Anime & Manga / Deconstructed Character Archetype

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Deconstructed Character Archetype in Anime & Manga.

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A-C

Anohana: The Flower We Saw That Day: Smashed the concept of Incorruptible Pure Pureness to pieces. Menma is ridiculously pure and innocent because she died as a young child and thus got mentally and emotionally stuck as a little girl forever. It's also brutally shown how much pressure that kind of character would have on others. Tsuruko and Anaru both remembered Menma fondly but are also jealous and resentful that she left an insanely high unattainable standard when she died, Jintan and Yukiatsu are emotionally screwed up due to still loving Menma well after her death with Jintan being unable to function in social situations and Yukiatsu cultivating an unhealthy obsession with her, and Tetsudo still blames himself for letting her die.
Arifureta: From Commonplace to World's Strongest:
- Kouki deconstructs the Stock Light-Novel Hero. The "hero" job he gets on coming to Tortus goes straight to his head and makes him go full-tilt Tautological Templar, thinking that his way, and only his way, is the epitome of righteousness, no matter how reckless, stupid, or suicidal his actions. It often takes violence to make him see how wrong he is, or keep him from endangering himself and others, and even then, he doesn't always get it.
- Like Hajime, Yukitoshi Shimizu's an Ascended Fanboy Gone Horribly Wrong. He shows that being a fan of "other world" harem anime to the point of immersion is not the best strategy to prepare for such an event actually happening. In fact, if you can't hack it in the real world, where life is relatively easy, you're not likely to do well if you suddenly find yourself in a setting like those common to "other world" anime, harem or otherwise, because you're not going to be strong enough, physically, mentally, or morally to deal with a life and death situation.
Assassination Classroom:
- Nagisa Shiota is this for Dude Looks Like a Lady. Nagisa has a notoriously effeminate appearance, which is often the subject of jokes. However, it is later revealed that his dangerously delusional mother refused to let him cut his hair and forced him to wear girl clothes because she wanted a girl and because her own parents never let her act feminine.
- Kaede Kayano is this for the Satellite Character. The reason why she was rarely active during the story was because she was trying to make Korosensei drop his guard with her when she revealed her tentacle powers.
The eponymous character of Astro Boy is famously an Unbuilt Character Archetype of the Replacement Goldfish: he was created by Dr. Tenma as a replacement for his deceased son Tobio, but Tenma threw him out when he realized that Astro wasn't the same as his original son. Different retellings of the story give differing reasons as to what was the main factor that led to Tenma abandoning Astro — the original manga and 1960's anime have Tenma frustrated that Astro can't grow in height like a real boy; Pluto and the 2009 film have Astro express differing interests and personality traits to the original Tobio — but the impact and lesson is nevertheless the same: no matter how hard you try, you can't replace a lost life.
Attack on Titan:
- Eren Yeagar has all the usual tropes of a Stock Shōnen Hero. Full of uncontrollable emotions, clueless idiot who has no sense of strategy, and fights using only will power. However, all these tropes are portrayed realistically with several negative consequences. While determination is necessary for combat, blindly attacking enemies head-on is a great way to ruin any clever plans that would minimize casualties. If anything, Eren himself can be blamed for causing needless deaths and hurting his team.
  - Deconstructed further, in the wake of the Marley arc, with the post-time skip Eren having grown into a thoroughly ruthless Wild Card. Ultimately, Eren's refusal to self-examine leads to a nasty case of Protagonist-Centered Morality; he no longer cares if he's seen as the bad guy, because he sees himself and his ideals as good. Finally, once he becomes more powerful than them, Eren confronts one who always outclassed him and bailed him out of trouble until recently, and tells them that he's always hated them for a multitude of reasons. Mikasa, who never saw herself as his rival, is driven to tears. Subverted later on when Eren reveals he only said those things on purpose to keep her from going down with him in an eventual suicide mission, and that he was always aware that she was in love with him and greatly appreciated the things she had done for him.
- The self-destructive side of having a Living Emotional Crutch is shown through Mikasa who at one point believed Eren had died. She had a mental breakdown, recklessly threw herself and her squad against the Titans, getting most of her squad needlessly killed. Later when Annie kidnapped Eren, she lost herself in anger trying to stop the latter and would have gotten herself killed if Levi hadn't stepped in.
- Erwin Smith deconstructs The Chessmaster and other character archetypes prone to using Batman Gambits. While Erwin is regarded as a brilliant tactician and strategist, both he and others readily and repeatedly acknowledge that the schemes he comes up with are gambles, and that their success comes not just from his genius, but also from sheer luck and the sacrifices of his subordinates. This fact eventually begins to weigh heavily on him as the series progresses.
Banished from the Hero's Party: Ruti Ragnason deconstructs The Hero. A central aspect of the series are "Blessings", roles assigned at birth by the gods. And Ruti's Blessing is that of, you guessed it, the Hero. It grants her an immense amount of power...but that's about the only good thing that comes with it. See, Blessings don't just determine the kinds of abilities or skills someone would have, they also come with mental afflictions, and Ruti's afflictions have made her life a living hell. She's compelled to save everybody, even prioritizing her own survival as secondary (which almost got her killed when she was five years old and tried to fight a monster to save another child), she doesn't need to eat or sleep because her Blessing won't let her rest until the Demon Lord is dead, and she doesn't even have the option of not saving someone, like the backstabbing politician Ares Srowa who kicked her beloved brother Gideon out of the party.
Beast Tamer: Arios deconstructs The Chosen One. Because he is the descendant of the divine hero and is destined to defeat the demon lord, he and his party treat that as a license to do whatever and treat anyone however they want with no consequences. For instance, they fire Rein for his perceived uselessness, and when he refuses to rejoin them, they are insulted that he would dare turn them down.
Berserk:
- Griffith is a deconstruction of the Rags to Riches princely hero of fantasy stories, the Determinator, and the Knight in Shining Armor. Rather than being noble, he's actually immensely ambitious and scheming, and views his True Companions as tools for his own advancement. His extreme devotion to fulfilling his dream has resulted in him committing things like kidnapping, assassination, prostitution, manipulation, and a Deal with the Devil. Following your dreams comes at a very real cost, and that cost can involve the lives of others.
- Guts deconstructs the badass. He can drink molten lead, routinely win fights against demons who would rip battle tanks apart, and can cut through entire armies of men on his own, but that's only because his entire life has been one big trial by fire and he's a broken wreck of a man as a result. While he embodies quite a lot of Shōnen characteristics seen in many well-known characters in manga and anime, what separates him from those characters is just how thorough an examination the story gives on those traits. His refusal to give up no matter the cost has more or less put his body through so much physical torture that the only thing keeping him from dying is dumb luck or sheer willpower. His extreme devotion to his loved ones severely outweighs any concern for other people. His love of fighting is taken to its logical conclusion. And finally, his Dark and Troubled Past, while having molded him into one of the most proficient warriors in-universe, has granted him WAY more baggage than he can emotionally handle.
