Horrible Judges of Character in Fan Works.
Crossovers
- In Avenging Class, MHXX combines this with a bad case of Wrong Genre Savvy. Namely, she assumes that Doctor Strange is evil because he has a goatee, while Victor von Doom is obviously a good guy.
- Boop the Snoot for Critical Damage!: Nicholas Schnee was a renowned Huntsman and corporate owner, having earned both Ozpin and Ironwood's respect. That said, he thought Jacques (a greedy amoral jerk) was a good catch for his daughter and saw fit to name him his successor. Ozpin even lampshades this.Ozpin: He was a good man, just not a particularly perceptive one.
- A Dead World: Not only does House believe that the Three Families will be unquestionably loyal to him despite them all having their own self-interests, he takes on The Starscream as his personal protege. Cain wonders how House has managed to keep any of them in check, and it's implied that she sees taking over the Strip as effectively replacing something that's been worn-out.
- In A Dovahkiin without Dragon Souls to spend, Taylor thinks that Shadow Stalker's awkwardness around her is due to the other girl trying to hide a crush. In reality, said awkwardness stems from how Shadow Stalker knows Taylor's identity, but Taylor doesn't know hers, and is worried that Taylor will find out and call her out for how heavily she bullied her before.
- King Henri from Heaven's Light (a crossover between Tangled and The Hunchback of Notre Dame). He's practically the only person in the story who trusts Judge Claude Frollo, the Minister of Justice, mentioned below. In his defense, he points out that Frollo is supposed to do his job, not to be popular, and he does try to reign in Frollo by ordering Quasimodo to be released when the crowd starts humiliating him at the Festival of Fools. Eventually, he wises up to Frollo's corruption, but only after the Minister has already taken him and his wife captive and is threatening to enslave his daughter and take over Corona. After Frollo dies, he names Captain Phoebus as his Redeeming Replacement.
- A Kaiserin's Post-Living Arrangements: Tanya assumes that the Magus Association will eventually crack down on Galliasta's unethical behavior, unaware that said association is entirely amoral and completely detached from all the magical traditions and institutions that she's familiar with.
- In The Prayer Warriors Jerry, the main character, qualifies on no less than three occasions in "The Evil Gods Part 1". In the space of a single chapter, there are two cases- when he believes Ethan when he repents his sins, but kills Thalia when she tries to do the same on the mere chance that she's lying- the former turns out to be a traitor, while the latter joins the Prayer Warriors in "The Evil Gods Part 2", and is retconned into being one all along. He also doesn't realize that his own wife is a traitor and that he's not the father of her unborn son. Interestingly enough, he has (so far) not ended up regretting deciding to trust the canonical traitor Luke.
- A Tale Of Spirits: The Fire Sages are completely enamored with Donatello, seeing him as a pure-hearted, benevolent and just Spirit. Azula is sickened by this, as she can tell Donnie shares many of the same traits with her, including her Lack of Empathy for anything that's not directly connected to things she cares about.
- Alternate Worlds: Despite recognizing that Esdeath is a Sadist, River believes that she'll eventually grow out of it, destroy the corruption plaguing the empire, and become a good ruler. While River is in a coma, Esdeath outright admits to him that while she doesn't intend to serve Honest forever, she will never become everything River wants her to be.
- What It Takes: John Diggle comes to realize he's this over the course of the story.
- First is the relatively benign example of his bad treatment of Laurel due to his grudge regarding the Deadshot situation two years ago, which he admits to himself was wrong of him after getting to know her better and seeing how much she loves and wants to protect Starling, allowing them to build a genuine and close friendship.
- Next is learning about the amount of trauma Oliver went through during his five years away from home, causing him to acknowledge that he's been too hard on Oliver for some of his choices and that he now understands him better. That allows for an easy reconciliation between them when they finally have the chance to really talk.
- Then comes Andy, which comes with its own set of problems because John operates under the belief that Andy has been brainwashed for the rest of the story and is implied to still be in denial even after the confirmation from Darhk that Andy was a willing member of HIVE.
