, his Implied Love Interest, in the first game.
  • Unlucky Childhood Friend: To Kairi.
• The Nose Knows: He has the ability to smell darkness and light.
• Refused by the Call: Thanks to the aforementioned jumping too early.
• Rival Turned Evil: But he got over it.
• Special Snowflake Syndrome: Some people find him a little too overpowered in his "Hero of Darkness" state.
• Super Mode: His Dark Mode in Kingdom Hearts and Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories, which makes him stronger and faster and lets him use powerful dark magic techniques.
• Took a Level in Jerkass: In the original Kingdom Hearts, until the Laser-Guided Karma he receives brings him back to his senses.
• Well-Intentioned Extremist: In the first game, Riku's determination to save Kairi was admirable. Except, you know, he ended up siding with the villains, gave into the darkness, fought his best friend constantly, etc etc...
• White-Haired Pretty Boy: Fits the trope in his villain days.

Tropes Appearing in 358/2 Days and Kingdom Hearts II

• Anti-Hero: Type III when working with fellow Anti-Hero DiZ.
• Bash Brothers: See Sora's Bash Brothers entry.
• Blind Weaponmaster
• Cursed with Awesome: He gains enough power to knock Roxas out, but at the cost of his body becoming his Enemy Within's.
• Disability Superpower: He spent a considerable amount of time fighting completely blindfolded due to being Cursed with Awesome.
• Eleventh Hour Ranger: Becomes a playable party member in the final world of KH 2.
• Evil Costume Switch: As a result of his turn to the dark path.
• Final Boss: In Days, depicting the battle between him and Roxas and why Roxas was taken to the simulated Twilight Town.
• The Lancer: Becomes one at the climax of II.
• Mysterious Protector: In II. Though it's easy to tell who he is when he confronts you with Soul Eater on The Land Of Dragons.
• Out of Focus: In II up until the last world, where he ends up becoming the last additional party member in the game.
• Redemption Demotion: On the side of evil, he was manipulated into being Maleficent's bitch. On the side of good, he willingly became DiZ's bitch. Though, both times, it was in order to try and save one of his friends; first Kairi, then Sora. Maleficent turned him against Sora, but he joined her willingly to save Kairi.
• Took a Level in Badass: After finally ending his period of Badass Decay, Riku gets a Keyblade and becomes a party member at the end of Kingdom Hearts II. He regains his self-confidence and sense of humor at this point too.

Tropes Appearing in Kingdom Hearts Dream Drop Distance

• Beehive Barrier: In 3D Riku's Dark Shield manifests as this and can replace his guard much like Aqua's barrier.
• Big Brother Instinct
• Colony Drop: Riku inherits Terra's Meteor commands as his ultimate magic.
• Deuteragonist: Had shades of this in Chain of Memories, then achieved full status at the end of Kingdom Hearts II where he and Sora take on Xemnas together, and the upcoming Dream Drop Distance, where both of them take the Mark of Mastery exam.
  • The Hero: Arguably the focus character in Dream Drop Distance, and when Sora's heart gets shattered by Young Xehanort and gets taken by darkness, you play as Riku for the rest of the story to derail Young Xehanort's plans and bring Sora back to the light.
• Expository Hairstyle Change: In Dream Drop Distance, his hair is about as short as it was when he was younger, if not shorter.
• Fire, Ice, Lightning: Did not possess any attacks or magic spells with these elements for many years until Dream Drop Distance came out. 358/2 Days did let him access these spells along with Aero and Cure spells when you played as him, but his possession of them until Dream Drop Distance is questionable canon at best.
• Fusion Dance: He has the ability to Link Style with Dream Eaters which can give him a variety of Power Ups and Super Modes.
  • Light Hammer: Riku finally show's the light in the twilight assailing the enemies with hammering blows creating powerful shockwaves of light magic.
  • Dark Fierce: Riku rushes the enemy with darkness based blows manifesting as Wolverine Claws on his hands and feet.
  • Fire Raid: Riku's keyblade becomes a Flaming Sword which he uses hurls at the enemy for mid ranged attacks.
  • Thunderstorm: Electricity crackles on Riku's keyblade giving him fast thunder based attacks that easily attack in all directions.
  • Wave Surfer: Defying the tradition of Fire, Ice, Lightning, Riku uses water elemental attacks instead of ice, surfing to assault enemy's with columns of water.
  • Ghost Drive: Riku teleports to attack enemies automatically, making gratuitous use of Flash Steps to avoid being hit.
  • Blade Charge: Keyblade becomes engulfed in magic, giving a huge boost to the range of attacks.
  • Rising Wing: Riku gains batlike wings and unleashes powerful midair strikes and dive bombs, Uses a tornado attack for a combo finisher.
• Guardian Entity: After the fight with Anti-Black Coat it is revealed that Riku had been a Spirit type Dream Eater in Sora's dreams protecting him since the exam began.
• Le Parkour
• Magic Knight: Is this as of Dream Drop Distance, however at core he remains a Black Knight down to both starting with darkness based magic and all but one of his unique spells being the same.
• Reality Warper: Reality Shifts which uses the powers of the Dream World's themselves to do unique attacks.
  • Slings Shot: The Reality Shift of Traverse Town which shoots a confetti filled projectile.
  • Holy Rope: The Reality Shift of La Cité des Cloches which you grind into enemies upon chains of light.
  • Code Breaker: Reality Shift of The Grid giving you the ability to program enemies to turn against each other.
  • Popping Bubbles: Reality Shift of Prankster's Paradise giving you the ability to launch bubbles at the enemy as well as trap them in one and smash them into the floor.
  • Wonder Comic: The Reality Shift of the County Of Musketeers, after preforming in an interactive comic sequence you unleash an team attack with Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck and Goofy.
  • Fantasmic: The Reality Shift of the Symphony of Sorcery, after a Rhythm Game unleash a Deadly Fireworks Display on the enemy.
  • Mirage Split: The Reality Shift in The World That Never Was has Sora and Riku combining light and dark themed keyblades into one huge one then swinging it together.

A close friend of Sora and Riku who came to Destiny Islands from Radiant Garden, which sparked their interest in other worlds. Much of her role involves waiting to be rescued or waiting for her friends to return from their journeys. She's one of the seven Princesses of Heart, possessing no darkness in her heart. In the The Stinger Reconnect ending of 3D Riku brings Kairi to Yen Sid to begin her Keyblade training.