- Casca in the Golden Age arc is a deconstruction of The Smurfette Principle and One of the Boys. She's a skilled fighter, the second in command of the Band of the Hawks, and a bona fide badass right up there with Guts and Griffith. However, the fact she's the sole woman in the group makes her be seen as weak by many of her enemies, and she's often ridiculed by the groups foes simply because of the mindset that "a battlefield isn't the place for a woman". It also causes some to accuse her of only being at her position thanks to sleeping with Griffith, which hurts Casca heavily because she initially does have feelings for him. There's also the reality that, as a woman, she still has the same biological problems a woman would have, but because she's the only one, this leads to her pushing herself even when ill and nearly leads to her and Guts' death, and Guts calls her out on the fact that she hid her problems going into a battle.
Kyo & Kyo Sawagi from Ben-To are both presented as The Dreaded. They both enjoy fighting and are virtually unstoppable. It eventually got to the point that everyone simply stopped fighting them all together because they were too strong. And for Blood Knights like them, it's the worst thing to ever happen to them.
Bleach:
- Coyote Starrk is one of the very few Token Good Teammates of the Espada to be not arrogant, violent or evil as a follower of Aizen. As his fight with Shunsui shows, however, despite being a decent person who dislikes fighting, he is still fighting for the villains and doesn't pull his punches when fighting, leading to his death when his opponent gets more serious.
- Gin Ichimaru is this for Dragon with an Agenda and Enigmatic Minion. Nobody is sure why he joins the Big Bad Aizen, not even Aizen is really sure why Gin joined him. It's later revealed Gin did so to get revenge on Aizen for taking a part of his childhood best friend Rangiku Matsumoto's soul, so he spent his life getting close to him so he could kill Aizen at the right moment. When he does so, Aizen not only is on the verge of nearly Godhood, but he right away tells Gin he pretty much suspected that Gin was going to betray him at some point, and instead of dying, Aizen becomes even stronger and fatally wounds Gin. As he lays dying, Rangiku arrives, cementing that everything he did was ultimately useless because not only did he make Aizen more powerful, but Rangiku has no idea why he would do what he did, so he instead dies hurting her more and accomplishing nothing. The only thing he does manage to do is get Ichigo to somewhat become refocused on beating Aizen.
- Kenpachi is this for the Blood Knight and Challenge Seeker. He loves combat, and actively seeks out strong foes all the time. It's later shown in the final arc, however, that because of his first real fight when he was a child ending in beating one of the strongest Captains in Soul Society, despite barely having any experience, he's developed a fear of running out of people to challenge, so he limits his own potential to prevent his full power from being reached. Shunsui later sends him to go through Training from Hell since Kenpachi's hangups are liabilities in war.
Blue Exorcist:
- Shura Kirigakure is this for the Old Maid. There's a running gag where she lies about being younger than she actually is, which is something Yukio would often point out. However, later in the series, it's revealed that the reason why her age is a sour spot for her is because she has a curse on her bloodline where the women in her family die at the age of 30.
- Izumo Kamiki is this for the Tsundere. She is often hostile towards her classmates, regardless if they're nice to her. It is then later revealed that she had a rather traumatic Freudian Excuse. When she was little, her mother neglected her and her younger sister because her father didn't want kids. Later, she, her mother, and her sister are subjected to horrifying experiments to revive a nine-tailed fox demon. Because of this she deliberately wanted to avoid making friends to keep them away from what she experienced.
- Most of the cast demonstrate in their own ways that being a Kid Hero isn't all it's cracked up to be, but Yukio particularly stands out. Since he was seven, his self-image has been built around his prowess as an exorcist, to the point it's warped his personality. Once gentle and Prone to Tears, he's become a short-tempered teen prone to getting himself stuck in the Heel–Face Revolving Door, playing up his own character flaws to make others see him as the villain he sees himself as, attempting at least three Interrupted Suicides, and, on multiple occasions, holding his own loved ones at gunpoint just to prove a point - and all this is while his heart is ultimately still in the right place. He's just that screwed up.
Citrus offers a realistic portrayal of Flirty Stepsiblings:
- Mei and Yuzu didn't meet until their mid-to-late teens, so they're not bound by the Westermark effect
- They deal with all the conflicting drama of young love, with added angst from the fact that they're legal relatives.
- They still manage to earn their happy ending.
Much of the appeal and possibly the entire point of Code Geass lies with presenting the two main characters.
- On the one hand, Suzaku Kururugi is an effective deconstruction of a Hot-Blooded Honor Before Reason Ace Pilot such as Amuro Ray in Mobile Suit Gundam. Suzaku would normally be stereotypically cast as the Ideal Hero, except he works for The Empire that brutally conquers other nations. It shows that despite how much you say you want to help others by working within the law, if your actions simply ensure the organization you serve is able to continue their policies of brutal subjugation, then you’re just going to come off as a destructive and delusional Hypocrite.
- On the other, we have Lelouch Lamperouge as a deconstruction of a stereotypical Diabolical Mastermind antagonist, and could also be considered a mild deconstruction of the Magnificent Bastard trope. Yes, his intelligence and ability to pull a mean game of Xanatos Speed Chess make him a great tactician, but one thing people tend to forget is the number of his plans that ended up going horrendously wrong thanks to circumstances out of his control or he couldn't possibly see coming, often resulting in his friends and loved ones getting killed as a result. No matter how much of a Magnificent Bastard you may be, if you try to pull off a Gambit Roulette, then nine times out of ten, you will end up failing at it.

D-K

Light Yagami of Death Note deconstructs the Vigilante Man, as one of the main points of the series is showing just how narcissistic and self-serving one would have to be to delude themselves into thinking that their own judgment is better than the law's. After finding proof that the titular Death Note works, Light initially sets out to only kill criminals with it because he wants crime to end for good. However, a combination of his growing God Complex, wounded pride, and self-preservation drives him to start murdering Law Enforcement Officers, who know that killing criminals is still murder and are trying to bring him to justice, and innocent people, regardless of whether or not they support his actions. In fact, in the second half of the series, Light even starts to consider killing off people who he deems as weak or lazy in the eventual future. This shows how these sort of people will inevitably Jump Off The Slippery Slope and see everybody as an enemy that needs to be eliminated. When Near finally catches him in the end, he outright tells Light that he's nothing more than a crazy serial killer who got Drunk with Power and deluded himself into believing that he became God through the Death Note.
Digimon Tamers: Henry deconstructs the Badass Pacifist. He's a talented Tamer and a skilled martial artist, but because of an incident where he misused his martial arts skill and injured another child badly, he leans so heavily into the pacifist part that he adamantly refuses to let Terriermon fight and repeatedly endangers himself and others. His character arc is learning that there are times when you have to fight for the greater good.
Of all the characters in Failure Frame, full name Failure Frame: I Became the Strongest and Annihilated Everything With Low-Level Spells, the most deconstructed character is Ayaka Sogou who rips the very concept of All-Loving Heroine to shreds. She protests Touka Mamori being teleported to "Disposal Dungeon" to die and gets rendered unconscious by the evil self-proclaimed goddess who did it, but as the series progresses, she puts a bigger and bigger burden on herself, trying to protect all her remaining classmates, even those who abandon her to die, or try to kill her themselves, twists herself into pretzels to see the genocidally racist people of the country of Alion, run by said goddess, as inherently good, and trusts every word the Vicius says, despite the fact that Vicius has repeatedly demonstrated herself to be completely untrustworthy, and actively uses hostages to get her way, just because Vicius promises that the class can go home safely once they carry out their task of killing the Great Demon Emperor.
