He's not good. He's not nice. He's a jerkass. What he just said is not what the main characters wanted to hear. And yet, he's right.
The jerkass in question can be anything from your ISO Standard Jerkass or Anti-Hero all the way up to any flavor of Villain (though the chance is inversely proportional to the distance they go down the "slippery slope"). Whoever he or she is, they're seriously deficient in the morals department, at least from the point of view of the perspective characters. Then they have a moment where they say something undeniably true - the good guys don't have to like what he's saying, but they can't deny he's right without deluding themselves. Perhaps even the protagonist is caught on a moral stumbling block, and the antagonist is all too glad to point out their hypocrisy. After all, at least the antagonist is honest about it.
The other main reason a character is likely to say "I don't believe I'm saying this, but I agree with him."
It's worth noting that the Alpha Bitch and the Jerk Jock, two of the main distributors of this trope, have a tendency toward bluntness. While our hero's friends may be hesitant to insult him, these characters don't really care what he thinks and are willing to say exactly what he's doing wrong, without sugarcoating their "What the Hell, Hero?".
A rare outcome of the claim "We are Not So Different". A response of "Shut Up, Hannibal!" would be out of place, and is likely to get shot down if it appears. See also Not Himself and What the Hell, Hero? for situations likely to inspire this. See Don't Shoot the Message for what happens when this occurs in Real Life. Sister Trope to Dumbass Has a Point and Wisdom from the Gutter.
Contrast Strawman Has a Point, when a character who is often unpleasant makes a point that readers are meant to see as wrong and characters dismiss, but which is supported at least in part by evidence. Cases of Jerkass Has a Point typically involve the listener conceding the point or a trustworthy source agreeing with the jerkass.
Although Vegeta was too harsh with Gohan about him getting weaker in the Buu saga and how his fight with Dabura was a "disgrace," he made a good point.
In the Saiyan Saga, Yajirobe invokes this after the fight against Vegeta, calling out Chi-Chi for focusing entirely on Gohan, who was merely unconscious, while ignoring Goku, who didn't have a single unbroken bone in his body.
In Mirai Nikki, Minene Uryuu, the Ninth, is an insanely violent version of the Nay Theist; having lost her parents to a religiously inspired conflict, she became a terrorist herself, focusing on attacking religious buildings, relics, priests, and congregations. Her most fervent belief is that religion should be stamped out, as if God does exist, then he is clearly far too malevolent to be worthy of reverence. Then we discover that Deus, who for all practical purposes is God in this series, has decided that the best way to decide on a replacement in order to keep reality running is... to give a dozen random people, most of whom are extremely warped in the head, magical diaries that foretell the future and provide other magical powers, and tell them that whoever kills off all the others, regardless of how many innocent casualties it takes, will take his place.
Neon Genesis Evangelion: Whenever she's not just putting him down, Asuka can sometimes make a valid point to Shinji about his issues.
Hes Dedicated To Roses: The leader of the Girl Posse give I-Da one of these after breaking her glasses. Subverted in that that wasn't what she had intended.
Revolutionary Girl Utena: The resident Jerk AssButt Monkeys Saionji and Nanami start making good points and recognising how they all are being manipulated towards the end of the series, but by then, each are teetering on the brink of insanity, so no-one listens to them.
Weiss Kreuz: Reiji Takatori is the Big Bad of the TV series, and antagonizes Weiss and their boss Persia aka his brother Shuiichi. However, in a certain confrontation, he brings up a pretty valid point in regards to their subordinates (which in Reiji's case, are his own sonsHirofumi and Masafumi), summed up as this: "You tell ME I use my sons to my advantage?! Look at the way you treat your four subordinates, you hypocrite! Specially the little guy whom you thought he was my kid... and who happens to be YOUR illegitimate son!" And then he kills Persia.
In Naruto, Orochimaru was the one who gave Tsunade the idea of starting a unit of medical ninjas to minimize battlefield casualties, though that was way before he turned to full-blown villainy. He was a recognized hero of Konoha, pegged to be the next Hokage and genuinely her friend at the time.
Sasuke gets this from time to time in Part 1. When Sakura complains about Naruto and says that he is a Bratty Half-Pint because he has no parents (which definitely strikes a nerve for Sasuke), Sasuke tells Sakura that she has no idea what Naruto went through, and after he leaves, she decides to start being nicer to Naruto. Shortly before the Chunin Exam, he tells her that she's as annoying as Naruto is and in terms of skill, even weaker than he is. During the Forest of Death, when Naruto and Sasuke are incapacitated, Sakura realizes that despite thinking herself superior to Naruto, she can't do anything when it counts, and goes through Character Development as a result.
However, it should be noted that Sakura got to be this in the Forest of Death as well, calling Sasuke out for always having such a superior attitude while talking to Naruto, and yet now was frozen in fear while Naruto fought for their lives.
The Fourth Raikage is often depicted as arrogant, stubborn and somewhat hypocritical. When Naruto's pleas for him not to kill Sasuke are dismissed as weakness, Naruto agrees to the extent that he has to either save or kill Sasuke himself.
Played with in the case of the Nine-Tailed Demon Fox, when Naruto heads out into the Fourth Ninja World War. In a conversation in his subconscious, Naruto declares that he will end the war himself, and won't let anyone down, The Nine-Tails points out that hatred and grudges have shaped the way of the world for as long as there has been shinobi, and the war is just another example of that hatred being brought to the surface, asking him how he expects to overcome it, if he's expected to use it. He then gets specific and mentions Naruto's failure to turn Sasuke, and noted that he has carried that hatred even as far back as their first meeting as children. While Naruto makes it clear what he will deal with Sasuke, and end the war, he has met a number of foes have largely been Zetsu copies, and zombies of legendary ninjawho want to rest in peace, before another example of this trope, Itachi, points out that taking it all on yourself can make you arrogant and no better than Tobi. So, in one sense, Nine-Tails was onto something...
Medaka Box: Right after being defeated, Kumagawa makes an point about Medaka's decision to make Kumagawa her Vice-President remarking that she's ignoring Zenkichi's feelings. Personal feelings aside, Kumagawa was nonetheless a dangerous minus who blinded Zenkichi, so distrust of Kumagawa was still partially justified.
Naze calls out the rest of the student council for their bystander attitude after Medaka beats Zenkichi into a bloody pulp.
Kumagawa does it again in Chapter 174. While erasing Zenkichi from existence was quite extreme, it manages to force Shiranui to admit her true feelings rather than continuing her Jerkass Façade.
Fullmetal Alchemist: Solf J. Kimblee. Jerkass has many points. Played especially straight in Ch. 60 where he lectures Mustang and Hawkeye about the nature of killing, free will, and military duty in the midst of war. Kimblee's words affect them so much, they decide to lose the self-pity, accept responsibility for their acts, and atone by putting into motion a long-term plan to change the leadership of the country from below.
In One Piece, after Kaku is revealed as a Cipher Pol 9 spy, Zoro asks him if the fact that he is not a real shipwright means that his assessment that the Going Merry was unable to reach the next island was incorrect, but Kaku says that he was telling the truth back then. Later on, when he goes to the place where Franky and Usopp are going to the ship, he chides Usopp for keeping Merry around, before dumping it into the stormy ocean. Kaku is correct, and the Merry falls apart after saving the Straw Hats from Enies Lobby.