• Badass Adorable: Near the end of II.
• Barrier Maiden
• Beauty Equals Goodness
• Blue Eyes/Purple Eyes: Her eye color varies on adaptations, but it's usually blue.
• Boyish Short Hair: In the first game, in the second she switches to Long Hair Is Feminine.
• The Chick: Serves as the emotional support and inspiration for both Sora and Riku.
• Cool Keyblade: Destiny's Embrace.
• Coy Girlish Flirt Pose: Just more friendly than flirty.
• Designated Victim: In both games. In the first game, her situation made sense. But in the second, the Organization kidnap her as leverage to use against Sora. See Always Save the Girl in Sora's section.
• Distressed Damsel: Apparently played straight in I and II but actually subverted everytime. In I, her heart is safe inside Sora's body, in II she escapes from Axel on her own, and still in II she escapes from Saïx with Namine’s help.
• Empty Shell: Spends part of the first game as one. Sora temporarily turns himself into a heartless (and unknowingly into a nobody) to save her.
• Everything's Better with Princesses: Though she is not royalty, she is considered one of the princesses of heart.
• Flip Flop of God: In an interview, Nomura said that Kairi was not a Keyblade wielder. In another, he said she was. Guess during the first one, he hadn't worked out the whole Keyblade Inheritance Ceremony concept just yet.
• Flower Motifs: Her Keyblade, Destiny's Embrace, has one.
• Girliness Upgrade: She's somewhat of a tomboy in I, far less so in II.
• Girl Next Door
• Girly Run: Bonus points for Holding Hands with Namine at the same time.
• The Heart: Hardy har.
• Heroes Want Redheads: Just ask Sora and Riku.
• Hot Chick With A Keyblade: Near the end of II.
• Incorruptible Pure Pureness: By definition.
• The Ingénue: A more modern version, she can be quite snarky as well, but never in a mean way (unless you ask the fangirls.)
• Japanese Pronouns: "Watashi"
• Joshikousei: In the prologue of the second game.
• The Lady's Favour: The Oathkeeper. It also doubles as a Memento Macguffin in Chain of Memories.
• Leitmotif: "Kairi". The only character to have one in the first game and one of the series' most iconic pieces.
• Light is Good
• Light 'Em Up: It comes with the whole Princess of Heart thing.
• Little Miss Snarker: She tends to join Riku in cracking a lot of jokes at Sora's expense.
• Love Interest: Usually serves her main role, other than being The Chick.
  • Implied Love Interest: For Riku.
• MacGuffin Girl
• Meaningful Name: The "Kai" in Kairi's name means "Sea". Nami(ne) means "Ocean Wave". Xion (Shio) means Tide. And prequel character Aqua means "Water", fittingly as Kairi is her successor.
• Ms. Fanservice: Becomes this in II, in appearance only.
• Nice Girl: And she's so cute!
• Ninja Pirate Zombie Robot: A Keyblade-wielding Princess of Heart. The Stinger of 3D takes it further by very heavily implying she is both a Princess of Heart and a Guardian of Light.
• The Other Darrin: Hayden Panettiere voiced Kairi in the first two games, but was replaced by Alyson Stoner in Re:COM most likely because of Heroes. In Days, this led to Flashback With The Other Darrin. As of Birth by Sleep, Hayden's back.
• Original Generation
• Out of Focus: In II up until the last world, and so far also in every game since.
• Panty Shot: Can be done by rotating the camera in a certain area. They are even fully modeled, down to the frilly edges and everything. Considering the Law of Conservation of Detail... well...
• Pink Means Feminine: Her outfit in the second game.
• Plucky Girl: As Axel points out, the girl's got a lot of guts. She even intended to fight Saix unarmed!
• The Pollyanna: She tries to be this through most of her scenes in the first game, but sometimes lets her inner worries slip.
• Power of Love: Uses this to restore Sora when he is turned into a Shadow.
• Protective Charm: Aqua placed one on her necklace that lead her to Sora when Xehanort cast her into the darkness as a child.
• Red Headed Heroine: Looks like she might become this.
• Redhead: To Namine's Blonde and Xion's Brunette.
• She Is All Grown Up: In the second game, despite only happening after one year. Went from "cute" to "cute" and "hot", in many a male gamer's opinion.
• She's Got Legs
• Single Woman Seeks Good Man: Kairi only has eyes for Sora rather than Riku.
• Spirited Young Lady
• Standard Female Grab Area: Kairi easily gets kidnapped by Axel in II by grabbing her by the wrist and pulling her away. Granted, she does try to struggle, but in a very... er, flimsy way. Yet one of II's many Narm moments, but then again he is twice as tall as her.
• Stay in the Kitchen: Justified in the first game, as she had no combat skills, though only time will tell if the second example in Birth By Sleep's secret ending has any justification or not, as Kairi can use a Keyblade now.
  • It's been justified; 3D, the next game, will be Sora and Riku's Mark of Mastery exam, and while she is a Keyblade wielder, she is not ready to become a Master. Now it is more of a case if Kairi will be a victim of Can't Catch Up like many an unfortunate Shonen female lead or not. Then The Stinger for 3D implies that Yen Sid will take her in for Keyblade training, meaning she may subvert this trope in due time.
• Take Up My Sword: Unknown to Aqua, when Kairi grabbed her Keyblade in fear as a child, Aqua performed the Keyblade Inheritance Ceremony for her, allowing Kairi to claim Destiny's Embrace in the second game.
• Theme Naming: She, Sora, and Riku are "sea", "sky", and "land". She also shares ocean-themed naming with Naminé and Xion. She and Aqua are both the water in their trio.
• Took a Level in Badass: At the climax of KH2. Keyblader Kairi, ladies and gentlemen! And even without that, she's much more athletically capable than before, escaping Axel and Saïx and jumping off balconies with no problem.
  • Word Of God in a Japan-only book states that she got stronger on Destiny Islands between games, which explains the athleticism.
• True Sight: She can see Riku's true appearance when he has Ansem's face.
• Victorious Childhood Friend: To Sora, but don't tell the fangirls that.
• What Kind of Lame Power Is Heart, Anyway?: While the Princesses of Heart have incredible and incorruptible light in them, none of them seem to be able to call on it to help them when they are under attack. Justified in that none of them have any magical or combat training to do it, however.
  • Heart Is an Awesome Power: On the other hand, it lets her restore Sora when he becomes a Heartless (though that one only worked because of Sora and Kairi's special connection and wasn't just due to her powers), as well as makes her immune to the corroding nature of the Dark Corridor and eventually lets her wield a Keyblade.
• Xenafication: After becoming a Keyblade wielder.

The King of Disney Castle, and a Keyblade Master. He's one of the first to notice how much danger the worlds are in, and one of the first to take action. When he leaves on a journey and doesn't come back, Donald and Goofy set out to find him. Although they meet a few times, Mickey is usually one step ahead of them and has a better idea of what's going on.

