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"HERMIT, n. A person whose vices and follies are not sociable."

Hermits are folks who don't live around other folks — and they like it that way. They never say I Just Want to Have Friends and they aren't afraid of Dying Alone. Hermits aren't banished or cut off from society as punishment — they willingly chose to leave it, for whatever reason.

Despite their reclusive lifestyle, fictional hermits may be either friendly or hostile. If a hermit is friendly, their reason for living alone will be that they simply enjoy the solitude. If the hermit is hostile, it's because they're misanthropic. On occasion, the hero will encounter a religious hermit.

Nice or not, almost all hermits are quirky. That's because Loners Are Freaks; they don't conform to society's rules about cleanliness, politeness, or footwear. Heck, they don't conform to society's standards at all. Hermits generally have a high tolerance to Going Mad from the Isolation, but they're not completely immune. See "quirkiness" above.

Most classic hermits tend to live in swamps, jungles, deserts, or caves; and are often shown to be Older Than Dirt. Modern hermits are more likely to live in cities or towns, but be highly, highly withdrawn, to the point of never interacting with the outside world. Hikikomori, Basement-Dweller, and the Reclusive Artist are some examples.

If a hero seeks out this person for guidance or training, chances are you're dealing with a Hermit Guru. Other times when a hero meets up with them on a journey, they may become a kind of one-person Wacky Wayside Tribe.

Self-Imposed Exile is another common reason for becoming The Hermit. Unlike other examples of The Exile, where exile is punishment, this hermit is choosing exile for themselves because they feel they must. Sometimes their continued freedom or survival depends on it. It may be a form of living Off the Grid.

Use caution when adding examples from Eastern media — "hermit" is a popular translation for the Chinese xian and Japanese sennin, but not all xian/sennin embody this trope.

Compare The Aloner, for whom social isolation is a terrible punishment, and those Sent Into Hiding. Contrast Hates Being Alone, for when a character really doesn't want to be isolated from others. See I Work Alone for when they don't rely on others. If they're also a magic user, you have a Solitary Sorceress.


Examples:

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    Anime and Manga 

    Card Games 
  • There's the Tarot Card named "The Hermit", which represents contemplative solitude.

    Comic Books 
  • Archie Comics: There have been a few stories about hermits — one was about a hermit teen who ran away from foster care and lived in a cave. He chased away any intruders, until Betty got in trouble — then he swooped in, rescued her, and decided he liked people and wanted to live among them again.
  • Astro City: Mister Manta becomes this in "The Deep Blue Sea". After decades marooned on a deserted island, he finds his way back to civilization, only to become rattled because he's so accustomed to being alone. He gets marooned again, and happily goes back to "planning" his triumphant return.
  • Copperhead: Ishmael lives alone outside town. He claims the choice is due to prejudice and lack of employment opportunities. It's unclear how often he interacts with the community before Clara's arrival; everyone knows who he is but only by reputation.
  • The Scorpion: Gottfried dwells in the middle of the desert, protecting the Cross of Peter.
  • Silverblade: After making his last film in 1967, Jonathan Lord withdrew to his palatial estate Shangri-la and made no public appearances for the next 20 years: preferring to remain in his mansion watching his old movies.

    Fairy Tales 

    Fan Works 
  • Cheating Death: Those That Lived: Skinner lives alone on the outskirts of District Ten and prefers hunting Mutts to socializing with humans. Even after he wins the 69th Hunger Games, he only maintains a cursory presence in the victor's village and mostly goes back to being a hermit at his old haunts.
  • Don't Keep Your Distance: Morris the Iguana left the big city he was from on his motorcycle out of grief when a friend died and drove mindlessly into the forest, eventually happening upon the village Sunny Clearing and deciding to start a new life there when the locals took him in. Quickly, however, he realized he didn't much get along with them owing to their closed-minded mentality, but he does participate in communal activities anyway, it being only fair. One of these activities, a search for food in the woods, was when he found the protagonist, Paint, as a helpless infant.
  • Egypt on Anur Khufos: Elias Amsude. Working as a journalist in Giza for nearly 15 years, he's grown bored with modern Egyptian life and wishes more for what the country was like thousands of years ago, and as such he lives under one of the smaller pyramids in a makeshift underground apartment. He's actually a Thep Khufan scribe named Elastamun, who was stationed on Earth to research humans while disguised as one. By the time the story starts, he's called back to his homeworld Anur Khufos by his master, because since he was away, their species had started dying from a mysterious plague while under the rule of a ruthless pharaoh.
  • Greenfire: Greenfire, by choice, avoids pony society. Rarity's attempt to invite him to the Summer Sun Celebration doesn't go to well, because he doesn't think that anypony—aside from Rarity—will accept him, plus he feels like Rarity is "bossing him around". He hasn't even had contact with any other dragons, either.
  • In The Keys Stand Alone: The Soft World, the four are sent by the Circle to speak to a hermit in a cold piney woods about the whereabouts of a piece of the Nine-part Key. They're warned that he may not be too friendly, that he may be guarded, and that he may require some kind of service done for him before he will make with the information. What they're not warned about is that there is no hermit, just an empty cave and an ambush by the Circle.
  • Vow of Nudity: Haara lives alone in the wilderness whenever she's not Walking the Earth on a quest.

