Everyone has different views on morality, and fan fiction is certainly no different. Of course this, combined with Sturgeon's Law, tends to result in plenty of questionable acts of "heroism".
Crossovers
- In the hilariously terrible crossover fic Blood Raining Night, Reicheru Ketsuneko-Oni is treated like she's the "hero" of the story despite being a terrible person. To recount, she works for the Yakuza, she cheated on her boyfriend Denmark and then got pregnant with Inuyasha's baby (and Denmark is treated as if he's in the wrong for not "accepting" this), she ripped off Lucy's horns because Lucy called her a whore, kills Luka Megurine and drinks her blood, does absolutely nothing to rescue Kagome from Sesshomaru and when Zombie!Kagome comes to call her out on it, Reicheru tries to run her over and she decides to ruin her father's wedding because her father hates her for killing her mother as a child. Don't expect the narrative to ever treat her like any of this is wrong. To be fair, the author took note of a lot of reviewers commenting on this and attempted to have Reicheru atone for her sins to win her daughter back by having her go through some hilariously over-the-top Torture Porn (losing her eyes and arms) and she does act somewhat less dickish after that, but she does then get given state-of-the-art robotic arms from Winry Rockbell for no particular reason and a random little boy shows up to be her servant out of nowhere.
- The Fantasia Times series has its protagonist, Princess Andi. She's clearly meant to be seen as the Team Mom who looks out for her friends and is a benevolent ruler to her subjects. In reality, she's a bratty Psychopathic Manchild who goes berserk the moment someone questions her decisions, she's a hypocrite (i.e. pardoning certain villains due to the Abusive Parents Freudian Excuse, but not pardoning others with the same excuse), she automatically assumes that her friends talk shit about her behind her back and never really thinks otherwise even after being told repeatedly that they don't, she acts downright racist at some points, and she relentlessly bullies a group of characters for no other reason than "they don't agree with some of my decisions and their parents were mean to me", then makes them apologize for being mean to her.
- The team led by Hizamaru, but especially himself and Higekiri, in the Touken Ranbu/Onmyoji crossover The First Saniwa. They threaten Yorichika with violence and hold him at swordpoint twice for being unwilling to cooperate with them on their quest to protect his half-brother Yorimitsu, even though he has every reason to be annoyed at six strangers showing up at his place demanding him to tell them his missing brother's whereabouts and threatening to off him. To be fair, the swords' objective of protecting Yorimitsu is very important since they will be Ret-Gone and their master will turn evil if they fail, Yorichika is kind of a jerk and a bully towards his brother in their childhood, and he is revealed to be secretly siding with Historical Revisionists.
- In Infinity Train: Blossoming Trail, after running away from home and boarding the Train, Chloe Cerise is initially ignorant of the panic her family and Goh are suffering back home because of her absence. When she finds out, she refuses to let anybody know she's okay and pushes Goh away whenever he tries to reach out to her, even ending their friendship when she finally talks with him. Chloe even says in an e-mail to her father that once she returns home, she is willing to run off again if Vermillion City isn't to her liking, being one of the reasons that her brother Parker decided to make everyone suffer with the Unown. Throughout the story, she fails to see her own role in anything, and only does something about this once her mother calls her out during the events of "The Dead Carnival Car" after the Unown fiasco, a fiasco which can be traced back to her poorly-worded message for her family.
- Chloe Cerise in Infinity Train: Seeker of Crocus. The story tries to paint her as a kind girl with a heart of gold who was treated unfairly by her homeworld. However, as the story goes on and more context is provided, the picture painted of her is less than heroic; she constantly bothered her classmates about her interest in horror in hopes that they'd eventually share it, but didn't consider they might grow to consider her a pest as a result. Her reaction to Sara pulling a Carrie on her was to beat her up with a paint can and proclaim she'd kill anyone who crossed her again, only to act shocked when her classmates ostracized her. Her father cancelled her plans for a softball camp she wanted to go for a last minute conference, but Chloe took this to mean he never cared about her and thus shunned him. Goh, being so obssessed with Mew, barely gave Chloe the time of day, but she herself didn't help by never bringing this up and just expecting Goh to notice her on his own. When she tried to reconnect with Goh via ghost hunts, the first of which ended up with Goh nearly drowning and catching a fever, the week of which she didn't visit him but simply texted and called his parents eager to go on another ghost hunt with him once he's better while focusing on every part of the adventure except the part where Goh nearly died. These and many more events, portray Chloe less as a heroic girl who was an unfortunate victim of her home life, and more as someone who kept quiet about things that were bothering her, and decided to throw a temper tantrum when people didn't immediately pick up on them.
- Kage: In-Universe, Jade comes to have this opinion about the Guardians and the former rebels, due to their Good Is Not Nice attitude.
- Nack and Psycho: In-Universe, Valchir and some of the officers don't think highly of the bounty hunters because they believe that the heroes let some villains like Eggman, who don't do anything during their off time, be seen in public and be among the crowd at times.
- A New World, A New Way:
- Cresselia, the legendary who came up with the "Brilliant" migration plan. While Arceus may have been the one to carry it out, he was called out several times, admitted to the plan having been too hasty, and later began to take steps to atone for it. Cresselia on the other hand has done jack shit and remains a Karma Houdini.
- Mewtwo has shades of this as well, due to an apparent lack of ethics when it comes to his psychic powers. It first comes up when he somehow intimidates a member of Celestia's council into shutting up - admittedly, said stallion was being a bigoted snob regarding Pokémon sapience - but he follows it up with his brutal Mind Rape of Luke, which left the latter a completely broken mon, with no stated excuse at the time beyond his curiosity about Luke's unusually powerful mind for a Gallade. And while he claims to regret doing this, a subsequent appearance (written by a different author to the above scene, it should be noted) showed him misrepresenting his actions as believing he was investigating a possible threat to the palace, directly contradicting his own POV from A New Way Chapter 53 - as a result, he now appears to have lied his way out of trouble, including the initial house arrest pending possible criminal charges that Arceus had previously agreed to, while even keeping his ambassadorial position at Canterlot Castle. In addition, his description of an offscreen confrontation with Luke's teammate Kasai, which left the Arcanine believing he had fleas for ten minutes, suggests that he has learned absolutely nothing about psychic ethics, from his or anyone else's recent experiences.
- The "heroes" from The Prayer Warriors are self-righteous, racist, homophobic, misogynistic mass-murderers who made Stalin look sympathetic in-universe. Even more so, they are never seen doing anything positive let alone anything heroic. We never see them feeding the poor, healing the sick, or even stopping to Pet the Dog. They get rid of the "villains" and make everyone convert to Christianity, but the Satanists were actually better people than the Prayer Warriors were, and the conversions are almost all coerced thanks to our heroes' policy of killing those who refuse.