• The Ace: In everything except Birth By Sleep.
• Alliterative Name: If you don't include his title, that is.
  • Depends on which title, "Master Mickey Mouse" is still pretty alliterative.
• Back-to-Back Badasses: With Ven, Aqua, and Riku.
• Badass
  • Badass Adorable: Well, it's still Mickey Mouse.
  • Badass Longcoat: Seriously!
• Big Damn Heroes: He's so good at this, it's a gameplay mechanic!
• Big Good: Although he defers to Bigger Good Yen Sid.
• Bling Bling Bang: Wields a golden bladed Keyblade.
• Combat Tropes
  • Glass Cannon: In terms of gameplay.
  • Magic Knight: Though he is a White Magic specialist.
    • Healing Hands: Has a Cure spell in Birth By Sleep and in Kingdom Hearts 2 has a spell called Healing Light that restores Sora to life after he has been defeated.
    • Light 'Em Up and Holy Hand Grenade: Loves these attacks the most. His Limit Break in Days is even the Holy spell.
    • Energy Ball: His signature spell are balls of light called Pearl.
    • Pillar of Light: His more powerful Holy/Faith spells manifest like this.
    • Time Stands Still: Has a powerful Stopgun spell that he uses to freeze Xehanort's thirteen seekers.
  • Master Swordsman: Of course, coupled with Implausible Fencing Powers.
  • The Paladin
  • Pint Sized Power House: Now with Yoda-esque acrobatics!
• Cutscene Power to the Max: He is a perpetrator of this, his first appearance has him striking down a pair of Darkside Heartless in one blow. In 3D he is able to freeze all thirteen Seekers of Darkness with a Stopga spell.
• Dark Is Not Evil: Wields the Keyblade of the Realm of Darkness.
  • Partly true. Only his Kingdom Key D is from the Realm of Darkness. His Star Seeker (which is apparently his original Keyblade) is from the Realm of Light.
• Everyone Calls Him Barkeep: His actual name is rarely used, as opposed to simply calling him the King or addressed as "Your Majesty".
• Failure Knight: For all of his effort in Birth By Sleep, he couldn't save Ven, Aqua, or Terra from their fates.
  • It also explains his reluctance to allow Sora to get involved in the Heartless war on Hollow Bastion.
• Funny Animal: But a helluva lot more serious in this game than in anything else he's ever appeared in... Except for the Italian comics, where he actually PUNCHES people.
• The Good King: No matter what he thinks.
• Happily Married: To Minnie. Just like Wayne Allwine and Russi Taylor.
• Heroic BSOD: Suffers from one due to the Downer Ending of Birth by Sleep. Yen Sid manages to rouse him out of it fairly quickly.
• Heterosexual Life Partners: With Riku, for a while, although Days inserted a disruption. Mickey was essentially Riku's sole support throughout Chain of Memories, and gives him an epic glomp at the end Kingdom Hearts 2 when they reunite.
• The Leader
• Incorruptible Pure Pureness: Like Aqua, he's no Princess of Heart in terms of purity, but is able to spend extended time the Realm of Darkness without a Black Cloak to protect himself, and only uses his to prevent the Organization from detecting him.
  • Supposedly, it was the dark-aligned Kingdom Key D that protected him during that time, although Nomura also said that Mickey, like Riku, is not affected by darkness at all. Something about "similarities" between them that have yet to be revealed in-game...
• Japanese Pronouns: "Boku".
• Let's Get Dangerous:
  Mickey: "They'll pay for this."*

  The "this" in question doubles as a case of It's Personal, given that Goofy just appeared to have died.
• Mickey Mouse
• Older than He Looks: Though Mickey has generally been timeless (and Kingdom Hearts has odd implications in that direction as well), he was already a King and Keyblade Master ten years previous to the main story, making him on the way to middle age. Despite that, he still displays the characteristic youthful Mickey Mouse exuberance and looks no different than any other portrayal (excepting the clothes, of course). That said, see Vague Age.
• One-Scene Wonder: Mickey was only allowed in one scene in the first game; Tetsuya Nomura made sure to make it count.
• The Other Darrin: Wayne Allwine, the longstanding voice of Mickey since the late '70s, died in May of 2009, shortly after he finished recording for Days. Birth by Sleep marks the debut of Bret Iwan as Mickey.
• Personality Powers
• Rodent of Unusual Size
• Royals Who Actually Do Something: Our mentor character, ladies and gentlemen.
  • Authority Equals Asskicking
  • Modest Royalty: None of his outfits are particularly kingly although his Bling of War in the Land of Musketeers fairly fancy.
• Sixth Ranger: To Terra, Aqua, and Ven as well as Sora's group.
• Spanner in the Works: In Birth By Sleep. The plan was for Vanitas to take over Ventus's body and form the χ-blade while Master Xehanort committed Grand Theft Me on Terra, and sometime while he dealt with Ventus Vanitas would kill Aqua. Unfortunately for them Mickey happened upon the scene and saved her, an act that would lead to Aqua further disrupting their schemes.
• Supporting Leader
• Took a Level in Badass: The exact process is detailed in Birth by Sleep.
  • Although by the start of Birth By Sleep, he had apparently already completed his training and become King of Disney Castle. He does gain more actual experience in exploring the worlds and combating Unversed, culminating in his takedown-assist of Vanitas.
• Vague Age: He was a King and Keyblade Master with the same general outlook and personality (minus some character development) ten years previously. However, Timeless River shows him to be acting vastly different sometime in the past while still appearing to be the same general age. Pete seems to imply that the events happened as depicted. If so, than Kingdom Hearts may be going for the same timeless chronology regarding Mickey Mouse as, for instance, Epic Mickey did, with decades of animation history all simultaneously being in Mickey's past.
• Weapon of Choice: The Keyblade of the Dark Realm, Kingdom Key D, a counterpart to Sora's Kingdom Key. In Birth by Sleep, he wields the familiar Star Seeker, and uses it again in Coded and back to Kingdom Key D in 3D. In his past however we find he learned his sword fighting wielding a Royal Rapier.
• Worthy Opponent: Xehanort seems to think so in KH 3 D. Notable considering how little Xehanort cares for any of the other protagonists beyond their usefulness to him. Mickey seems to be the only foe Xehanort actually respects at this point.
  • The feeling is far from mutual however.

A fiery-tempered magician and a member of King Mickey's court at Disney Castle. Sent to find and follow the Keyblade bearer, he joins up with Sora to help him save the worlds and becomes one of his closest friends.