Hody Jones states the painful and obvious truth when giving Princess Shirahoshi "The Reason You Suck" Speech. While yes, it was admirable that she kept quiet about who her mother's killer was and wanted to "prevent the cycle of hatred" from continuing, but by not telling anyone said person grew only worse in their murderous, racist ways before they would eventually initiate a bloody coup d'etat on the kingdom.
In a similar way to Hody, Crocodile tells Luffy that he finds Vivi's idealism impractical, suggesting that the idea of saving everyone is naive. Luffy agrees, but points out that as she's willing to risk her own life to stop his plan, he'll fight so she doesn't have to.
In Yu-Gi-Oh!, Joey Wheeler's deck gets stolen by a kid, but quickly gets it back. Later, he faces Weevil Underwood in a duel, but finds that his deck has been sabotaged, putting him at a disadvantage. Joey and his friends realize that Weevil hired the kid to sabotage the deck and angrily condemn Weevil for cheating. Weevil confirms this, but retorts that it is Joey's fault for being so stupid and naive as to not inspect his deck after getting it back.
Later on in the arc, when Yugi is going to confront Joey/Jounouchi, Kaiba, in the original Japanese, tells Yugi that while he showed him the power of cooperation in the tag duel with the Masks of Light and Darkness, he wonders how much that idea will hold up now that his friend is possessed. In the dub, this is changed to him telling Yugi he won't help him unless he stands to benefit.
Weevil gets a bigger one later, in the Doma Arc. When Yami tells him he's horrible, Weevil points out that Yami had used the Seal of Orichalcos in order to win despite knowing that he'd be putting his friend in danger, and that Yugi paid the price. Weevil acknowledges that he is indeed an asshole, but points out that at least he didn't use the seal knowing that he could endanger his friends. Even though he tries not to show it, Yami is visibly affected.
Oberstein of Legend of Galactic Heroes is a magnificent example of this trope. There is practically no one in the show who likes the guy, and yet he always makes arguments that, although devoid of concepts such as honor and often morals, are simply correct and most effective when looked at logically. Even Reinhard states that he has not once liked Oberstein as a person, but followed his advice the most because "that man makes arguments that are so right, they leave no room for debate".
Grimmjow has several good points during the course of the Arrancar arcs. For instance, he points out what's wrong with letting Ichigo survive at the start of the arc, argues why it was better to kill Ichigo and being 95% right, and even asks why Ichigo just won't leave Las Noches despite having accomplished the goal. Ironically enough, each of these have a very irony-filled end; Ichigo ends up killing several of the Espadas by himself, the 95% was because Aizen didn't tell anyone his plans for Ichigo, which also backfires, and that, because Ichigo didn't leave when he had the chance, Orihime is kidnapped AGAIN and that leads into the Curb-Stomp Battle Ichigo recieves from Ulquiorra.
In the pilot, Orihime's father, who turns out to be obsessed with staying with his daughter forever to the point at which he killed her himself, tells her that she shouldn't confess her feelings to Ichigo, because as he is alive and she is not, she will only cause him pain. However, once he's dealt with, Rukia appears to come back with Orihime, as she was denied re-entry, setting up a Sequel Hook in which Ichigo and Orihime could get together.
Mayuri Kurotsuchi, of all people, gets to play this role recently. In the Final Arc, Yamamoto is making preparations for war against the Vandereich, and confronts Mayuri about essentially killing 28,000 residents of the Rukon District to offset the Vandenreich's plans to upset the balance. While discussing it, Mayuri straightforwardly tells him that for not having eliminated the dude who'd later become the Vandereich's Emperor when he should've done so, he's the one who blame for the whole mess in the first place. And he's right.
Afore mentioned Emperor of all people gets such a moment when he basically accuses Yamamoto of being a Retired Monster who used to have little regards for allies or enemies alike - He'd had some Character Development since then, sure, but even during the present storyline, we saw him do such "nice" things as threatening to burn two people who could be considered his surrogate sons out of existence for "breaking the rules", declare a kidnapped main character a traitor and generally being a Knight Templar, and he does have several Genocides under his belt, including that of the Emperor's own people - which serves as something of a Not So Different moment since the Emperor, for all his disturbing brutality, is merely returning the favor.
He decimated the Emperor's people in a war, but he didn't commit genocide against them- that was Mayuri, afterwards. And Yamamoto was pretty justified in his actions because the Emperor and his people were Omnicidal Neutrals (at best) who acts of destroying Hollows completely upset the spiritual balance so much that that it threatened to bring about The End of the World as We Know It- and based on the evidence, the Emperor knew that, and just didn't care.
In Bakuman。, Nanamine, who has a morally dubious plan to rise to the top of Jump, had once sent the main characters as fan mail, but stopped when they started writing Tanto, saying they weren't suited to gag manga. This is a bit of an odd case, in that it takes a while for Nanamine to be revealed as a Jerk Ass, and this opinion was shared by the majority of the characters. He also says that like him, the main characters took risks and defied their editors at times to get what they wanted.
In the finale of Death Note, Near, who, like L, largely only takes on cases that interests him rather than a out of a sense of justice, but hates Kira response to Light Yagami's Hannibal Lecture / Motive Rant was to tell him that "you're nothing more than a crazy serial killer."
In Area 88, Kanzaki of all people warns Ryoko that her fixation on Shin is pathological. He tells Ryoko that her obsession with an absentee Shin is reminiscent of his mother's obsession with his estranged father, which ended with his mother's suicide. Kanzaki's observation was validated in later manga issues that did not make it stateside. Ryoko unsuccessfully attempted suicide after Shin broke her heart over the phone.
Ryoko: I feel bad about saying this, but I think your mother must have been a very weak person. To end up like that, I mean. Even if I were in her situation and lost my man. As long as I had the memory of the love I shared, I'm sure I would be able to handle it. And I would never involve a small child in my problems.
Kanzaki: It's easy to have such an idealistic attitude. But, would your attitude hold up if you were really faced with the same kind of situation? ... Shin has been missing a long time. And you don't know whether he's alive or dead. Yet, you still love him. In retrospect, is your situation any different?
Knuckles of Sonic X is rather aloof and arrogant, and makes severe tactical mistakes like falling for Eggman's fake Heel Face Turns. However some of his resentment towards Sonic's reckless behaviour does make sense (he did get everyone stuck on Earth by acting showy in a fight with Eggman's machinery) and he often points out the stupidity of some of the team's plans. It doesn't help the team tend to just make him their punching bag as a response.
In Muhyo and Roji, while Roji has been given leave from his position as Muhyo's assistant to learn an important lesson about what it is he needs to do. The one who convinces him that rather than worry about his own capabilities, which would leave him useless to Muhyo, he should support Muhyo, is Ebisu, Goryo'sunpleasant and amoral (but also at times sympathetic) sidekick, who does so after telling him his criminal past and loyalty to the Goryo group for taking him in, which allowed him to ultimately accept being fired for his mistake.
Goryo himself later reveals that Ivy's parents were not innocent victims, but rejected an offer of lenience and killed magical law officers while resisting arrest. Surprisingly enough, though, at the end of his fight with Ivy, he has a few chances to Pet the Dog.
While he's typically the hero, Muhyo sends the spirit of Fujiwara to the equivalent of purgatory, saying that his loss against a rain dog was proof of "ineptitude or negligence, neither of which earns (Muhyo's) sympathy". Roji, despite being typically idealistic and kind-hearted, doesn't question this but does question why Muhyo is performing so many sentencings and using up his tempering even before facing Sophie.