    Films—Live-Action 
  • The Hobbit: Radagast the Brown. Unless you count the animals he seems capable of speaking with, in which case he's a very social person indeed.
  • Monty Python's Life of Brian has at least one scene with a traditional religious hermit, who's had his eye on a particular bush of berries.
  • Ophelia: Mechtild has lived by herself in the forest for years ever since losing her son, getting accused of witchcraft and faking her death to escape being burned as one.
  • Pig is about a man who lives alone in the forests of Oregon traveling to the city in search of his kidnapped truffle pig.
  • Star Wars:
    • At the beginning of A New Hope, Obi-Wan Kenobi is living in this way on a desert planet called Tatooine, as is Yoda in The Empire Strikes Back in a swamp located in Dagobah. The prequel films show that both are hiding from the Empire that has kill-orders on them.
    • In The Force Awakens, Luke Skywalker becomes a hermit out of guilt after his nephew and former apprentice massacred the new Jedi order and took up residence on the water world Ahch-To. He technically lives in a village of intelligent aliens that maintain the planet's ruins, but he is isolated from the galactic society at large.
    • Averted in The Rise of Skywalker: After seeing a vision of herself as a Sith Rey decided to become a hermit herself on Ahch-To, however Luke returns as a force ghost and convinces Rey to go to Exegol and confront Palpatine, telling her that even though her grandfather is Palpatine it doesn't make her a bad person.
  • The Wailing: The man suspected for the deaths lives in an old decrepit house in the woods near the village of Goksung.
  • Zachariah: The titular character befriends the Old Man, who lives in a hut by himself and farms vegetables because he likes being alone.

    Jokes 
  • Farmer William's son was helping his father unload wares at the market when he let out a fart so huge everyone stared at him. He immediately ran off into the forest, only stopping when he dropped from sheer exhaustion. He lived there for years, fleeing at the slightest approach of a fellow human. One day he saw his reflection in a pond and realized his hair had grown white, and resolved to find out what had become of his village now that he had been long forgotten. He returned to the village and saw a magnificent church had been built near the market. He approached a small child and asked what the building was, and the child replied "That's the Church of Our Lady Mary. They started building it five years, six months and three days; and finished building it twenty-six years, four months and nine days after the day Farmer William's son farted".