• Alliterative Name
• Angrish
• Bash Brothers: With Goofy.
• Big Damn Heroes: In the ending of 3D
• But Now I Must Go: An unspoken agreement in the first game. Due to the "no meddling" rule, Donald and Goofy will have to leave Sora forever at one point. Subverted in Kingdom Hearts 2, where they are far too attached to Sora to leave him.
• Character Development: He starts off as rather antagonistic towards Sora, but they soon grow close after having lost eachother in Deep Jungle. When forced to choose between duty and friendship, he follows his duty to the letter instinctively, abandoning Sora. The point at which he realizes that Sora is worth more to him is the crux of his development in the first game. At the end of the first game, he is reluctant but willing to let Sora go home, never to see him again. However, Donald implicitly defies King and country to stay with Sora when given a chance to leave in Kingdom Hearts 2.
• The Chew Toy
• Combat Tropes
  • Deadly Fireworks Display: His Limit Breaks Flare and Comet are actually fireworks.
    • Macross Missile Massacre: With firework rockets.
  • Drop the Hammer: One of his two weapon types.
  • Fire, Ice, Lightning
  • Magic Wand: His default one has the head of Black Mage at the top.
  • The Medic
    • Healing Hands
    • Combat Medic
  • The Red Mage
  • Squishy Wizard: In spades.
• Court Mage
• Donald Duck
• Hair-Trigger Temper: It's not Donald without it.
• Half-Dressed Cartoon Animal: Notably, he, his uncle, and his nephews are the only ones left half dressed.
• Hot Blooded: He is Donald Duck, after all.
• Honor Before Reason: Briefly follows Riku in his evil phase due to a literal interpretation of King Mickey's orders. He realizes this is stupid.
• Invincible Minor Minion: A rare heroic example; no matter what slams Donald's HP to zero, whether Heartless, or magic, or Sephiroth, Donald will revive a minute later on his own, provided Sora survives.
• Japanese Pronouns: "Boku".
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold
• Knight in Sour Armor
• Morally Ambiguous Ducktorate
• Nice Hat
• Out of Focus: A major character in KH, COM, and KH2, but much less consequential in every game since.
• Personality Powers: Here's a fun one. Donald's Limits are fireworks, and he's known for his explosive temper.
• Robe and Wizard Hat: Wears it in the prologue of the first game, Coded, and Birth by Sleep.
• Shipper on Deck: To Sora and Kairi.
• Side Kick: To Sora, though he insisted on being the leader for a while at first, and only seems to step down from this after he comes back from his Honor Before Reason mistake.
• The Smart Guy
• The Unintelligible: If it weren't for the subtitles, you'd have a tough time understanding him. And it's ten times worse in Japanese.
  • Wait, what did Donald just say?!
• Voluntary Shapeshifting: Donald's magic is what transforms the characters in other worlds like Halloweentown, Atlantica and Pride Rock.

The mild-mannered yet loyal Captain of the Royal Knights at Disney Castle. Same deal as Donald.

• Bash Brothers: With Donald and Sora, individually.
• Big Damn Heroes: In the ending of 3D
• The Big Guy
• But Now I Must Go: An unspoken agreement in the first game. Due to the "no meddling" rule, Donald and Goofy will have to leave Sora forever at one point. Subverted in Kingdom Hearts 2, where they are far too attached to Sora to leave him.
• Character Development: While Goofy is more level-headed than Donald and got on with Sora better, he, like Donald, leaves Sora when his orders technically dictate it, and eventually defies said orders to help Sora. At the end of the first game, he sadly allows Sora to return to his home world, never to see him again (though events dictate otherwise). In Kingdom Hearts 2, however, both he and Donald are categorically unwilling to leave Sora, implicitly defying King and country.
• Combat Tropes
  • Fastball Special: The end of Goofy's Knocksmash Limit ends with a variation on this, with Sora launching Goofy as if he's a rocket, hence the Fan Nickname for the Limit.
  • Item Caddy
  • Healing Hands: Can heal both HP and MP of allies with his MP Gift and Evolution skills.
  • Luckily My Shield Will Protect Me: And along with it...
    • Face Design Shield: The Defender which is stolen from the heartless with the same name.
    • Shield Surf
    • Shield Bash
    • Throwing Your Shield Always Works
  • Mighty Glacier
  • Rolling Attack
  • Spin Attack: His Tornado skill.
  • Use Your Head: An amusing sleight in Re:COM has Sora and Donald use him as a battering ram.
• Conjoined Eyes
• Disney Death: In the second game.
• Dogface
• Fan Nickname: "Goofy Rocket", for his Knocksmash Limit.
• Genius Ditz: He's actually probably the most level-headed and logically-thinking of the three.
• Goggles Do Nothing: It's quite easy to forget they're even there.
• Goofy
• Honor Before Reason: Same as Donald.
• Invincible Minor Minion: Like Donald; will Auto-Revive automatically a minute or two after HP is knocked down to zero.
• Japanese Pronouns: "Boku".
• The Klutz
• Mondegreen: Some of his battle quotes are hard to understand.
• Nice Hat
• Out of Focus: A major character in KH, COM, and KH2, but much less consequential in every game since.
• Side Kick: To both Sora and Donald.
• Simpleminded Wisdom
• Simpleton Voice
• Smart Ball
• Taking the Bullet: In the second game. And when that happens, everyone—characters and players—start to get serious.
• Technical Pacifist: The reason he fights with a shield. Although he has in the past wielded a Royal Rapier as seen in The Land of Musketeers world in Dream Drop Distance.
• Vague Age: Like Donald and Mickey, appears in Birth by Sleep, and has been around since Timeless River.

An aspiring Keyblade Master who is denied the title due to the darkness in his heart. He is manipulated by Master Xehanort into embracing and channeling that darkness. Though he wises up, his body is taken over by Master Xehanort, becoming the infamous Xehanort known today. His mind still exists within the Keyblade Graveyard as the Lingering Will.