- Reflections Lost on a Dark Road: The Titans as a whole can be seen as this, the most obvious is the fact that they treat Ryoga’s and Jinx’s mental compulsion as true love as well as their increasing apathy for the people in the XComverse because of the dark nature of the universe. Even when they first showed up while the X-Com characters were harsh in their treatment of them the Titan’s wrote off all the damage their appearance caused as well as the people hurt as Hero Insurance and just went about their business. Cyborg was the only one who realized that this was wrong.
- Jinx is incredibly antagonistic with literally every other character in this story. It varies between character whether or not she is an out and out Jerkass or a Jerk with a Heart of Gold, yet each time she is treated as the sympathetic party. For example Raven is called out for her dislike of Jinx and even apologizes to her despite Jinx doing nothing but insulting her whenever they see each other. Jinx even out right attacked her when she did apologize, which is Played for Laughs.
- Raven gets increasingly arrogant as the series goes on the reason she didn't tell the X-Com characters what the Titans were doing in Azarath because she believed that X-Com felt they were too important to let leave. Despite the fact that they were risking their lives to do just that and as mentioned by Word of God the Titans' contributions were minimal at best especially since they weren't in the departments they would provide the most help. This just makes her come across as arrogant and ungreatful. There is also her "The Reason You Suck" Speech to X-Ryoga which was basically telling him that all his suffering and therefore the suffering of the XComverse as a whole didn't matter because it didn't directly benefit her like T-Ryoga's suffering did.
- T-Ryoga repeatedly come across as a hypocritical jerkass; despite this he is constantly presented as in the right eventhough many of his actions are entirely self serving. X-Ukyo put it best.Ukyo: You're a hundred times worse than I could ever be, a sick, indecisive piece of shit who strings his friends along. A pervert who abused the trust of someone he claimed to love. A moron who doesn't even know when he isn't wanted. An arrogant prick who butts in where he doesn't belong. Don't you try and lecture me, Hibiki. Don't you dare.
- Showa & Vampire had problems with this due to the size of its cast, which kept the story confined to the heroes' school for the most part. That doesn't sound so bad, but it's combined with the fact that the heroes themselves are the villain's big goal, meaning both that the heroes' presence puts their school in danger and they say nothing about it to anyone outside their group, and they know that powerful and ruthless villains are out there and do nothing to stop them despite having the resources to easily do so. Worst out of all of them is Yuji Fudo, the leader/Big Brother Mentor of the rest of the group. He's presented as a Cultured Badass and All-Loving Hero who puts family before all things. But reading about him, well...
- During a side-story he mentions when his fire powers surfaced and he accidentally burned a bully to death, but was shielded from any consequences by his parents, seemingly including that he has to carefully control his power or he could easily take a life. He threatens to beat people up for looking a little too long at a girl he's interested in, and makes the same threat to his students for hitting on the same girls after he becomes a teacher. note
- When there's a scholastic martial arts tournament (that is it's supposed to be friendly competition with no real stakes and no fighters suffering lasting injury), his sister has to bow out after entering a painful stage of their species' life cycle in the middle of her match. Yuji is so upset over this he demands the right to take her place so he can "f*** up some opponents" to work off his anxiety. Not only is this something that happens to all of their species, which he knows having gone through it himself, but by taking her place the first opponent he'll "f*** up" is not just a treasured childhood friend of theirs but the One True Love of another childhood friend of theirs. And after beating her, the final matchup of the tournament is guaranteed to be between Yuji and his beloved younger cousin who he wants as his #2 guy when he takes over a powerful evil-fighting organization...It was really just to have a reason to set up a duel between the two main heroes, okay. But looking at Yuji's insistence on fighting in a tournament with nothing at stake, and who his opponents will be, it's almost as if Yuji feels like his loved ones owe it to him to let him beat them up if he gets really upset.
- Yuji has not one but two barely-restrained Super-Powered Evil Sides. And yet the story rushes him into command of both the heroes the story's been focusing on and the large organization he's inheriting from his grandfather, the Vongola famiglia, the largest and most powerful mafia family in the world. The potential for abuse with his multiple dark sides, and his own natural tendency toward violent anger, is never addressed (although that was a major plot point in the manga that mafia's taken from).
- Untitled Displaced Fanfiction has Jonah. For starters, he wants to destroy all of the area around Ponyville, only saving those he deems worthy. He brainwashes the mane six into agreeing with him and as a ruler makes Ponyville such a hellhole that ponies have to trade sexual favours with his assistant to get food. All for the ambiguous goal of removing shame and destroying what he sees as puritanism. And yet we're still supposed to root for him over the US government who also want to nuke Ponyville.
- The Wedding Crashers: In-Universe. It is clear that in a Stephanie Meyer novel, the "heroes" would be Jacob and Renesmee, as the story is focused on them officially tying the knot. Unlike the Twilight Saga, however, this is deconstructed as their typical behavior is nothing even close to heroic or impressive. Without a narrator that falls under their Protagonist-Centered Morality, Team Free Will and Leah clearly see that Jacob is a thuggish, misogynistic Jerkass — and a pedophile, given that Renesmee is really 10 — while Renesmee is just a Spoiled Brat who is way overdue for a spanking.
- Mykan Jaden from Dakari-King Mykan's Yu-Gi-Oh!/Totally Spies fanfics. In the "final season", in spite of being a "master duelist", he makes two rookies duel brainwashed ponies despite knowing that, should they lose, they'll get brainwashed too. When the rookies triumph and Shining Armor is teleported away, Mykan gets so mad at a brainwashed Cadance for trying to brainwash and accidentally destroy his world with card games and double-crossing them on a deal they made, he soundly beats her up
with the power of a Millenium Item. When Mykan attempts to finish her and is stopped by his wife, he implies that it's Cadance's fault that he nearly killed her. Incidentally, in the author's note at the end of that particular chapter, the author Mykan notes that it felt good to beat up Cadance, then goes on to state he wouldn't disrespect real-life women like that.
- Loyalty Among Worlds: Despite his last name being "Loyaliat", Darrel isn't that loyal as he dances with, confesses his love to, and kisses Anne while still being in a relationship with Sasha. note He also has moments of being selfish and hypocritical towards the Calamity Trio whenever their mistakes are exposed. One infamous example is when he unsympathetically calls out Marcy's selfishness while he himself cheats on Sasha. In the same infamous moment, Darrel also yells at Marcy for hiding the fact that her family was planning on moving away while he himself wasn't honest with the girls about his mother's terminal illness long before they ended up in Amphibia.
- Katara and Zuko in How I Became Yours:
- In canon, Katara is a kindly Team Mom and Action Girl who does what she can to help her friends despite having quite the temper. In the webcomic, however, she is presented as vain ("I'm sure that Kuzon will come out quite charming, with me as his mom."), self-absorbed ("[Kuzon] died years ago, a day before my birthday..." and the emphasis is not added by the troper), and downright murderous (bloodbending Mai to death). Yet she's always right and no one ever questions her stupid, selfish or downright evil actions.