- It really hits when he finds out about Felicity ditching him and the others and keeping Oliver in the dark in order to maintain their relationship. He flat-out tells Oliver that he completely misjudged her and that he should've realized what kind of person she was after she nearly got all of the team killed trying to sneak Oliver out of Nanda Parbat. Though he doesn't say it outright, it's obvious he no longer considers her a friend.
- Accursed Ones: Amell gives the benefit of the doubt to everyone he meets. While this works to his advantage, inspiring many of his followers and helping him gather up some True Companions, it also works against him when he puts too much faith in Quentin, who cuts out his eyes for his Frankenstein Bride.
- In Bastard, Lockhart seduced, then abandoned Aina. Despite this, she firmly believes that he was her Knight in Shining Armor, hanging on to how he told her that he'd never be able to live without her.
- Vale Whitaker, the heroine of Some Semblance of Meaning, is awful at discerning the true alignments and motivations of others. Even in the arena, she wants to trust others, which leads to her allying with Phlox, who tries to kill her and her other allies. However, the one person that she consistently distrusts is Obsidian, who is quite kind to her, all things considered, and even saves her life on multiple occasions.
- Later on, during their alliance, we learn that Vale also misjudges Obsidian by thinking that, as a well-trained and strong Career, he must not have any problems, while he is simultaneously plagued with constant questions about the morality of his actions, as well as the fear that he isn't so different from Amber and the other Careers. Obsidian also misjudges Vale by mistakenly assuming that she is a Purity Sue type who could never hurt anyone and therefore lacks the kind of worries that consume him.
- In The New Adventures of Invader Zim, Skoodge thinks that Zim is his caring best friend, despite the fact that Zim doesn't give a damn about him and doesn't even try to hide the fact. Of course, we can’t judge him too harshly for this, as the only alternative Skoodge has ever known is the Tallest, and unlike them, Zim actually recognizes that Skoodge does have worthwhile skills.
- Entering The Love Hina World:
- Seta passed off everything Sarah and Naru did to Keitaro in front of him as "play-fighting", but accuses Anthony of being a bad influence on his daughter for... making clear that he won't tolerate her acting like a Spoiled Brat.
- Naru decides that Masako is immediately and innately trustworthy simply because she's a woman, unaware of her true intentions for the Hinata Inn.
- For His Own Sake:
- Keitaro used to have serious issues with this. He and his cousin once caught a girl stealing test answers; he tried convincing Yoshinari not to report her, believing her claims that she'd return them. Later, when a group of thuggish-looking boys asked him where his cousin was, claiming they were her friends and she wanted to 'thank' Yoshinari, he pointed them in the right direction. As a result, Yoshinori wound up hospitalized, and Keitaro was called out on his naivete. Granny Hina then exploited her grandson's trusting nature for her own ends by making him the manager of the Hinata Inn, until he eventually wises up and breaks things off.
- Mutsumi is so convinced that Keitaro and Naru are meant to be together that she blinds herself to all of Naru's flaws, as well as the fact that neither one wants anything to do with the other anymore. She also trusts Kagura and Chisato completely, despite the fact that her False Friends are barely making any effort at all to hide their ill intentions. It takes Chisato getting so enraged at her obliviousness that she slaps her, followed by both telling her outright that they were just using her the whole time for reality to finally sink in.
- In BURN THE WITCH, Lila's assessment of others hinges entirely upon whether or not she's successfully lied to them. Since Marinette has called her out on her deceptive nature, she presumes that all of her efforts to save her from Witch Hunter and her angry mob must be a trick, while she's convinced that she has Hawkmoth wrapped around her little finger and that he'll protect her from his own creation.
- Cheshire:
- Master Fu firmly believes that Cheshire must be evil, purely because all of the past holders of the Black Cat Ring have used it for evil. This spurred him to attack Cheshire the moment they met, leaving her traumatized and wary. Making matters worse is how he keeps making questionable choices for who to trust with Miraculouses, as he doesn't take the time to get to know any of his candidates beyond shallow surface impressions.