• Aesop Amnesia: Damn it Terra, STOP LISTENING TO OBVIOUS VILLAINS!
  • To be fair, the only one he truly helped was Maleficent; after that, he fixed what he would mess up.
• Animated Armor
• And I Must Scream
• Anti-Hero: Type II, a "Disney Anti-Hero".
• A Sinister Clue: A rare Anti-Heroic example who doesn't fall under The Southpaw. Though he swings his Keyblade with his right hand like the other protagonists, Terra's dark powers tend to manifest through his left, to the point where his finishers in Dark Impulse mode involve turning it into a huge, grasping claw. Nice touch, Square-Enix.
• Badass Cape: As the Lingering Will. Sadly, it had to be removed for gameplay in Birth by Sleep due to programming difficulties.
• Battle Aura: A vaguely flame-like, pitch-black one whenever he taps into the power of darkness.
• Berserk Button: Same as Aqua's. Only it's not just villains who can trigger it, as Master Eraqus can attest.
• Big Brother Instinct
  • Knight Templar Big Brother: This develops by the end of the game in regards to everyone seeming to want to end Ven's existence, whether they were good people or bad people.
• Blue Eyes
• Body Snatched
• Bonus Boss: As the Lingering Will in Kingdom Hearts II Final Mix.
• Broken Ace
• Captain Obvious: He has a stange tendency to always announce when Unversed appeared.
• Combat Tropes
  • BFK: Big Freakin' Key.
    • And he can transform it into a BFG. Terra doesn't mess around.
    • Morph Weapon: Moreso than anyone else in the series with a Keyblade. As said above, Terra can turn his Keyblade into a positively enormous cannon. Like the rest of the trio, it can also turn into a hovercycle capable of travelling through the universe like a Gummi Ship. When you face him as the Lingering Will, he ups the ante with additional forms like a whip and a bow and arrow.
  • Casting a Shadow: His specialties are darkness and earth spells. He even has a D-Link with Maleficent.
  • Diagonal Cut: His exclusive Zantesuken move (which can also One-Hit KO).
  • Dishing Out Dirt: His strongest magics are earth spells like Quake and Meteor. He can also use the element in physical attacks.
  • Flash Step: Despite being the Mighty Glacier of the trio, he does have access to a few, namely his exclusive Sonic Shadow and Chaos Blade moves (which also use a brief Teleport Spam).
  • Mighty Glacier: Hits like a tank, and moves and attacks about as fast as one too.
    • Glass Cannon: Begins to overlap with this. He becomes fairly speedy with Critical Impact and Dark Impulse, but Aqua's Barrier and Ven's Dodge Roll are more effective against the Bonus Bosses than Terra's Slide and Block. His sole defensive advantage over them is his higher HP.
  • Super Mode: Command Styles, which boost offensive power:
    • Critical Impact: Terra's attacks become much stronger and a bit faster. Leaps into the air and slams the ground to send out a shockwave as a finisher.
    • Firestorm: Keyblade turns into a Flaming Sword. Terra creates a wave of flame pillars as a finishing move.
    • Diamond Dust: Keyblade acquires ice powers. Terra summons a large explosion of ice around him as a finisher.
    • Thunderbolt: Keyblade crackles with lightning. Terra creates a storm of lightning bolts overhead as a finisher.
    • Rock Breaker: Terra's attacks become earth-based and he excels at ground combat. He sends homing rock spears flying around as a finisher.
    • Dark Impulse: Terra's attacks become dark-based, and his gauntlet slams enemies with a large fist of darkness. Teleports under enemies to deliver an uppercut as a finisher.
    • BladeCharge: Keyblade becomes engulfed in light, giving a huge boost to the range of attacks. Uses an overhead Spin Attack as a finisher.
    • Frozen Fortune: Triggered by using ice cream items to fill the command gauge, uses ice to attack. Creates a field of ice orbs in the air that explode as a finisher.
    • Rhythm Mixer: Exclusive to Final Mix, spin and fly through the air to attack with dance-like attack. Create a trio of symbols and beat them to send out soundwaves as a finisher.
• Cool Bike: His Keyblade Glider.
• Dull Surprise: Jason Dohring's performance, except when he's really angry.
  • It should be noted that Jason Dohring's performance isn't completely emotionless, as can be seen with anger. But contrary to what Game Spot says, Dohring's acting is actually much better when he is in a scene with other characters, especially later in the game as Dohring got more comfortable with portraying the character. Though obviously it's still a large case of your Your Mileage May Vary.
• Emotional Bruiser
• Mr. Fanservice: For some. The tight clothing he wears definitely helps. And he'll do vertical push-ups on command.
• Everything's Better with Samurai: Well, do you have a better explanation for the hakama?
  • He even gets a Diagonal Cut as a unique attack that has a chance of One Hit Killing regular enemies.
• Eyes of Gold: At the end of II's secret ending.
  • Most likely Foreshadowing for Master Xehanort's Grand Theft Me of Terra.
• Face Heel Turn: Subverted. Many people assumed that he was going to pull one to become the current Xehanort. In reality, he winds up possessed by the real Big Bad, Master Xehanort, and is currently serving as his vessel.
• Fatal Flaw/Ambition Is Evil
• Fighting From The Inside: It's what lets Aqua overcome his Xehanort-possessed body when she joins him in his Battle in the Center of the Mind.
• Gender Blender Name: Terra is a girl's name.
• Heel Realization
• Heroic Spirit
  • First instance of Our Souls Are Different, in comparison with all the usual talk about hearts.
  • Heroic Willpower: Probably the most out of anyone in the series. Too bad it wasn't enough to stop Xehanort from taking over his body.
  • The Determinator
• Hero with an F in Good: At first. He improves it to a B+ over time.
• Hey, It's That Voice!: (Hi Logan!)
• Horrible Judge of Character: Even if he has some distrust of them, he winds up listening to Maleficent, the Evil Queen, Hades, Jumba Jookiba, Captain Hook, and (of course) Master Xehanort. It never ends up well for him.
  • To put that into perspective, the only villains in the game that Terra doesn't ally with are Lady Tremaine, Pete, and Braig. He's after Vanitas too, but they never actually meet until the very end.
    • To be fair though, Terra never really trusted Hades or Captain Hook, and never had any intention of helping the Evil Queen and was actually planning more on keeping Snow White safe just in case Master Xehanort showed up. However, he still doesn't seem to learn until after Master Xehanort tricks him into attacking Master Eraqus.
    • Justified in the Deep Space scenario, Jumba said he was put in prison for ridiculous charges and this was after Terra himself was dragged into the ship and imprisoned for almost no apparent reason.
  • Genre Blindness
  • Lampshaded by Peter Pan if you talk to him in Neverland after finishing the storyline there.
  Peter: I'd watch out if I were you. You look like an easy guy to trick.
  • And earlier by Hades:
  Hades: Wait... Dark, moody, powerful. Yes! He's perfect.
• I Did What I Had to Do
  What I do, I do for friendship.
  • My God, What Have I Done?: After beating up Master Eraqus to the point of near-death. Xehanort finishes him off.
• Japanese Pronouns: "Ore".
• Laser-Guided Karma: Much like Riku, he gave into the darkness. Although Terra's consequences in comparison were much worse.
• Leitmotif: "Terra", which is lifted from "Fate of the Unknown", the track that plays under the secret video of Kingdom Hearts II Final Mix.
• Identical Stranger: Master Xehanort looked suspiciously like Terra in his youth especially after Xehanort's possession leaves him Hades Shaded.
• Meaningful Name: Shares the "earth" theme with Riku, though he has no relation to him outside of character role, Keyblade succession, and getting possessed by Xehanort.
  • Also, an anagram of Xehanort without the "X" is "No earth". As in, he got Body Snatched and That Man Is Dead.
  • Theme Naming
• Missed the Call: According to Word Of God, Terra has the skill and power of a Keyblade Master and thus is essentially one in all but title — that's why he's able to perform the Rite of Succession with Riku. However, due to Eraqus's concern for the darkness in his heart, he chooses to make Aqua a Master instead. If Xehanort hadn't sabotaged Terra during the exam, it's likely that Terra could have made Master too, and Xehanort's manpulations of his insecurities may not have gone so well.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: See the spoiled trope below, but also, he inspired Riku, more than he already was to leave his world, most likely causing him to jump at the call as early as he did.
• Original Generation
• Personality Powers: Specializes in earth and darkness and is stubborn, hard headed, and brooding.
• The Power of Hate: His hatred for Xehanort builds and builds leading up to the final battle as he realizes Xehanort manipulated him into killing Eraqus and more. Then reaches critical mass when his hatred for Xehanort becomes so intense that he reanimates his armor to fight Xehanort when he loses his body.
  • Unstoppable Rage: There's a reason the Theme Music Power-Up used when he rises against the new Xehanort is called "Rage Awakened". For once the barrier surrounding the battlefield is the hero's, to make sure Xehanort has nowhere to run and no one can interfere.
• Rage Against the Mentor: Causes a pivotal turning point in the plot.
• Signature Move: Ultima Cannon! Terra-Xehanort and The Lingering Will can also use it because both of them were once Terra in a way.
• Single Stroke Battle: The only one of the Birth By Sleep trio to learn Zantetsuken. In his case, the attack has him flash past his foes as he strikes, with a very high chance of instantly killing the enemies he hits.
• Skilled, but Naive
• Tears of Remorse:
• Theme Music Power-Up: Used as a tragic piece when his theme plays when he fights Eraqus. The Lingering Will gets one when it fights Terranort with Rage Awakened playing.
• Took a Level in Badass: Through accepting his heart's darkness, but like Riku, it has its costs.
  • Not only did he defeat Master Xehanort, when Xehanort stole his body at the conclusion of the fight, he animated his armor out of force of will and defeated him again!
• Tragic Hero
• Unwitting Pawn
• Weapon of Choice: The Earthshaker keyblade which is later upgraded too Ends Of The Earth.
• What the Hell, Hero?