- In the series, Zuko is an Anti-Hero with a lot of issues stemming from his past, but genuinely aspires to do good (even though he initially has a bit of trouble at that). In the comic, however, he cheats on his wife behind her back and fathers an illegitimate child with the designated heroine mentioned above, physically and emotionally abuses Mai when she confronts him and appropriately points out the huge political and social fallout his philandering will bring, leaves his struggling and almost destroyed kingdom without any second thoughts to get together with his woman-on-the-side — and yet he's supposed to be the sympathetic one.
- Outcast is an Avatar: The Last Airbender fic where Yue has a sister named Kya (no relation to Katara's mother). She acts woe-is-me when Yue tells her about her romance problems, looks down on the Water Tribe because she's different from them, and flat-out abandons her home once she finds out that she's half-Fire Nation (in the middle of a siege, no less). Once she meets Zuko, she latches onto him and pretty much devotes her life to revolving around him, even using Yue's death to force Sokka into helping Zuko when Sokka gets wary.
- Awesome de Britannia in Code Geass: Awesome of the Rebellion, whom the narrator repeatedly assures us is a kind, noble and heroic leader and yet he constantly murders any enemies who try to surrender to him, has the biggest ego ever, (at one point his subjects chant that "Awesome is the greatest" to which he "modestly" replies "Thank you, thank you. I know I am.") and by chapter 10, he's just blowing people up for no reason at all.
- Oh Shit, There's Fanfiction of Us!?: In-universe, Raven is regarded as one in the badfic. She's framed as this utterly pure and wonderful person, but she constantly cheats on Leon, has the gall to be angry at the other girls for expressing interest in him, casually insults and sometimes even wishes death on people for petty reasons (like Maizono for being a "weeaboo" and Yamada for being unattractive) and opts to solely use her healing tears on Leon without bringing back anyone else who died in the killing game.
- Dark Yagami from Light and Dark The Adventures of Dark Yagami is this, despite being described as a villain early on. Everyone loves him, and in later chapters, the author and characters say he's a good guy, and yet he's an unrepentant Jerkass who helped sing the song that ends the world, even after having thought about how the children will have nowhere to live.
- In Beginnings, it's openly stated that L relishes the idea of putting Misa in restraints in case she loses her temper (compare this to his canon counterpart who treats tying up Misa as a necessary evil and shows no evidence of explicitly enjoying doing it) when Light tells her that he loves L and is leaving her. The fact that Light was the one that’d been leading her on up until this point is hardly if at all addressed and the story treats it as excusable because at the time Light was Kira and therefore "not himself" and besides who cares what Misa thinks anyway? She's crazy and as dumb as a post. When she threatens to commit suicide ("to give him a shock to snap him out of it"), L looks for a window to open so that he may "accommodate her" (again, compare to his canon counterpart who appears visibly shaken about the deaths of Ukita and the FBI agents and has Watari stop Misa from killing herself in confinement by gagging her so she can't bite her tongue). Later when Misa leaves, Light tells L that he knows that he "didn't mean it," but L admits that "the thought was enjoyable, anyway." The author seems to want the reader to side with L and Light and somehow this attempt at a "Take That, Scrappy!" is supposed to be cute and funny.
- The Fire Emblem Fates fanfic A Brighter Dark paints Corrin as a grizzled and fiercely independent Anti-Hero, but in practice, she's a Nominal Hero at best and Villain Protagonist at worst. In contrast to the kindhearted hero from the game, Brighter Dark's Corrin is crass, violent, disdainful of most non-Nohrians (and even dismissive of some who are on her side), and sees no issues with following Garon's orders to brutally murder any opposition to Nohr despite her (and other characters') insistence that she makes her own decisions in life.
- The Fullmetal Alchemist fans in this fanfic. We're supposed to believe they're in the right and be rooting for Edward Elric, when his fans have just laughed at people going into CARDIAC ARREST! The reason? Liking something they don't.
- Egon in College Boys: His enemy insulted him, stole his hat, and pulled out some of his hair. This was a jerkish thing to do, especially since it was implied he was being antisemitic, but Egon leapt on the other guy and started punching him over and over to the point that the police were called.
- In Leaving Town, Mitchell badly injures two players at a lacrosse game, one of whom suffers a concussion. In the aftermath of the incident, he insists on doing tankery because he wants something to do, not realizing that if he gets into trouble, he'll undermine the movement to include boys in tankery (something that's pointed out in the story). Other characters call him out on his actions, from the aforementioned incident at the lacrosse game to not thanking the police officer for giving him a ride home, so he avoids being Unintentionally Unsympathetic, but you have to wonder who in their right mind would let him take part in tankery, let alone command the team.
- The infamous The Ariana Black Series, which has Harry and his friends tripping over themselves to praise Ariana for how "kind", "selfless" and "sweet" she is when she isn't any of these things. She's actually a Spoiled, whiny Faux Action Girl and The Load who regularly brags about how strong her "Empath" powers are, but whenever faced with any kind of obstacle, from her rival pointing out things she doesn't want to hear (like that it's wrong for Ariana to be dating her teacher or that she needs first years to fight her battles for her) to being kidnapped by Voldemort, she always starts sobbing and whining and needs Harry, Neville or various male characters to rescue her. Her "selfless" nature includes needlessly inserting herself into situations to look good, like rummaging through Snape's personal memories without permission or tagging along to Lupin's werewolf transformations because her powers can "tame" him and she never takes responsibility for her stupid actions, allowing her to get kidnapped at least once per year.
- A Collection Of Harmonious OneShots is a fic that, in its final chapter, has Harry and Hermione (who are married in the fic, for some reason) start out with good intentions — to prevent a war between wizards and Muggles that is even worse than anything caused by Voldemort — but they jump off the slippery slope as soon as they arrive in the past, as they make a deal with the dementors, set fire to their enemies' houses, and blackmail the Gringotts goblins (and treat both the goblins as inferiors and approve of house-elf slavery) into executing Dumbledore and Snape, who actually come off as better in comparison, as Dumbledore at least implores Harry not to go around killing all who have angered him. Harry ignores him, and this is supposed to be seen as heroic behavior. In fact, there are many Peggy Sue Fix Fics which have the main character, usually Harry, act in a way more befitting of Voldemort than the Boy Who Lived.
- That fic has a different chapter in which Harry and Hermione decide to become Dark Lord and Lady because Harry has decided everyone abused and manipulated him, and this is framed as a good thing.
- In the (now erased) Harry Potter story Doing Hermione a Favour, Harry is most definitely this trope regardless of what the author insists. First, he realizes that Tonks is pretending to be Hermione so the latter can run to the store (why she needs to sneak out is never brought up) and tricks Tonks into having sex with him by acting like he and Hermione do all the time. Then Harry tricks Hermione into having sex with him by making her think Tonks promised it. When Hermione and Tonks admit that Tonks has been taking Hermione's place, he acts outraged at "their deceit" and demands a threesome. Finally, after a few weeks of regular sex with Hermione, Harry decides that despite being on birth control for months, Hermione must already be pregnant so he switches out her birth control with sugar pills. Hermione doesn't learn of this for another couple of months when she learns she's six weeks pregnant.