Zeref from Fairy Tail deconstructs the Greater-Scope Villain. He's first mentioned as the most heinous dark wizard and mass-murderer in history, and his influence can be felt across the series, such as evil demons of his creation and artifacts that appear tailor-made to help him cheat death. His legacy has also inspired several Big Bad Wannabes who believe he's either dead or sealed away somewhere, and aim to bring him back to unleash his brand of evil onto the world. In reality, Zeref is just an average Joe who hates death and violence, but was struck with a horrible curse that made him immortal and kills people against his will. On top of that, his resurrective artifacts were meant for bringing his baby brother Back from the Dead, and his demons were made to help him end his suffering. Unfortunately, his name became so synonymous with evil that he's become a self-loathing wreck who embraces the role of Big Bad because he feels he has no other choice.
Fruits Basket:
- Tohru Honda deconstructs the All-Loving Hero. While a genuinely kind person who sees the best in everyone, Tohru focuses on helping other people because her low self-esteem and grief over Kyoko's death makes her believe that she doesn't deserve any kindness for herself. As a result, she constantly sidelines her own problems and hides her insecurities behind her upbeat attitude. Part of her Character Development is allowing other people to help her, and to feel worthy of being helped.
- Kagura Sohma is a deconstruction of the violent Tsundere. Whereas most examples of the trope find such volatile behavior endearing, all Kagura's outbursts succeed in doing is making Kyo terrified of her, and in the end, she's one of the few main characters who doesn't have a love interest.
- Kureno Sohma deconstructs the Extreme Doormat and Nice Guy. His curse has been broken for over ten years and he could easily leave the Sohma estate any time he wants, but instead, he couldn't bring himself to abandon a crying, begging Akito and agreed to pretend he was still cursed out of pity. In the present day, it's heavily implied that if Kureno had broken away right then and there instead of feeding Akito's abandonment and dependency issues, it would have been better for her overall mental state; Shigure himself tels Kureno point-blank that he's done nothing but make Akito worse as a person by making her think she's entitled to be loved while giving those around her nothing but abuse and spite in return, and Kureno eventually realizes he's right after Akito locks Rin up in the Cat's Room to starve.
Alucard from Hellsing is this for the Invincible Hero archetype. He's an immortal Sociopathic Hero able to survive near-total bodily destruction and few if any situations ever credibly threaten him. At first, it appears that the Major's plan simply involves starting a war with London. However, it's eventually revealed that there's a lot more to it than that. The point of his plan is to get Alucard down to a form where he's vulnerable enough to finally die. Starting a war and taking London down are pretty much just bonuses.
Hell Girl: Leon Yamada is a destruction of the Japanese Delinquent stereotype. When karma catches up to him, he is left to die because everyone hated him as a result of his horrendous actions.
Horizon in the Middle of Nowhere: Masazumi Honda is a swiftly deconstructed Bifauxnen. To have a better chance to inherit the name of Masanobu Honda's son, she underwent several gender reassignment procedures, including a mastectomy. The procedure stopped partway through when her father was dismissed as a vassal. Now, Masazumi wears male clothing because it doesn't feel right to her to dress like a girl after trying to change her body.
Hunter × Hunter: Gon is initially a Stock Shōnen Hero, an optimistic young man determined to achieve his goal. As the series progresses we learn the traits that make up his character (stubborn, simple, wide-eyed and honest) have heavy consequences. During the Chimera Ant arc he is deconstructed into a sort of Anti-Hero. His determination goes above the safety of others, his friends are tools to meet his ends and a Despair Event Horizon turns a Next Tier Power-Up into a horrifying Power at a Price.
JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Stone Ocean has Jolyne Cujoh. Normally, all the JoJos after Jonathan meet any combination of these traits: a Disappeared Dad, Hot-Bloodedness, delinquency, and impossible-to-pull-off hairstyles. Despite these traits, they still managed to become altruistic heroes^note More or less for Jotaro . However, unlike before, these traits actually made her turn out pretty messed-up (initially, at least). She joined a biker gang at fourteen, got sent to juvie and then jail, became resentful of her father before meeting him, and even has a record of getting in trouble with people of authority.
In Jujutsu Kaisen, Sukuna is a deconstruction of the Sealed Evil in a Can and Superpowered Evil Side. He's the strongest Curse in history who ends up in Yuji's body after being consumed by him, leading to the latter letting him take control in case he's in a fight that he can't win normally, which so far has been an instant win condition. However unlike most examples in anime media that end in a more amicable or tolerant relationship for both parties, Sukuna shows exactly what a sociopathic, unrepentant, ancient evil, who's able to back up his ego with the power to match, controlling your body would actually be like. Especially if you're a Naïve Newcomer like Yuji, who had no idea how the Jujutsu system works, in order to control him completely prior to becoming his host. Something that Sukuna, who has centuries of Jujutsu knowledge and lore takes full advantage of in order to exploit Yuji at every opportunity, with the latter having increasingly less control as Sukuna slowly regains his powers over the course of the series. Sukuna forces Yuji into a contract on his terms while making the latter forget it completely, shows gleeful Lack of Empathy to Yuji's lowest suffering and whenever he controls the body, he will make things go From Bad to Worse by killing/harming innocents and Yuji's friends.
In Karin, Kenta's young and beautiful mother Fumio's attractiveness resulted in the majority of her bosses sexually harassing her and her co-workers hating and isolating her. The combination of repeatedly losing her job and trying to pay the bills caused her to become so stressed that she was becoming a wreck.
KonoSuba: Kyouya Mitsurugi deconstructs the Stock Light-Novel Hero and The Chosen One. Like Kazuma, he was a Japanese teen who was sent to a fantasy world by Aqua, with his cheat item being a powerful sword that allowed him to act like the chosen hero he saw in the media he enjoyed. Instead of becoming a heroic figure and the savior of the world, he becomes somewhat of a creep because he sees himself as deserving of Aqua's affection as her "chosen one", and he becomes arrogant and sure he can't lose. Kazuma beats him by simply playing a bit dirty when Kyouya forces a duel, and the heroines express disgust for how entitled he acts due to viewing himself as the protagonist of an "isekai" story, when in truth he's just another rando who Aqua convinced to go to the fantasy world as part of her job.
Kotoura-san:
- Poor, poor Haruka Kotoura. So Innocently Insensitive. Having an attitude like that would make everyone around cold and distant, but she's Just a Kid and was never taught any better. That, and Power Incontinence is to blame. She could have been a classic Moe protagonist and is one deep down. The problem is that her Telepathy cannot be turned off so she's unable to distinguish between speech and thought. In her backstory, she grew up in a society where Tatemae is a commonplace concept. Added to common moe traits of innocence and shyness, it did not end well for her at all. As a result, many of her major character tropes are either Deconstructed, Played for Drama, or they are simply cynical in nature.