A rookie Keyblade wielder who trains alongside Terra and Aqua at the Land of Departure. He runs away from home to chase after Terra after receiving a warning of things to come. His heart, which has been stripped clean of darkness, is required to create the legendary χ-blade. Ven loses his heart when he destroys the χ-blade, and is currently recovering in Castle Oblivion while Sora holds on to his heart.

• Adorably Precocious Child: Poor Ven. No one's taking him seriously.
  "My name's Ventus. Call me Ven."
  • Break the Cutie
• And I Must Scream: Just like the secret ending from Final Mix+, Ventus is frozen alive by Master Xehanort. Granted, he does escape via Heroic Willpower just in the nick of time to save Aqua, but winds up being pinned down by some Unversed just for Vanitas to commit Grand Theft Me. Poor guy.
• Battle in the Center of the Mind: With Vanitas.
• Big Brother Worship: Of Terra. It's rather depressing how long it takes for poor Ven to accept that maybe there is something bad going on with him.
• Blue Eyes
• Character Tics: He often places his hands behind his head like Sora does.
• Call Forward: Nearly replicates Sora's famous speech to Riku.
  • Another possible one might involve Master Eraqus mentioning how Ventus was never meant to exist, similarly to how Naminé mentions how Roxas was never meant to exist.
• Celebrity Voice Actor: Like Roxas, Jesse McCartney.
• Cool Board: His Keyblade Glider is basically a Galaxy Glider.
  • Sky Surfing
• Combat Tropes
  • Blow You Away: His most powerful spells are wind-based like Tornado, and one of his first signature Command Styles is Cyclone. His final shotlock even combines wind magic with his light magic.
  • Fastball Special: When teamed up with Hercules, he is thrown, but when teamed with Stitch, he does the throwing.
  • Fragile Speedster: Has the fastest attacks but the lowest HP growth. Curiously though, his defense is the highest, but only by a couple points.
  • Holy Hand Grenade/Light 'Em Up: Each character specializes in at least two elements. Ven's specialty aside from wind is light-based spells like Faith and Salvation. Also reflected in his Wingblade Command Style which is basically his version of Sora's Final Form.
  • Magic Knight: Ventus is more balanced in magic and sword fighting compared Terra and Aqua who focus one one or the other.
  • Multi Wielding: Gets six swords of light in his Wingblade style and holds one in each hand, with the others floating behind him.
  • Super Mode: Command Styles, which boost offensive power:
    • Fever Pitch: Ven's attacks get even faster. Finishing move is a long combo with beams of light.
    • Firestorm: Keyblade turns into a Flaming Sword. Ven creates a storm of flame pillars as a finishing move.
    • Diamond Dust: Keyblade acquires ice powers, Ven summons a large explosion of ice around him as a finishing move.
    • Thunderbolt: Keyblade crackles with lightning, Ven creates a storm of lightning bolts overhead as a finisher.
    • Cyclone: Ven spams Spin Attacks with wind-elemental powers and uses a stronger Spin Attack as a finisher.
    • Skyclimber: Greatly boosts Ven's proficiency with aerial attacks, Ven rides his Keyblade like a skateboard to hit enemies as a finisher.
    • Wingblade: Ven discards his Keyblade for six blades of light that float behind him, grabbing them to dual-wield and using long, powerful combos. Uses Instant Runes to blow up enemies as a finisher.
    • Frozen Fortune: Triggered by using ice cream items to fill the command gauge, uses ice to attack. Creates a field of ice orbs in the air that explode as a finisher.
    • Rhythm Mixer: Exclusive to Final Mix, spin and fly through the air to attack with dance-like attack. Create a trio of symbols and beat them to send out soundwaves as a finisher.
  • Reverse Grip
• Dark Is Not Evil: Even as Xehanort's apprentice, before his darkness was extracted to make Vanitas, he was largely the same person he is now. In fact, the reason his darkness was removed in the first place was because he was too soft for Xehanort's purposes, even with all that darkness within him.
• Decoy Protagonist: You'd think he'd be the chief protagonist due to his resemblance to Sora and Roxas. As it stands, both Terra and Aqua are both somewhat more important protagonists.
  • It could be compared to the events of the first game. While Sora was the one wielding the Keyblade, it was Riku who was supposed to get it as he was the one chosen by Terra, and then to add more insult to injury, Kairi of all people was officially chosen to be a Keyblade Wielder although, Aqua didn't know what she was doing.
• Demonic Possession: If Vanitas can truly be percieved as a demon.
• Determinator: Despite Vanitas completely outclassing him the last time they fought, Ven adamantly refuses to give up when the time comes for their rematch. His determination is so strong that he willingly destroys Vanitas and inflicts catastrophic damage on his own heart to keep his Evil Counterpart from wielding the χ-Blade.
• Despair Event Horizon: He crossed it when Master Xehanort told him of his true nature.
• Dull Eyes of Unhappiness: Whenever his heart is in critical condition.
• Everything's Better with Spinning: He has an entire fighting style based on this concept called Cyclone.
• Expy: Not just similar, but identical in appearance and voice (both English and Japanese) to Roxas. This is a major plot point.
• Friendship Freak: Just may be the biggest one in the series. His motivation through his entire story can be summed as making/saving/protecting friends.
• Heroic Sacrifice: He destroyed the χ-blade even though he knew it would destroy his heart, along with Vanitas's.
• Incorruptible Pure Pureness: The three fairies of Sleeping Beauty even note that he's just like Aurora, with no darkness in his heart. As it turns out, it's because his darkness has been forcefully removed and personified as Vanitas.
• Japanese Pronouns: "Ore".
• Just a Kid: The reason he's not allowed to take the Master Qualification Exam.
• Leitmotif: "Ventus", a mix of Sora's and Roxas' themes.
• Identical Stranger: Is identical to Sora with the exception of hairstyle/color.
• MacGuffin Guy
• Meaningful Name: Ventus = wind. Sora = sky. Do the math.
  • Theme Naming
• Mythology Gag: While every character shares some of their trademark skills with Sora, which is more or less just a testament to them being series mainstays, Ven gets Ars Arcanum, several variations of Dodge Roll, Glide, and Strike Raid, and his Wingblade command style is heavily based on Final Form in appearance and fighting style, with a combo finisher that looks like Trinity. And for good measure, Faith and Salvation create pillars of light to attack enemies like Roxas's Event Horizon.
• Only Known by Their Nickname
• Original Generation
• Personality Powers: Specializes in wind and light and is bright and cheerful.
• The Power of Friendship: See the above quote.
• Pyrrhic Victory
• Shirtless Scene: In his awakening.
• Took a Level in Badass: When he first fights Vanitas, he gets pummeled and needs Mickey to pull a Big Damn Heroes moment. By the end of the game he manages to beat Vanitas one-on-one, while Vanitas is armed with the χ-blade.
• Trauma Induced Amnesia
• Teens are Short: He's only a few years younger than Terra and Aqua, but he's only a couple inches taller than Ienzo, who's a preteen.
• Weapon of Choice: The Wayward Wind keyblade, specially designed for Reverse Grip.