- Much like Master Fu, all of the kwami assume that Plagg must be evil because of how evil all of his previous holders have been. Those who actually get the chance to meet him are surprised to learn that he's anything but.
- Adrien doesn't believe that Chloé could possibly be a bully... but at least he's better at choosing holders than Fu.
- Even Marinette falls into this a bit when it comes to choosing holders. While Rena Rouge works out well, her decision to trust Alix, one of her bullies, with a Miraculous results in it being lost during War Horse's very first akuma fight.
- Dodged a Beetle:
- Since Lila was nice to her on her first day, when Tikki proves less than supportive to the fledging heroine, Marinette decides that Lila would make a much better hero and secretly passes the Earrings over to her. She also tends to gloss over any of the little oddities in Lila's behavior, giving her more leeway than Marinette ever granted herself.
- Downplayed with Tikki; while she's immediately suspicious of Lila, she shoves those aside and bluntly tells Marinette that she was right to trust her with the Earrings.
- Feralnette AU:
- Alya plays with this: Despite knowing about Lila's supposed "lying disease", she keeps providing a platform for her claims. When the heroes call Lila out on spreading Malicious Slander about Marinette, Alya leaps to her defense, revealing that she knows about her "lying disease"... and Ladybug calls her out on her Skewed Priorities, suggesting that Alya's faith in Lila is largely self-serving. Namely, that her belief in Lila is more that she wants the stories she tells her to be true so she can get "exclusive scoops" out of her.
- Alya continues struggling with this, in large part due to how Lila keeps telling her what she wants to hear. Such as Playing the Victim Card after the above confrontation and claiming that Ladybug was completely in the wrong for not hearing them out, as Alya latches onto the notion that her idol only knows One Side of the Story. It takes Lila crossing a line in a way Alya can't excuse for her to start coming around.
- Rose also proves to be one of these. Even after Marinette spells out for her that Lila treating Rose decently doesn't mean she's that nice to everyone, she's still ready to ignore all their pleas not to tell Lila about Felix's ballet troupe. It takes Felix calling her out and glaring her down for her to reconsider.
- The Karma of Lies:
- Despite being fully aware of Lila's true nature, Adrien insists that she's only lying in order to impress her classmates. Even though he's watching her con them into donating to Fake Charities and other expensive favors. This eventually leads to him trusting her when she tells him just what he wants to hear, and being repaid for this by her draining the Agrestes' emergency funds account.
- While Adrien is understandably horrified to learn that his father was Hawkmoth all along, he's ultimately more concerned about how this impacts their family over how it impacted Paris, latching onto every paper-thin excuse he can muster to handwave away the damage he did. Ladybug's Miraculous Cure means nothing stayed destroyed, so it's like he did nothing at all, right...?
- This poor judgment of others' characters also bites him hard when it comes to Nathalie, his father's secretary and partner in crime. When he learns that Nathalie is Mayura, he offers them a hand up, not considering how they might take advantage of his trust.
- Played With in Leave for Mendeleiev:
- On one hand, Adrien recognizes that his Childhood Friend Chloe is an entitled, Spoiled Brat, and he doesn't particularly enjoy when she turns that attitude towards him. Yet he's more than happy to excuse her bad behavior so long as he's not the one suffering for it, and when Lady Wifi mistakes a cosplaying Chloe for Ladybug and 'exposes' her Secret Identity, he's thrilled, thinking this cements his claim to his 'partner'. He also doesn't seem to understand why Plagg and the real Ladybug find the notion of Chloe being a heroine so repugnant, and gets upset when others are glad that she's gotten knocked off her pedestal a bit.
