The Addams Family — Despite their gothic appearance, eerie mannerisms, and apparent trappings of pain and horror amidst which they live, the Addamses are clearly NOT evil - they are compassionate and loving, friendly to all they meet, eager to help strangers in times of need, and tolerant to a fault. In fact, they are probably more so than most families! The end result is more delightfully eccentric and endearing than disturbing.
The Adventures of Puss in Boots has the skeleton race. They look intimidating and will attack when provoked, but are actually quite friendly and willing to mingle with other creatures. Their only issue is being unable to speak.
In the American Dad! episode "Minstrel Krampus" despite him looking like an evil demon and his tendency to kidnap children, Krampus is actually a very nice guy he kidnaps the children to show them the errors of their ways and teaches them not to be spoiled, on the other hand his mortal enemy Santa Claus whom the Smith's tangled with before is the true villain as he encourages the kid's bratty behavior and gives more toys to the spoiled kids regardless if they were good.
Z from All Grown Up! (and Rugrats) looks like the kind of badbutt punk you'd better steer clear of and run away from. He's also into raising money for inner city schools as much as everyone else and pretty much proof that appearances can be deceiving, even in Tommy, Chuckie, Angelica, Susie, Phil, Lil and Kimi's world.
This is a common theme in Amphibia, which is an overall dark and creepy-appearing world, but which has many good people in it.
Soggy Joe looks like a stereotypical thug but helps out the protagonists multiple times, starting with Anne Vs. Wild.
Maddie is the most prominent example, appearing dark and creepy but revealed to be well-intentioned and forgiving in "Cursed!" and becoming a close friend of Anne and the Plantars.
Priscilla from the episode "Hopping Mall" looks like (and is) a terrifying fighter, but is honorable as well as being a good mother.
In "Night Drivers", the hitchhiker looks like a villain from a slasher movie, and the protagonists flee from him, but he turns out to be the ghost of a guide who tries to help travelers get through the mountain pass safely.
Dr. Beaumont is sinister-looking and runs a novelty stop that's a mystery all its own, but seems like a nice fellow who helps Archie and co. The only time he does cause trouble is when he sets them up to learn a lesson.
Similarly is Lucinda, a voodoo witch doctor of sorts who dabbles in all sorts of "dark" powers but is also actually quite nice and even rather fond of Archie for inadvertently sending business her way with his mystery column. Like Dr. Beaumont, she too delights in screwing with the kids to teach them a lesson sometimes.
Waterbending in Avatar: The Last Airbender. It is powered by the Moon, and as a consequence it is stronger at night, it is associated with the winter, and there's a Dangerous Forbidden Technique of bloodbending, but waterbenders are normal people like everyone else, and waterbender Katara is a main character; the swamp tribe in particular double counts because it is a subversion of Swamps Are Evil.
Koh the Facestealer is one of the creepiest examples. Despite his name, Koh isn't an "evil" spirit, but one with a very shifty and amoral nature. After all, he did help Aang when he asked for insight. Avatar Kuruk particularly wanted to kill Koh, for stealing his wives' face. But that was the fault of Kuruk's own arrogance, nothing of malicious intent. He very rarely meets humans, which goes to show he doesn't go out looking for trouble.
Asami Sato from the same series is more of a visual example, wearing a good deal of black and red — the same color scheme as Vaatu, no less — but she's firmly on the heroes' side. (Interestingly, Asami was conceived as a Sixth Ranger Traitor. The writers, however, decided they liked her character too much to waste it.)
Firebending too. Fire benders wear red and black and many of them are powered by the anger inside them, and it originated from dragons, but they are normal people too, outside of the Fire Nation royal family (excluding Iroh and eventually Zuko) and in fact the avatar before Aang was a Firebender.
Played with with the Dark spirits from the second season of Korra. On the one hand, they're on a rampage and being antagonistic, but as Unalaq explains, they are not inherently malevolent — no spirit is, according to him — and are in fact reacting to people's disregard of nature, like Hei Bai in the previous series. Though the fact that they're being manipulated by Vaatu, THE dark spirit, muffles this quite a bit. Though he himself honours his deal with Unalaq with no fuss, so who knows.
We do see some non-angry spirits with dark aesthetics that are benevolent, however, like the one Bumi pacified with his flute and a dark, red eyed dragonfly-thing that accompanies Jinora in the Book 3 teaser.