The only one of her trio of friends to become a Keyblade Master. She is tasked with looking after Terra to keep him from succumbing to darkness, and to bring Ventus back to the Land of Departure after he runs away from home. Her actions lead her to being trapped in the Realm of Darkness in a desperate bid to save Terra, and inadvertently brings about the destruction of many worlds.

• The Ace
• Action Girl: Is primarily a magic user, which she can combine into a few good physical attacks. There's a reason she's the one with the Master rank, after all.
  • Affirmative Action Girl: Though Kairi had fought in cut-scene form before, and Xion and Larxene had been playable in Days's multiplayer mode, Aqua is the first proper female player character.
• Back-to-Back Badasses: Subverted when she tells Zack to sit on the sidelines before her battle with Hades and the Ice Colossus. Later played straight in an awesome fashion when she teams up with fellow Memetic Badass Mickey to fend off a Vanitas-possessed Ven.
• Badass: Let's see, she's the only of the trio to get the Mark of Master, she delivers a Shut Up, Hannibal! to every villain she meets, she turns out to be a Spanner in the Works, and in pretty much every world you visit, it's Aqua who sets things right. On top of all this, she tends to be more of a Game Breaker than Terra and Ven due to her high magic stat. Not to mention that after ''eleven years'' in the Realm of Darkness, her heart is so strong she hasn't been corrupted yet.
  • Aqua fights Xehanort in a one-on-one duel at the height of his power, a youthful, skilled, Lightning Bruiser Keyblade Master with the Guardian and all the powers of darkness. With a bit of help from Terra who's Fighting From The Inside, she's able to overpower him until he resorts to locking his own memories to get rid of Terra's interference. Keep in mind this is shortly after she wakes up after being knocked unconscious when she and Mickey fought the Vanitas-possessed Ven and she used The Power of Friendship to destroy the χ-blade.
• Berserk Button: Do not say or do anything bad to or about her friends. Vanitas, Braig, and Xehanort learned this the hard way.
• BFS: One of her transformations turns her Keyblade into a laser sword with massive reach. Now if only she had Blasting Zone as a technique.
• Blessed with Suck: Often her Ghost Drive style can be more of a hinderance than a boon, as it teleports when she attacks and dodges, making it hard to control her properly.
• Boobs of Steel: Being that she's several years older than the other main female heroes seen so far, she's more physically developed, and is certainly the most powerful of them, as well as one of the most powerful heroes period.
• The Chick AND The Hero: Much to everyone's surprise, Aqua does most of the heroics in the game, wraps up almost all of the Disney stories, and is the longest lasting original character in the series making it all the way to the end without turning evil or comatose at some point or other, all while maintaining a motherly/sisterly role.
• Women Are Wiser: She is the only one of the trio who qualifies to become a Keyblade Master. Ven's too inexperienced to apply, and Terra has too much darkness in him. Though in Terra's defense, he was sabotaged.
• Combat Tropes
  • The Archer: Her Keyblade's vehicle form also works as an enormous energy bow. Sadly, you can only use it during Keyblade Ride games, unlike Terra's BFG.
  • Barrier Warrior: Not exclusively, but where Terra and Ventus block attacks with their Keyblades, Aqua throws up a Beehive Barrier that protects her from all directions. She also learns skills to dash while projecting a barrier to damage enemies, can explode her barrier outwards to damage enemies, and is the only character who can use her Block skill in midair.
  • Fastball Special: She tosses Stitch at enemies when teamed up with him. When teamed up with Prince Phillip, however, he tosses her instead.
  • Fire, Ice, Lightning: While Terra gets Earth and Dark attacks and Ven gets Wind and Light, Aqua actually has no preference towards Water and instead focuses her skills in these three areas. Not counting the Non-Elemental ones, her unique magic skills are Triple Blizzaga, Triple Firaga, Thundaga Shot, Raging Storm, Glacier, Firaga Burst, and Ice Barrage.
  • Flash Step: Many of her spells and special attacks include this. Her "Ghost Drive" Command style makes all of her attacks Flash Steps.
  • Full-Contact Magic
  • Glass Cannon: She attacks fast, and later, on her spells seriously hurt. Sadly, her HP is unimpressive.
  • Lady of War: While Ven and Terra assume typical battle stances, Aqua stands perfectly poised even in the heat of battle. Her first Command Style, Spellweaver, hammers this concept home, where she attacks with graceful Keyblade flips and twirls.
  • Light 'Em Up: Her Spellweaver and Ghost Drive magic, Magic Pulse finishers up to and including Teleport Spike, and her Lightbloom shotlock, appear as glowing white orbs of Pure Energy. She also has Roxas's Magic Hour.
  • Making a Splash: Unlike Terra and Ventus, who get a spell for their elemental namesake, Aqua's only water attack is her starting shotlock Bubble Blast. Instead her element is shown through her unique Keyblades, Rainfell and Stormfall, and her Infinity–1 Sword Brightcrest.
  • Spin Attack: Many, including her Spell Waver and Blade Charge finishers, and her Lightbloom Shotlock.
  • Squishy Wizard: She's got the lowest defense, is only slightly faster than Terra (but with a better dodge), and lacks in sword skills. However, Terra and Ven each control two magic elements (darkness and earth, light and wind), she specializes in magic in general, having a powerhouse spell in the Fire, Ice, Lightning trio, some powerful spells of nonstandard magic types, and her guard is replaced by a Reflect spell.
  • Super Mode: Command Styles, which boost offensive power:
    • Spell Weaver: Aqua enchants her Keyblade with magic, using fancy sword throws and twirls to attack and an extended Spin Attack as a finisher.
    • Firestorm: Keyblade turns into a Flaming Sword. Aqua creates a wave of flame pillars as a finishing move.
    • Diamond Dust: Keyblade acquires ice powers. Aqua summons a large explosion of ice around her as a finisher.
    • Thunderbolt: Keyblade crackles with lightning. Aqua creates a storm of lightning bolts overhead as a finisher.
    • Ghost Drive: Flash Steps to attack enemies and teleports instead of cartwheeling for a dodge. Stab spears of light into the ground and explode them as a finisher.
    • Skyclimber: Greatly boosts Aqua's proficiency with aerial attacks. Aqua rides her Keyblade like a skateboard to hit enemies as a finisher.
