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"Now you see that evil will always triumph, because good is dumb."
-Dark Helmet, Spaceballs
Having a villain, especially a particularly threatening one, change sides is generally a good plot, and for three good reasons:
- It lets you introduce a "darker, edgier" hero.
- It reinforces our notion of the inherent goodness within people.
- It prevents the Worthy Opponent from falling victim to What A Senseless Waste Of Human Life.
Unfortunately, a lot of the drama in such shows hinges on the odds being massively unequal: the bad guys always seem to have the heroes at a substantial disadvantage.
To make the character an interesting villain, he is usually built up as the equal or superior to all of the heroes, a serious threat to their team. Often, he's far and away the strongest of the Evil Minions our heroes have faced thus far.
And then he switches sides, and it all goes to hell. Suddenly, he's just one of the gang, not substantially stronger than the others. He's decidedly less powerful than the leader of the good guys. This phenomenon is related to Villain Decay.
Very common in RPGs, since the "playable" versions of the characters tend to have much lower Hit Points, fewer and less impressive abilities, and generally worse stats than the "boss" versions. In older games, they even got smaller, since hero sprites were much smaller than enemy ones.
There are a number of possible, rational justifications for why a villain-turned-ally is suddenly weaker than before:
However, sometimes no explanation is given at all. It could be worse though; if the Heel Face Turner is particularly unlucky, he'll just suffer Redemption Equals Death and that will be the end of it.
So remember, when you switch from evil to good, odds are good that you will start to suck.
If your character isn't exactly evil but a mere antagonist, they might fall victim to being Not So Above It All.
(This trope can also apply in reverse, though, because Evil Is Cool.)
Sometimes, an enemy-turned-friend loses nothing of what made him a formidable opponent in the first place. This is usually because the character wasn't previously relying on any powers or methods that could be considered "evil" and thus which can continue to serve him as a hero.
Slightly rarer, a new ally goes through enough Character Development (or just Training From Hell) to acquire some new, heroic ability to replace his old ways, and can contribute to the cause from then on.
Good Is Dumb should not to be confused with Dumb Is Good. Compare Good Is Boring and Good Is Impotent. See also the Balance Between Good And Evil. Frequently accompanied by Badass Decay.
For those instances where being Good is actually about being dumb rather than being the underdog, see Hero Ball or Lawful Stupid.
Examples:
Live Action TV
- Power Rangers, every single time they did the "evil ranger" plot. The original Green Ranger nearly killed the heroes in five-against-one fights, but the second he switched sides, he was weakened immensely. Ditto the Titanium Ranger, the Lunar Wolf Ranger, the Thunder Rangers, and season 12's White Ranger.
- What are you on about? All the Green Ranger lost was a fireball attack, his sword and some evil healing. He was still a much better fighter than any of the other rangers (notably beating the crap out of Goldar when unmorphed, whereas Red Ranger struggles to stay alive), and his Dragonzord could stall a foe that destroys the Megazord in seconds. Not to mention that when Dragonzord merges with Megazord you get something more than double the power of Megazord.
- Of course, the original Green Ranger was sort of justified in that his sword, which gave him a large amount of power but also made him evil, was destroyed, thus causing his Heel Face Turn. Or So I Heard...
- In Power Rangers: Lightspeed Rescue, when Impus steals Diaboloco's star power after the Rangers defeat him, Diaboloco returns later on, though is more-or-less an afterthought by the Rangers compared to newer Monsters of the Week.
- Spike in Buffy The Vampire Slayer started out as a decoy Big Bad, but ultimately turned good and suffered massive Himification.
- In an episode of Angel, Wolfram & Hart create a diversion to distract Angel while they extract vital information from Lorne's mind. Angel completely falls for this ruse despite its similarity to one that Angelus used on Buffy in "Becoming". Indeed, Angelus often seems a bit more clever than Angel, perhaps because Angelus is not burdened by any loyalties to his friends. A lampshade was hung on this in Season 4, with Cordelia observing that Angelus is "smart" and Angel taking umbrage.