Back at the Barnyard once had a Halloween Episode with a guy who looks like the kind of masked villain who'd hurt people for a living until the barnyard residents discover that he's actually a nice individual and despises horror movies.
Blackarachnia of Beast Wars is a key example of this trope; despite being born a predacon, she was originally a maximal protoform, thus her just being a Dark Action Girl. She tries to deny her good side to Silverbolt, even stating that she's an evil black widow. Yet, she never fatally wounds Silverbolt, and he notes this, much to Blackarachnia's dismay.
Lydia Deetz of Beetlejuice. In the movie, she was a moody, depressed and suicidal goth. The cartoon still has her as a goth, but here she's sweet, perky and creative. Her best friend is a ghost everyone else despises.
Several aliens in Ben 10 and its sequel Ben 10: Alien Force, some of which Ben himself transforms into thanks to the Omnitrix. Most notable examples include Ghostfreak and Big Chill, who are both ghost-like aliens (though Ghostfreak didturn evil after escaping from the Omnitrix) and the forms Ben got from Ghostfreak's minions (Benmummy/Snare-oh, Benwolf/Blitzwolfer and Benvicktor/Frankenstrike), who are all horror-themed aliens.
We eventually see Anur Transyl, the planet of all the horror-themed aliens. The Anur System is as scary as its inhabitants, the planets all purple and black with what looks like giant spiderwebs connecting them. Its star is smaller than the sun, leaving high noon looking more like dusk on Earth. However, the inhabitants — all the same races as Ghostfreak and his minions — are like those of any other world, going about lives that aren't that different from Earth. (As for Ghostfreak, the reason the Omnitrix transformation became a unique villain is because his race can regenerate From a Single Cell... such as the DNA sample of his that he managed to have placed in the Omnitrix so he could escape.)
Casper the Friendly Ghost also counts. Unlike other ghosts who scare people, he wants to be friends will everyone.
The Chaotic tv series features the Underworlders tribe of Creatures, who seriously play up the "Dark Beasts of the Netherworld" type for all it's worth, is host to some of the show's nastier monster badguys, like Lord Van Bloot, and it's leader, Chaor, is constantly organizing attacks against the Overworlder tribe. Yet, Chaor has been displayed honorable tendencies, and the Underworlder, H'earring, is practically Team Pet to Tom, Kaz, Peyton and Sarah. Furthermore, the Underworlders claim that the Overworlders were responsible for starting the war over the Cothica.
Just to point out that Chaotic is often all over the map with the tribes' and creature's morality. Yes the Underworlders are the most unashamedly morally grey tribe but the Overworlders have just as many problems. They've got a couple members who look and act like mindless thugs and some have a habit of arrogance and intolerance while not being afraid to Shoot the Dog while claiming to be moral guardian types. It's just that their Teamwork mechanic makes them seem nicer.
To really drive the point home, in one episode, Tom complains about how Midpedians (the bipedal, lizard-like tribe) are evil for attacking them in a previous episode. Peyton explains to him that no one tribe is all good or all evil, but that each has its' good & bad members. This comes to play when they're attacked by a scorpion-like Overworlder and saved by a Mipedian.
The Clone Wars: Played with. The Darksaber is for the most part an ordinary lightsaber, except it's black. It was constructed by the first Mandalorian Jedi, who as far as we know was a perfectly fine example of a Jedi Knight. However, after he died the Mandalorians raided the Jedi Temple and stole it, and it became a symbol of the greatest Mandalorian warlords. By the time of the series, it's in the hands of the terrorist organization Death Watch, and several Sith end up wielding it. Note that in the old Legends canon, black was the Mandalorian color of justice.
The Nightsisters of Dathomir are at best a neutral faction. Thrice did the Sith adopt one of them into their fold (Maul, Ventress and Savage), but not without something in exchange. Ironically it was also the Sith, who would betray them. Dooku was responsible for attempting to kill Ventress, which led to her failing to assassinate him in return. Eventually, the Nightsisters were slaughtered to near-extinction by Grievous. Still, one or two of them survived, but now understandably skeptical of outsiders.