Done with Tomoe frequently from Kamisama Kiss. The guy's default personality is sarcastic asshole and the people he likes are not exempt from that sarcasm or his general dickish behavior. That being said, he regularly gives the heroine Nanami sound advice. Too bad she never really listens.
In the Girls Und Panzer prequel manga "Little Army", Miho's friend Emi acts very hostile toward Miho's older sister Maho from their first meeting, causing friction between Miho and Emi. Eventually, Emi reveals the cause of her antipathy toward Maho; Emi's older sister's team went up against Maho's team. While Maho's team was winning, one of its tanks fell into the water, and Emi's sister's team's flag tank went after it, but Maho's tank took the opportunity to shoot at the flag tank and win. Miho is hesitant to believe this, but she asks Maho whether it's true, and is quite upset to hear that it is.
In the main series manga, after the match with Anzio (which waspassed over in the anime), Anchovy, the commander, acts like a Sore Loser, angrily saying she doesn't accept Miho's way of tankery and saying that there is no meaning to tankery unless you strive for victory. Miho fires back with an Armor-Piercing Question that asks if Anchovy believes that her and her team's efforts are meaningless because they lost and says her comrades are most important, but Anchovy replies that the commander's responsibility is to lead the team to victory. Ultimately, it turns out that the only way for Oarai to avert being shut down is to place first in the tournament, something none of Miho's team wants, so it is necessary for Miho to win, although Miho doesn't know that at the time and it's unclear whether Anchovy does.
Rurouni Kenshin: Anti-Hero Saitou is generally placed in this role. Though Kenshin's non-killing philosophy prevails in most instances, Saitou points out that Kenshin's philosophy often gives him more challenges and grief against opponents who do not share it. He also coldly points out that Sano's skills would be of little use in a match in Kyoro, and proves it in a fistfight.
Comics
In volume 4 of Empowered, the protagonist is overjoyed to be running for the Caped Justice Awards, until Sistah Spooky informs her that the award is a setup used to publicly humiliate the receiver and that she should watch out. Given that Sistah Spooky has been nothing but antagonistic from day one (not to mention breaking her own pedestal, since Empowered was a big fan of hers until they met), she assumes Sistah is just raining on her parade. She's not.
In both the graphic novel Watchmen and film adaptation of the selfsame, Ozymandias is moved to set his plan into action after The Comedian mocks (Captain Metropolis in the novel, Ozymandias himself in the film) for trying to form a Super Team and points out that with the Cold War inching mankind closer to nuclear annihilation with each passing moment, running around beating up petty criminals was pretty much irrelevant.
The Comedian also condemns Dr. Manhattan for his noninterference. The Comedian shoots a pregnant Vietnamese woman over Manhattan's objections, and is then chastised for it. While this is obviously a heinous crime, he correctly points out that Manhattan could have prevented it with his godlike powers, by teleporting either party away or changing the gun into something harmless, but chose not to. As it turns out,this passive observation eventually leads to the deaths of thousands.
In Perfection Is Overrated, Nao, despite her antipathy toward Natsuki and largely amoral nature, reminds Natsuki that killing is not something to be done lightly, noting that she has not tried to kill any of the perverts she robbed. Natsuki agrees, but notes that they have little other choice in dealing with Shizune.
After the Sasuke retrieval mission is successful, Kiba in Escape from The Hokage's Hat generally treats Sakura like dirt pointing her out as "Sasuke's whore" or "Useless fangirl". During a spar where he's being especiallyvicious, he says she's the weakest Genin and is pretty much The Load with Naruto (and Sasuke) having had to cover for her being a rather lackluster ninja. He also points out that Naruto at least bothers to nag someone for training (knowing he'll get brushed off) while she was to busy (unsuccessfully) chasing Sasuke. Sakura does snap trying to kill Kiba... because she realizes he's telling the truth.
Sasuke in Naruto Ramen Days rips Tsunade a new one after hearing why she left the village.
Sasuke: "This is the person we went through all this trouble to ask to be our Hokage? Someone who just runs away from all their problems and spends all their time drinking and gambling? Don't think I missed the fact that Jiraiya was looking at casinos and bars when he was trying to find you."
Tsunade: "Now see here, what does a brat like you know about-"
Sasuke: "What do I know about loss? Was your entire family killed in a single night? Did you come home to find your parents lying on the floor, covered in blood? Did you find a single relative still alive, only to find out that he was the one who was responsible? ...I didn't think so. This whole time you've been treating us like we weren't worthy of your time, like we should be thankful you bothered to speak with us at all, when really you're just a coward who abandoned her village and her duties as soon as something went wrong. I guess you were right about one thing; if someone like you is going to be our Hokage, the title really is worthless."
Multiple Naruto fanfiction use another character (notably Sasori in Scorpion Disciple and Sasuke in The Scorned Son) to point out that Naruto constantly boasts that he'll be the next Hokage but puts little to no effort into actually achieving said goal. Likewise that his being an orphan means very little in a village of shinobi where roughly half of the children in shinobi families are missing at least one parent.
Save that Naruto's issues come from being ostracized, not orphaned, and that he is constantly trying to better himself as a ninja...so where's the point being made here?
In the Farscape multicross fanfic "What the Frell Did You Do This Time Erpman?" there is a scene where John Chriton meets with Gaius Baltar, and they can all see the various personalities in each other's head. John, while not a jerkass per se, immediately starts ranting at how unfair it is that despite all his good deeds, all the times he's saved the day, all the sacrifices he's made... and he gets Harvey◊ in his head, while a traitorous, weasel of a man like Gaius gets the super-hot Six◊ living in his head. Harvey starts to protest that a) this is not why they set this conference up, and b) that's not fair to Harvey... but then he takes one long look at Six and admits that, yes, John has a point.
Grinch: That's what it's all about, isn't it? That's what it's always been about! Gifts, gifts, giftsgiftsgiftsgiftsgiftsgifts! You wanna know what happens to your gifts? They all come to me. In your garbage. You see what I'm saying? In your GARBAGE! I could hang myself with all the bad Christmas neckties I found at the dump. And the avarice. THE AVARICE NEVER ENDS! "I want golf clubs!" "I want diamonds!" "I want a pony so I can ride it twice, get bored with it and sell it to make glue!" Look, I don't wanna makes waves, but this whole Christmas season is stupid! Stupid! STUPID! There is, however, one teeny-tiny Christmas tradition that I find quite... meaningful. Mistletoe. Now pucker up and KISS IT, Whoville!
Used in-universe in Gremlins 2 with this exchange:
Clamp: That thing that was in here a minute ago, that's dangerous! This guy's from the art department.
Forster: Well, ask him how he knows so much about these "green things".
Clamp: That's a good question Bill – how do you know so much about them?
Night of the Living Dead, If Ben and the rest of the group had listened to Harry and hunkered down in the basement, they would have had a much better chance of surviving.
The Last King Of Scotland: Stone, the arrogant Smug Snake British official whom the protagonist hates, turns out to be completely right about Amin's brutality. When Garrigan tries to get help from him, he only decides to if he does his bidding.
Dean Wormer and the Mayor are, respectively, a jerk and a crook... and their dislike of and desire to be rid of Delta Tau Chi Fraternity are perfectly understandable and reasonable.
Nixon: Maybe some people would not think of a 19 year old college kid who protests against The Vietnam War as a Jerk Ass, but Nixon certainly does:
Richard M. Nixon: She got it, Bob. 19-year-old college kid.
