Sometimes, when a person undergoes a Forced Transformation or become Brainwashed and Crazy, they completely lose their minds and become beasts, but other times they can keep some parts of their minds intact and recognise loved ones even when they display otherwise animalistic behavior.
This trope is somewhat prevalent in Werewolf Works when they want to make said lycanthropes more sympathetic.
In some cases, they are completely monstrous at first, but an I Know You're In There speech can snap them back to their senses.
Interestingly, this trope rarely happens with villainous characters who usually keep their full intelligence or lose their minds completely whenever they change into monsters.
Compare Fighting from the Inside for when the original benevolent personality actively fights against a new influence in their mind when they became monstrous. Related to Sheep in Wolf's Clothing, when the transformation becomes a tactical advantage in the fight against other monsters. Sub-Trope of Face–Monster Turn.
Examples
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Anime and Manga
- Attack on Titan: The mindless "pure" Titans seen throughout the series are a horrifying take on this trope. As former humans who are permanently absorbed into their Titan forms, they are driven mostly by the zombie-like urge to devour any normal human they come across, but a select few are shown to retain traces of their original personality.
- The "House Titan" is a Titan that lies sprawled on top of a house, completely unable to move due to its malformed limbs. Said Titan is also Connie's mother, and when Connie first encounters her, not only does she recognize her son, but even manages to mutter "Welcome home."
- The "Talking Titan" is another Titan capable of Hulk Speak, who used to be a member of a cult that worshipped a messiah figure, and is still conscious enough to make a shrine dedicated to said messiah out of a hollowed-out tree. When Ilse Langnar, a member of the Survey Corps, comes across it, the Titan mistakes her for the messiah and instead of immediately attacking, it bows to Ilse, much to her confusion. Even after the Titan eventually ends up biting Ilse's head off in a fit of Sanity Slippage, it still makes sure to tenderly place her corpse inside the shrine.
- Berserk:
- Many Apostles retain full control of their personalities when fully transformed. Unfortunately, since they pretty much all work for Griffith or oppose the protagonist, they aren't exactly benevolent in the first place (becoming an Apostle requires the sacrifice of someone you hold dear).
- Bishop Mozguz' Quirky Miniboss Squad's last thoughts were of gratitude for their boss having shown them kindness in a Crapsack World (he employed them as torturers, but they never seemed sadistically evil, seeming to genuinely believe they were leading sinners to redemption).
- Danganronpa 3: The End of Hope's Peak High School: Izuru Kamakura, Hajime Hinata after being engineered into The Worlds Strongest Man, retains almost none of his original memories or personality, becoming an incredibly powerful but apathetic being who struggles to find attachment to anyone or anything. The exception though is for his Love Interest Chiaki, the one bit of Hajime's personality that carried over into his.
- Fullmetal Alchemist: A heartbreaking example occurs when Shou Tucker decides to fuse his daughter, Nina, and his dog, Alexander, in order to create a talking chimera. The creature that comes of it looks largely doglike with long, brown hair, and sits quietly most of the time aside from wondering about its 'daddy' and asking to be played with. Unfortunately, the process cannot be reversed and it remains like that until Scar kills it.
- Hunter × Hunter: Chimera Ants that are part human are eventually capable of remembering who they were when they were still human, whether fully or only in small remnants, allowing them to retain their personalities and sometimes even nen abilities.
- The zombies from School-Live! manage to retain some of their memories from when they were alive, behaving in the manner they would normally. An example being the zombified high school students who still follow their schedules, arriving during the morning and leaving when it's time to go home.
- Yu-Gi-Oh! GX: Season 3 has the Duel Zombies/Ghouls, duelists who become mindless, shambling zombies stripped of free will and thought if they lose enough energy via the Bio-Bands that they wear, going on to make other duelists like them. However, there are a few of them like nurse Emi Ayukawa/Fonda Fontaine who manage to retain their articulation and speech capability and are even capable of controlling those who do not.
Fan Fiction
- Dungeon Keeper Ami: The transformed people from around the 200th chapter, still care about their families, even after losing some sanity.