- Along similar lines, Mme Bustier recognizes that Chloe has... issues. Rather than correcting her misbehavior directly, however, Bustier insists that her other students should 'lead by example' by forgiving her mistakes and modeling better behavior. In practice, this simply means that Chloe gets away with everything, never getting punished for doing anything wrong — it's the 'good students' who bear the brunt instead.
- The One to Make It Stay: Alya has this problem, especially when it comes to Lila. Particularly noteworthy when she decides that Lila is such a Nice Girl that she'd be perfectly happy to help her pull off an Operation: Jealousy that entails having Lila 'date' Adrien... in order to make Marinette jealous and spur her to start pursuing her old crush again. Without so much as asking Lila before shoving her at Adrien.
- Recommencer:
- Adrien naively believes that people like Lila simply don't realize how their actions hurt others, and that they would stop if they knew the truth. His rose-colored glasses are eventually ripped off, as Bella spells it out for him that Lila is fully aware and reveling in her cruelty, and will not change unless she absolutely has to... and only if she believes changing will benefit her in some fashion.
- Alya fully buys into Lila's slander and lies, convinced that she's the most wonderful person in the world and that Marinette and Ladybug are both secretly the Bitches in Sheep's Clothing that Lila makes them out to be. She also ignores all the mounting evidence that Lila is a False Friend, taking it to I Reject Your Reality levels.
- Weight Off Your Shoulder:
- Adrien firmly believes that Chloe is still the sweet, sad little Lonely Rich Kid he remembers from their childhood, and that everybody else is simply wrong about her. No, never mind that she's known most of the kids at their school since école and has been bullying them for all those years; they just don't know her like HE does! And really, how dare they judge her based on her actions, without ever taking her feelings into account?! This spurs him to lambast his classmates for their supposed Lack of Empathy, failing to recognize how he's showing no sympathy for their point of view.
- Ms. Bustier also believes that the best way to help Chloe learn to be a better person is to have everyone around her "set good examples" by forgiving every slight, while she refuses to punish Chloe for any of her bullying. She only realizes how badly she's mishandled matters when Chloe informs her that she's no longer useful, but takes the time to thank her for all the times she took her side.
- What Goes Around Comes Around:
- Adrien convinces himself that Lila only spun her Celebrity Lies for the sake of making friends, something he personally relates to. He completely ignores her efforts to destroy Marinette's reputation since that doesn't fit into his positive point of view.
- When his mother Emilie spins a sob story claiming that she needs a Miraculous to combat her 'mysterious illness', Adrien completely buys into it, giving her the Black Cat Ring over Plagg's objections.
- This is what most of the My Hero Academia fanbase deduce that Kirishima is doing when it comes to Bakugou. By misinterpreting Bakugou's loud, aggressive and often cruel hostility towards everyone he views as extras (or in the case of Izuku, a punching bag) as nothing more than confidence. In several cases, this comes back to bite him in the ass.
- Deku in Class 1-B: After Bakugo is put on probation and removed from the Hero Course when his past actions back at Aldera came to light, Kirishima is convinced that Bakugo is "not as bad" as Izuku is putting him out to be and comes up with the remarkable theory that Izuku is a Bitch in Sheep's Clothing trying to remove all the powerhouses of 1-A from their class after finding out that Tenya and Shoto have been temporarily placed in Gen Ed after their reckless actions against the Hero Killer. This is especially after the fact that he witnessed Bakugo give a No-Holds-Barred Beatdown to Setsuna during the Sports Festival, burying her in rubble and decided to paint Izuku as the bad guy after getting some unreliable info without getting any information from Izuku directly.
- Quirkless 1-B
: As Togaru is able to deduce, Kirishima hates Izuku not because of his Quirklessness, but because Izuku is everything he wasn't, and the red-haired teen constantly defends Bakugou despite the fact the boy had gotten himself arrested for assault on a classmate and was practically viewed as mentally unstable by the staff.