Not all the monsters Courage the Cowardly Dog came face-to-face with are Always Chaotic Evil. Just ask his friend Charlie the big, scary-looking but very friendly giant rat, Carmen the sea monster, who just wants everyone to hear her break out in song (as in "Carmen," of course), Bigfoot, the shadow who used to be a actor, William the Dragon and the enormous, vulture-like monster Mama Bird, who's just protecting her hatchlings for good reason. Possibly the most tragic example is the Magic Tree from Nowhere; it's a benevolent entity (despite being pretty creepy) with Eustace being the true antagonist of the story, chopping the poor tree down out of jealousy.
Danny Phantom despite being part ghost, is a superhero.
Darkwing Duck looks like and is even mistaken for a purple-wearing crook by Launchpad in the first episode, but he's more than willing to rid the world of evil, as he's a SUPERHERO, and a loving dad.
Di-Gata Defenders: Seth is the leader of the Di-Gata Defenders and a friendly, unambiguously heroic person. He is a master of the Dako and Nega sigils which represent chaos and force respectively. His spells often have a shadow theme or sound somewhat sinister such as "Spinning Doom", "Twisted Chaos" and "Dark Anarchy".
The creepy-looking, green-skinned ghoul Doug and his BFF Skeeter once encountered turns out to be not so scary after all, even helping them scare Roger Klotz for messing with Doug himself.
Drak Pack was a heroic trio consisting of a vampire, werewolf and a Frankenstein-like Monster.
The titular hero of Fantomcat was a ghost who looked like he should have been the show's villain. Justified since he was based on Zorro.
In a Series Fauxnale of The Fairly OddParents!, the cosmic entity know as "the Darkness" turns out to have never been seeking trouble; everyone that saw it simply got scared and preemptively started filling it full of explosives. When Timmy decides to be the first one to send anything nice into it (namely a smile made from light coming from every planet in the solar system) it returns all the people it swallowed and its Killer Robots started hugging people.
Final Space: Ash, despite her grim color scheme, gruesome hobbies and instability, is a good and gentle-hearted person who's on the heroes side. Until Season 3, where Invictus corrupts her by taking advantage of her emotional vulnerability, and the "Not" part disappears from this equation entirely once she attempts to murder Gary and Avocato and she sets Invictus loose on the universe.
Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends: Eduardo is a imaginary friend who looks like a scary-looking minotaur with purple fur and grey pants with a belt with a skull on it. He's really a Gentle Giant who's cute in his own way.
The title characters of Gargoyles may look like classical demons from Hell, but they are unambiguously heroes sworn to protect the innocent. (Well, most of them.) This trope may only apply to the main characters, who were Scottish gargoyles. Gargoyles from other countries can have different appearances; the English ones resemble mythological beings like griffons.
Grim to an extent. He may be death personified, but he enjoys watching television and is always (although reluctantly) willing to use his supernatural abilities to save others. Played with, since he does show often a sociopathic disregard for other people's lives and welfare and in a few episodes he does act outright evil. But most of the time he is too passive and affable to completely subvert it. Of course, Grim would seem like a nice (or at least likable) fellow compared to the company he is forced to keep.
Irwin, too, as is expected for the Non-Action Guyoffspring of Dracula's son and a Mummy. More noticeable in Underfist, where he gains superpowers and a costume that could best be described as Goth meets Ancient Egypt and unlike previous episodes where he abused the powers that he got, he acts heroically and decently.
In He-Man and the Masters of the Universe (1983), Castle Grayskull is just about the creepiest looking piece of architecture any villain could ever hope to design. Yet the place is always presented unambiguously as a source of power for good. Presumably, its appearance isn't really supposed to look evil... Just badass.
The 2002 version has a backstory that reveals that the castle was truly named after it's original owner, King Greyskull, a great hero and the true source of He-Man's power. (In fact, when Adam chants "By the power of Greyskull", he's actually calling on King Greyskull's power.)
In the 2002 animated series episode "Underworld", King Randor, Adam and Man-At-Arms travel to the underground land of Subternia to negotiate between two races, one of which is a fearsome-looking tribe of bat people that a freaked Adam nearly pulls his sword on before Duncan stops him. Despite their appearance they're very friendly towards the visitors and Randor is greeted warmly by their king Lord Dactys. There's a funny "Not So Different" Remark when Adam expresses disbelief that Dactys is really their king and Dactys gently calls him on it.