Thor: Loki has two very good points. Putting Thor on the throne of Asgard at the beginning of the film would have been a very bad idea. Also, when he accuses Odin of adopting him for political reasons only, it is apparent that it strikes very close to home.
Larry the Liquidator in Other Peoples Money. He seems to revel in the fact that he's hated for getting rich by destroying companies. But when people actually talk to him, he's quick to point out that he's just salvaging the value from companies that were essentially dead already.
Kate: You know, you're not very nice.
Larry: Since when do you gotta be nice to be right?
When Dante's bemoaning at how badly his day's gone and how Randal's the one to blame for it reaches its peak in Clerks, Randal snaps. Noting that he came to work that day of his own volition and that most of the bad things that happened were his own fault, such as closing the store multiple times to pursue his own interests and trying to vainly re-ignite his relationship with an ex by cheating on his current girlfriend. He then criticises Dante's attitude, noting that he constantly talks down to and belittles otherswhile working a low-wage menial job at a convenience store, and pointing out that although Jay and Silent Bob are stupid, at least they don't try to overcompensate for having what's essentially a monkey's job.
Randal: If we're so fucking advanced, what are we doing working here?
The Avengers: Captain America, tired of Stark's arrogant egomania, tries to insult his manliness by accusing him of being nothing without his Iron Man armor. Stark effortlessly swats the insult down:
Cap: Take away that suit and what are you?
Stark: A genius billionaire playboy philanthropist.
What really makes it this trope, however, is that it's followed by Natasha - not the biggest Tony Stark fan given their interaction in Iron Man 2 - nodding in acknowledgement of the point.
He loses his cool and is genuinely hurt, though, when Cap then fires back with: "I knew guys with none of that worth ten of you!"
In Alien³, Mr. Andrews (the nominal Warden of the prison) is a pretty big Jerkass, but he has very legitimate grounds for not wanting Ripley to walk around the prison freely. He has to keep a population of convicted murderers and rapists in check, who are still very dangerous even if they have found religion. Ripley almost gets raped and perhaps even killed when she wanders off alone. Also, her story about the Alien (which has never been seen on any other planet than LV-426) is admittedly a little hard to believe, when from his perspective the more likely scenario is that Murphy's death was just an accident, and that Golic was simply an insane murderer who killed two other inmates.
Literature
Vidia from the Disney Fairies series does this on occasion.
In Darkest Powers, Tori Enright, while not necessarily evil, is a self-proclaimed bitch who once made it her priority to make Chloe's life hell. While her first time attempting to give Chloe advice ends up in the two of them almost getting carved up by a trio of street thugs, when it seems that Chloe is having trouble with Simon and Derek and gets subsequently very depressed about it, Tori's pep talk ends up helping Chloe to realize just what's wrong with herself. Which in turn leads to her accepting the fact that the one she's liked all along is actually Derek and allows her to return to a mostly normal state.
Tyrion: Lord Baelish, buy our brave Ser Alliser a hundred spades to take back to the Wall with him.
Alliser: Spades?
Tyrion: If you bury your dead, they won't come walking.
It doesn't change the fact that Alliser was telling the truth: The dead are walking, the Others are coming, and the kings and lords of Westeros are too busy fighting each other to do anything about it.
This is also a major bit of Nice Job Breaking It, Hero for Tyrion; knowing what a Jerkass Thorne is, Tyrion refused to see him when he arrived, and kept him waiting for so long that the severed, yet still moving, wight hand Thorne had brought with him had rotted down to the bones. Had Tyrion seen him earlier, he would have been presented with indisputable proof that Thorne was telling the truth, and the course of the whole series might have been dramatically changed.
Then again, Thorne was asking for men, and Tyrion gave him men. Not huge hordes of men, maybe, but let's be real, he was never going to get those while the civil war was going on.
This one is sort of a mixed bag: Tyrion gave Thorne the men he was asking for by pretending to do do it as a joke and says that the only thing hurt was Thorne's pride. However, Thorne is right that by treating it as a joke, Tyrion insured that everyone else would treat it as a joke as well and no one would take the threat from the wall seriously.
Sandor Clegane also counts he is a pretty big jerk but the majority of what he says about how the lords and knights of the kingdoms take advantage of the weak is pretty accurate.
Tywin Lannister justifies the Red Wedding by arguing that it's preferable to kill a dozen people at dinner than thousands in the field. Reprehensible as the act was, it's difficult to disagree with that.
Another one where we'll have to see. The Red Wedding caused a smaller loss of life in the short-term, but the consequences of breaking one of Westeros's biggest taboos have yet to play out, and it could be that it causes more problems in the long run.
In Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, Malfoy believes Hagrid's Blast-ended Skrewts are abominations of nature. The Skrewts are jet-propelled scorpion-leeches that eventually grow to be 10-feet long and are apparently illegal hybrids of Manticores and fire-crabs meaning they shouldn't even exist in the first place. While Hermoine defends the Skrewts in Hagrid's class out of loyalty to Hagrid, she privately agrees with Malfoy that the Skrewts are horrible monsters.
Argus Filch has one of these towards all the messes he has to clean up. As he's a squib he's basically forced to clean up after hundreds of magical students by himself with nothing but elbow grease. He even points out that what's little bit of mud to Harry is an extra hour of scrubbing for him. His views on punishing the students for the messes on the other hand...
In The Slap by Christos Tsiolkas, Harry is often portrayed as abusive asshole with few redeeming qualities. Nevertheless, his defence for the titular Slap - that Hugo was in the process of attacking his and his cousin's children with a cricket bat while his own parents were doing little to stop it - is difficult to argue with, as Anouk points out early on - "We all wanted to slap Hugo that day!" - and even Aisha comes to agree with as the court case approaches.
While Inspector Javert's belief that criminals can never change is extreme, he was fully justified in not trusting Valjean to keep his word and allow himself to be arrested after being given a few days to put his affairs in order. After all, the reason Valjean was a wanted criminal at the time was because he had already broken his parole once, so why would a policeman who knew this trust him to honor a parole now that he's finally been caught?
In the Inheritance Cycle, Big Bad Galbatorix reveals that one of his plans is to enforce equality by controlling the use of magic, accomplished by hijacking the magical language itself so that he is only one who can use it. While Galby is notoriously treacherous and it's heavily implied that this is done only so that he can retain power, it's hard to argue against some level of control in a universe where magic has turned the elves into nearly invincible GameBreakers who could decimate the humans, dwarves, and urgals combined if they felt like it. Even Nasuada, leader of the Varden and one of the biggest enemies of Galbatorix, admits that he might have been right on this one.
Live Action TV
Supernatural: The Trickster/Gabriel was a big one. Sure, his method was cruel (a time loop within which Dean died every day, and Sam couldn't save him), but he did have a point: Sam had to accept that Dean was going to die, and that sacrificing themselves for each other isn't a good idea. Not that it stopped them...
Cordelia fills this role constantly in Buffy and Angel: "Tact is just not saying true stuff. I'll pass". When she joined Angel, the role on Buffy was taken over by Anya, an ex-demon who hasn't learnt which thoughts should be verbalized, and occasionally by Spike who often didn't have time for social skills.
Frequently — but extremely reluctantly — with Spike and to a lesser extent with Andrew, though it overlaps with Dumbass Has a Point.
In season 3, the Mayor (while anything but Jerkassy, was definitely a vicious villain) provided frank and accurate advice on why Buffy and Angel's relationship was doomed to fail. While he was trying to kill the both of them. Nice guy.