- Harry, Hermione, and Luna in Faery Heroes are supposed to be seen as Anti-Heroes, but they actually come across as petty, vindicative Jerkasses who inflict Fates Worse Than Death on everyone who has wronged them regardless of whether or not they actually deserve it, to the point where the conflict can come across as Evil Versus Evil.
- Rose Potter from the infamous The Girl Who Lived series is a particularly egregious example - she belittles and bullies nearly everyone in the series. She angrily demands to know why she isn't being told anything while they're visiting Arthur Weasley in the hospital, she outright kills Quirrell herself, does absolutely nothing to keep Peter Pettigrew from escaping even though she knows everything about it in advance, spends half of the hearing with the Ministry of Magic belittling the wizarding world for not being as wise and enlightened as the druids, and carves words into Ron Weasley's forehead. The author believed these to be improvements to the canon and to the protagonist.
- Ebony Dark'ness Dementia Raven Way of My Immortal. She hates anybody who dares to have a different opinion than her, swears at teachers, kills people just for bothering her, and has a hissy-fit whenever the attention isn't on her.
- Harry Potter from Never Cross a Potter is supposedly an anti-hero who is out to get revenge on all those who wronged him. However, he inflicts Disproportionate Retribution on those who thought he was guilty of Cedric Diggory's murder, even when they're sorry for having done so, and on people who it's unclear what they did to him. He even lets children die during Death Eater rampages while watching.
- Partially Kissed Hero:
- Harry, whose Protagonist-Centered Morality is so extreme that it would most likely make Stalin terrified.
- Luna is also awful, because she encourages Harry to continue when even he realizes he has gone too far. By Chapter 91, no less than Voldemort thinks her conduct should be rewarded, and somehow the author still denies that she is even morally grey, let alone black.
- Rounding it off, once Hermione orchestrates the plot to turn innocent witches into Harry's sex slaves, she’s as bad as the above two.
- Trelawney, after being turned into a dryad, when she goes back in time. She thinks of killing a baby just because he will be evil in the future, and nukes Moscow. Undermining the human civilization is something she does on purpose, and the reader is supposed to root for her. Downplayed however, as she is brainwashed by the three monsters above!
- Queen Alice. She has her childish fun at the expense of actual humans, thinks nuclear weapons are mere trifles, and abuses the power she has over Muggles. She is nothing more than a childish dictator, such as Harry really wants to become. By Chapter 99, she starts advocating for the forced resettlement of entire populations of people (and the reestablishment of medieval feudalism) as a remedy for disasters that she caused.
- In general, the protagonists torture and kill anyone who stands in their way, want to end human civilization and will do so through Reality Warping and nuclear weapons, have as a primary goal to gather more and more power, and their leader has a harem of sex slaves. In any other work of fiction, they would be portrayed as irredeemably evil.
- A Question of When: Romilda, without a doubt. That she is so dim and self-absorbed is the only reason her meddling with Harry's life isn't outright frightening.
- In The Real Us, Harry and Hermione are pathological liars (the entire canon series is pretty much lies they told), have a sociopathic disregard for anyone who isn't them and won't worship at their feet (for example, manipulating the Weasleys, including by using memory charms at the slightest provocation), manipulate the law and their status as heroes of the Wizarding World to visit Disproportionate Retribution on their personal enemies, and are insufferably smug about everything, outright boasting about how they lied to and manipulated everyone. The framing device of the story is them telling the real story to the wizarding world, and mocking and being condescending towards people for daring to believe the lies that the pair have altered their memories to make sure that they would believe.
- Hecksing Ulumate Crconikals: Invoked with Seras. In this fic, she contributes almost nothing, doesn't actually kill any member of the MillenniumNote, abuses and insults her own teammates, and acts as an uncontrolled ragaholoic.
- Danisha from Back to the Frollo is this in spades. She's supposed to be sympathetic, but is unabashedly racist, incredibly rude and self-righteous, and sometimes outright villainous. She slandered a 14-year-old boy for picking up his younger siblings from a party and made an eleven-year-old watch her brother die. In one of the later chapters, she punched Esmeralda in the face and had her kidnapped and tortured on the rack... all for the "crime" of being attractive and not letting a genocidal maniac rape her.
- Frollo, too. In the movie, he was a genocidal judge who literally burned Paris to the ground because he wanted to have sex with a girl. In Back to the Frollo, he's the same psychotic, victim-blaming maniac... except this time, he likes Motown and Indiana, and all of the aforementioned traits are portrayed as right. Again, special emphasis is put on Esmeralda deserving to be burned to death and/or tortured, for having the nerve to look pretty in public.
- Jenna from My Inner Life does nothing besides fawn over Link, have sex with Link and get fringe benefits and praise for being married to Link. Every character loves her because it's explicitly stated that they do.
- Particularly egregious is the king of Hyrule. In short order, Jenna goes from a traveling foreign merchant with a good inn at the castle to the king's de facto second daughter. By the middle of the story, it's stated that she effectively has a line to the throne.
- Anger Management (TLH): Lincoln. Throughout the story, numerous characters either congratulate Lincoln for "sticking it" to Lynn or belittle Lynn for both losing and wanting retribution, including their parents and sisters. This is in spite of the fact that "sticking it" to Lynn is basically violently beating her until she can't walk without being hurt, and later beating her into unconsciousness. Not only is Lincoln praised for this, but his sisters (who would normally try to take care of one another in their time of need) spend the rest of the story making light of Lynn's injuries, and instead choose to worry about a stuffed animal.
- In Diary of a Loud (now taken down, but covered on Peeking Through the Fourth Wall, episode 7), Lincoln is meant to be in the right, but he knocks Lola downstairs just because she embarrassed him at school.
- In Lincoln is Done, the fanfic does acknowledge that Lincoln was being "spiteful", but he's still mostly meant to be the good guy. This is despite him disowning his sisters just because they wronged him in a dream and punching his six-year-old sister Lola in the face twice, the second time knocking two of her teeth out.
- In One Angry Person, Lincoln is meant to be innocent and his sisters are meant to be the bad guys. However, with the possible exception of Lori (who slapped him), Luan (who he only insulted), Lucy and Lily (who he left alone), what he did was much worse than what they did — he destroyed Leni's dress, smashed Luna's guitar, broke Lynn's nose, blocked Lana's mud puddle, used Lola's dress to wipe up dog pee, and poured Lisa's lab chemicals down the drain. All those sisters did was take the remote, accidentally stage-dive onto him, eat a snack Lincoln wanted and accidentally hit him with a tennis ball, occupy the TV, yell at him, and test something on him that was no worse than what she does to her other siblings respectively.