Randor: I apologize for my son... Dactys: I've been apologizing for mine for years! [they laugh as Adam and Man-At-Arms give each other wry looks]
Zhalia Moon in Huntik: Secrets & Seekers is pragmatic to the point of occasional ethically dubious actions, uses scary-looking Titans like Garion and Strix, has a Black Knight as a melee fighter, and has a history with the villains. She's not a bad guy, just complex.
Dib from Invader Zim raised network concerns because he looked like the kind of kid who would pull off a school shooting. He's the only person trying to save the Earth from an insane alien. (Although admittedly, he's not always nice about it, either.)
The animated short "Kagemono: The Shadow Folk. Played with in that Dark can be both good AND evil!
Kipo and the Age of Wonderbeasts: The rats have dark colored fur, Hellish Pupils and sharp teeth but they're one of the more egalitarian societies on the surface and they even help save Kipo and Benson from Scarlemagne's forces despite not having a reason to.
Bleak from Lite Sprites. Though the toys portray her as a friendless rebel sprite who steals color For the Evulz, in the special she's more of a Jerk with a Heart of Gold and considered a friend by all the sprites.
Little Gloomy, which had similarities to Ruby Gloom. Sure, some of the characters were obnoxious, but there were only two particularly nasty ones in the lot. (The monster, for all his vows to destroy all life, did not seem to be one of them.)
Lucy Loud from The Loud House is Lincoln's sixth sister, who is the resident Goth and creepy sister. Despite being forgotten a lot, Lucy is actually quite mature sometimes disturbingly so. She's very misunderstood for her dark ways, scaring quite a large portion of the cast without trying at times.
The Men in Black all work on the side of good (except for Alpha, but he left a long time ago).
The metal band Dethklok in Metalocalypse enjoy all things brutal and violent, but they are actually the heroes of the series...and they are not evil, just really stupid at times.
The Klokateers wear black and have executioner hoods, but they protect Dethklok.
Dr. Rockso is a Monster Clown who loves cocaine, but he is on the side of good and is even best friends with Toki Wartooth.
In the Mickey Mouse cartoon "Ghoul Friend" we have the scary and grotesque Zombie Goofy, but as we later find out he means no harm and only wanted help Mickey fix his car.
The Deuteragonist of Miraculous Ladybug is named Cat Noir ("Black Cat"), has an all-black superhero outfit and gains his powers of destruction ("Cataclysm") from a spirit of bad luck. Both he and said spirit are extremely nice.
Despite the fact that Stephanie wears gothic clothing and piercings, she's a Cool Big Sis to Orel and one of the few only sane men in Moralton.
Also of note are the Satanists Coach Stopframe encountered: the high priest talks about their concept of Satan as a pagan image of power, virility, sexuality and sensuality, which he notes predates the Christianity concept of Satan as evil. He was also horrified about how Stopframe had brought the underage Orel as the 'virgin sacrifice' and asked if he knew legal virgins for their orgy. (At any rate, the Satanists are just too darned goofy to be considered any real evil.)
Funny note, Ms. Sculptham had talked about how darkness was warm and sheltering...except she was referring to the Dark Ages.
My Life as a Teenage Robot — The aliens Jenny Wakeman (a.k.a. XJ9) encounters in the episode "Stage Fright." Sure, they look like atypical 1950s alien invaders, which is why Jenny Wakeman, while in drama class, mistakes them for bad guys BECAUSE they yelled out "Alien invasion!", but as it turns out, they're actually good guys, warning everyone about the real invaders: a bunch of beautiful-looking aliens.
Twilight Sparkle, having mostly dark colors of lavender and purple, in addition to a name that refers to a time period of night. She is undoubtedly the loving and friendly hero and central protagonist of the entire series.
Princess Luna is the ruler of the night, but isn't evil. Her Big Entrance in "Luna Eclipsed" pretty much has about every villain appearance trope you could imagine... when she comes to meet the citizens and show that she's no longer evil as in the Nightmare Moon persona that had previously taken over her for a thousand years. None of it is really helping her case, including her time of arrival during the night at Nightmare Night, a local version of Halloween centered around Nightmare Moon.
"The Crystal Empire" showed that Twilight and Princess Celestia can cast shadow spells, and as of "Princess Twilight Sparkle Part 2" it has been shown to be identical to alicorn magic. While this hasn't been elaborated on in the series, this seems to imply (along with the "Alicorn Amulet" being an Artifact of Doom) that alicorn magic is inherently dark.