Kennedy is a self admitted Jerk Ass who was talked down when she tried to share her views. Thing was, she was dead right when it came to Buffy's own jerkass behavior, and when the two meet up again in the comics she's ditched the Drill Sergeant Nasty attitude she got off on and genuinely wants to help other Slayers, and Buffy, not just with employment but coming to terms with a new unmasqued world and what Buffy had done.
The Firefly episode "Safe" has Jayne thrilled that Simon and River have gotten kidnapped, but he does make the point that not harboring fugitives makes their lives easier, and Zoe and Mal agree with that. Jayne makes a lot of points like this. In Joss Whedon's own words: "He's the guy who will say what everyone's thinking but are too polite to actually say it."
Degrassi: "Whisper to a Scream" is a great example. Ellie, a GothZen Survivor, is the only character all season who has been able to stand up to Paige [the Alpha Bitch]. The episode starts with Ellie fighting Paige's latest scheme...then, due to trouble at home, Ellie begins cutting herself. Paige finds out and tries to help her get counseling.
There was also a much less serious episode where Emma has her first period, and Paige tries to convince her that it's great because "You'll get boobs now" And "Boobs aren't that bad... they're really great actually."
From our other Alpha Bitch, Holly J, we get a few moments where she gives 'advice.' The first is after Mia finds out Sav likes Anya ("We need men, not boys."), after her fall she gives advice to Spinner and Jane in season 8. Season 9 she has a wonderful scene with shades of the Paige Emma discussion telling Clare that having a impure thoughts isn't bad... so long as it doesn't lead to kissing the neck of Holly J's boyfriend.
Mrs. Torres, oh wow. She's mad at Snake because her son was shrinkwrapped to a pole. Then she's mad at Snake because her other son who she still isn't quite used to not being her daughter was the victim of a hate crime in school. By this time she's probably wondering what kind of school he's running. Then Vegas Night happens...
Another example involving Paige happened in the episode "I Want Candy". Ashley would not get out of bed to go to school after Craig cheats on her with Manny (several months after it's already happened). In an effort to try and cheer her up, Paige and Spinner skip school and take her out on the town. Of course, Ashley does nothing but whine the entire time. Finally, Paige gives Ashley a What the Hell, Hero? speech, telling her that while what Craig did to her was wrong, he was not the issue. The real problem was Ashley because she wouldn't move on with her life.
Bianca's gotten her fair share in, pointing out that while she did steal Drew from Alli, it wasn't as bad as Alli kissing Clare's ex-boyfriend/current step-brother. Since Alli is Clare's best friend she should know better, Bianca has no such loyalty to break. Later on she sets Jake straight that no matter what Clare says, she's not going to be able to separate the sex from the romance she has building in her head, and if he sleeps with her he's royally messing her up. Bianca didn't choose the nicest ways to go about sharing these lessons, but she was right in both counts.
In the "Chimera" episode, Laas repeatedly tells Odo things he'd rather not hear. For example, while he's not tactful about it, Laas does bring up legitimate concerns about Odo and Kira's relationship. He reminds Odo that Changelings cannot reproduce with humanoids, which ruptured Laas' relationship with his former Varalan mate. Also, he warns Odo that if he remains with Kira, he will watch her grow old and die because of Changelings' long lifespans. Laas also points out that it is Kira, not duty or morality, that prevents Odo from leaving Deep Space Nine and reuniting with the Changeling Founders.
Odo: I won't have anything to do with the Founders and their war.
Laas: Odo, we linked. I know the truth. You stayed here because of Kira. If it weren't for her, you would be with our people. War or no war, you would be a Founder!
In "The Siege of AR-558", Quark's comments about humans to his nephew Nog don't seem so unreasonable when you remember just how much dirty work our heroes have done up to this point in the Dominion War.
In an earlier episode, he says that the reason humans hate Ferrengi is because Ferrengi culture is everything that humans think that they abandoned, that the Ferrengi are a living reminder of everything bad they used to be. The thing is, that he's absolutely right from a behind-the-scenes perspective. The Ferrengi were created as a statement on twentieth-century earth culture taken to an extreme, to show how much better and more enlightened humans have become since then... but his statement proves especially haunting over the course of the series as characters are forced to abandon high ideals as the realities of war set in.
Mad Men: Joan Holloway gets to hand out a lot of this. So does Bobbie Barrett.
In The Wire, William Rawls is a complete asshole that openly hates protagonist Jimmy McNulty. But, when McNulty's partner is shot, Rawls makes it a point to tell Jimmy that the shooting wasn't his fault.
Breaking Bad: Walter White fits this trope in season 4. He becomes increasingly paranoid as the season goes on, thinking that Gus is planning to kill Walt, partly by driving a wedge between his relationship with Jesse. And he's right. Still, this doesn't excuse his acting like a total asshole; he even says, "It's All About Me" at one point.
Glee is full of this and most of the Jerkass characters get one or more scenes where they get to tell one of the 'good' characters the plain truth and force them to address their problems.
Sue Sylvester tells Will that he shouldn't use demeaning hairography in the glee club's set list. Later, Will thanks her and as required willingly shows her the set list which she promptly leaks to the competing schools.
Quinn tells Rachel that Finn does not have the same dreams for the future as Rachel and as such she should stop pursuing him since they will just end up miserable. This makes Rachel realize that she has been too self-absorbed and has not really considered what Finn wants out of life and a relationship.
She turned out to be right.
Scrubs: A teen is admitted to the hospital and Dr. Cox is assigned to treat her. When he learns that she willingly stopped taking the medicine she needs to survive he lays into her. The plot treats him as the bad guy, because even if she is an idiot, that's because she's a teenager, and a treating doctor should know better than that
Gossip Girl: Both Chuck and Blair often fill this role, telling the blunt and terrifying truth.
From The Walking Dead, there's Daryl. He may be a caustic redneck, but he is usually the only one of the group to recognize the gravity of their situations.
Shane as well, if it's closer to "The Psychotic Jerkass Has A Point". He warns Rick that the member of a rival gang they captured could lead people to their location if he was released, and since they have guns and their location is not fortified and a lot of people, especially the women, don't know how to defend themselves, it would be disastrous. Rick himself cannot even raise a good logical argument against this and eventually folds. Then he finds himself unable to pull the trigger and refuses to do so or let anyone do so when the resident moral compass of the group is killed after lodging his objections. Shane rightly points out that the two are unrelated and that keeping Randyll around and wasting resources on him while increasing the likelihood that people will grow lax with regards to security and let him escape is a bad idea. And sure enough, when Randyll gets free he shows that he knows where the farm is, relative to his group's position even though he was blindfolded for a while.
He also points out just how dangerous it is to have a barn full of walkers in their midst, and a bunch of people that think that they're human.
In the second season of Community, a recurring plot arc was Pierce Hawthorne's increasingly Jerkass behaviour towards his friends, which eventually reached a point where they were debating whether to throw him out of the group or not. However, while Pierce was shown to be unreasonable and cruel with many of his actions, he was also shown to make the entirely valid point that one of the main reasons that he was acting out in this fashion was that his supposed friends weren't actually that much nicer or better towards him in many ways, often deliberately excluding, mocking or ignoring him. While Pierce is the group's Acceptable Target in that he's a racist, sexist jackass, his friends were forced to concede that in several ways he had a point. However, the trope is played with in that Pierce is also forced to concede the point that it's in many ways his own fault he's excluded in the first place.