- Art of Mass Vexations can come off as this. For one, he was condescending, aggressive, and sanctimonious to a lot of people. He mouthed off a number of characters, often for petty reasons. He also punched Kaidan, a commanding officer, over Shepard's former relationship with him and her relationship with Thane when he met him on the Citadel after Horizon. The only form of reprisal was Tali calling him out on his crap in MV2. It was surprising no one else called him out on his behavior. One of the notable contributions he did to canon was playing Shipper on Deck between Shepard and Kaiden in the first entry and her and Thane in the second, despite knowing the heartbreak it would ensure with the former. One reviewer noted how weird it was for him to be liked by Shepard despite his behavior:Rogue Penguin: It’s a strangely uncomfortable situation, actually. The narrative makes it obvious that other characters don’t like this behavior, but the main character persists in engaging it long after he realizes this. For some reason, however, Shepard continues to include Art in the plot of the game and brings him on away missions to allow him to get combat experience. It’s baffling. It actually reeks of an author who is aware that Mary Sue’s are frequently adored by characters for no justifiable reason, and then decides to throw in lines from other characters expressing their hate but NEVER actually following through on their hate to get away from the character. In the end, Art ends up feeling even MORE Mary Sue-ish because he's an ass, who is NOT liked, but is still not thrown off the ship (or boxed up in crew quarters to be ignored).
- Riley of Coyote comes across as incredibly smug and condescending at his best, such as when he complains to Pro Heroes about thinking realistically, even when they've saved his life or someone he cares about. There's also him and Izuku making recordings of personal information on any of their potential teachers and giving them to the general public (and charging them money, even though neither Riley nor Izuku have any financial problems). At his worst, Riley is shown to physically assault people he doesn't like, such as Aizawa for lying about expelling the student who has the lowest score in the Quirk Apprehension Tests as well as the press for supposedly hounding UA. And while Riley may have had a point regarding their behavior, it's immediately lost with Riley's behavior towards the situation.
My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic
- The Conversion Bureau: The Other Side of the Spectrum: Marcus Renee. For a grown man who has lived through the hardship of war, Marcus frequently exhibits a belligerent attitude that goes well beyond the typical Shell-Shocked Veteran. While attacking the Mane Six at the start of the story is understandable considering the circumstances, it's much harder to justify him assaulting Celestia after being given proof she isn't an enemy, and it doesn't get much better from there. On top of that, the character practically lives by the mantra "Violence is the Only Option", which the story attempts to depict as I Did What I Had to Do, regardless of how many alternatives are in fact available. All in all, rather than a world-weary yet kindhearted warrior of mankind, Marcus comes across more like a petty, snide, and downright abusive Jerkass.
- Friendship is Failure: Characters that are intended to be seen as the good guys are instead interpreted by the audience as unlikable jerks at best and irredeemably cruel villains at worst.
- Garfield Logan in HSM V: Ways of Life:Another_Brony: He is just a jerk. He reacts with anger towards everything nice anyone may actually do for him and I don't get why Sunset and her friends should even bother helping him. Just because they are the good guys doesn't mean they have to be nice to everyone, especially if the other person obviously does not care for anyone or have one nice bone in its entire body.
- He ends up as this earlier in Beast Boy in Equestria. If you've seen any of Mykan's works involving him, this should come as no surprise.
- Talon Ted in Pride and Punishment is an ungrateful pony only concerned with his "pride", as well as completely brushing off his own sister no matter how nice she is. It doesn't help that Mykan has admitted him to be an Author Avatar.
- Stone Heart in Write a Wrong is this for the same reasons as Talon Ted. When anyone has a problem with his stories, he brushes them off and pushes them out of his life like an immature brat.
- The Dark Angels don't interact with anyone or anything even if it could save lives and are willing to declare war just because Twilight got upset that Spike became one of them (incidentally, said war involves destroying everything and everyone)...and we're meant to assume they're heroes (at least initially) because they keep the "Darkness" in check.
- Garfield Logan in HSM V: Ways of Life:
- Princess Luna in Frigid Winds and Burning Hearts is our main viewpoint character, and the plot of the story is about her learning how her sister smeared her and portrayed her as the monster during her time banished to the Moon. She also constantly refers to everyone around her as "commoners", has no sympathy for any mortal pony, was willing to abandon Equestria to centuries of anarchy and destruction just to get her own way, and outright brainwashes Twilight Sparkle onto her side. 90% of her dialogue is whining about Celestia while she waits for other ponies to fix her problems.
- My Brave Pony: Starfleet Magic has its own section.
- In The PER: Michealson and Morely - The Speed of Right, has the eponymous "heroes" forcibly ponifying people.
- Related to this, Princess Luna and Princess Celestia are considered the heroes in most Conversion Bureau fics, despite committing genocide against the human race.
- Spike's Gambit: Spike can be seen as this to some readers as they are greatly put off by his arrogant and stand-offish attitude, his Protagonist-Centered Morality, his need for revenge against Impossibly Rich, and most of all, the way he treats Twilight throughout the story.
My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom!
- Fortune_Lover_(TGS Beta)(SARU_rip)[T+Eng0.75_Sincere].zip: The story's basic premise is the existence of the titular Fortune Lover mod (implied to be created by A-chan), in which the Katarina Claes of Fortune Lover is replaced by the Katarina Claes of My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom! while all the event flags and everyone else's dialog is left unaltered. So wherein Fortune Lover's Keith and Geordo routes Maria Campbell's story is that of a heroic commoner standing up to a privileged bully and winning the heart of the handsome prince Geordo or troubled duke's son Keith, in this story she becomes a manipulative bitch who pulls off a sadistic campaign of gaslighting and character assassination to destroy the life of an innocent girl who wanted nothing except to be left alone and to get out of Maria's way, and who gets away with everything and is publicly acclaimed as a hero.
- Uzumaki Naruto and his mother the Red Death Uzumaki Kushina are this in A Mother's Love. Kushina gets away with literal murder for anyone who even tries entering Namikaze grounds, including those who are lost or just drunk. The Third Hokage lets her get away with it since its "Clan grounds and out of his jurisdiction"...yet the Hyuga, Akimichi, Aburame, Uchiha, even the Senju Clan don't get that preferential treatment. Not only that, she teaches Naruto to be an arrogant dickwad with a entitlement complex and gives him Lost Technology that would benefit all of Konoha-yet doesn't share since they aren't Uzumaki's. Naruto himself becomes a practical tyrant when he becomes Hokage who conquers the entire continent through military force to usher in a Pax Konoha. In any other story, Naruto would be the villain and his rival (who he kills in the first half) Sasuke would be the hero.
- Lord of the Land of Fire normally does this. For example in his A Mother's Love AU, Kushina leaves Konoha in a huff since she can't keep her lifestyle as the 'Namikaze wife', taking an infant Naruto with her and they settle in Sunagakure. At no point does anyone try stopping her, Hiruzen Sarutobi just lets it happen and the only way Kushina is stopped being portrayed as a Villain Protagonist is by having Fugaku lead a successful coup d'tat against Hiruzen when Itachi of all people chooses the clan over the village.