- Lumity Lycanthropy: Even in werewolf form, Luz still remembers Amity and even tries to lick her hand. She also doesn't hurt her or King after Amity lets her out of the barrier they were keeping her in.
Film — Animated
- The Batman vs. Dracula: Even after being turned into one of Dracula's vampires, Joker still manages to retain most of his individuality (though he is unable to confess where Dracula's lair is), intellect, and can still talk normally but in a slightly raspier tone, with virtually no difference to how he was when he was alive. This is probably due to him having Insanity Immunity.
- Superman: Man of Tomorrow: Parasite is portrayed as still having a semblance of the war hero and family man he was before his transformation, with his still missing his family and performing a Heroic Sacrifice in the end.
Film — Live-Action
- Count Yorga: Erica is targeted by and eventually turned by Yorga to become one of his vampire brides. Near the end, a fellow bride and she try to ambush Micheal, but he fends them off with his stake stick. However, where her fellow bride runs off, Erica remains still and actually gives him an opportunity to stake her, implying what little humanity she has left is giving him a chance to stop her. However, he can't go through with it and leaves her be, to which she responds by hissing at him, fully giving in to the vampirism. When she, along with her fellow bride, confront him again at the end of the movie, she doesn't pause in her attack that time.
- The Fly II: When Martin changes into a monstrous insect creature, he maintains some of his intellect and compassion (such as literally petting a dog that was sent to track him down). However, he is clearly quite vicious in this state as he mercilessly kills multiple guards send after him. His condition is in direct contrast to his father Brundle, who underwent severe Sanity Slippage as he transformed into a pathetic deformed creature (unlike his healthy and formidable offspring).
Literature
- Animorphs: When morphing into an animal, its instincts come with it, which leads to a few teething issues the first time until the morpher gets the animal under control (such as small prey animals finding themselves out in the open surrounded by humans, or a shark's urge to find blood, or an insect's Hive Mind overriding the human). Still, instincts are a Required Secondary Power when it comes to fighting, flying, or doing anything else that would otherwise take considerable practice to pull off in a new form.
- Some time after becoming a bird monster in Dr. Franklin's Island, Miranda stops using her Electronic Telepathy and Semi fears that she's mentally become an animal. At the climax of the book, after having arranged for the animals in the Menagerie of Misery to escape and wreak havoc, she reveals that to an extent that was Obfuscating Insanity, but she also had been losing her sense of self... but she still remembered Semi.
- Durarara!!: After seeing Kujiragi kiss and slice Shinra with Saika, Celty goes berserk, transforming into an amorphous shadow monster and chases Kujiragi across Ikebukuro. While Kujiragi remarks that although Celty is mindless in this state, she's still hellbent on attacking Kujiragi and getting Shinra back.
- In The Elric Saga, the hero Elric fights a shapeless blob-monster that periodically sprouts arms and limbs for just long enough to wield weapons. Killing it with the Black Blade Stormbringer, the monster identifies itself as "Frank..." before dying. Elric, who is yet to know his destiny as the Eternal Hero, fated to die and be reborn a million times, is puzzled, recognising something significant is happening but he does not know what. He is yet to live a life where the Hero is called Jerry Cornelius, who is betrayed by his brother Frank. However, Frank's progress through Time is taking him in the opposite direction. He certainly knows who Elric is. Or will be. And the realisation gives him that sentient memory just before dying...
- In Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, Wolfsbane potion has this effect on werewolves. Without the potion, they turn into murderous rampaging beasts, such as Remus Lupin does at the end of the book. In the film adaptation, Sirius tries to invoke this, telling the shapeshifting Lupin to stay himself inside, without success.
- In The Surviving Twins, even after Helmuth's benevolent personality, along with all of his memories, is erased completely, he can't bring himself to harm his daughters, though now he doesn't realize the reason for it.
Live-Action TV
- Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Discussed in "Doppelgangland" when Willow encounters her vampire double from another universe and is disturbed to find that she's an Ax-Crazy, sensual, leather bustier-wearing nutjob.
Willow: That's me as a vampire? But I'm so evil! And skanky! And I think I'm kinda gay!
Buffy: Just remember, Willow, a vampire has nothing to do with the person it was.