L-O

While Laid-Back Camp isn't a deconstruction of School Club Stories, the protagonist Rin deconstructs one of the most common character types in the genre. Usually, the protagonist of School Club Stories is a Shrinking Violet who desperately wants to make friends, joins the eponymous club in the first chapter/episode, and remains joined at the hip with the rest of the club members for the rest of the series. However, Rin is not a Shrinking Violet, instead being a classical introvert who simply likes her alone time and has no desire to make more friends, and she refuses to join the Camping Club when offered to. While she does eventually end up becoming close friends with Nadeshiko and shows that she also cares about the other club members, she never does officially join the club, and this isn't portrayed in any negative light.
In The Legendary Hero Is Dead!, the resident Tsundere and female lead Yuna Yunis, is mercilessly deconstructed near the end of the series, the narrative takes a turn in showing there are risks in being a Tsundere; with the series protagonist, Touka, eventually becoming more of a standard hero with only a casual perverted streak, and Yuna growing to really love him, it reached the point that when Yuna fully confessed her love to Touka he was so sure by then that Yuna couldn’t possibly love someone like him that his brain literally cannot register what Yuna is telling him. The girl is left in complete disbelief as she repeats several times she absolutely loves him but Touka simply doesn’t take it as she loving him as a woman, wants him to be his girlfriend, etc. Yuna accepts this absolute failure of a common understanding as the result of she keeping her feelings hidden for too long, while being too open with the times she clearly showed how much she hated Touka’s bad behavior.
In Liar Game, Akiyama's mother was a kind and honest person but that unfortunately led her to be easily deceived by an old friend who deceptively pulled her into a MLM. Despite working hard, she never saw any money and her debt remained the same. When she tried to get out, the company required a huge sum of money she would have never been able to pay off. She eventually took her life because of this.
Akane Hiyama from Love Tyrant deconstructs the Yandere. She definitely acts like one and is perfectly willing to murder anyone who comes between her and Seiji. But then her character arc happens and we see how she became the way she is. Since she was young she was put into strict training by her mother to become an Emotionless Girl and a cold killer. The fact that she always stabs Seiji when angered or tries to kill any girl that comes close to him is due to the fact that she was taught that Murder Is the Best Solution. The first time she met Seiji was also the first time she felt emotions, hence why she's so dangerously in love with him.
The Magical Revolution of the Reincarnated Princess: Prince Algard deconstructs the Prince Charming often seen in manga and games aimed at the Shōjo Demographic. Algard shares a lot of core character traits with the archetype, such as a desire to fix the social problems of his kingdom and a refusal to bend his will to the rules. He also shows how destructive those traits can be if allowed to become obsession. He hates his Arranged Marriage for being something another person decided for him, and so he ends up also hating Euphie just for being his fiancee, even when she has done nothing wrong. His insistence in doing things based on what he thinks is right leads to political unrest as he breaks several rules and social norms with no regards for consequences. Finally, the knowledge that nobles won't just accept social reforms that bring more equality, mixed with his own Inferiority Superiority Complex, leads to him concluding he must force his kingdom to be better, effectively mistaking being a tyrant for being a strong king.
Maoyu: The Hero deconstructs the Invincible Hero as he's supposedly able to fight entire armies on his own, but his powers made him feel alienated from other people, and with his schooling under the Demon Queen's tutelage, he has since become more of a pacifist. Furthermore, the Hero often becomes depressed due to feeling like he can't accomplish anything noteworthy for the Demon Queen's plans, as all he knows is how to fight. Thus he also deconstructs the Supporting Protagonist, as he can do remarkably little compared to the Demon Queen which frustrates him to some degree. Gradually though, he realizes he can be useful in ways that don't require his fighting abilities.
Maria no Danzai: Kumiru Shikimi is a deconstruction of the Manipulative Bitch. Both in the present and in flashbacks, Kumiru is shown to be a highly deceitful and manipulative person who uses Frameups, social engineering, and bribery to move the social ranks, isolate people she doesn't like, and get what she wants. This, however, prevents her from forming any lasting, meaningful relationships, and when she eventually needs someone to seek her out, she really doesn't have anyone she can rely on, as Maria gleefully points out to her. Ultimately, Kumiru dies alone, just as she always feared because of her manipulative actions.
Monster Musume is a decidedly lighthearted Deconstruction of the Cute Monster Girl. Rather than taking the fantastic creatures at face value, the manga takes the time to delve into the complexities of their anatomy and how they would interact with the world around them. For example, Mero the mermaid must avoid chlorinated water, since trying to breathe in it is akin to inhaling bleach fumes and will make her sick. Spiders have been shown to get drunk off of caffeine, and Rachnera the arachne is no exception. Manako is a cyclops, and her depth perception is poor. Normally, Hilarity Ensues whenever moments like these pop up, but there have been a few tense moments, like when Miia the lamia nearly drowns in a pool: because she's cold-blooded, the cold water saps her strength.
Monster Rancher deconstructs Aloof Big Brother in the form of Tiger and his younger brother Gray Wolf. Tiger wanted to toughen his brother up so often acted strict and harsh towards him. However, this treatment fed Gray Wolf's inferiority complex and insecurities and Moo magnified it to full-blown Green-Eyed Monster proportions to the point Gray Wolf wanted to defeat and kill Tiger, much to Tiger's horror.
Mobile Suit Gundam 0080: War in the Pocket is a deconstruction of boys growing up playing soldier with toys and being obsessed with war, by having one of those boys getting to see first-hand just what goes on in an actual war. This is most powerfully shown in the final scene, where Al - who not too long ago witnessed his closest friend die in a battle with another of his friends, in an attempt to save the colony that turned out to be entirely unnecessary - crying his eyes out in a public setting just from the memory of what happened, while the rest of the student body - completely unaware of anything that happened across the series beyond the initial battle - complains that the war is over already, hoping that the next war starts soon and will have even cooler-looking mobile suits.
The first generation of Mobile Suit Gundam AGE presents itself as a deconstruction of a warrior messiah, and the psychological toll war can bring to a Kid Hero.
My Youth Romantic Comedy Is Wrong, as I Expected is a cynical and realistic work. A deconstruction of the typical light novel and anime romantic comedy, it also deconstructs the typical male protagonist of this kind of work. Hachiman isn't the typical Nice Guy and comedy version of an All-Loving Hero: he's instead a misanthropic, cynical and very blunt loner, and can be considered as a comedy version of a Byronic Hero and a Pragmatic Hero. He's really a good and kind-hearted person who feels the obligation to help others, and is a Nice Guy deep down, but the methods he uses to help others can be harsh and make him unsympathetic.
Naruto: Hiruzen Sarutobi, the Third Hokage, deconstructs the Reasonable Authority Figure. A lot of problems in the Ninja World were caused because he was too reasonable and allowed people like Orochimaru and Friend Danzo to do whatever they wanted; if he had just learned to put his foot down and say "no," said problems could have been avoided.
Negima! Magister Negi Magi deconstructs the Idiot Hero: the main character's father, Nagi Springfield, is pretty much the World's Strongest Man, capable of defeating even the strongest opponents without breaking a sweat, and his usual reaction to any kind of enemy is to simply charge head-on and beat it into submission. Which normally works for him, since he's so incredibly strong. However, he seems to be unable to think his way out of a situation, and he finds himself out of his playing field when faced with a problem that can't be solved by simply hitting it hard enough - for example, the impending destruction of the Magical World.