- Cori Falls' Pokémon fanfic saga tries to play like Ash Ketchum is a case of this, but the reality is that her versions of Jessie, James, Meowth and Gary fall into it more than Ash at his worst ever could. The stories make a big deal of what good people they are and how they have the souls of angels, even as the trio snark and mock anyone who doesn't live up to their standard of intelligence and brutalize first Domino, then later Ash and Tracey on several occasions.
- The Pokémon: The Series fic The Longest Road turns the likes of Ash, Nurse Joy, and Officer Jenny into these in the original version of Chapter 28. Erika has once again banned Ash from entering the Gym for not liking her perfume, so he goes to report it to Officer Jenny. But instead of punishing her for being unprofessional about her duties, she and a Nurse Joy inspector bring up that the Pokémon League has an article that forbids anyone who is not straight from being a trainer, let alone a Gym Leader. And since Erika is a lesbian, she is fired because of this, with everyone involved in it being okay with it. The resulting backlash of this plotline resulted in the author removing the mention of Erika’s lesbianism completely.
- Pokédex:
- In-Universe, it is noted that the Drilbur of legend that fought Arceus to control the universe is this, because though it is seen as an Inspirational Martyr, it is always ignored how it would have caused uncontrolled overpopulation if it had succeeded.
- Likewise, those who defeat Thundurus in battle become folk heroes for defeating what is perceived as a monstrous demon (in actuality more of an overzealous, indiscriminate Knight Templar), with their massive, disgusting crimes, which attracted Thundurus' attention to begin with, being generally glossed over.
- Pokémon: Gospel Version has Ash and his companions destroying property, harassing people, robbing the elderly, hijacking a plane and attempting to outright murder others with their Pokémon. All of this is treated as "justified" by the narrative as they're doing all of this "in the name of the Lord".
- The Pokémon Adventures Revenge Fic Two Sides of a Genetic Hybrid Human: Retribution portrays the titular alien/author avatar in question mauling Cyrus (presumably to death) for his wrongdoings (mainly that he hurt the Gym leaders during the Spear Pillar incident) as the heroic individual. Problem is, this fic happens after the events of the Platinum chapter, where Cyrus has already redeemed himself. We're meant to see him as an Asshole Victim getting punished for his 'cruel actions' (never mind the fact in canon he was a misguided Well-Intentioned Extremist) and the alien as a harsh but fair vigilante, but the sheer brutality of his aforementioned mauling, plus the implication that he'll either die from his wounds or end up in a 'permanent vegetative state for the rest of his life', which the alien happily relishes in either way, only ends up drawing sympathy and pity for him, rather than catharsis, while making the alien come off as a deranged psychopath with a Hair-Trigger Temper, rather than the supposed 'absolute dream' people in-universe tend to regard her as. Cyrus himself sums this up perfectly:
- Butch from We’re All Mad Here is listed as Buttercup's love interest in the tags. In the actual story, he’s a murderous Yandere who kills Buttercup’s family, destroys Wonderland completely, and drives her insane just so he can have her all to himself (though given the fic's inspiration, that might have been the point).
- Blaze and Shadow from Xantrax-42's Precure Meet The Dream Traveler series. Xantrax-42 claims Blaze and Shadow are pure and good-hearted heroes, and the fics take their side in everything. Both are jerks who beat down on whomever they feel like, including the other Precures, who are only 14 years old. Blaze murders Madame Momere simply because her fate was unknown at the end of Happiness Charge. Shadow in particular frequently threatens to murder 12-year-old Regina in gruesome manners, such as melting her face off and then desecrating her body. He is well aware she is Brainwashed and Crazy, but outright states he doesn't care because she's the daughter of the villain who is himself brainwashed. Both are in one-sided relationships with 14-year-old girls, whom they "kiss passionately" toward the end of each fic. Shadow lives in the same household as Mana (even living in a room next to hers). The entire romance honestly comes across as a sexual predator and his victim, or child-grooming. Shadow constantly takes pictures and makes recordings of 10-year-old Aguri despite her insistence that he stop and him not having permission. and later does it with Aguri's friend Eru. Shadow later threatens to set her on fire in front of Mana's class, simply because she told them all to leave Mana alone and let her rest when she was sick. The chapter even ends with Aguri apologizing to Shadow for "causing trouble." Both of them get through the Pretty Cure Graveyard by stealing the souls of the Pretty Cures, sealing them in cards, and then forcing them to fight as their personal army. Some of them, such as the Dark Pretty Cure 5, are already dead, and it is not known what happens to them after their cards are expended. Blaze attacks, insults, and bullies all villains even if said villains are Brainwashed and Crazy, including Siren despite who is (in story) possibly his sister. Blaze and Shadow double team Phantom, beating the Pretty Cure Hunter almost to death. Then, when Phantom reverts back to being Phanphan, the two of them flat-out bully and belittle him. They then bully Cure Honey when she calls them out, even after she has agreed with their statements. It really says something when a reviewer considers some of the more vile Pretty Cure villains, such as Joker, to be saints when compared to these two.
- Fanfic author Hung Nguyen is known for combining Demonization with Flanderization to stress and heighten all the negative aspects of the Ranma characters. However this just made them come across as huge jerkasses in The Great Crossover Crisis due to the fact they openly resented the original Ranma for not having the same privileges as them when it should have been the other way around making him come across as far more sensible the writer obviously wanted him to be. In fact the only one of the five main characters who can’t be considered this is D-Ranma.
- T-Ranma used Mind Rape on Nabiki using Schmuck Bait when he could have just prevented her from entering giving his access to advanced technology.
- Whether knowingly or unknowingly P-Ranma used Schmuck Bait on Ranma with his water stone. Knowing that given his lifestyle it would either be stolen or broken making it useless to him.
- B-Ranma used Why Did You Make Me Hit You? as an explanation for all of Shampoo’s and Cologne’s past manipulation completely taking any sympathy one might have for them. Given the fact that he grew up with the Amazons and knows their laws and the consequences of breaking those laws intimately, it comes across as him not caring because she wasn’t his Shampoo and just trying to get Ranma to marry her because she’s Shampoo.
- Kojiro has spent his entire life complaining about his Neko-ken training yet sees nothing wrong with using his Tiger form in front of Ranma.
- Of course take note that the original casts can come off as Designated Heroes themselves and Hung focus on not allowing them to be portrayed heroically undeserved and Alternative Character Interpretation as his bases. Also the five Ranmas do not resented the original for lacking the same privileges as them it more the fact the original has several flaws such as coming off as a Jerkass and push around at times. They do understand what he is going and doing what they can to help him achieve REAL character development unlike in the original series. Not only Ranma, they are also focus on fixing the flaws of the others like Kojiro telling Ukyo not to be so possessive, B-Ranma getting Shampoo not to use mind manipulation, P-Ranma never meant to reveal his stone to Ranma and does what he can to help improve. As for the things that made them appear as designated heroes, please the note the story behind them, T-Ranma only show Nabiki the consequences of her continuing her path of blackmail and extorting and showing the upsides of treating Ranma better, B-Ranma is understandable of how he feel about the Amazon as he was cared for by them and he recognized the bad behaviors of the original and tried to correct them, as for Kojiro using his tiger in front of Ranma was only done after the latter insisted on transforming. As for the flaws of the some characters like Genma despite appearances are not exaggerated just played seriously. Be honest would you find it funny for a man to thrown a kid into a pit of starving cats and just treated as it wasn't his fault or shrug as no big deal?