    • BladeCharge: Keyblade becomes engulfed in light, giving a huge boost to the range of attacks. Uses an overhead Spin Attack as a finisher.
    • Frozen Fortune: Triggered by using ice cream items to fill the command gauge, uses ice to attack. Creates a field of ice orbs in the air that explode as a finisher.
    • Rhythm Mixer: Exclusive to Final Mix, spin and fly through the air to attack with dance-like attack. Create a trio of symbols and beat them to send out soundwaves as a finisher.
  • She-Fu
  • Teleport Spam: With many of her attacks.
• Curtains Match the Window
• Cute Bruiser
• Detached Sleeves
• Double Jump: Doubleflight
• Distaff Counterpart: To Sora to a a certain extent
• Dull Surprise: Willa Holland isn't as bad at this as Jason Dohring, but still frequent. However, sometimes it works — when Aqua mutters dully "first things first" after encountering Unversed in one world, she sounds bored with the idea that there's yet another swarm of Mooks to mow down, which one probably would be in her situation.
• Eleventh Hour Superpower: She gains the Brightcrest Keyblade in the Final Chapter. It possesses very impressive range, makes critical hits a 75% chance, and provides an outstanding boost to her already impressive magic stat.
  • She gets yet another one, namely Eraqus's Keyblade, Master Keeper, during the Secret Episode. It has the same range and magic rating as Brightcrest, but with additional physical strength.
• Expy: Averted contrary to expectations. Though she's the female in the Two Guys and a Girl Power Trio and looks like an older version of Kairi (and by extension Kairi's own Expies), Aqua is closer to the Team Mom rather then The Heart/The Chick.
• Everything's Better with Spinning: Her final Shotlock Lightbloom.
• Fighting Your Friend: Poor girl had to fight both of them.
• Fingerless Gloves
• Friendship Freak: Nearly as much as Sora.
• Hot Chick With A Keyblade
• Incorruptible Pure Pureness: Because she follows Eraqus's teachings so strongly, she has only a small bit of darkness in her heart. This leads Vanitas to plan to use her as a back up for the Master Plan, and her heart is strong enough to not be consumed in the Realm of Darkness without her armor or a Black Coat for 11 years.
• Japanese Pronouns: "Watashi"
• Jiggle Physics: Part of the reason that ESRB tagged the game with "Mild Suggestive Themes".
• Leitmotif: "Aqua", which is lifted from "Fate of the Unknown", the track that plays under the secret video of Kingdom Hearts II's Final Mix.
• Male Gaze: Pay close attention to where Hades's eyes briefly wander.
• Meaningful Name: As detailed above for Kairi, Aqua continues the "water/sea" theme, though she's not related to her aside from Keyblade succession.
  • Theme Naming
• My Name Is Master Aqua
  "Now return my friend's heart, or pay the price!"
• Mythology Gag: The scene in which we are introduced to her is played out in exactly the same way we met Kairi in the first game, only with a more sisterly tone than romantic. Likewise, the lucky charms Aqua made were inspired from a misinterpretation of the two tales we heard in the first game, with the thalassa shell charm made by sailors for safe returns merged with the binding properties of the Paopu fruit.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Letting Maleficent go and saving Terranort wasn't exactly the best thing for the universe....
  • Nor was her creating Castle Oblivion. To be fair, she probably didn't realize that it would be used by Terranort's Nobody, Xemnas & his crew for more nefarious purposes later on.
• Onee-sama: Arguably qualifies as this to all of the Princesses of Heart she encounters, Kairi and Cinderella in particular.
• Ooh, Me Accent's Slipping: Willa Holland has a slight British accent, but in one of Ven's flashbacks, her accent comes unbelievably strong. Just listen to her cast Fire or Magnet spells; her British-style "r" is unmistakable.
• Original Generation
• Personality Powers: Specializes in magic in general and (minorly) water, and is levelheaded and intelligent.
• The Power of Friendship: It can create a Spirit Sword.
• Senseless Sacrifice: She gives up her armor and her Keyblade to save Terra. While she turned out fine, she has to spend the next decade stuck in a hostile world at a serious disadvantage, and saving Terra turns out to set most of Xehanort's evil deeds in motion.
• Sexy Backless Outfit: To the point where it had to be toned down... not that it changed much.
  • For those of you curious, here◊ is the Sexy Backless Outfit to end all Sexy Backless Outfits.
• She Is The King: Master Aqua.
• Spanner in the Works: Vanitas tries to kill her off several times during the game as he and Master Xehanort only need Terra and Ven for their schemes. Except she kept surviving and ultimately defeated the both of them after Terra and Ven were possessed.
• Static Character: While she may do most of the heroics of the game, she does not do much growth as a character and essentially remains the same person as when she started.
  • Not necessarily a bad thing though, since arguably the entire point of her character is that in contrast to Ven and Terra, Aqua has absolute faith in Eraqus's teachings and doesn't care for Hannibal Lectures.
• Sugar and Ice Personality: Nomura says that, "She puts up a cold front, but she's kind to her friends."
• Supporting Protagonist: Although the plot focuses more on Terra, Aqua spends more time as the Protagonist of Birth by Sleep. She also serves as The Hero of the epilogue.
• Take Up My Sword: Eraqus told her that if he were ever killed, she should take his Keyblade as her own and use it to take control of the Land of Departure. In the Last Chapter, she does just that.
• Teacher's Pet: Described by Nomura as an Honor Student type. She follows Master Eraqus's orders without question, and even (albeit reluctantly) spies on Terra for him.
• Team Mom: To Peter Pan and the lost boys.
  • Mama Bear
• Trapped in Another World: Come the ending of Birth By Sleep, Aqua's stuck in the World of Darkness and, according to the secret ending, was there until some time after Kingdom Hearts II. Ansem says he met Sora a year ago, which would put Aqua's imprisonment at around twelve years. However, the secret ending of Final Mix implies that she still had more adventures down there and wasn't just wandering around.
• Weapon of Choice: Rainfell and later the upgrade Stormfall keyblade, once she gives it up to save the possessed Terra she wields the Master Keeper.
• Women Are Wiser: Played with, she is more mature and centered then Terra and Ven but to them she can come off as high and mighty and a busybody.
• You Gotta Have Blue Hair
• Zettai Ryouiki: *ahem*