- Connor, also from Angel, personified Good Is Dumb. As a conflicted character, he was constantly switching sides; when fighting at his father's side he was a bit slower than Angel and not as agile, but when he fought against the good guys he was like Spider-Man with a cause, decking multiple foes with each blow and always one step ahead.
- Illyria in Angel too. When she was first introduced, and seemed as if she'd be the Big Bad of the 5th season, she was downright godlike in her invincibility. Wolfram and Hart, the main villains of the entire series, were collectively so weak in comparison as to be like insects to her. There were other characters in Buffy The Vampire Slayer and Angel who were actual gods, and Illyria could've overpowered any of them. But when she ended up more or less on the heroes' side, it's quickly revealed that her new, human body can't handle that level of power, and she gets powered down to the point that a minion of Wolfram and Hart is able to beat her into the ground.
- Averted in Heroes with Noah Bennet, aka HRG. After his Heel Face Turn he STILL keeps a serious amount of competency and shrewdness. Taking down an angry lunatic in midair, taking out and torturing an electric hurling assassin, killing his mentor in cold blood, and utterly owning the annoying manager of the copy store where he worked. The only noted exception being with the activities of his teenage daughter but to his defense is there ANY TV Dad who is competent in that regard?
Film
- One of the worst examples of this is in the James Bond film Diamonds Are Forever. The main Bond girl is Tiffany Case, a professional diamond smuggler. In the first half of the film, she's shown to be a seasoned pro, good at her criminal work, with enough authority to even have her own henchmen. Late in the film, she successfully (and cleverly) eludes a crowded auditorium loaded with CIA agents ready to arrest her. After she turns good, her brains go south, particularly over a mix-up with cassette tapes. This prompts both Bond and Blofeld to make snide remarks about what an "idiot" she is.
Anime
- Vegeta in Dragonball Z had destroyed dozens of planets, but when he turned good, he was left permanent second-banana to Goku. At one point, he willingly becomes a minion of the current Big Bad, pointing out that as a hero, he could only ever be second-rate, but he was a damned good villain.
- That Vegeta is a better villain than hero is further highlighted by the fact that shortly after this he makes a second Heel Face Turn, in which he attemps to save the world via a Heroic Sacrifice. And fails.
- Another example would be the debut of Yamcha in Dragonball. While initially posing a threat to Goku and then quickly turning good, Yamcha doesn't legitimately win a battle in the next 400-something episodes, eventually rapidly fading from relevance.
- Ditto Tienshinhan, who permanently crippled his first on-screen opponent, nearly did the same to Yamcha, and stood toe-to-toe with Goku in their first fight (and technically won), yet was quickly banished to Jobberdom. Only stayed in the big leagues due to his Kikohou/Tri-Beam, which literally sapped the life from him. (And even then, later on, it was only good enough to sucker-punch Super Buu, who swiftly - and apparently permanently - returned the favor.)
- In fact, nearly all of Goku's allies were at least rivals to him, and frequently outright villains, when first introduced. And were credible threats to him. But after Defeat Means Friendship kicked in, they were quickly left in the dust by Goku.
- Though really, it's not so much a matter of them losing power as it is everyone else growing in power by monstrous amounts. Goku in particular survived a battle with Vegeta and, in so doing, automatically became stronger than him thanks to his Saiyan physiology reactively evolving him. Seriously
 .
- Tokyo Mew Mew. Retasu. (Just Retasu. Zakuro retained her ability to take out scores of Monsters of the Week at once, but did we ever see Mew Lettuce with the kind of power with which she just about killed Mew Ichigo and Mew Mint used against the bad guys?)
- Possible Aversion: If anything, Fate Testarossa of Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha got stronger. Same with Signum and Vita in the third season. Also inverted in StrikerS; when Ginga is brainwashed, she cannot use anything but her Inherent Skills.
- Mermaid Melody Pichi Pichi Pitch uses this in its second season, to Noel, Coco and especially Caren.