    Literature 
  • After the Revolution: Roland starts the book living as an amnesiac hermit living on a mountain in the now-mostly abandoned former state of Arizona, getting high and trying not to indulge his 'kill people, get pleasure' implants. He knows part of his memories are missing and that he probably still has former friends and lovers out there somewhere, but he has little to no motivation to try to reconnect with any of them. After going through the events of the book, recovering much of his memories and then promptly losing them again, Roland goes back to his mountain and abandons all the connections he made through the book.
  • A Canticle for Leibowitz: Benjamin, who may or may not also be the pilgrim from the first portion of the book, the Old Jew from the third, and/or Leibowitz himself, lives in isolation on one of the mesas surrounding the monastery, only coming down to trade with the monks from time to time,
  • Carl Hiaasen: Several novels include a recurring hermit named "Skink" who's sworn off society and lived the last 40-some years wandering the Florida Everglades, subsiding off roadkill and occasionally surfacing to lend his hand to a struggling individual or exact some vigilante justice on those who he feels have wronged nature. Only a few people know that he's actually Clinton Tyree, a former Governor who famously resigned and went missing after becoming disenchanted with the rampant corruption that permeated Florida politics.
  • Charlie and the Chocolate Factory: In the backstory, Willy Wonka became this for a time after he closed his factory due to corporate espionage on the part of his rivals, completely breaking off contact with other people and vanishing from the public eye. Eventually he discovered the Oompa-Loompas and hired them as a new workforce, though he remains an in-universe Reclusive Artist.
  • The Chronicles of Narnia: The Horse and His Boy had the protagonists helped by a nameless (but friendly) hermit once they reach the end of the desert and cross into Archenland.
  • City Of Bones 2007: Madame Dorothea doesn't like leaving her apartment, and only interacts with Jocelyn Fray.
  • Discworld: Snuff introduces a hermit who lives on Sybil's countryside property, because apparently having a hermit on one's land was once fashionable among the nobility and they like to keep up traditions. This one wanders around speaking cryptic philosophy and being filthy, but gets a week's vacation each year during which he behaves normally and is actually popular with the ladies, ensuring that he will have sons to carry on the profession.
  • The Divine Comedy: The seventh sphere of Heaven (Saturn) houses those who left their worldly possessions to live a monastic life.
  • Edenborn: Halloween has the whole continent of North America to himself.
  • In The Faerie Queene, many knights encounter hermits — these are either genuinely religious or Evil Sorcerers in disguise.
  • Goodnight Mister Tom: Tom Oakley became this at the start of the book after losing his wife and his son, but he still has his dog Sammy for company.
  • In Green Angel, Green becomes a non-religious hermit out of grief at her family's deaths. Over the books she lives largely alone except for her dog; the boy Diamond stays for a while due to heavy face burns, and they fall in love until he leaves to search for his mother. In the second book, she's less of a hermit since people come to her to tell their stories, and it takes the end of the book for Green to finally start living with Diamond and his mother.
  • Hayy ibn Yaqzan: The protagonist is a hermit by circumstance, being a Wild Child on a Deserted Island who has never met another human in his life. In middle age, he becomes a true religious hermit who spends almost all his time meditating in a cell, leaving only once a week to gather food.
  • How the Grinch Stole Christmas!: The Grinch lives alone in a mountaintop cave, with only a dog for companionship.
  • It's Not the End of the World: Jeff, the eldest child and only son, becomes increasingly moody and withdrawn as the story progresses, spending most of his time in his room.
  • Judge Dee: The titular judge is rather skeptical of hermits as a whole, but he does meet one that gives him important clues to solving a murder.
  • Land of Oz: In Glinda of Oz, Reera the Red is a master shapeshifter who mostly just wants to be left alone in her small cottage with her various transformed pets; she has be cajoled and finagled into undoing a Forced Transformation spell (that someone else cast).
  • The Light Jar: William Blakelore, the former owner of the cottage Nate and his mum moved into, rarely left the cottage or spoke to anyone in the years leading up to his death.
  • A Little Bush Maid: Norah Linton discovers a hermit living in the Australian bush. He is quite friendly to Norah and her friends but has a Dark and Troubled Past which explains why he prefers to live in isolation.
  • The Lorax: The Once-Ler lives near the wreckage of his old factory and never ventures outside. This is largely due to his guilt complex.
  • The Misenchanted Sword: The wizard who Valder meets and enchants his sword lives all by himself.
  • Mungo City is about a world where commercialisation runs rampant. People are allowed to leave Mungo City and get away from the capitalistic society, but only if they agree to live isolated in the wilderness forever. The main character decides to chose this option to get away from his incredibly annoying friend. The friend follows him into isolation.
  • The Night Garden: A hermit lives on the edge of Franny's family's farm's property. Zebediah visits him quite frequently during his time there and gets the code to activate the Argot for Fixing Bob from him.
  • Noob: The Ashentäk Oracle had to leave the city to settle in the Ashentäk Bubblegloop Swamp, due to being a Blessed with Suck Seer who would get regularly harassed. She's aware that whoever goes though the trouble of paying her a visit must really need her help, so she's as good a hostess as living in a half-sunken castle can permit her.
  • Nursery Crime: The Quangle-Wangle is a notoriously reclusive figure, specifically the type of extremely rich person who avoids contact with society at large. An in-universe joke goes that, when recluses meet up, they remark on how nobody's seen the Quangle-Wangle of late. As it turns out, the reclusiveness is due to his having been killed some time before the books.
  • RWBY: Fairy Tales of Remnant:
    • The Warrior in the Woods: The Warrior lives alone in the deep forest. Not only does she avoid the village, she doesn't even want them to know she exists. She eventually tells the hero that her home was massacred, and she's been living alone ever since.
    • The Story of the Seasons: The Old Wizard lives in an isolated cabin in the middle of a forest. He receives no visitors and hasn't even left the house to step outside in centuries when the four sisters encounter him. Through their compassion and persistence, they encourage him to accept their presence, their help and to even step into the sunlight, transforming his life for the better. The Old Wizard is one of Professor Ozpin's previous incarnations, something he confirms in Volume 5 of the main show.
  • In Sirena, the titular mermaid and her nine sisters commit an Accidental Murder of two ships full of men while trying to seduce them. Sirena is determined not to kill another man, so she travels to the Deserted Island of Lemnos, planning to live out her days alone in the nearby waters. Her time as a hermit ends when the human Philoctetes is abandoned on Lemnos by his fellow sailors.
  • "The Sword of Saint Ferdinand": Agatín is a reclusive hermit and scholar who lives alone in a cottage in the Jerezan countryside. Agatín doesn't like visitors, and he will happily introduce strangers to his crossbow if they don't leave without a fuss.
  • Tough Magic: Uncle Rick lives by himself a few miles away from town, is anti-social, not much of a talker and resides in a mountain.
  • Villains by Necessity: Before the quest, Kaylana lived by herself in the woods with only some animal companions there for an unspecified amount of time.
  • Les Voyageurs Sans Souci: Sébastian and Agathe must talk to a hermit who lives in a cave on a mountainside to find Golden Eagle. Agathe's idea of a hermit is "a very old long-bearded man who wears a hood and black robes, and lives alone in a cave because he has been hurt by people or wants to meditate over his griefs without being disturbed." When they meet him, though, he is a blonde, blue-eyed -filthy- man who suffers from unrequited love and is seventeen at most.
  • Wool: Walker is notable for being perhaps the smartest mechanic in Silo 18 and having gone years without leaving his work area.