Another example would be the zebra Zecora. She lives in a hut deep in a dark forest full of spooky monsters, speaks in rhyme, and collects herbs for brewing natural remedies (or in the townsponies' eyes, evil witchcraft before she's proven to be good). Despite this, she has never shown any ill intent towards anyone or acted threatening. In fact, the moral of the episode where she makes her first appearance, "Bridle Gossip", is "Don't judge a book by its cover."
Countess Coloratura from "Mane Attraction" has a "glitz and glam" stage persona and edgy aesthetic, but she cares very deeply about her younger fans and insists on doing charity events.
Discord qualifies post-Heel–Face Turn. He's an Eldritch Abominationmade of chaos with bat wings, red pupils, and a dragon's leg, and he loves to troll the ponies for fun, but he is trying to help in his own chaotic way.
Starlight Glimmer officially becomes this post Heel–Face Turn, being dominantly purple. However, she has a much brighter pastel shade of purple in her coat and mane than Twilight Sparkle.2
While most reformed changleings become even more brightly coloured than the typical pony, Pharynx retains his dark green and red scheme after his delayed joining the reformed.
While the first of the My Little Pony TV Specials has Dark Is Evil in the form of Tirek, it also has Scorpan, an Anti-Villain who is just a protective friend/parental figure who serves Tirak only for the safety of Spike and is otherwise a nice guy, despite looking like a demonic ape-man. Same goes for the next one, where the reptilian Rep is a reluctant minion who only serves Catrina because he cared for her before she went bad.
Pottsfield is populated by creepy-looking villagers in pumpkin costumes who are actually skeletons. One of them states that "people don't usually just pass through Pottsfield", and the episode initially sets us up to believe that the village has some kind of totalitarian state or black magic that forcibly prevents people from wanting to leave, but it's really just a genuinely fun place where people don't usually want to leave quickly. Their leader, Enoch, is a little strict, but ultimately proves to be a Reasonable Authority Figure who is perfectly willing to let Greg and Wirt go home once they've been fairly punished for destroying other people's property.
The Beast has a lot of Dark Is Evil traits, but his DragonAdelaide is melted by the night sky, and he himself is ultimately killed by blowing out his lantern, leaving the screen completely black.
Auntie Whispers looks like an evil hag, but is actually a very kind woman who was telling the truth about protecting Lorna from "the evil spirit".
The Pixar ShortPartly Cloudy follows a storm cloud who is only capable of making potentially dangerous creatures such as baby gators, porcupines or sharks for his Delivery Stork while all other clouds make cute little babies or puppies. Nevertheless, he is depicted as well-meaning, only wishing for companionship and not at all malevolent.
The minor character Mr. Green from The Powerpuff Girls episode "Substitute Creature" looks like something from out of the gates of hell and looks like the kind of monster that destroys things and harms people, but he really is a sweet, kindhearted, nice guy who loves kids and is a good teacher.
The Real Ghostbusters are typically hired by human clients to get rid of evil supernatural creatures, but some of the ghosts they've encountered are not evil, and are easily gotten rid of when the Ghostbusters help them complete their Unfinished Business. Other times, the supernatural creatures are the ones who hire the Ghostbusters, either to get rid of another supernatural being that really is evil, or to protect them from overzealous human villains.
The Web Riders in ReBoot. Sure they fight the heroes and look creepy, but they're actually quite nice and helpful once you get to know them. They weren't fighting the heroes because they were evil or malicious, but because they were defending their herd of Web Creatures from the Net invaders.
Recess had Butch, who tells the main characters scary stories and looks like a rebel, but is as nice as almost any other kid in the series.
Most of the alien races the duo encounters are scary looking monsters and eldritch abominations at first glance. However, most of them are just ordinary people who are either friendly or outright jerks.
Scary Terry and his Dream Walker race are expies Freddy Krueger with Scary Terry being prone to outbursts. However, Scary Terry is simply a frustrated married man who is also a Jerk with a Heart of Gold with traumatic nightmares about his youth. Not to mention his Dream Walker race is revealed to have its share of friendly and mean members, such as the hippie professor who Scary Terry greatly respects.