In the season 1 finale of Spartacus Blood And Sand, Oenomaus angrily calls out Ashur for his cowardice, dishonorable tactics, arranging Barca's murder, ruining Crixus and Naevia's relationship, and other slights. Ashur retorts that ever since he arrived in the ludus, everyone gave him a hard time: repeatedly calling him a wimp and a coward even though he won a few matches, and making fun of him when Crixus crippled his leg, so why shouldn't he try to ruin their lives?
Ashur: My fucking treachery? When did YOU stand forth for Ashur? When did ANY OF YOU GREET ME SHORT OF MOCKERY, AND SCORN?!?!! FUCKING CUNTS!!!
Annie's father in the Masters of Horror episode "Cigarette Burns". Kirby treats him like an unreasonable jerkass, but Kirby did get his daughter killed by indulging her drug habit, abysmally failed to get her on the right track despite agreeing with him to do so, is still massively in debt to him, and just evades him whenever the topic of repaying the loan comes up. It's only when he resolves to kill Kirby that he crosses the line into outright villainy.
Lois and Hal revealing their grand scheme for Malcolm's life will come off to many as little more than the big Kick the Dog finale to Malcolm in the Middle, but if you think about it, it might actually not have been so much if only they were a lot more reasonable about it towards him. Given how Malcolm consistently exceeded their expectations of him, it indeed would be a waste of potential for him to not even attempt to become a big name like the president. It just is a jerk move for them to expect him to solve all their problems as president because most of their problems are self-inflicted.
Christian Shephard in LOST was a complete dick in most of his flashback appearances, often acting like a self-involved jerk. But when he tells his daughter Claire that its not right to keep her mother on life support solely because she is not ready to let her go, its kind of tough to disagree with Him. Most of his advice to Jack is like this too.
In the Babylon 5 episode "Grey 17 is missing" the Warrior Caste member Neroon delivers a rather caustic observation to how he interprets Delenn's breaking of the Grey Council and essentially taking over Minbari leadership for the Greater Good. While everything Delenn claims about the situation turns out to be true and eventually works out for the good of everyone, from Neroon's point of view it's probably the equivalent of how a modern-day American Senator would view a fellow Senator breaking up Congress, the Senate, the Supreme Court and the Presidency, forming a private army with her own charisma, proceeded to enlist volunteers from a country we were recently at war with (like, say, Iraq), formed a base on an outpost of said country, claimed she was on a Mission from God, and that all this was necessary to save the world from Alien Invasion.
Lily from How I Met Your Mother had no right to break up many of Ted's girlfriends including Robin because they didn't fit her idea of the front porch test (where she, Marshall and Ted grow old together). However she brings up a good point that she probably saved Ted thousands of dollars from an expensive wedding where he would have married one of these girls and inevitably gotten a messy divorce. She also brought up how, if Ted and Robin didn't break up, they would have remained together but their relationship would have deteriorated and they wouldn't be Better as Friends as they are now.
Revolution: Zig-Zagging Trope for Miles. He often calls out Charlie for her attitude problems/questionable decisions. While these are generally accurate assessments from a viewer standpoint, no one in-story seems to agree with them.
Doakes in Dexter. He is convinced that something is off about Dexter, who is of course a serial killer. Dexter manages to make sure that no one ever knows he's right however.
Dr. Hooten in Monday Mornings. Sure, he may be extremely harsh on the doctors at the hospital but he does it because they are doctors and they need to be kept in line.
The Witch of Into The Woods has this effect on the characters; regardless of whether they say so aloud, they are visibly humbled by the Hannibal Lecture that is "Last Midnight", in which she calls them out on the fact that their wishes and carelessness got them in the trouble they're in now.
Freddie Trumper of Chess is correct in his assertions that his reputation as the bad boy of chess have help to renew public interest in the game. He later helps Anatoly realize that winning the championship is his only chance to redeem himself.
Video Games
In Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney Justice For All's second case, it's strongly implied that Dr. Grey is right and that Mimi Miney was, in fact, at fault for the malpractice incident that killed fourteen patients, as Phoenix says near the end of the trial.
Unintentional example at the beginning of The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time: Mido refuses to let Link see the Great Deku Tree until Link gets a sword and shield. While Mido was doing it just to be a pest to Link and bar his way like a schoolyard bully, the sword and shield do turn out to be necessary both to kill the Deku Babas on the way to the Great Deku Tree and to kill the enemies inside of the Great Deku Tree. This "point" is so good that even Saria agrees with it.
In Mass Effect, the turian councilor is the only council member who thinks it plausible that Matriarch Benezia would be willing to murder her own daughter. He's right - because of indoctrination, she is. The turian councilor also is the most staunchly opposed to Shepard's insistence that the Reapers are coming. To be fair, the idea of massive cybernetic space-monsters harvesting all life in the galaxy is pretty hard to swallow, and Shepard had just endured getting his brains half-scrambled by an old alien artifact and even if they did send a fleet, Shepard would have caused a war that will leave neither sides in shape to stop the Reapers. Interestingly, the turian councilor ends up being the first member of the council to actually go to Shepard when the Reapers finally arrive.
The sequel also has an instance with Quarian Admiral Zaal'Koris, who is entirely distrustful of both Tali and her father trying to get the family exiled. However he's also the only member of the Admiralty board who opposes going to war with the geth and sees them as another sentient species, with the quarians also largely to blame for what has happened. If you speak to him during the trial, he will explain his position in detail and tell Tali that he has no personal vendetta against her or her father: he is just doing what he thinks needs to be done for the good of the quarian people. Tali responds with "I do not agree, but I understand."
If you sacrificed the Council in the first game, in the third, the new council reminds you of this while refusing to divert resources from protecting their own homeworlds to help Earth. It's fairly presumptuous to expect them to help you after you betrayed their predecessors, possibly in order to allow humanity to take control of the Council.
Dishonourable nobles in Mount & Blade aren't particularly nice. They're backstabbing, warmongering, and quarrelsome. However, "honourable" characters are still perfectly willing to raid caravans and torch enemy villages. If you take the honourable option and allow defeated enemies to walk away, your dishonourable allies rightly ask whether your honour will be much comfort to the orphans and widows caused because you let a general out to rebuild his army and keep going.
This mixed with Good Is Not Nice is pretty much Jedi Master Vrook's entire characterization. He opposes the training of the Player Character from the first because re-training and trusting a mindwiped Sith Lord really is a bad idea. And in the second game, he's even less thrilled with the Exile, seeing her (or him) as a "mediocre Jedi" whose presence only brings disaster...and turns out right.
In Pokemon Black And White, Ghetsis says, "A Pokemon, even if it's revered as a deity, is still just a Pokemon!" After all the legendary Pokemon being called "gods", it's kind of nice to see someone who isn't falling for it. Even if he redefines "bastard".
Subverted. One particularly godly pokemon (Arceus) created the world, and all other pokemon. That hardly makes you "just a pokemon".
Subverted even further, in that after he is overthrown, everyone, including the other Sages, goes back to the same old mindset that humans and Pokemon depend on each other, even though it's clear to players that Pokemon would actually be infinitely better off without the existence of humans (or at least without exploitation and the sport of Pokemon battling).
A movie in the sequel has a scientist angry at the hero for making a Ridiculously Human Robot and spending all day playing with it instead of working on other projects and refusing to let anyone build another. While his actions are terrible, he was right that the lab had sunk a lot of money into that robot that was earning them nothing and their head scientist was costing them funding by refusing to work on anything else.