- Downplayed in A Clear Pattern of Behavior: After Katsuki attempts to kill Izuku during their first training exercise together, Yagi attempts to convince Aizawa that they should go easy on him, given how they also made mistakes that contributed to the whole debacle happening in the first place. Aizawa shuts him down:Yagi: Ah, Young Aizawa! Shouldn't—in light of the mistakes we've made, shouldn't we be more accommodating of Young Bakugo's mistakes? He is still learning.
Aizawa: A mistake is one thing. Attacking a classmate with lethal force is another. As a hero, shouldn't you be aware of the difference? (shakes head) There's such a thing as being too forgiving, you know? - Flashback: This is a Fatal Flaw of Toshinori's. When the other teachers at U.A. compare Bakugou's behavior and personality to Endeavor, Toshinori doesn't understand what the issue is, since he believes Endeavor is an exemplary Hero. He also takes Himiko Toga's openly rose-tinted views on several members of the League of Villains at face value, even going so far as to condemn one of his fellow heroes for killing Twice, ignoring how Hawks gave Twice the chance to stand down, which he refused.
- We're Not Friends Kacchan: Aizawa initially assumed that Katsuki's anti-social and defensive behavior was due to being bullied and isolated for his destructive, 'naturally villainous' Quirk, while Izuku was a Bitch in Sheep's Clothing who pretended to be meek in order to tease and antagonize Katsuki. It takes seeing video footage of Bakugou bullying Midoriya and learning about his Suicide Dare for Aizawa to realize he had things completely backwards.
My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic
- Echoing Silence: Diadem is willing to give King Sombra the benefit of the doubt when he first speaks to her in a dream, feeding her a sob story about his past that happens to strike a chord with her. Namely because she was betrayed and banished to the Dusklands by her former mentor.
- The Kakashi Way: Hiruzen is well aware of Danzo's ambitions, as well as the role he played in orchestrating the Uchiha Massacre. Despite this, however, he firmly believes that he's merely a Well-Intentioned Extremist, driven by a sincere love for Konohagakure and desiring to protect everyone living there. Surely, surely that love keeps him grounded and prevents him from doing anything that would harm their village...? Unsurprisingly, Hiruzen's trust is woefully misplaced, as he learns the hard way after Danzo's treachery is exposed and he finds his old friend's private records, which exhaustively detail all of the horrific things he's done in the name of his selfish ambitions.
- Three's A Crowd: Due to his Psychological Projection, Kakashi dismisses Sasuke and Uo's callous and uncaring treatment of Sakura as no big deal, convinced that she can "earn" their respect by showing off just how skilled she is. He doesn't realize just how deep their arrogance runs, or that forcing Sakura to reveal her talent just makes the boys even more resentful of her, since they can't stand being outperformed by a girl.
- A Dip in the Inkwell: In Agent Recall, Odd Todd thinks to himself that Olive's willingness to trust him after his Heel–Face Turn means that she's unlikely to make a good Director. However, he can't bring himself to tell her as much outright.
- In the sidestories of Pokémon Reset Bloodlines, Jeanette Fisher's grandfather is revealed to have been this at some point. To wit, he almost married his daughter Kaoruko to a man who was actually a criminal and murderer, while disapproving of her eventual husband because he came from Gringy City.
- Anybody who buys Liu Bei's hero act in Farce of the Three Kingdoms, with special note going to Lu Su and Liu Zhang, who had to be beaten about the head with his treachery before either of them would accept it. It never really sticks with Lu Su, either.
- Rosario Vampire: Brightest Darkness:
- In Act III, Akua and Kahlua helped Kiria in his plan to use the Chrono Displacement spell to rewrite history, going so far as to steal said spell from their father Issa's archive for Kiria to begin with, because they genuinely believed that the extent of Kiria's plan was to send Tsukune's ghoul back to the Battle of Kahdaln so as to turn the tide of the battle and change history in favor of the monsters, thus ensuring that monsters would rule the world. In chapter 52, upon their defeat, the two are completely shocked to discover that, in addition to that, Kiria also planned to send out Blackheart-infected monsters to the dark lords themselves, as well as any other being powerful enough to oppose him, so he would be the top monster in the revised timeline, and he would have had Akua and Kahlua, and possibly Moka and Kokoa as well, infected with Blackheart as well and sent back to kill their father Issa and destroy the Shuzen empire from within, all of which is anything but what they wanted. Kahlua and Akua spend the entirety of Act IV as The Atoners.