    Live-Action TV 
  • Boy Meets World: One episode features an Imagine Spot after the group of friends begin playing pranks on one another in which this causes a rift between them and breaks them apart. In this fantasy, Eric becomes a hermit living alone purifying and re-drinking his own urine, having changed his name to Plays-With-Squirrels. He wrote an immense manifesto (claiming that every hermit has one), which includes a thousand blank pages and only one with writing on it- "Lose one friend, lose all friends, lose yourself."
  • Doctor Who: In "The Time Monster", the Doctor refers to visiting a hermit who lived on a mountain behind his house on Gallifrey. (Fanon has it that this was K'anpo Rinpoche, the Buddhist Time Lord from "Planet of the Spiders".)
  • In Merlin (2008), the titular character's father Balinor lived as a hermit.
  • Monty Python's Flying Circus: Parodied in a sketch about hermits living in caves on a mountainside, who act like cooped in housewives and often meet up for a chat!
  • The Path: Kodiak is a mystic and Willing Channeler, founding member of the Meyerist faith, he has lived alone in, literally, Siberia (perhaps studying shamanism there) for the past twelve years, until called back to the main community by their doctor, to help her unravel leader Cal's schemes. He is a Nature Lover. Along with mystic/counselor Richard, he becomes The Seeker.
  • Star Trek:
    • Star Trek: Deep Space Nine The elderly Bajoran farmer Mullibok along with his friends Baltrim and Keena become hermits on the Bajoran moon Jerrado, but are forced to leave in 2369 when an energy transfer project made the moon uninhabitable. In the novel "Warchild" he begins a new life in Bajor's Kaladrys Valley, forgiving Kira for forcing him to leave his home.
    • Star Trek: Picard: After resigning from Starfleet, Admiral Picard became something of a hermit at his family estate near La Barre, France. Admiral Clancey once referred to Picard as The Hermit of La Barre
    • Star Trek: Voyager: Janeway becomes something of a hermit after the USS Voyager enters a region of the galaxy where there are no stars and it is completely dark out by spending all of her time in her quarters and refusing to interact with anyone outside of Commander Chakotay.
  • The Walking Dead (2010): It's no big surprise that he would enjoy being alone, but the circumstances at hand make it tragic. Daryl Dixon becomes a hermit in Season 9 Episode 5. After Rick Grimes blows up the bridge the communities were building to destroy a massive walker herd and seemingly sacrificed himself, Daryl cried over the loss of his "brother". He then silently realizes that his and Maggie's actions trying to kill Negan ended up getting Rick "killed" instead. As a result, Daryl walks off alone and lived in the woods for six long years. In the six years he spent in the woods, Daryl desperately tried to find Rick's body or evidence of survival for closure. At some point he did find a dog he simply called "Dog" who he trained and kept around for company. However, it can be presumed that Daryl spent a vast majority of the six years living in the woods completely by himself. Downplayed because he encountered Michonne looking for Rick's body on the riverbank about eight months after Rick blew up the bridge. Later on the next day, he helps her find Judith and the other missing children who were kidnapped by Michonne's old friend Jocelyn and her group. It is also subverted partially because Daryl told Carol where to find him if she wanted to see him. However, dialogue between Henry and Daryl suggest that Carol hasn't seen much of Daryl after the bridge explosion. As such, Daryl spent many years completely cut off from his allies who cared about him.
  • Uchu Sentai Kyuranger: Stinger/Sasori Orange prefers solitude as he doesn't want to associate with anyone. Dark and Troubled Past is major cause for this. He can be roughly kind under the right circumstances.

