History Main / HeroDoesPublicService

** In the ''[[Comicbook/TheAvengers Avengers]]'' story arc "The Search for She-Hulk" Shulkie is eventually found helping repair a community devastated by one of [[ComicBook/TheIncredibleHulk her cousin's]] rampages.

* ''ComicBook/{{Superman}}'': Superman is known for this. What makes him special amongst the superhero ranks is that no job is too big or too small for him. One day, he's halfway across the galaxy fighting a universal threat. The next, he's reading books to orphans or planting gardens. In one issue, a little girl is lost in an airport and crying because she can't find her mom. A figure in shadow offers to help her and you assume the worst. Cut to the next page and it's [[AllLovingHero Superman]]. [[FriendToAllChildren He calms the little girl and tells her that he'll help find her mom]]. After carrying the little girl on his shoulders as they float above the people in the airport, Superman picks up the shouts of the girl's mother. After reuniting them, the woman apologizes to Superman for troubling him and saying he must have more important things to do. Superman simply responds with "Honestly? I can't think of anything more important".

* ''ComicBook/{{Batman}}'': In ''ComicBook/BatmanIncorporated'', Man-of-Bats is a doctor in his civilian identity who, in his very limited spare time, also does pro bono work and tries to battle alcoholism.

This can apply to mundane heroes such as police officers just as easily as it can to {{superhero}}es. Coaching kids' sports leagues is a very common choice for the extracurricular activity, since it lets them show off their athleticism while at the same time doing good in the community.

* Sailor Venus, both in ''Manga/SailorMoon'' and ''Manga/CodenameSailorV'' does this often. Aside for being the one confirmed blood donor of the Sailor Soldiers (having started on-page in ''Codename: Sailor V'', and being seen doing it again in the first anime), she's going to help ''anyone'' in need, no questions asked-no matter if she'd just like to go home and rest after having donated enough blood she should be ''dead'', climbed a building, destroyed the MonsterOfTheWeek and climbed down in the last ten minutes and is only standing thanks to eight ''cans'' of tomato juice (and yes, [[SincerityMode that specific event actually happened]]).

** In the second movie, ''Anime/MyHeroAcademiaHeroesRising'', the hero work ''is'' public service. UA sends Class 1A to work as heroes on the small island of Nabu. But since the island is so peaceful, their jobs mostly consist of lifeguard duties, finding lost items, and helping out with household chores.

* ''ComicBook/NewAvengers'': The Avengers take time in between adventures with cosmic level threats to stand on street corners in bad neighborhoods to help make people feel more secure and let small-time crooks know they're not below them.

** In another story, Jen Walters volunteers with Green Cross (an organization devoted to helping victims of the Hulk's actions) to clean up the town that she herself trashed during one of her own rampages. Initially, she works incognito, but ultimately comes out as She-Hulk to expose a woman who's trying to use She-Hulk's actions to cover up her murdering her husband.

* ''ComicBook/SpiderMan, ComicBook/{{Storm|MarvelComics}} and ComicBook/LukeCage'': The [[DrugsAreBad anti-smoking miniseries]] opened with Luke Cage coaching a high school track team (with Peter Parker covering it for the ''Daily Bugle''). The plot (something to do with organized crime and illegal casinos) gets kicked off when he investigates why his star player, Brett, is suddenly not doing so hot.

* ''ComicBook/WonderWoman'' has always had an interest in civic duty, helping out students in most iterations in reading, science and sports programs. Additionally she's [[ComicBook/WonderWoman1942 aided in prison reform studies]] and helped domestic violence victims who are being [[ComicBook/WonderWoman1987 stalked and harassed]] or [[ComicBook/WonderWoman2006 brutally attacked while on the line with a support center]].

* ''Fanfic/RedFireRedPlanet'': One {{infodump}} mentions that Brokosh, C.O. of the IKS ''mupwI[='=]'', started a sort of community center in one of the slums on the fringes of First City on Qo'noS with two other KDF-aligned Lethean mercenaries and a Romulan Republic officer named Makus. Unfortunately he also doesn't think it'll do a whole lot of good without some help from the Klingon High Council.