In Noragami, Yato is a Shameless Self-Promoter but his desperation for clients is a result of his innate fear of disappearing. He has few believers and a very unstable existence. He knows there is a very low chance of reincarnating like other gods if he were to die. Also, advertising himself as a delivery god is Yato's way of breaking free from his "father" and his own past of killing others.
Nyarko from Nyaruko: Crawling with Love! deconstructs the Manic Pixie Dream Girl. Even though Mahiro is attracted to her, he's put off by her aggressiveness, which he finds annoying at best and horrifyingly stalker-like at worst; in fact, the only thing that's kept her from outright raping him on multiple occasions is his skill with weaponized forks. There's also the fact that her "zany" personality includes lying about their relationship to other people, which Mahiro outright tells her has made it so he doesn't believe her when she tries to confess her feelings because he can never tell when she's honest. And of course, this isn't even mentioning that the way she "changes his life" is by dragging him into life-or-death battles with powerful alien criminals. In short, a Manic Pixie Dream Girl is exactly the last thing the Only Sane Man wants; at one point Mahiro even remarks to himself that if Nyarko acted like a normal human girl, they'd probably have become a couple long ago. They do end up getting together, but it isn't until the very end of the series, after a lot of adventures and hardships.
One-Punch Man:
- Suiryu is this for Arrogant Kung-Fu Guy and the Smug Super. He's confident in his abilities and loves reminding his opponents about how strong he is. He also has traits of The Social Darwinist, claiming that the only reason why he got so strong was so he could do whatever he wants. He finds out the hard way that there's Always a Bigger Fish when Gouketsu beats him down hard and is saved by the same heroes he looked down on before he gets beaten down again. Defeated and humbled, Suiryu is forced to reevaluate his outlook on life as he begs for any hero, no matter how weak, to come save him.
- Saitama himself is what happens when an Invincible Hero is taken to its logical conclusion. He trained himself intensely to become a great hero, only to learn that beating anyone with a single punch leaves him very bored with his life. Without anything to really threaten him, Saitama simply stopped feeling much of anything.
- Tatsumaki deconstructs Big Sister Instinct towards Fubuki. Tatsumaki believes that she has all of Fubuki's best interests at heart, but is so brash and arrogant that she goes to the extreme about it and causes Fubuki to live a lonely childhood under the belief that having friends will only drag her down. It gets to the point that Tatsumaki believes that her Blizzard Group is keeping Fubuki from reaching her full potential and attempts several times to kill them. What really holds back Fubuki is the fear and loathing she has for Tatsumaki.

P-R

Peter Grill and the Philosopher's Time has what happens when the Unwanted Harem really is unwanted. Because Peter has been declared the World's Strongest Man, all forms of Cute Monster Girl haremettes all come out of the woodwork to bone him not out of anything romantic but to use him for their own ends, whether it's to produce strong children or to get back at their own people. Peter himself is already in a happy relationship, which he spells out to these girls several times over. They ignore all his wishes, personal space, and churn his libido to get what they want, go as far as to blackmail him to keep him from telling anyone, and in some cases put him under the influence to have their way with him. This is all Played for Laughs but we all know it wouldn't be as funny if the genders were reversed.
Persona 4: The Animation deconstructs Fire-Forged Friends. Yu and his friends have caught the murderer and peace has returned to the town. But with no more murders, all his friends drift apart because the only thing keeping them together was solving the murders and without them, they had nothing in common anymore. This was actually a nightmare induced by Mitsuo's Shadow on Yu and in reality, the friends had developed into True Companions and would stick together thick and thin.
Altair/the "Military Uniform Princess" from Re:CREATORS can be viewed as the deconstruction of Draco in Leather Pants and Evil Is Cool. Despite attacking the main characters, she was all but mysterious with ambiguous motives and wore a very stylish suit, hence her nickname. These are all traits of popular antagonist characters. Her popularity dropped when she brutally murders Mamika for trying to help her cope with her Creator's suicide, but then she manages to ascend into a full-blown In-Universe Villain Sue thanks to the fact she had total admiration by those who were viewing the "Elimination Chamber Festival", and ultimately gets what she wants in the end and escapes punishment (because there is absolutely nothing the other characters can do to stop her other than facilitate this). After all, who cares about all the other characters that she murdered and/or traumatized if the most badass character gets their happy ending?
Rent-A-Girlfriend:
- Kazuya deconstructs the No-Respect Guy. Everyone in his life, including his family, always enjoyed poking fun at him and making him the butt of numerous jokes, namely his inability to get a girlfriend. This resulted in a guy with very low self-esteem who's prone to putting himself down over various things, such as calling himself scum over the fact that he decided to use a rental girlfriend to help him cope with his break-up, and it's hinted that part of the reason he's still interested in Mami is because he thinks Chizuru is too good for him.
- Chizuru deconstructs The Stoic. On the surface, she comes across as a strong but slightly distant girl, who carries a cool air around her, maintaining an impressive composure even under intense situations. Whenever Kazuya worries about how she feels about her career struggles, her grandmother's condition, or when it comes to Mami and Ruka, she tends to become dismissive and doesn't seem to let it bother her. It eventually becomes clear to Kazuya that it's a defense mechanism that she adopts to hide the fact that she's more vulnerable than she lets on.
Revolutionary Girl Utena: Deconstructs Prince Charming, Princess Classic, Witch Classic and Lady and Knight. In addition to deconstructing common shoujo romance tropes at the time, it showed just how limiting being forced into those fairy-tale roles - or only seeing people as those roles - could be. Anthy, the Princess, is seen as by many as nothing more than a tool or a prize to be won and whose only real power is in her doll-like façade and passive-aggressive rebellion in her hidden identity in as the Witch. Akio, the Prince, is not a gallant savior but a manipulative monster who feels entitled to control everything around him because of the circumstances of his birth. Utena is the Knight who, out of a misguided hero complex, wants to be seen as the Prince to Anthy's Princess without understanding exactly what that role means or who the Lady she wants to protect truly is until the very end.
Re:Zero:
- Subaru deconstructs Groundhog Peggy Sue. While in most stories such an ability allows a character to solve problems with ease, either by using the loops to become strong enough to defeat any foe or using foreknowledge to foil any enemy plans, here several shortcomings are presented.
  - First the 'save points' are set automatically, and usually within a few hours to a few days to the event that kills him, leaving him little time to train, since his physical abilities also reset. What's more, while he may learn some details of their plans, he can still be blindsided by things he wasn't present for in the last loop, and villains are unlikely to gloat about their plans to a random victim they kill.
  - That's not even going into the psychological impact from dying has on him, and as a result rather than doing so deliberately to learn new information like in most cases of the trope, he's even more scared of dying since it's just pain with the promise of more pain in the aftermath.
  - While he does strive to save his friends, more often than not he fails and has to watch them die horribly, and at the start of several loops has to deal with people he considers good friends treating him like a stranger. This leads to a sense of isolation, since he knows when people's lives are in danger, but has to be careful about how he tells them for fear of them just ignoring him, or worse, suspect him of being the cause.