- In Beyblade, just about anyone who fought the Bladebreakers and reformed. The most egregious examples in this editor's mind are the Saint Shields, who provided a legitimate challenge for our heroes when they fought them, but were thrown aside by the Big Bad, and Tala, who got demoted from Big Bad in the first season to Kai's second banana in the third. Then he got seriously wounded when fighting the good fight.
- Partially averted in Digimon Adventure, where a very strong minion of the current Big Bad, Gatomon, joins the good guys and is able to progress in strength enough to kill her old master.
- Played straight in Digimon Adventure 02, where the first Big Bad, who was in fact the Emperor of the Digital World, joins the team and is, for the most part, not able to defeat Digimon he would have earlier brainwashed easily. To be fair, part of turning good required giving up the massive brainwashed armies he would have used.
- He also lost that sooper-cute outfit he wore as Emperor. This troper cried when he lost the outfit.
- Played straight in Digimon Season 4 when the amazing badass Duskmon is revealed as the Light Elemental Hero's Dark Twin, turns good, loses the awesome body made from eyeballs look and pterodactyl like beast form, to become shitty-black-lion-mon and proceed to be useless unless and whiny unless his brother wants to go super-fusion with him.
- Naruto offers us The Worf Effect victim Gaara. A psychopathic villain who would kill without a second thought, he severely injured one of the main characters, and it looked like he was about to kill Sasuke. After losing to Naruto, he becomes an ally, only to get owned in nearly every fight in which he participates (in the most recent example, he is actually killed having his sealed beast extracted, only to be revived by another character at the cost of her life). The only post-Heel Face Turn fight which he wins is one where he has a tremendous amount of backup. Granted, he is fighting against enemies that are far stronger than before, and still manages to put up a decent fight. But he never wins.
- Jun Manjoume begins Yu-Gi-Oh GX as a snobby but respected duelist in the Obelisk Blue dorms (the highest-ranked class) and a rival to Judai. As the series plays its course, Manjoume leaves the school, returns (but is forced into low-class Osiris Red), grudgingly becomes pals with the gang, and gains an obnoxious spirit partner in the form of Ojama Yellow. He also becomes something of a joke, especially when it comes to his crush on Asuka. At least Season 4 was about him regaining his old strength -- talk about coming full circle.
- Inverted in Pokemon. Jessie and James are bungling fools who can't do anything right, but when they're helping Ash they're almost always vital for saving the day, and much better at battling than they normally are.
- This Troper also seems to recall that Chimchar from season...what was it now, 5? Yeah...from the Diamond and Pearl Arc was particularly worthless on the Bad Team, but suddenly became very useful due to Ash's compassion with his Pokemon.
- Zelgadis from Slayers, to a certain extent. While shown to have impressive powers while he still opposes the group and/or is in the plot's spotlight, once he joins the party he becomes close to useless combat-wise. Whenever he attacks, the attack usually accomplishes nothing, if only to show how powerful their adversary is. Also, his demonic ability to move faster than the eye can track seems to be largely forgotten, as it never allows him to dodge out of the way of incoming cannon blasts or spells while the rest of the party are unable to. The times when he does accomplish something in battle, it's usually something another character could've done just as well, be it shield or levitation. However, his decreasingly important role in battle is somewhat redeemed by the sheer variety of his skills, the hardiness of his stony skin (which enables him to take a cannonball to the head only to have it bounce off) and the fact that he's pretty much the only mature one in the group and often makes important discoveries and observations that the others had missed.
- Avoided in Dragon Quest: Dai no Daibouken. When he leaves the dark side, Hyunckel loses some of his power; it's later explained to be a side-effect of losing the internal conflict that had driven him since childhood. When he finally finds a new reason to fight, he becomes more powerful than ever.
- Usually played so straight it hurts in Kinnikuman, whereby a character trumped up to be an analytical genius killing machine cyborg proceeds to lose every damn fight after his Heel Face Turn except for one. The reason for that was losing his memory and snapping back to his original brutal nature for part of the fight, thereby showing no restraint in mauling the opponent severely.