- Fanfic/After: Both the books and the movies try their damndest to make us root for the smug, sanctimonious, dithering adulterer that is Tessa, and the lying, manipulative, short-tempered jerk that is Hardin. For a lot of audiences, it doesn't work, and they both come off as supremely selfish and dysfunctional people who cause most of their own problems.
- Tony Stevens in the Real-Person Fic The Global Gunger. We’re supposed to laugh at the so-called 'cocky celebrities' while Tony humiliates them, gives them their 'Just Deserts', and wrecks their holiday, all because he's jealous of them and they can afford it. And throughout all this, Tony's regret for his actions are non-existent, bar a part of the story where he considers what he might be doing is wrong... until he sees one of the celebrities ordering expensive wine, then he just goes ahead anyway. He also gets away with stranding a celebrity out to sea after gunging him, leaving him to be deserted, and at best, humiliated, and at worst, killed from starvation/dehydration. Even then, he doesn't give a crap that he is destroying a man's social life. And, despite his actions, where he could be arrested in real life for harassment, which so far, he hasn't, the audience is supposed to cheer on him humiliating the celebrities, when they really hope that the celebrities give him their 'just deserts' for sabotaging their holiday.
- Liu Bei in Farce of the Three Kingdoms. Everybody is fully aware of this, for better or for worse.
- Emerald of I'm Here to Help is either this or Nominal Hero, depending on how one views things. He's on a mission to stop the creation of Crystal Tokyo, which he claims is a soulless dystopia full of brainwashed people. But he shows no sympathy to its citizens (the same people he's striving to save), referring to them as zombies and cattle. At one point he mentally rants about how he wants to kill Luna because she won't trust him enough to tell him where Serenity is (this being despite the fact that he only met the senshi a handful of times and was dodgy each time). He reacts to Mamoru's kidnapping with exasperation and jokes and rescues him only to earn the trust of the senshi, basically thinking that the guy can rot when the Dark Kingdom re-captures him (and on top of that, makes a very tasteless joke about how Beryl may or may not be forcing him to have sex with her while brainwashing him. He later saves the youma in Beryl's cryogenic sleep, but kills any that show any signs of PTSD, without waiting to see if they recover. He then abandons the handful of remaining ones, brings them to Earth once they remind him they're still there (which kills several more in the process), and leaves them to do whatever they want (implied to be attacking humans for energy) but with the warning that he'll kill them if he finds them again. Despite claiming to respect the senshi of the past, particularly Sailor Moon, he belittles them or condescendingly treats them like ignorant children, and at one point rants that he only wants them around to lead him to Serenity and continue to protect the planet. And at the end of the fic, he bathes the planet in his energy to prevent the creation of Crystal Tokyo. Not only does that mean he subjected every living being on the planet to a strange energy without their consent (something that he hates Serenity for doing), but he essentially destroyed a future world that showed no signs of actually being a dystopia and which would have provided planet-wide peace and safety.
- There's also Sailor Pluto, who manipulates the timestream by allowing a terrorist and criminal to go back in time and meddle with history. The reason she lets this happen? She didn't like how Crystal Tokyo turned out, and was willing to let it and everyone living in it vanish into nothingness as a result. Again, like with Emerald, it's left unclear if her actions were meant to be seen as heroic or not, in-universe.
- Brought up In-Universe by Joe Dark in Clash of the Elements, who claims that Alex Whiter is getting undeserved treatment as a good guy after some sort of atrocities he committed in the past.
- Eiga Sentai Scanranger:
- True, the Scanrangers do routinely thwart the efforts of aliens who want to suck our planet dry, but they're also the people who not only seemed willing to let B.C. end the universe if they couldn't convince him to go back to his own time in the crossover, they consider him the glue that holds the team together. And insulted someone who brought up the downsides of their protection, and people who have different fashion sense than they do, and people who enjoy partying at Spring Break.
- It’s telling that MizunoBBS’ reading of the work said that a random guest character in the Valentine’s Day episode managed to be more heroic in one line of dialogue than the entire team had been in 17 chapters.
- In "Scanranger vs. Jetman," B.C. falls in love with Blue Swallow and plans to stay in the past to be with her, despite his friends’ warnings that the space time continuum will collapse if he doesn’t go back to his own time with them. To reiterate: a character we’re supposed to like, a superhero no less, seriously considers something that would result in the destruction of the universe. Our hero, ladies and gentlemen.
- The entire United Super Sentai and Power Rangers Alliance in Super Sentai vs. Power Rangers can be seen as this. Basically, aside from doing the regular missions, all else they do is talk about love life, gushing over how certain characters are awesome, and worst of all, mistreating their own members in harsh ways that make them no better than the villains they fight. The moment that people get involved in the detention center and that their own teammates mock them to boot, it means you can't even call these people heroes. This, combined with extreme OOC-ness, makes them extremely hateable, when we are supposed to root for them.
- Smash School: Anna and Woe don't really do anything that's remotely heroic, aside from stopping a skyquake and killing Master Hand, which is then balanced by Anna killing Mr. Collins (the LA teacher), and Woe killing Olimar.
- In Super Smash Bros: The Animated Series, the cast is less "Designated Hero" and more "Designated Not-The-Villains". Everyone is spiteful, cold, cruel, and downright psychotic at times, but the narrative rarely calls anyone out for their behavior (unless you're a. a villain or b. Pit.)
- Meta Knight is the worst offender. He is cruel. He is selfish. He is violent. He is a pedophile. He murders children in the Halloween special. But because he's Kirby's Love Interest, the author is more than happy to sweep all of that under the rug.
- The main Guardian cast of Super Smash Brothers: Guardians Arise!. To be specific, you have: Psyche, who's an ungrateful jerkass to Pit, the person who saved her life merely because he's a Smasher (not that he's any better) but this is a bit downplayed due to her care for Heather; Golfer, who, after offering food to Pikana, refuses to help her fight Primids as she's nearly dying to them because she's involved with Traca who abandoned him on a critical mission; Rinku, who, after returning to his father because he mistakenly killed his mother in an attempt to murder him, sentences countless people to prison and justifies genocide of the Gorons and Zoras as a way of penance for his action; Cameron, who, after his introduction, eviscerates a mangled laguz and justifies killing millions of brainwashed laguz just to survive; and the aforementioned Traca who easily falls prey to a betrayal scheme from Clark Wolfon, justifies her selfish behavior by saying that she wanted to know who she was, and consistently holds the Conflict Ball alongside Golfer by which all of the Guardians' arguments boil to. Though there are heroic examples, these people get the most attention from the story and make it hard for the readers to root for them.