  - All of the above results in him becoming a psychological and emotional wreck as early as the second arc, and spends an entire loop in the third in a state of catatonia.
- Garfiel deconstructs Determinator. His resolve to keep the people of the Sanctuary safe from any outside threats is impressive, but how he goes about it involves preventing anyone from leaving, and he has little hesitation harming others to do so. This same mindset prevents him from acknowledging the flaws in such an approach, or even considering that he might be wrong, forcing others to take extreme measures just to get him to listen. It's later revealed that this resolve comes from being forced to witness his mothers death, and was ultimately undertaken so he wouldn't have to face the reality of the situation, leaving him stuck in a state of denial for years.

Sailor Moon:
- Kid Hero is taken apart with Usagi, especially in the first two seasons. She tends to freeze and panic during most fights as she never had any combat training and was basically thrown into life or death situations. She was often unhappy or uncooperative when told to step up into her leadership role as she wasn't emotionally ready to deal with the sudden pressures and major responsibilities of being Sailor Moon. Later on, she couldn't handle the trauma of watching her friends sacrifice themselves for her and for them to die brutal deaths. In R, after regaining her memories, Usagi's fighting skills were affected as she wanted to be normal and did not want to be Sailor Moon at all. Even in later seasons, she still has visible traumatic responses whenever her friends are at risk. She is still a teenager whose biggest worries should have been getting good grades.
- Vain Sorceress is deconstructed through Queen Nehellenia. She started off as a vain but mostly naive queen who went mad when the mirror showed her a vision of her future ugly self but also her entire kingdom abandoning her when she lost her beauty. Her obsession with staying beautiful has actively ruined her life, causing her to destroy her own kingdom and eat all of subjects' dreams to maintain her beauty. Eventually, she has become so obsessed with her beauty that she would rather be imprisoned in her mirror and be alone for eternity if it meant she will never be ugly. In the end, Nehellenia is an extremely miserable and bitter woman who is desperately clinging to a dying dream of staying beautiful so she would be loved and lashing out at those whose happiness she is jealous of and longs for.
Ueno in A Silent Voice shows the painful results of being a Tsundere. She likes Ishida but her Can't Spit It Out tendencies confuse him and her abrasive attitude only pushes him away. Her failure to properly talk to him leaves her frustrated and angry which she channels by lashing out at the world and bullying Nishimiya - which only pushes Ishida further away.
Sanrio Boys, of all things, looks at the Social Circle Filler with sympathy. Do Tsuchiya and Machida, Kouta's two friends since middle school, just accept their place and quietly fade into the background when the protagonist finds his main cast like most "best friend" characters do? Not quite; Tsuchiya does, but he does it with resignation, while poor Machida tries to keep hanging with Kouta while the latter demotes him from "friend" to "acquaintance". By the finale they accept they're not Kouta's friends anymore, since at the very least he's happy with his new crowd.
Umino from Satou Kashi no Dangan wa Uchinukenai is a quirky, rich New Transfer Student who refers to people by their full name, insists she is really a mermaid, and has several odd qualities such as saying noises out loud and telling the protagonist that she hates her as a term of endearment. Instead of these traits making her cute and popular, she ends up ostracized and bullied for being weird. It's also implied that her behavior is due to her highly abused upbringing. Umino speaks in metaphors about being a mermaid who will die if she doesn't make a friend by the next major storm, which is actually a metaphorical cry for help. In the end her father does end up killing her.
School Days, Uwakoi, and Aki Sora all put their own spin on deconstructing harem tropes and characters, particularly by asking, "What type of Ridiculously Average Guy would be banging multiple sexy girls, and what type of girls would fall for a guy like that?"
- For School Days, the guy is a Manipulative Bastard - a self-serving, debauched asshole who treats his lovers like puppets. The naive girls who fall for his charms are driven to emotional breakdowns that do not end well.
- For Uwakoi, the guy is a Chivalrous Pervert suffering from an Extreme Libido that he needs many different lovers to satisfy. Thus his sex life leaves him emotionally empty, while his lovers are just using sex for comfort from an inner problem they're trying to run from. His only partners who do want more than sex out of him are a Fetishized Abuser and a Yandere, both of whom are realistically horrifying.
- For Aki Sora, the guy is an Extreme Doormat who lacks the willpower and physical strength to refuse the advances of every perverted girl in his life, all of whom treat him as little more than a sex toy. He and his elder sister are also gender-flipped and inverted deconstructions of the Little Sister Heroine - while her seductions are traumatizing at first, she's still the only girl in his life he has a deep relationship with, and they go through a lot of angst in keeping their intimacy a secret.
- Finally, all three show the consequences of a teenage harem lead getting caught by the wrong person, and in the case of School Days and Uwakoi, deadly consequences.
A rather sad version of the Genki Girl is shown in School-Live!. Yuki is so cheerful and optimistic that her mind outright refuses to see how gloomy and depressing the situation is, to the point of hallucinating that the rest of the students are fine and there is no Zombie Apocalypse - when her delusions temporarily break, she initially completely breaks down. Her cute, eccentric personality caused her to be bullied prior to the apocalypse. Her hat in particular was considered weird by others.
School Rumble deconstructs different high school romance character archetypes.
- Harima is the delinquent hero whose life is changed when he falls in love with Tenma. It's only then that he realizes how pointless his life has been so he decides to be a manga artist.
- Tenma hides her loneliness by being the Genki Girl.
- Yakumo seems like a Yamato Nadeshiko but really she's an Extreme Doormat.
- Eri's Tsundere qualities alienate people.
- Nara is a Ridiculously Average Guy who expects to get an Unwanted Harem, but never does.
Seirei Gensouki: Spirit Chronicles calls into question Stock Light-Novel Hero and Summon Everyman Hero tropes: teenagers who are summoned randomly regardless of their individual personalities and demeanor to be heroes are certainly going to be unpredictable. Simultaneously, the values they hold won't necessary align with the natives of the new setting, which will interfere with any semblance of common sense between them. These "heroes" may wind up becoming an incompetent puppet, a self-righteous Hypocrite or a chaotic revolutionary. Worse, heroes are nothing more than deterrents by the respective nations who summon them; if their friends are unwillingly brought along with them during the summoning process, chances are they will be used as hostages and political leverage to bend the heroes to the summoner's will. Finally, their Infinity +1 Sword don't mean squat if their opponent happens to be more experienced in combat (especially with power to match theirs), as shown by the protagonist, his arch-nemesis and two of the main character's retainers.
- Furthermore, each of the six summoned heroes in the story wind up becoming a Deconstruction to a specific character archetype seen in isekai fiction, taken into a negative light:
  - Sakata Hiroaki is the Hikkikomori Loser Protagonist: upon becoming a hero, Hiroaki believes he has entitlement to anything he desires on the assumption he's the "protagonist" of the story, not caring about the customs and surroundings of this new world. Unfortunately, what he does is widely seen as an embarrassment by his hosts; he's only tolerated because of his hero status. He also deconstructs New Life in Another World Bonus - while his powers as a hero are formidable, he has no regards to learning the fundamentals nor is he capable of understanding his own abilities. It lacks to the point where he can spar and beat the average person, but against someone with power equal to that of a hero with years of fighting experience, they can beat Hiroaki effortlessly.