- A notable exception is found in the early enemy wrestler Ramenman, however. The authors were originally going to use him only for the first Tournament Arc, but proved so popular they brought him back as a hero, at which point he usually kicked someone's ass left and right without breaking a sweat once per arc.
- Averted by Shuten Doji/Anubis from Ronin Warriors, who becomes even more powerful after breaking free from Talpa's mind control and even going on to take over the mantle of the Ancient One when the previous one died.
- Averted by Mahou Sensei Negima and Evangaline. She starts out powerful enough to cause Negi and Asuna trouble. Turns out she wasn't fighting too hard. All her later appearances she's just generally more powerful than she was before, beating down every hero the series has and one arc pulling a Big Damn Heroes and destroying a Demon God (nearly) single handedly. She's not all that good yet, for the most part she's gone from Lawful Evil to Chaotic Neutral.
- Massively inverted with Viral in Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann. After his first appearance he suffered steady Villain Decay, eventually reaching the point where he was effortlessly tossed aside in seconds, but when he joins Simon and pilots Gurren Lagann they becomes able to destroy hordes of enemies by the sheer awesomeness of their presense.
- Renji from Bleach is an example of this trope, albeit a justified one. By the time he comes around to the good guys side, the only baddies left to fight are the ones that would have kicked his ass even when he was on their side.
- Subverted in Code Geass, when Ineffectual Sympathetic Villain Jeremiah (Orange) does his Heel Face Turn he actually becomes more badass.
Western Animation
- Scavenger in Transformers Armada was initially a quite a big threat, until he became an Autobot and started taking a lot of naps.
- Exception: Dinobot of Transformers: Beast Wars started as a bad guy Predacon, but joined the Maximal good guys in the second episode. As a villain he was good but not overwhelmingly powerful, and after joining the Maximals he remained one of their most effective warriors up until his death. And he died fighting against every Predacon warrior in the series at that point in rapid succession, to boot!
- From the same series, though, Blackarachnia was notably less effective as a Maximal than she was as a Predacon, though more because of inner emotional distress than any explicit depowering.
- After his Heel Face Turn to the side of good on Gargoyles, Xanatos laments that he's not as pro-active as he was when a villain, being limited to reacting to threats rather than causing them.
- In the Rankin-Bass holiday special Santa Claus Is Coming To Town, the Winter Warlock appears as a villain with massive powers of weather control. After Kris Kringle uses The Power Of Friendship to melt his icy heart, he later sadly explains his powers are now limited to a few novelty gimmicks (such as corn that makes reindeer fly).
- Lampshaded in Avatar The Last Airbender: When the Turncoat Zuko suddenly finds himself unable to Firebend, he almost instantly (and correctly) concludes, "I bet it's because I changed sides", and has to spend the rest of the episode getting it back.
- Averted too, in that when he does get his powers back, they're at least as good as they were before, if not better. Avatar seems to be taking the Star Wars path here: Good is actually more powerful than evil, it's just much harder.
- Subverted in Xiaolin Showdown, where Jack Spicer does a temporary Heel Face Turn and becomes far more competent, brave and useful. Sadly he creeps the monks out...
- Partially seen, partially subverted in Jackie Chan Adventures. After his Heel Face Turn, the show's initial The Dragon, Tohru, is largely left out of combat situations, relogated to being Uncle's "Chi magic apprentice" (which largely involved fetching ingredients and helping Uncle chant out demon exorcism spells). On the rare occasions he does get into a fight, however, Tohru is usually depicted as just as powerful as he was when he was on the other side. Of course, he is about 8 to 10 feet tall, making his strength something that's hard for the writers to forget. Also explained by the show's lack of So Last Season, at least in terms of the main characters' normal abilities.
- In The Batman, the original Clayface, Ethan Benett turns good and goes fighting a new clayface who has the exact same powers. Despite having three more years to practice with his powers, Benett still looses miserably to the new clayface, who just got his power a few days ago.
- This had more to do with the new Clayface taking an ass-load more putty than Benett as he became infected intentionally.