* In ''Fanfic/BrilliantLightsWillCeaseToBurn'', Izuku runs all over Musutafu doing random errands for people, whether it's delivering goods, reading to orphans, translating Latin scriptures, he's widely recognized as the city's gopher. He runs himself ragged keeping his responsbilities once he becomes the Cardcaptor and it's only because of everyone's faith in him that his SecretIdentity as the vigilante Deku [[OpenSecret stays a secret.]]
* In ''Fanfic/MyHuntsmanAcademia'', Izuku runs out to grocery shop for a few hours in the sidestory, "Charitable Disadvantages". It turns into an all-day affair once his ChronicHeroSyndrome kicks in. He helps a local homeless shelter feed hundreds of people when he saw how overworked its manager was. After this, he helps an old widower with her groceries even though her apartment was opposite the direction of the bullhead shuttle. Then he stops to play with a lonely Faunus boy who aspires to be a Huntsman but [[AllOfTheOtherReindeer is left out of the games the other kids play]] [[FantasticRacism because of his heritage]].

* In the Franchise/{{Batman}} fanfic [[https://archiveofourown.org/works/39338058 Spoiler Alert: It Gets Better.]] Jason and the other Bat-kids run/volunteer at a no questions asked style youth shelter called "Robin's Nest". Jason in costume as Red Hood due to his legally dead status and the others under their real names.

* Played with in the ''Literature/{{Discworld}}'' novel ''Literature/{{Jingo}}'', where Captain Carrot first appears playing football with disadvantaged kids... where this means two of the nastiest street gangs in the city who are only going along with this because Carrot has that kind of effect on people. Once Carrot's left and the spell wears off, the only thing stopping war breaking out is how embarrassed they all are by the past hour, so they'd prefer to pretend it never happened.
* Every last character in the ''Literature/VillageTales'' novels who's not irredeemably rotten does this. Seaside holiday for the children? The Duke, the Rector, and the Deputy Headmaster have it covered. Hampers of food for those down with 'flu? Lady Crispin will be there, with her maid. Intervening to reform … by any means necessary … a drunkard and spousal abuser? The curate, Fr. Bohun, will step in: less as second-career clergyman than as Sir Gilbert Bohun Bt [=MC=], late [[MajorlyAwesome Major]], the Blues and Royals. Commandeering the brewery to make fruit squash and lemonade for the care home when a delivery goes astray? The Duke and Lady Crispin strike again: enlisted by the Rector. Taking the youths for footy? Senior curate Fr. Campion, enlisting the aid of retired Premier Leaguer and JP, Edmond Huskisson. Even the postman stops on his rounds to change a light-bulb for an old lady with rheumatism.

** {{Exploited|Trope}} in "[[Recap/CastleS2E21DenOfThieves Den of Thieves]]". Tom Demming, a detective from Robbery, is briefly suspected by Beckett, Castle, et al. to be the Killer of the Week. Demming alibis out on account of he was coaching an underprivileged youth basketball league at the time of the murder.

* In one ChristmasEpisode of ''Series/NCISLosAngeles'' Kensi is at loose ends Christmas Eve, so Deeks brings her along on his "date", which is serving meals at a food bank.

--> '''Wonder Woman:''' The sky's the limit when it comes to buying bonds!
* Several team members on ''Series/CriminalMinds'' also do community service-type things in their spare time. Garcia runs a grief counselling group for families of crime victims (which has become plot relevant in two episodes), JJ volunteers with new moms, Morgan unofficially mentors a kid back in his hometown of Chicago, and Hotch coaches his son's soccer team with Rossi as an assistant. And if you want to stretch it a little bit, Gideon and Blake both taught at the FBI academy in between cases. It sort of makes you wonder how any of them have time for a personal life.

-->-- ''Series/{{Castle}}'', "Den of Thieves"

* ''Series/{{Castle}}'':