  - Sendou Takahisa is an extreme case of deconstructing Protagonist-Centered Morality: similar to Hiroaki, he believes he's the "protagonist", thus entitled to winning the affections of his Childhood Friend on the assumption that because they've been together for years, they will wind up together. Unfortunately, his Love Interest has been pining for someone else for a lot longer than Takahisa has known her, thus he reasons that he needs to "steal her away" that results in major political turmoil. Also, Takahisa deconstructs the "naive, pacifist Japanese" isekai protagonist who espouses non-violence against a dangerous environment and social setting to the point of suicidal pacifism because he's too stubborn to adjust to his new surroundings, while maintaining how "Japanese morals" should be the standard when the other world has no reason to go along with it when it's not a part of their culture.
  - Kikuchi Renji represents the Genre Savvy isekai protagonist, but his efforts at trying to be subversive backfires hard on him when considering his No Social Skills and Smug Super traits, especially when a Tragic Mistake could have been avoided. Meanwhile, his Web Novel counterpart deconstructs the Chuunibyou protagonist as he tends to be a "mysterious savior" living on a Power Fantasy who likes to charge into fights, but quickly leaves the scene without explaining himself, something which frustrates his host to no end.
  - Sumeragi Satsuki may have acquired the hero status upon being summmoned, but she's still a girl in a fantasy setting where women barely wield any political power as men do and heroes are treated as the political tools of nations. Her actions in the story are so restricted to that of a figurehead that she becomes a convenient candidate for marriage negotiations between countries.
  - Shigekura Rui, despite being a Reconstruction of The Ace, is the isekai protagonist who refuses to be active in the on-going plot. While it keeps him away from trouble, the Seirei Gensouki narrative doesn't stop for him when he's not the protagonist; by the time he's forced to become active, Rui is severely restrained by circumstances that he cannot back out from.
  - Sakuraba Erika is an example of a protagonist who wants to change the political landscape of the world. While her methods are doable in a Crapsack World, the new world in this story is neither Dark Fantasy nor Grimdark enough when multiple kingdoms are politically competent and fair-minded. Her motives essentially boils down to her becoming the Medieval European Fantasy equivalent of an anarchist, who so happens to have the power of a hero at her call. Finally, Erika is an isekai protagonist who swiftly creates a Cult of Personality around her to the point where she willingly uses her followers for nefarious means. Such examples in isekai are generally of the light-hearted, comedic variety, but Erika's methods is that of a means to a destructive end so she can find someone who can kill her, allowing her to be Together in Death with her fiancee.
Shaman King
- Incorruptible Pure Pureness is deconstructed by Iron Maiden Jeanne. She is very pretty, cheerful, humble, soft-spoken, immensely skilled as a Shaman, willingly and happily subjects herself to horrible and constant torture in the belief that her suffering will make others suffer less (there is a reason she is called "Iron Maiden"), seems to make the world a brighter place just by smiling, and is immensely kind to Lyserg Diethel when he becomes the Naïve Newcomer of her group. Oh, and she's a ruthless Knight Templar who brutally tortures to death anyone who opposes her, yet doesn't do it out of pure malice but because she truly believes that's what she has to do. At least she seems sad about it...
- Invincible Villain, Visionary Villain, and Arch-Enemy are deconstructed by Hao. The guy's clearly powerful enough to be the first, he has a Freudian Excuse several characters acknowledge (supporting the second), he's related to one of the heroes (validating the third), and killing him just means he'll be back stronger for the next Shaman Fight. It seems completely impossible for any of the good guys to stop Hao from becoming God and destroying the world. Yoh's solution? Realizing that for all his power, Hao is still a lonely and miserable person under his calm, Affably Evil facade. Rather than trying to defeat Hao with strength, Yoh and his friends reach out to him once Hao has attained the title of Shaman King to try and appeal to Hao's better nature. When every character in the series follows suit, Hao is completely caught off-guard and loses his resolve to destroy humanity, admitting defeat calmly and letting everyone go back to their lives. The epilogue indicates that the heroes do see where Hao was coming from when he was rejecting their worldview, but fortunately Hao mellowed out.
Anna from Shimoneta deconstructs Incorruptible Pure Pureness. She's a paragon of moral virtue in the sex-negative authoritarian world of Shimoneta, but in order to achieve that she had to be sheltered so hard that she's incapable of comprehending anything considered obscene by the powers-that-be. So when she falls in love with Tanukichi, she has no idea how to properly act on these feelings, having never learned a single thing about sex and sexuality, and undergoes major Sanity Slippage until she turns into an obsessed Yandere who nearly rapes him because failing to understand anything sexual means she's also ignorant of the concept of consent and believes that anything she does in pursuit of him is okay because she's doing it for the sake of love.
- Ayame is also somewhat of a deconstruction of the Lovable Sex Maniac, at least within the context of the Shimoneta world. She loves dirty jokes and has no problem being around porn and even streaking in her Blue Snow persona, but she's just as inexperienced as everyone else when it comes to sex, and all her confidence vanishes when it comes to the actual act.
Stardust Telepath:
- Umika Konohoshi, an Elective Mute wallflower, desperately wants to meet a telepathic alien so she can make friends without needing to say a word. On her first day of high school, a Genki Girl and self-proclaimed alien named Yuu Akeuchi who allegedly has the power of "forehead telepathy" bursts into the school building and decides to help Umika come out of her shell, Manic Pixie Dream Girl-style. For a while, the series plays their introvert-vs-extrovert dynamic straight as Yuu uses her "foreheadelepathy" to give Umika the helping hand she needs. But after the series undergoes some major Cerebus Syndrome and Umika makes great strides in speaking to other people, subconscious jealousy and insecurity turn all of Yuu's once-quirky traits into a toxic psychological mess that severely impacts her mental state, causes her to believe she's a "bad alien", and exposes the codependent undertones in her relationship with Umika.
- Haruno Takaragi seems like the quintessential Team Mom in an iyashikei school club story, nurturing and supporting her teammates purely out of the goodness of her heart. But after the Cerebus Syndrome starts, the series really seems to enjoy peeling away Haruno's nurturing, Fun Personified façade to reveal the messy emotional scars underneath, exposing just what kind of psychological baggage a person must have to devote themselves to making other people's dreams come true instead of their own.
Sword Art Online:
- Suguha deconstructs the Kissing Cousins and Not Blood Siblings Love Interest. While she and Kazuto are first cousins and their relationship would be acceptable in Japan, they've also been raised as siblings, and neither knew until only a bit before the start of the story. Suguha knows that her family would be upset if they knew she had feelings for her "brother", so she tries to get over it but she is so startled when he returns from being stuck in Aincrad that his new personality and attempt to form a genuine friendship with her leaves her to feel even worse. She attempts to find love in Alfheim, only to find her her new friend she was crushing on turn out to be said "brother" all along, causing her to panic and tell Kirito how she feels. This does lead to them mending things, but it becomes very awkward as a result initially.