Video Games
- Particularly egregious example: Magus in Chrono Trigger (although this is explained by having a significant portion of his powers drained by the Big Bad).
- Exception: The Super Robot Wars games occasionally reward the player for superior performance (or just satisfying extremely obscure requirements) with a playable boss character who retains his or her boss abilities and stats. Notable examples are Neo Granzon in Super Robot Wars Gaiden and Nashim Gun-Eden in Super Robot Wars Alpha 3, both of which are at least an order of magnitude harder to kill than any other unit in the player's army.
- The same series also plays it straight with non-bonus characters; one of the more extreme examples is in Original Generation 2, where a boss character who pulls a Heel Face Turn goes from having 100,000 HP to 5,500 - in the middle of a battle.
- An exception also comes up in Super Robot Wars Reversal(SRWR). After fighting the rival robot of Gear Fighter Dendou, Gear Fighter Ogre, you can get it and it's stats will go down but if during a route split you coose to fight the possessed Subaru who is using Ogre after the battle you get him back and find out that the bad guys put Ogre back to the stats it had before and you get to keep them this time.
- In Super Robot Wars Original Generations 2 there is another exception. Initial bad guy Arado had stats worse than your average mook when he fights you, but instantly becomes much more capable after he joins you.
- Utterly averted in Super Robot Wars F, where the big bad's Dragon undergoes a Heel Face Turn in the final battle and fights on your side; His machine still has the same 50,000 HP it had when you fought him, and he deploys with full Morale, allowing him to use the same devastating moves he used on you. Further, Gale and Julia of SPT Layzner have the same stats they had as bosses when they join you.
- Played straight in the same game with Johnny and Yuu's sister from Brainpowerd, who's Barons are more powerful then all but Nelly Brain, but are nowhere near the 60k they exhibited as bosses.
- Subverted in Disgaea 2, where such a Heel Face Turn was the result of a loss in power by pseudo-antagonist Etna. Even then, she shows every sign of only hanging around the protagonist and his entourage until she regains her former power (descriptions of which are rife with fourth-wall breakage).
- Tales of Symphonia has a few rather blatant examples of this with Kratos, Sheena and Regal, with Kratos' actually happening in reverse order. What makes it strange is that Kratos is fought both in a normal and solo fight, and when fought solo, Lloyd tells him not to hold anything back, but he not only has only 1/4 the HP he has in the normal boss fights, but appears to have taken considerably more damage when the fight is over.
- Tales of Destiny pits you against Leon Magnus, a genius swordsman who is tasked with kicking the snot out of the hero and his party. Given that this happens within the first few hours of the game, the party isn't even near the level needed to wear down his 9999 health points and survive his attacks. However, once he joins you, his level and stats are barely any higher than those of your other characters. And of course, when he turns against the party halfway through the game, he suddenly gets a whopping five digit health and access to moves that the party member version didn't.
- The Remake gives this more of a realism by reducing the boss version's HP and statistics to around what they should be when he joins the party, and instead just made him literally unbeatable.
- Zero from the Mega Man X games is at his most powerful when he's fighting against the player: he even has access to moves that the playable Zero is never able to use. In X5, if playing as Zero in the third fortress stage, you fight X, and he does the same thing, using the Ultimate Armor that is otherwise attainable only through a cheat code or as a Guide Dang It.
- Potentially justified, depending on how you view it. X and Zero are both well-aware of each other's capabilities, which means that they are forced to go all out against each other, using techniques they would not use otherwise. Of course, the real reason is that the player needs to be challenged, but, well, it's potentially justifiable...
- Similarly, in fellow Capcom game Devil May Cry 3, the playable version of Vergil (accessible in the Special Edition) lacks moves that the boss version can do. However, playable Vergil does get some moves his boss incarnations don't, and the series also tends to make Dante, the hero, far more Badass than any evil counterpart.