Angel: Well, actually... [sees Buffy's Death Glare] That's a good point. - The Incredible Hulk (1977) goes even further than the comics do, despite this version of the Hulk having less intellect than the Savage Hulk: besides saving those Banner cares about and attacking those who wronged Banner, Hulk tends to finish whichever task Banner intended to do before the transformation, including: going to a specific location; using a water tank to save people from fire; open a large water valve, etc.
- The reason why Koragg from Power Rangers Mystic Force believes in Honor Before Reason despite being a villain is because he is actually Leanbow, Udonna's husband, who has been brainwashed into serving the forces of darkness. Despite making him switch sides, they could not completely erase his sense of honor. This also goes for Wolzard, Koragg's counterpart in the original Super Sentai version, Mahou Sentai Magiranger. However, in this case, while part of it is his pride as an honorable warrior, it's mostly implied to be increasingly flimsier justifications made as a result of Wolzard's original self, Blagel/Isamu, recognizing the Ozu siblings as his children and not wanting to hurt them. It's eventually revealed that Wolzard's apparent defeat of Miyuki/MagiMother at the beginning of the series actually involved teleporting her away at the last second because Blagel's love for his wife intervened.
Tabletop Games
- Dungeons & Dragons:
- In early versions of the game, The Polymorph Other and Polymorph Any Object spell can change one living thing into another. There is a chance (based on the intelligence of the target and the hit dice of each form) that the target will keep their original mind. If they do, each day the polymorph continues, they must check again to see if they acquire their new form's mentality.
- The 3.5 Edition Libris Mortis says that successfully reminding an undead of its mortal life might alleviate its Always Chaotic Evil instincts for a short time; for example, to permit a would-be victim to leave alive, or at least give them a head start.
- Mind flayers, who reproduce by taking over human bodies, will sometimes inherit Character Tics that the body's original occupant possessed. They are extremely careful to hide this from others of their kind, in part because of fears of "The Adversary" — a theoretical mind flayer whose personality was completely subsumed by their host's, leading them to become a Hunter of Their Own Kind, though Word of God states that this scenario is just superstition and not actually possible.
- Played with in GURPS with the Residual Personality quirk, which is exclusive to shape-changers. With it, mental traits from your "primary form" manifest at a reduced level in your other forms.
Video Games
- Bloodborne: Ludwig "the Accursed" is a horrific mashup of human and horse parts that form a pained, malformed beast vaguely resembling a centaur. He spends his entire boss fight aggressively screeching and clawing at his opponent. But once he sees the Moonlight Greatsword, his signature weapon as a human, his warrior-like demeanor and personality return, and he fights the player in a graceful duel, his moniker changing to Ludwig "the Holy Blade".
- The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim: The werewolves of The Companions are a unique strain that can change at will and have basic control of their wolf forms.
- In Fate/Grand Order, Siduri is able to remember the protagonists after being transformed into a lahmu. She refuses to attack them and rescues Kingu after mistaking him for Enkidu, one of Uruk's greatest heroes.
- Final Fantasy X: The world of Spira is under constant attack from a giant monster called Sin, which Summoners can temporarily banish by sacrificing one of their companions to become an aeon, which then slowly becomes the next Sin. The incarnation fought in the game turns out to be Tidus' father Jecht, a pro blitzball player like his son, and still sufficiently self-aware to attack Zanarkand and bring Tidus to Spira (not to mention not attacking Bevelle and its blitzball stadium). When Jecht is fought for real, Tidus can talk to him to interrupt his spells, but this only works twice.
- Friday Night Funkin': Corruption: Corrupted characters are empty shells with the sole desire to further spread the corruption; despite this, they still display traits from their old selves, such as Boyfriend keeping his hand in his pocket or Skid and Pump dancing when it's not their turn to sing.
- In Resident Evil – Code: Veronica, Steve is turned into a giant green-skinned monster armed with a battleaxe, but when he sees Claire being strangled by tentacle vines he retains enough of his memories and old personality to save Claire from them.