Jaguar is a scary looking Expy of Batman and the Punisher, but he is actually a freedom fighter who fights corrupt government officials. He even saves Rick and Morty from Concerto (a Joker expy) at one point.
Gordon Lunis is a creepy looking old guy with moon motifs and looks like a villain from a Hanna Barbera cartoon, but after his death that Morty unwittingly caused, he is revealed to have been a well-respected Marine officer and a Guidance Counselor.
The Ruby Gloom cartoon intentionally exemplifies this trope. Perky Goth Ruby Gloom's friends include a two-headed Frankenstein's Monster, an animate skeleton, a banshee, a cyclops, a black cat, a bat, and three ravens. Despite being traditionally being monstrous or "dark", all are decidedly not evil, and very friendly, if a bit eccentric.
Other characters introduced along the way (including, among other things, a ghost, a mad scientist with the brains exposed and a carnivorous plant) are always examples of this trope if they are friendly. And there's an episode where the dark clouds covering the sky of their home place disappear; cue the oppressive hot sun.
Samurai Jack: In the first half of season 5, Jack is wearing a dark armor with horns and a mask with a very devilish look resembling a Japanese Oni. Also, in the promotional picture, Jack has a very menacing Kubrick Stare, all topped off with him being covered in blood. Of course, Jack still manages to be a rather heroic man despite his fatal flaws.
His one-time foe and eventual Love Interest Ashi settles on this; she starts as a Dark Is Evil Aku-worshiping assassin raised from birth to kill Jack, but after he defeats her she undergoes a Heel–Face Turn and gets a Good Costume Switch. It's eventually revealed Ashi is technically Aku's biological daughter, and has all of his vast eldritch power at her disposal (which she uses to free Jack and send him back to the past once he breaks her out of her brainwashing.
Don Bluth's animation for Scizzor Sisters has a a warlock/wizard that helps the hero to save his girl. He looks like your average magic wielding villain though.
The tanner in "The Small One." He's rough and abrupt, but when the boy asks if he'll take good care of his donkey, he looks sad and very gently tells him, "I only want his hide, son. I'm the tanner." Small One and the boy freak out anyway.
Oddly enough, the zombies in Scooby-Doo on Zombie Island. Indeed, it turns out the cat demon creatures (aka, the true forms of their 'hosts' whose mansion they were staying at) are the villains, and trying to kill them for some form of life energy (and the zombies were the remains of the people the villains had killed in the hundreds of years before the gang arrived, and were trying to warn them about the villains). After the demons are killed, the zombies simply fall apart with their souls at rest, and the ghost of one of the Confederate soldiers who they'd seen in their earlier camera footage on the island thanks them. However, some of the zombies weren't nice people when they were alive, as for instance the pirates responsible for killing the original settlers of the island.
How about Scooby-Doo and the Ghoul School? The girls of the eponymous school are all quite nice and friendly, and even their fathers (including the likes of The Mummy, Dracula, and The Wolf Man) are nice, if frighteningly protective of their daughters. The only really evil monsters to appear in the entire thing are Revolta and her minions.
In Scooby-Doo! and the Witch's Ghost, Wicca is portrayed as good and it's even gone into detail as to the fact they're very different from witches. Of course the 'Wiccan' they thought they were clearing the name of was actually an evil witch, but Wiccans were the ones who imprisoned her inside her own spell book and only a Wiccan could imprison her again. The Hex Girls (introduced in this movie) also play this trope; they dress like vampires for their act, but are actually three really nice girls and love the environment. They even help the Gang everytime they meet, and their leader is the one to banish Sarah the witch back into her prison.
This is actually lampshaded in their song "Earth, Wind, Fire, & Air", with the lyric "we may look bad, but we don't care."
In "Woodland Critter Christmas", the mean, old mountain lion who kills the newborn savior of the titular critters is actually the beloved protector of the forest, who stops the Critters from giving birth to the Anti-Christ, and a loving mother.