In Katawa Shoujo, when Hisao suggests that JigoroHakamichi could visit his daughter Shizune, Jigoro counters by, among other things, asking when the last time Hisao has called his parents was. Hisao concedes that he has not made much of an effort to keep in touch with them, although he hates Jigoro enough to be tempted to punch him in the face.
Interestingly enough, Jigoro does appear to take Hisao's comment to heart, since he appears at Yamaku later in the route... To ask Shizune if she wants to go fishing with him. He's still a huge ass while asking it, but it does show that the above comment was just an attempt to change the subject and avoid thinking about it. It obviously didn't work.
In Rin's route, Nomiya, while not originally a Jerk Ass, asks Hisao at one point while arguing over whether it was right to let Rin walk away from the exhibition whether he has anything comparable to Rin's passion for art. Hisao is forced to concede that he does not.
Super Robot Wars Alpha Gaiden has long strings of this trope by Tetsuya Tsurugi from Great Mazinger. Throughout the course of the game, he basically trash talk both the heroes and the villains, and pointed out the flaws on their structures and performances in an increasingly Jerk-ish way. The problem is, he is completely spot on with every single one of his statements, which includes the fact that the Heroes has a rather ineffective ways to handle the situations, some of the teams has a leadership problems, the fact that Koji relied way too much on his Grandfather's Mazinger, and on top of it, a Gameplay and Story Integration comment of a big mistake made by Duo and Quatre that nearly resulted in the death of the whole team.
In Jade Empire, Gravedigger Shen is an unpleasant person who seems to have no morals to speak of, selling the possessions of those buried in his graveyard. You may be inclined to believe Miss Chen's claim that he killed her baby after she died in childbirth. But you hear from him that the baby also died, and if you show her to his grave, Miss Chen realizes the truth and is calmed enough to pass on.
An interesting example in Final Fantasy Tactics Advance: large parts of the fandom view Marche as a Villain Protagonist who is trying to forcibly destroy Ivalice, a world where his friends and his brother are happy because they can escape some of their problems in the home world. Whichever side the player might personally side with (whether they view Marche as right or wrong), both "wrong" sides make some very good points. If Marche is in the right, the royal forces, Ritz, and others are still very much correct when they claim that it's easy for Marche to want to go home - he doesn't have to deal with the same problems and bullying, or inability to walk (in his brother Doned's case) that his friends do, although as Marche admits to himself before the battle with Mateus, he too has problems that he faces in the real world. Further driving their point home is the argument that if Marche really cared for them, he wouldn't actively try to destroy a world that makes them happy. On the other hand, even if Marche is the real bad guy, he is absolutely correct when he claims that his friends, especially Mewt, are just using Ivalice as a way to avoid handling their real-world problems in any constructive way. In the long run as shown in the Epilogue, Marche turns out to be correct.
In-universe, Ritz concedes that the game must eventually end, but says she will fight Marche to stop him from reaching Ambervale because she isn't quite ready yet.
Web Comics
Something Positive: When Kharisma leaves the medicaid company at which she works with Davan, she advises him to get out, telling him that he can do better and that she wouldn't wish the job on her worst enemy.
Davan himself is the living embodiment of this trope; for that matter, his father Fred is too.
Molly: Now lets sit back, just us bitches and figure out how to fix this, 'cause being a bitch is kind of my thing, and two bitches is one bitch too many.
Several instances in The Order of the Stick where Belkar says something useful. Xykon delivers some foreshadowing to Miko in this strip, by way of paraphrasing Yoda: "fear leads to anger, anger leads to suffering, and suffering leads to the Dark Side." Minus the fear, that's just what happens to Miko later on.
Girl Genius got pretty unpleasant Zulenna who habitually advocated Baron's dubious actions including imprisonment of "Othar Tryggvassen, Gentleman Adventurer". Agatha and other students ignored this. The guy turned to be more or less as much heroic as he pretended to be... and dangerous nutcase as a bonus. Zulenna generally has a point any time she is not posturing.
This is a trait of Mike from the Walkyverse. He seemingly exists solely to make others miserable, but on a few occasions he has done so by pointing out when they are being hypocrites or making bad decisions. Who cares if it causes Character Development in the long term, as long as it makes them suffer in the short term he seems fine with it.
Drowtales: As part of the Grey and Gray Morality, this pops up quite a bit. The Kyorl'solenurn, for instance, are surprisingly justified in their extremism against the tainted, especially after recent revelations like the fact that most tainted have been given intentionally faulty demonic seeds that will kill them within 50 years. Quain'tana also has some of this, since while a terribly abusive parent and all around not very nice person she does make good points, especially when it comes to the Sharen, who the readers know are not what they seem at all. This also applies to her interactions with her daughter Mel, who has twice tried to claim submission to her mother, but Quain doesn't buy it, and we the audience know that she's actually right to not trust Mel since she was put up to it by the character who's effectively the Big Bad of the series.
CG: IF I RECALL, IT WASN'T THAT LONG AGO FROM EITHER OF OUR PERSPECTIVES THAT YOU WERE RIPPING ON ME AND MY SMUG WINDBAG FUTURE SELF FOR ARGUING WITH EACH OTHER
GG: oh come on...
GG: this is NOTHING like that!
CG: HOW IS THIS NOT LIKE THAT
GG: because she's...
GG: well
GG: she's ACTUALLY INSANE
CG: OH I SEE, AND ALL THOSE IDIOT PAST AND FUTURE KARKATS WEREN'T???
When undyingUmbrage tells Dirk that Lil' Cal is a juju who will only bring misery to everyone around him, Dirk just waves it off as more of uu's aggressive trolling. Unfortunately, he was telling the truth that time.
When Meenah sees Cronus verbally abusing Mituna, she rightfully calls him out on it. He counters that she's a hypocrite since, in an alternate timeline, she grafted him to her spaceship and artificially extended his life to use him as her ship's motor, which is much worse. She can't manage to come up with a good response to that.
YouTube user Cinema Sins often receives negative reception for mixing genuine goofs with opinion. Keep in mind, though, that some of the things he lists are really goofs (Captain America not having an ear radio, Bane entering a tunnel in daytime and coming out at night, etc.)
The Angry Video Game Nerd: He may be a rude, vulgar and overly hostile negative nancy who takes Video Gamesway too seriously, but that doesn't make his much-needed commentary on the constant wrongs of game and hardware developers throughout the history of the medium any less valid.
Global Guardians PBEM Universe: Achilles, leader of the titular superhero team, goes to his father for advice on his personal life all the time. His father, by the way, is Lord Doom, one of the setting's world-conquering master villains. This is a slightly inverted example, though, because usually Achilles is the blunt antagonistic one (for a hero), and Lord Doom is generally urbane and polite (for a villain).
In The Onion's articles by Jean Teasdale, "Hubby Rick" is an interesting intersection of Jerkass and Closer to Earth. He spends most of his time at the bar, mainly because Jean's Cloud CuckoolanderIt's All About Me behavior frustrates him; one article has her squirreling away money to "invest" (read: buy Betty Boop collectibles), and when Rick finds out he chews her out because they could use that money to pay their bills.
In Season 3 of Marble Hornets, Tim finally calls out Jay for his actions, constantly interfering in the lives of others and getting them ''involved,'' while Jay does little besides filming it all. As out-of-it as Tim is, and as crazy as he may be, he has a very good point.