- Variation: One of the drama CDs of Guilty Gear depicts an Alternate Universe in which the character Dizzy -- a sweet, innocent Friend To All Living Things in the games -- inherits the title of Big Bad from her mother. In the games, she's more or less toe-to-toe with the rest of the characters (sort of), partly because she's trying to suppress her powers so she doesn't hurt anyone -- although this doesn't seem to change drastically when she goes berserk in the third game. In the Alternate Universe, she singlehandedly destroys a fleet of airships using one move.
- Nitros, from the game Bomberman Hero. During the game, he's quite a hard guy to defeat, using all kinds of weird powers. But at one point, after you defeat him, he realizes he's been brainwashed and adds his power to yours. But do you get any special board-game based attacks? Nope, you get to lay more bombs. The funny thing here is that you'd have to be more powerful than him to defeat him in the first place. Also, as soon as you next die or turn off the game, you lose all that power. And you don't get any power from beating him another time replaying the level - it only happens when you first trigger the cutscene.
- Averted in Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door. When Vivian joins your party, she is actually stronger than she was in the fight against her and the other Shadow Sirens much earlier in the game. In fact, if you fully upgrade her stats, she will be equal in strength to her ex-fellow siren Beldam during the rematch at the end of the game.
- She doesn't manage a complete aversion, though. When she turns, she has to relearn her Fiery Jinx spell by leveling up - though when she does relearn it, it's still several times stronger.
- In Ultima 7 part 2, Selina the sorceress briefly joins with you early in the quest, is absolutely worthless at doing anything, and teleports out when the going gets tough. Later on, she turns up as an antagonist, and is surprisingly effective at that.
- Inverted in the Half Life series. In Half Life, where the Vortigaunts are enemies, they're low-to-mid-range opponents who aren't too much to worry about. In the Half Life 2 games, where they're on your side, they're more powerful combatants and have also gained almost mystical healing and mechanical abilities. This may have something to do with the slave collars they were wearing in Half Life but not in Half Life 2, however.
- Subverted in Zone Of The Enders Fist Of Mars: It's possible for the villain's cohort to Face Heel Turn, and although she loses her powerful boss mech, she still maintains her well-above-par stats. On the good path, you can recruit someone in a boss mech with an absrud amount of hp (20000, when the others have like 5000) and strong attacks, and in the next fight she will be at full strength. Although she'll have trouble hitting the fast final boss, she will take a ridiculous amount of attacks and OHKO the minions. Also, this game subverts Evil Is Cool.
- Averted in the 10th Fire Emblem. The Black Knight (a boss from the 9th game that is arguably harder then the final one (but is not optional)) briefly joins the party to protect Micaiah. The only thing that stops him from being a Game Breaker is that he takes away experience points (in a game where they are limited) from horribly under leveled units that desperately need it.
- In Fire Emblem 7, Vaida is an enemy with greatly increased stats, the boss of a "survive" mission (i.e., you don't have to kill her to win, so don't even try because she has at least +5 to every stat). When she joins a mission later, she is thoroughly mediocre. Justified in that she was powered up by the Big Bad's magic.
- In an unintentional subversion, the player can use a glitch to steal Vaida's Spear, the item that was coded to increase all of her stats (dubbed the "uber spear" by fangroups), and give it back to her in the next mission, allowing her to retain her beastly stats even while Good.
- Similar: In Puzzle Quest: Challenge Of The Warlords, you'll often find that after capturing an opponent, the uber-spell you were hoping to learn from it isn't available. (for instance, you can't learn Deathsting from the Giant Wasp or Breathe Ice from the Frost Dragon). Also, since the mana costs of learned spells are 50% higher than from "natural" use, often you won't have enough of a certain level to use it, even with full mana levels (Ex: You need 30 Blue Mana to use the Call The Horde spell, but Orc Lords only need 20) or the cost per attack isn't worth it (Rend is deadly in the hands of a Wyvern, not so much in yours).
- Justified in Legend of Spyro: A New Beginning. The villain for almost the entire game, Cynder, is actually a baby dragon, mutated into a powerful adult-like form by the powers of the actual main villain. Once she is defeated, she is cut off from these powers and reverts to her natural younger-looking, weaker, and much less badass form. She remains in this form throughout the ending and subsequent Spyro games, where she is a protagonist.