- Star Wars: The Old Republic: A Republic sidequest on Taris determines that rakghouls, humanoids turned into monsters by a Viral Transformation of Sith origin (or spawn thereof), prefer to make their lairs in the locations where the original humanoid had once lived. A Republic scientist studying the rakghouls suggests this may lead to a way to possibly negotiating with and eventually coexisting with the rakghouls.
- Vincent Meis in The Witcher is a city guard from Vizima who suffers from lycanthropy. He retains his sense of justice as a werewolf, preying exclusively on criminals who operate at nighttime, as well as enough intelligence and self-control to recognise Geralt as a friend and be reluctant to attack him.
- In Xenoblade Chronicles 1, the Telethia are revealed to be the original form of the High Entia, which they revert to when exposed to high concentrations of Ether. While most of them lose sentience and become instantly hostile servants of Zanza when this happens, some Telethia can be found close to their surviving relatives, as if they are still watching over them. One of the victims, prince Kalian, manages to hold onto his sense of self long enough to say goodbye to his sister Melia shortly before dying. With Zanza gone in Future Connected, the Telethia become much less hostile and even help the party at times, and Teelan is convinced that in time, it may be possible to change them back to their old selves.
Webcomics
- Slightly Damned: Demons are usually just mindless killing machines when they go berserk, but this trope has occurred twice thanks to Buwaro's star pendant.
- When Sakido goes berserk during the escape from Hell she accidentally grabs Buwaro's pendant when trying to kill him, thus regaining partial sanity. She stops attacking and carries Rhea and Buwaro toward the ascension.
- Later on, Buwaro drinks a red strength potion and involuntarily goes berserk, but he was still wearing his pendant so he still has enough of his mind to go save Kieri from some other demons.
- TwoKinds has an example of the person not physically transforming but is similar in spirit. Trace has a Superpowered Evil Side that is violently murderous towards Keidran; at one point, he slips into a similarly powered state, but this time he protects Flora (though it is downplayed, as he's Ax-Crazy).
Western Animation
- Big Hero 6: The Series:
- In "Big Problem", the heroes fight a mutant monster that keeps quoting Shakespeare. After some investigation, they figure out that the monster is millionaire Orso Knox, who had been mutated by experimental gene altering technology, trying to cry out for help with quotations by the Bard.
- In the two-parter "City of Monsters", Karmi is turned into a mutant creature and forced to kidnap and later try to kill Hiro, on Di's order. However, as Hiro gives her an "I Know You're in There Somewhere" speech, she snaps out of Di's control and proceeds to fight against Di's right-hand man Chris.
- In Castlevania (2017), Flyseyes retains some memories of his life as a philosopher in Athens during the rise of Christianity, despite having his soul transferred into the body of a night creature.
- Kipo and the Age of Wonderbeasts: When Song is in her mega-monkey form, she displays some traits of her previous human mind such as greater intelligence than other mega-mutes, a deal of empathy and a fiercely protective love for her daughter Kipo.
- At the end of season 2 of Skylanders Academy, Spyro is corrupted by Strykore and turned into Dark Spyro. The next season has Dark Spyro be given the task of infiltrating the academy to uncover its secrets and destroy it, while also attempting to corrupt other skylanders. However, Spyro's original personality sprouts every now and then, causing him to pull back at times. This causes the rest of the skylanders to realize what happened to Spyro and they have him chained up to extract the evil from him, which results in Spyro and Dark Spyro becoming separate from one another.
- Spider-Man: The Animated Series: During the "Neogenic Nightmare" arc, Spider-Man transforms into the monstrous six-armed Man-Spider, but it is still at least partially him underneath it as he goes out to save Flash Thomson after he is attacked by Morbius. Later he seeks out Mary Jane and even leaves after he frightens her and his friend Harry.
- Steven Universe: Some corrupted gems exhibit a sense of loyalty such as Centipeetle's loyalty to her crew and later to Steven after he shows her he's a friend despite their damaged mental states. Some even show strategic intelligence, such as when two corrupted gems communicate with each other and split up to try and outmaneuver the pursuing Jasper.
- Teen Titans (2003): After Beast Boy is exposed to some chemicals, he changes into a werewolf-like monster and seemingly attacks Raven. Later it turns out he rescued her from Adonis, who was also exposed to those same chemicals.