Western Animation
Archer's cast consists of jerks. Smart jerks who will point out the flaws of something. For example, when Cheryl explains to Pam that her brother is planning on having her thrown into a mental hospital to get her half of their inheritance, Pam says that this might not be such a bad idea, as Cheryl is mentally unstable and endangers everyone around her constantly.
In one episode of The Spectacular Spider Man, Peter, under the influence of the symbiote, acts uncharacteristically abrasive to his friends. A speech from Flash Thompson causes Peter to realize what a jerk he's been and cast off the symbiote.
Peter: OK, if Flash Thompson is making sense, something must be seriously wrong.
Of course, symbiote-influenced Peter makes a good point during an angry rant directed at his friends; he does have a big hospital bill to pay.
Overlaps a bit with Jerkass Woobie, but Eddie Brock's increasing antagonism towards Peter stem from a combination of his own issues as well as legitimate gripes towards Pete. In a few cases, he actually points out a few cases of Pete's recklessness (taking photos of the Lizard).
Harry Osborn and Mark Allan are both more Jerkass Woobies than full out jerks, but they give Peter rather reasonable points. Mark calls out Peter for his blatant ignorance of his sister's feelings, while Harry notes that Mark's addiction to gambling is really his own problem.
Eric in Dungeons And Dragons was set up as The Complainer Is Always Wrong, but if you're listening carefully, he's the only one in the party perfectly willing to call out Dungeonmaster over those dirty tricks and half-truths that get the party in trouble, and the only one to tell Hank that Honor Before Reason may be a bad idea.
On Sponge Bob Square Pants, after the Flying Dutchman (the Bikini Bottom version of Satan) is ready to drag Mr. Krabs to Davy Jones' Locker for being greedy, Spongebob sticks up for his boss, wagering his own soul that Krabs is really generous. The Dutchman then offers Krabs a handful of pocket change in exchange for Spongebob's soul, which Krabs accepts without hesitation. Krabs gloats over the money, while the Dutchman departs with the sponge, causing Squidward to go ballistic. Normally Spongebob's sworn enemy, Squidward yells to Krabs, "I can't believe I'm saying this but how could you sell Spongebob for 62 cents?" Eventually, Squidward's words makes Krabs see the light and he regrets his greedy ways.
The entire Cadmus story arc in Justice League centered on Cadmus' attempts to thwart the worst-case scenario of the league taking over the world like their Justice Lord counterparts. Amanda Waller points out that the League has a Kill Sat, they have made some questionable decisions in the past, and there has been at least one reality they know of where the League overthrew the government (albeit to keep Luthor from wiping out all life on Earth out of sheer spite). Normal people don't have a way to defend themselves against a group of super powerful beings if it ever came down to it. In "Question Authority", Green Arrow lampshades the whole thing by saying that if the League ever decided to cross the line and become the Lords, there's nothing that the rest of the world could do to stop it. Green Arrow and the league's more grounded heroes were meant in part to keep the heavy hitters honest but they only served as the overall conscience against them Jumping Off the Slippery Slope, not an actual Restraining Bolt if they were to truly abandon their principles and attack the government.
South Park: Eric Cartman gets this quite a few times throughout the series, when his twisted worldview is occasionally proven true. Usually Played for Laughs like most everything else in the series.
Craig lampshades in excess how the boys actually often bring a lot of their problems on themselves (and others around them due to their lack of consideration) throughout the entire "Pandemic" two parter.
In "The Cutie Pox" episode of My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic, Diamond Tiara probably only calls Apple Bloom out on her cutie marks which were caused by Cutie Pox being fake in order to take her down a peg when a second one appears, since she hates anypony taking the spotlight away from her. Still, she's 100% right, and even the teacher Cheerilee shares her skepticism.
Fluttershy gets one herself in Putting Your Hoof Down when she talks about how Pinkie Pie and Rarity want "Pushover Fluttershy" back. Yeah, she was being mean about it, but it's been shown plenty of times before and since in which her friends will take advantage of her kindness. But really, Pinkie and Rarity were HAPPY that Fluttershy was finally standing up for herself. They only tried to put a stop to it when they saw Fluttershy had become needlessly vindictive and aggressive.
Queen Chrysalis also gets one when she brags to the cast that she managed to carry out her plan to take over Equestria even when Twilight Sparkle thinks something is wrong with Princess Cadence who was actually Chrysalis herself in disguise thanks to all of Twilight's friends not believing her and coldly walking out on her. It was at that point when the others have aJerkass Realization and apologize to Twilight.
Though, to be fair, in this case Jerkass with a Point were actually Twilight's friends. Twilight was Stopped Clock kind of right - completely wrong about what was amiss and her friends had every right to dismiss Twilight's shouts. Not only no less than four episodes this season shown how far off the mark Twilight can be, what they were supposed to do, call off wedding between two willing ponies just because sibling of the groom doesn't like his choice? Same sibling that was willing to casually brainwash whole village on nothing but similar outburst of baseless paranoia?
Regardless, they were still quick to walk out on Twilight when she tried to explain herself.
Twilight herself admits she didn't have the best case when they apologize to her and actually doubted her accusations until Chrysalis revealed herself.
Red Arrow is a suspicious jerk towards Artemis in Young Justice. Although Artemis probably isn't The Mole, Roy's lack of trust in her unfortunately does have some merit, since she is keeping secrets about her past from the team. Reaches a head in "Insecurity" when Roy's mistrust pushes Artemis to endanger the mission by trying to lead the rest of the team away from the targets just to have a chance to prove herself. This backfires immensely when the mission goes south and her deception is exposed.
The same went for his suspicions of Superboy and Miss Martian. While not The Mole like he suspected, they, along with Artemis had information they were hiding from the rest of the team.
Benson from Regular Show seems to embody this trope. While he is hard on Mordecai and Rigby, his anger often comes from their slacker attitudes and desire to be cool, which tend to screw things up or prolong the time it takes to complete menial tasks..
Teen Titans: Beast Boy, while being affected with the Jerkass Ball in "The Beast Within", also brings up the point that he's often disrespected, especially by Raven.
When Bill Dauterive of King of the Hill has a spike in blood sugar and is warned by his doctor that he's at risk of developing diabetes, he goes to another doctor who, despite being a smug, verbally-abusive prick, is pretty spot-on in identifying the problem and guessing both what will happen if Bill dosn't curb his unhealthy lifestyle and that he most likely won't.
Dr. Weissman: Did you talk to any other doctors before coming to me?
Bill: Well, yes.
Dr. Weissman: Did they tell you to diet and exercise?
To further add to this, when Hank and Bill finally confronted the doctor about what he said, the doctor backpedaled and said "N-no I said your legs could fail at some point, and I certainly didn't say anything that could constitute a malpractice suit."
In the "Bend-Her" episode of Futurama, after Bender has a sex change, the female crew mates accuse of him of being a bad representation of their gender and dating a celebrity robot just for the sake of indulgence. When "she" questions whether they've really never done the same thing, they can barely muster up a denial.
Invoking this trope is the modus operandi of every dictator, ever. The two most infamous strongmen of World War II, Adolf Hitler and Josef Stalin, both claimed they had to send death squads out to round up "unpatriotic" citizens and put them in camps, or else the other side would use them to take over the country. Certainly they had a point, as there were communist saboteurs in Germany and capitalist saboteurs in the Soviet Union, but not many people will argue the solution was.... heavy-handed, to say the least.