- Their supposed leader, Master Hand, fails at being the Big Good, and his insistence on using the Guardian prophecy to rally up a plan to battle Tabuu. He's the one who effectively creates the prophecy, along with the other deities, but that only brings about angst and ruin towards the other Smashers, who are still grieving the loss of their loved ones and with how leaving them shut in for a century in favor of the Guardian plan is what will defeat Tabuu in the long run. The already aforementioned problem regarding the Guardians as designated heroes adds to this, and one would wonder what they were thinking with regards to the overall plan. The overall story arc for the first part of the story ultimately boils down to rallying the Guardians to Mount Smash, subjecting them to harsh trial by combat to prove their "worthiness" as Guardians, and then waiting for further instructions from Master Hand...largely because there isn't a proper concrete plan to begin with.
- Resisting the Incubus: Alejandro, who is a vampire in this fic, regularly feeds on women and has sex with them in their sleep. While he does need blood to live, he does not need sex, and nowhere in the story is it acknowledged that this is rape. Heather eventually makes him stop having sex with the women he feeds on, but it's because she sees it as him being unfaithful to her, not because the women never consented to it. To add insult to injury, Alejandro also transformed Heather into a vampire when it was explicitly against her wishes.
- Total Drama: Cody's Redemption: Readers have cited Cody as being portrayed in this light. Cody is supposed to be the hero who's trying to improve his life. It failed as Cody unnecessarily rants about the most minor of things, has meltdowns, and is described as whiny and self-centered by his detractors. This Reddit post goes in full depth about his flaws.
- While the heroes in Total Drama Stranded were called out on their more jerkish actions from time to time, the heroes of its sequel Strandarama play this frustratingly straight. Portia in particular acts rather horrible, and while some of it is excusable, a lot of her actions after the merge have alienated most of the readers.
- Total Shuffled Island Series: An In-Universe example with Lightning, who's put on the Heroic Hamsters in All-Stars despite being a Jerk Jock for most of his run. This is Justified as Chris originally wanted to put a jock on the team, but was forced to make do with Lightning since both Tyler and Jo were unable to compete. Over the course of the season, Lightning outgrows this status and eventually evolves into an Anti-Hero.
- Brolli Diamondback of the Touhou Project fan series/movie Diamond in the Rough (Touhou) is both a satire on Self-Insert Fic main characters that result in this trope and then a nasty Deconstruction. In the first half of the movie, Brolli treats himself as the hero of his own adventure in Gensokyo, then later believes he is the only one who can save Gensokyo from a disastrous incident, even though he has done no good and everyone else is perfectly capable of handling everything without him. It's obvious to both the residents of Gensokyo and the viewers that Brolli is obviously unprepared and morally skewed. In the second half, Brolli becomes aware he's nothing more than a Designated Hero and then does what he can to actually become a redeemable, likable hero. By this point, however, everyone has become fed up with his actions, even ones that aren't directly his fault, and believe killing him is the only option to save Gensokyo. By the end, the audience and Gensokyo get exactly what they want: Brolli is killed, just after he's done everything he could to redeem himself. Shiki does decide to reincarnate him, however.
- The titular character of The Daimyo's Grandchild [a saniwa's tale] is an overly violent Jerkass who assaults and abuses others for the slightest perceived slight and has No Sympathy, to the point where she beats up a grieving boy for being unable to save his grandfather from murder, among other morally outrageous acts, and never expresses any remorse or even gets called out for it. She is a suitable saniwa and the undisputable heroine of the story because the fic says she is.
- The Final Sword:
- It is extremely hard to root for Rebora as a heroine. For starters, she is a sword OC who violates every rules of Touken Ranbu canon regarding swords, and yet is constantly touted as the Citadel's true savior, the only one able to ultimately end the conflict between them and the Revisionists, essentially rendering the canon swords useless and dependent on her. She also effectively makes the entire TouRabu universe revolve around her, to the point where it's even implied that the whole reason the Revisionists exist is a desire to have her. That's not even getting to the boatloads of racist implications surrounding her characterization.
- Her goddess Haleena is supposedly the Big Good, but is just as bad as her, if not worse. She is extremely annoying through and through, she's treated by the narrative as if she's part of the Japanese pantheon whom the canon swords know about by default without having to be told who she is even though she's a nonexistent deity, dialogues are devoted to telling what a benevolent, pure and loved-by-all person she is.
- The unnamed protagonist in Avoiding Stupid Deaths In The 41st Millennium, who is also the author of the guide of the same name. Although portrayed as a good father and husband and brave soldier in the out-of-character chapters, he comes across as smug and abrasive in the guide he writes. Although the examples he gives for every line of advice do feature the person in question dying due to doing something incredibly foolish, he comes across as needlessly cruel due to the fact he relentlessly mocks them.
- In one entry example he gives, a group of drunk guardsmen hit on his sister. They were never stated to have gotten violent or even to have overstepped their boundaries by touching her in any way. Naturally, his sister (who is an Adepta Sororita) kills almost all of them, leaving only one alive and with horrible injuries. Our protagonist then mentions how, while taking the survivor to the medbay, he stabbed the man in the throat multiple times, killing him. All because he got drunk and hit on a sister of battle. The drunk guardsmen were presented as jerks who got what they deserved, even though the protagonist could have just told them to back off instead.
- In another entry, he insults the Ultramarines for being smug, while also telling the readers to still accept their help if they can get it. However, in the very next entry, he tells the readers not to accept the help of Cato Sicarius (who is the Ultramarines' chapter champion and commander of their 2nd company, considered to be one of the most skilled warriors in the Adeptus Astartes, an organization of superhuman killing machines) because he is more smug than the rest.
- The finest example for this trope in this particular fanfic, and what makes the protagonist an Idiot Hero as well as a Designated Hero comes in Chapter 2, entry 39. In this entry, the protagonist tells all of his readers, who are most likely young imperial guardsmen straight out of training, to burn their copy of the Imperial Infantryman's Uplifting Primer when their officers aren't looking. The reason he gives for this is that it is completely worthless and full of imperial propaganda. While the latter is true, the Primer also informs guardsmen on how to maintain their equipment, instructs them on what litanies they must say to keep their guns from jamming, and what rules to follow to avoid punishment by the commissariat among other extremely useful advice. Now, telling all guardsmen to burn it would be bad enough for its contents alone. However, the biggest reason to absolutely not do what the protagonist says is due to the fact that any guardsman that fails to present their copy of the Imperial Infantryman's Uplifting Primer when called upon will be summarily executed by their commissar. Just this one entry alone most likely caused more deaths in inexperienced guardsmen than every other entry combined prevented. This isn't just in one entry either, the protagonist goes on to repeat this advice in later entries, somehow never realizing that his egotism is causing the needless deaths of thousands of young recruits.
- A Closed Fist To An Open Palm: Jasmine to an extent is this, her Hair-Trigger Temper can easily lead to Jerkass territory.