- Sinon deconstructs the Minor Living Alone, and to some degree, I Just Want to Have Friends. Because she lives alone, she has to pay for her own expenses with a relatively meager allowance, and has trouble making ends meet. She's desperate enough to make friends that she quickly accepts Endou and the others' offers of friendship, not knowing that their only interest in her is because she has an apartment that they can use to throw parties, and the resulting betrayal of her trust leads her to be relatively cold and aloof until she starts making real friends. Because she lives alone, in a building with relatively poor security, she ends up being targeted by Death Gun.

T-Z

Karina/Blue Rose from Tiger & Bunny deconstructs Ms. Fanservice. She's marketed as a mix of Faux Action Girl (she does have decent ice powers, but her fanservice outfit puts serious hampers on her fighting and she doesn't have hand-to-hand training) and Romanticized Abuser (people think she's a hot dominatrix, but she's as much a tsundere)... and she hates it, due to how far her public image is from her real personality. Not to mention she doesn't even have much of a choice: her sponsors are the ones who choose the skimpy outfit, to start.
Ken Kaneki, the protagonist of Tokyo Ghoul, deconstructs the Extreme Doormat. As a child, his mother taught him the idea that it was better to be hurt than to hurt others, a lesson he took to heart as he grew up and tried to be a selfless person. The story goes to show how flawed this mindset is by revealing his mother worked herself to death helping her greedy sister, showing how being so focused on selflessness can be unhealthy. To reinforce this, Kaneki is later captured by Yamori and brutally tortured by him for several days, ending with Yamori bringing out a Ghoul mother and daughter, and making Kaneki decide who lives and dies. When he can't find a third option or a way to Take Me Instead, he ends up freezing up due to his Extreme Doormat mindset despite the Ghoul mother begging for her child's life, prompting Yamori to kill both instead. This causes Kaneki to mentally break, realizing how stupid being an Extreme Doormat was. The sequel series, RE, takes it further by revealing that Kaneki's own mother would physically abuse Kaneki when she got angry, making her a hypocrite when it came to following her own advice. All of this demonstrates how making yourself someone to be trampled on out of a sense of "selflessness" is a self-destroying mindset that leads to unhappiness.
Toradora! deconstructs the Tsundere, Token Mini-Moe, and Minor Living Alone with Taiga Aisaka. Her short temper and mood swings stem from insecurity over her small body and flat chest, a serious lack of social skills, and issues with a broken family. Her relationship with them is so bad that she couldn't even stay with any of them. However, her parents failed to teach her any basic domestic skills. Before she meets Ryuuji, she's living in a filthy apartment and surviving on convenience store food, only able to barely get by because of her father's monthly cash deposits.
Trigun: Vash himself is a deconstruction of Technical Pacifist. He will not kill his enemies nor hurt them in any major way, and the show takes great pains to show that it's a noble calling, but possibly misguided considering the Crapsack World circumstances (Vash's body is a mass of scars, the sixty billion double dollar bounty (until it's removed) means that anybody with a gun and a desperate need of money (which is practically the whole planet) is out to get him, he's constantly arguing with his companions (or at least Wolfwood) about the usefulness/futility of his Thou Shalt Not Kill code, the Quirky Miniboss Squad and the Big Bad are out to make Vash suffer by any means possible, which usually involves killing everything that moves and going the extra mile with anybody that Vash so much as gave the time of the day to, increasing in cruelty/kill count up to Apocalypse How levels as the series goes on...)
Vermeil in Gold: Lilia Kudelfelt decontructs the Hopeless Suitor and Tsundere archetypes. Despite clearly crushing on Alto, her stubbornness and inability to talk to him properly without being rude makes it her own fault that she can't get him to see her more than a friend, and any chances she could have with him are dashed quickly by his growing bond with Vermeil since taking her as his Familiar. Worse, Alto clearly cares for her, but only as a friend because of how she treats him half the time, which would make it obvious that he'd be oblivious towards her feelings because her Tsundere attitude without properly being more civil towards him, which plays her lack of progress towards a relationship with him straight.
Welcome to Demon School! Iruma-kun: Soi Purson for the Forgettable Character. Whereas the average person of this trope is usually either becomes Out of Focus or delegated to bit roles because of their lack of importance to the story, Purson (and even the author) deliberately invoked this by hiding as a background character due to his family's magic and desire not to stand out. His family prides itself on hiding themselves and not standing out, so Purson being a background character is due to making sure he doesn't stand out and potentially become the next head of his family. He actually has to break out of this in order to Rank Up along with the rest of his class to stay in the Royal One Dorms.
Yosuga no Sora: Sora Kasugano deconstructs the Little Sister Heroine. Her incestuous feelings for her twin brother Haruka are due to her extreme physical and emotional dependence on him, and while Haruka shares similar feelings, he keeps them repressed until Sora's story arc, where he struggles with the morality and consequences of their forbidden romance.
YuYu Hakusho deconstructs '90s Anti-Hero in regards to Younger Toguro. Ridiculously muscled and possessing tremendous power? Check. Cold, aloof son of a bitch with little care for others? Check. No inhibition to destroying anyone he is ordered to kill and/or needs to be killed to fulfill his goals? Check. Though the "Hero" part? He is a Fallen Hero who made his Deal with the Devil with the intention of using his newfound eternal youth to avoid being powerless to stop massacres like the one that cost his students their lives. However, he gradually became more jaded in his outlook and lost faith in his mission upon realizing he had become no different than any of the demons he fought, being that his wish for eternal youth was based more out of his selfish desire to never grow old than it was out of any utilitarian goal he had used as an excuse.
Zombie Land Saga:
- Sakura Minamoto deconstructs a few archetypes:
  - She deconstructs the Cute Clumsy Girl in that her self-admitted clumsiness is what leads her to run headlong into the street without regard for traffic, leading to her death by truck collision. The deconstruction is taken further by showing that continually having moments like "I spent weeks preparing for the relay race only to pull a muscle during the opening ceremony" in life caused her to have issues with self-esteem and motivation.
  - She also deconstructs the Determinator when it comes to working in a group; she gets so enthusiastic about something, she races ahead without stopping to consider anybody else, and if she can't see how what the others are doing is directly relevant to what she's doing, she thinks they're goofing off, missing any hidden lessons there might be.
- Ai Mizuno's status as The Ace is constantly dissected, showing what kind of person she is to conform so heavily to the trope.
  - For starters, Ai's immense level of skill as an idol comes from years of industry work. And it's implied that, like Sakura, someone prone to getting consumed by her work, she had to sacrifice a lot of time and physical health to to get to where she is now. The result of this is someone with high standards and heavy Workaholic tendencies, as seen when she works herself to point of literally falling to pieces.
  - Being so familiar with idol work makes her confident at her job, but also unwaveringly stubborn if presented with a conflicting opinion. It takes a long time for her to finally come around to giving being a zombie idol a shot, all by having her stance countered piece by piece as Sakura and the others dive into the challenge. This stubbornness also frames her argument with Junko, believing that Junko needs to start conforming to modern idol standards if she's gonna thrive in the modern day, not considering if it wasn't fair to make her do activities she wasn't comfortable with or prepared for.
  - As Franchouchou's most experienced performer, Ai becomes heavily relied on by the others to the point of over-dependence. Kotaro sees this group flaw and decides to act on it, keeping her busy with side-performances so that the others can learn to be more self-reliant.

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