Star vs. the Forces of Evil: Eclipsa Butterfly, The Queen of Darkness is touted in the first two seasons as being a villain who practiced "evil" dark magic and abandoned her kingdom to elope with an evil monster, and the queens after her were dissuaded from reading her evil chapter in the royal spellbook... except she's not evil, more just selfish and unwilling to be hampered by limitations set by others. Her first actual appearance shows her to be calm, a bit childish, and genuinely sympathizing with Moon's grief over her mother's death and her own premature ascension to the throne. She is in a loving relationship with her monster husband Globgor, and is even willing to sacrifice her own daughter Meteora in order to protect Mewni from Meteora's rampage. She is a devoted monster rights advocate, in direct contrast to her sun-themed mother Solaria, who was a warmongering racist hellbent on eradicating all of monsterkind from the face of Mewni.
Clone Force 99 of Star Wars: The Bad Batch wore dark grey and red armor, but they were the VERY few clones that revolted against Order 66 and betrayed the fallen Republic (Crosshair didn't, but he wasn't brainwashed at least). All of the Bad Batch stuck-up for one another, becoming more of a family than just soldiers. This deep sense of free will and comradery, is among the many reasons why they're considered elite on their own.
The titular Static of Static Shock has a jet black/dark blue color scheme, but he is definitely the good guy.
On the other hand, Ebon is a bang-baby with shadow powers who is literally so dark his face can't be seen and he is definitely a Big Bad.
This trope was played with in the episode "Army of Darkness". Trying to plunge Dakota City into eternal night definitely sounds evil — and Ebon wants to use it to rule Dakota City — but the "army" in question is made up of bang-babies who are extremely photosensitive and just want to stop living underground and go home without being hurt by the sun. So they aren't evil, but being forced to live in the darkness underground made their personalities darker as well.
The diesel engines in Thomas & Friends. Diesels are typically portrayed as evil; rude, heartless machines who want all steam engines scrapped. But several kind-hearted and friendly diesels have emerged, such as BoCo, Derek, and Rusty. Likewise, while steam engines are shown as the good characters, several aren't.
Toonami has TOM who is a dark blue robot, but is kind to his viewers.
Total Drama (Island, Action, World Tour and All-Stars) has Gwen. She's a snarky, cynical girl who dresses entirely in black and green, and is not afraid to point out when the other contestants are acting stupid. But as the episodes go on, it becomes apparent that she's one of the nicest characters on the show- she just takes a while to warm up, that's all.
The kindhearted necromancer Dr. Orpheus from The Venture Bros.. He states that he only took the title of Necromancer because the other titles for sorcerers were taken.
The Black Lion in Voltron: Legendary Defender despite being the largest and most imposing looking of the Voltron lions. The Black Lion is just a protective of it's pilot as the other lions. Though it feels conflicting loyalties between it's original and current pilots for a brief time.
Lumpy from Winnie the Pooh is a Heffalump introduced within Pooh's Heffalump Movie as the titular Heffalump. Heffalumps are elephant-like creatures who, prior to this film, are portrayed as some of the very monsters Pooh and his friends fear. Lumpy happens to be the first friendly Heffalump they've meet and befriended.
This becomes a minor sub-theme of Winx Club after the first season; once the Trix are gone, the witches of Cloud Tower start acting nicer to fairies. It turns out that, despite being powered by darkness and negative emotions, most witches aren't really bad people; the Trix just had a way of bringing out the worst in people, especially since they were the strongest kids at Cloud Tower.
This also applies to Mirta, who's a dark-color-wearing witch, but she's a heroine and Griffin, who has the look of a typical villainess and the heart of a heroine.
The Witch from the 1978 Halloween Special "Witch's Night Out" is a textbook case of this trope. She's not Malicious and uses her magic to transform anyone into anything they wanted for Halloween and will change them back once the day is over... Oh and she throws a party at her mansion to boot!
The disarrays, the spirits in charge of destruction, are initially seen as evil, but as the series goes on it becomes apparent their role is just as vital to existence as that of the sprytes. Seth is a disarray that becomes a main character in season 2.
One of the primordials has a demonic appearence... but is so harmless as to try to hide themselves to prevent others from being frightened. Seeing that they are not evil gives Seth confidence and pride in being a disarray.
Xiaolin Showdown: Klofange looks intimidating, that with being a giant compared to the Xiaolin Warriors, his Wild Hair and appearance, but he's only trying to stop a evil mermaid from Taking Over The World.
Like his comic counterpart, the demon-like Nightcrawler fits this trope to a T in X-Men: Evolution. In fact, he's probably the most lighthearted character on the show.
mischievous than actually evil.