- Averted in Final Fantasy IX with Worthy Opponent Beatrix, who proves to be more than a match for your party as you battle her time and time again. However, when she realizes the ruler she has sworn fealty to has gone mad, she joins your party, and proves to be every bit as powerful as she was when you fought her. Sadly, she doesn't stay long.
- At least you can swipe her goods from her before she leaves for good. However, her kick ass sword can't be removed and her other equipment are sub par if you managed to get all the best items to date by the time you get to move her stuff.
- Particularly bad in Castlevania III when you must fight two of you possible allies - Grant and Alucard - before they join your party. Not only do they take more hits and do more damage when you fight them, but they're significantly larger in size as well.
- Partial exception: Destiny of an Emperor allows the player to recruit bosses at their full strength. However, since the main P Cs gain soldiers (the game's equivalent of HP) over the course of the game and the bosses (and less important allies) don't, the bosses-turned-allies eventually become worthless. Except Zhou Yu.
- Every Star Wars game ever made where jedi powers are available to the player. Light side powers are always defensive powers meant to resist the effect of enemy weapons and dark side powers, the latter being incredibly devastating offensive powers. Because you can't defeat your opponents by hiding behind a shield but you can push the "I WIN" button with a well placed force choke or lightning, there is very little incentive to become anything else than a megalomaniac sith bent on galaxy domination.
Comic Books
- Juggernaut, in the X-Men comics, was a literally unstoppable force. Basically the only way to defeat him was to trick him into going away (or, to be fair, to remove his telepath-blocking helmet, but getting the thing off generally necessitated a battle royale). After going through a Wonderful Life montage, he repented his evil ways and joined the good guys' side. Despite formerly being able to take out entire teams of superheroes by himself, he was now having trouble taking on solo villains as 'part' of a team. Justified in that the evil god who gave Juggernaut his powers was displeased by his servant's kinder, gentler personality and was slowly removing his powers.
- Similarly, long-time X-Men adversary Magneto is one of the most powerful mutants in the Marvel Universe...except when he switches sides.
- In her first appearance, a villainous Rogue took on the entire Avengers by herself and was a major force in her early encounters with the X-men. Then she joins the X-Men and is thereafter beaten up by all subsequent villains to show how tough they are (okay, slight exaggeration). Justified (a bit) by her being less willing to use her increasingly problematic absorption powers.
Webcomics
- Averted, subverted, and lampshaded in this Order Of The Stick comic.
- Sluggy Freelance both subverts this trope and plays it straight with the Dimension of Lame characters. Alt-Riff's inventions actually work far better than normal Riff's, and Alt-Gwynn has much greater control of her magic. Unfortunately, they're also die-hard pacifists. Where the normal Riff and Gywnn would have fended off the invasion of their dimension with killer robots and blasts of magical power, the best attack Alt-Riff can manage is a Retreat-Bot that trampels the occasional demon, and Alt-Gwynn never harms any demons, just uses a spell to gently set them down somewhere else.
Other
- This happens a lot in Professional Wrestling too; after a Heel Face Turn, the new face proceeds to fall for all of the tricks that he perpetrated as a bad guy. See Jericho, Chris.
- Subverted by Batista, who turns face and, thanks to being Genre Savvy, anticipates and counters the heels' tricks.
- Also subverted by Eddie Guerrero's final face turn, as he continued to use all the dirty tricks he used to... except that now the fans were cheering him for it.
- Actually that was pretty typical of Eddie's face runs. At least with the WWF/WWE; I never saw him in WCW. His motto after all was "Lie, Cheat, and Steal". The only difference between heel Eddie and face Eddie was that as a face he was played for laughs.
- Of course, the flipside of this is that a wrestler who was able to get clean wins as a face will only be able to win by cheating after a Face Heel Turn.
- Reputedly lampshaded by Ric Flair, who said he didn't cheat because he needed to, but because he could.
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