- Tsukune's mother and cousin fall into it during Act IV, automatically trusting Jovian and Jacqueline, Hokuto's Psycho Lesbian Co-Dragons, simply because the two claimed to be Tsukune's friends. They realize just what a mistake that was after Jovian holds Kyouko hostage and rapes her, and after Jacqueline blows up the Aono house and levels most of the neighborhood to the ground for laughs.
- In Act VII chapter 3, the new Complica decides to trust Routier right off the bat. While Routier did save her from a group of human pedophiles, she did so by ripping them to shreds with a chainsaw and laughing about it.
- Blackened Bluebird: Not only does the heavily traumatized May join the Obviously Evil Salem (though she had few other options at the time), her depression spurs her to assume that Winter and her teammates disliked her, or found her and her struggles amusing. In reality, they were making an honest effort to befriend her, hoping to help her out.
- Bart Simpson: Attorney at Law: Teenage Maggie toward Gina. Her idolization of Gina leads her to ignore the damage she has done toward Bart and gets an earful from him and Marge for reintroducing Gina to him. Gina joins in a plot to kidnap Bart on behalf of Jessica Lovejoy. However, she does end up redeeming herself by testifying against Jessica, thanks to Maggie's never-ending faith.
- A Lion's Duty: Daenerys doesn't trust Tyrion or Arianne, as Tyrion is a member of the family that sacked King's Landing and killed her father, while Arianne doesn't act the way she was told women of Westerosi are supposed to behave. However, she fully trusts Jorah, who is secretly a spy working for Varys.
- TMNT: Secrets of the Sewers: The High Council of the Foot Clan are convinced that the Shredder is an honorable, righteous man and that Splinter is a despicable, dishonorable monster when the opposite is the case; in fact, it's revealed in the very next chapter that everything Shredder has done throughout the fic has been to amass an army of mutants so he can slay the council and take complete control over the Foot. They nearly kill Splinter to avenge Shredder's apparent death, and would have done so had Murakami not intervened and helped set them straight.
- The Duke and Duchess of Boxford in Sodor's Legend of the Lost Treasure Bad Ending. After their former private engine, Spencer, is purchased by Charlene Bellis, the North Western Railway’s new controller, they buy a new private engine. That would be fine - if you don’t count the fact that the new private engine is Crovan, a.k.a 87546, a Jerkass and bully of the highest order who is ALSO secretly a member of the villainous Barrow Union of Diesels. In this scene, Molly even lampshades their decision.
- In A TDA Love Triangle with Betty, Cody, and Gwenny, Bridgette feels like she has trouble with this, due to her having terrible luck with boyfriends. She completely missed all the signs that Geoff was helping Duncan bully Harold, and feels awful about it once she does find out.
- In Gensokyo 20XXV, we have Reimu, who is noted, in one chapter, to be someone who can "be bullied one minute and still go back around and trust them the next", which is true seeing that she trusted Paintbrush Bitch, when the latter let her outside, knowing full well that could place her in danger and it did. Naturally, one of the kids thought of her as a moron for doing that, to which Alice did bring up the fact that she could have thought of it as being nice by doing something the other adults wouldn't do. In that vein, Ren gave his brother a thinly veiled threat about what could happen if Baka dared to betray said trust.Ren: On a note and you had better get this through your thick skull and make clear note of which it is I am saying to you now, you can bully Reimu one minute and, yet, she'll still trust you the next, so, in no way, are you to violate that trust or place her into harms way and, if you do, well, we will never at all hesitate and will act as we see best, be you my older brother or not.