    Music 
  • Warren Zevon: In "Splendid Isolation", this is the ultimate goal of the narrator — to remove himself from the rest of humanity as much as physically possible.

    Religion 
  • Christianity:
    • Catholicism and Eastern Orthodoxy allow for hermits. It was indeed how the first monks lived (anchorites) before switching to collective life in the monasteries.
    • Catholicism has specific rules for hermits: they have to present themselves to the diocesan bishop and place themselves to his direction as diocesan hermits or belong to an eremitic order.
    • Eastern Orthodoxy allows for eremitism in which hermits live lives of prayer for their communities.
    • Anglicanism has religious communities with hermits as members; one Church of England community, the Society of St. John the Evangelist, now even has solitaries only in its British congregation. Similarly, Anglicanism allows for diocesan hermits.
  • Some Dharmic religions like Buddhism and Hinduism have hermits as well.
  • Shamans of the Sami traditional religion customarily live as hermits. This started as a result of persecution when the religion was suppressed by Christian Scandinavians.

    Tabletop Games 
  • Deadlands: The Fire & Brimstone supplement included a Hermit archetype for Blessed characters.
  • Pathfinder:
    • Bronze dragons are the least sociable of the metallics and prefer to spend their time alone with their books and research, often spending years or decades at a time holed up in seclusion before being forced to return to society to acquire new reading material.
    • The Golarion setting has Eziah, an archmage so reclusive he built a magically shielded Mage Tower that floats within the sun.
  • Warhammer 40,000: By preference, many Ork Weirdboyz would be entirely happy to wander off from their tribes, find a nice cave in the wilderness, and spend their days in isolation, looking for weird rocks, talking to Squigs and drinking fungus moonshine. Warbosses commonly assign them Minderz specifically to ensure that this doesn't happen and the Weirboyz stick around.
  • Warhammer Fantasy: Amber Wizards, who use the Lore of Beasts, tend to avoid human civilization if they have a choice in the matter, and instead prefer to live in the depths of the forest with only nature and wild beasts as company.

    Theatre 
  • Arcadia: A Mad Mathematician hermit is a major plot point. By the end of the play, we know it was Septimus.
  • Samuel Beckett: This trope is a very common feature of Beckett's male protagonists (like the "seedy solipsists" of Murphy, Krapp's Last Tape and Eleutheria) who often try to detach themselves from the outside world entirely.
  • Timon of Athens: Timon becomes a hermit once he is sufficiently Maddened Into Misanthropy, and, unlike most examples, he's not friendly to visitors at all.

    Video Games 
  • Avencast: Rise of the Mage: The nameless hermit doesn't figure into the game, but he's critical to the backstory and serves as the audience for the framing device.
  • Bug Fables: The tarantula wizard in the Far Grasslands is one. His Mage Tower is surrounded by "keep out" signs, and when the party accidentally crashes into his basement he's eager for them to leave as soon as possible. He'll warm up to them a bit if they help him find ingredients for a hard-to-brew potion, however.
  • Dragon Age: Origins:
    • A mad hermit features as part of the Nature of the Beast questline. The player character must either seek his help to reach the centre of the Brecilian forest or retrieve an acorn from him for a poetic sylvan. He is also a powerful blood mage who once occupied a tower raised from the ground with magic.
    • Solas of Dragon Age: Inquisition is an elven hermit, displeased with society as a whole and particularly the direction the elves have gone. Unsurprisingly, seeing as he's actually one of their gods.
  • Evolve: Crow chose to live alone in the wilds of Shear for his retirement, surviving off the land with only a little tech to help him. His job before that was essentially the same thing, being dropped alone onto alien worlds for a few years to learn about its survivability before being retrieved, debriefed, and tossed to a new world.
  • Fire Emblem: The Binding Blade: Niime is known as the Hermit on the Mountain, and, after the end of the game, she's stated to have returned to her reclusive life to continue her research into the Scouring and Elder Magic. It's thought that she was able to unlock many of the world's mysteries, but she never left any written records.
  • Knight Bewitched 2: Ash was once a brainwashed minion of Mona and was forced to kill anyone who opposed her rule. When he regained control, he holed up in a cabin in the snowy wilderness out of guilt.
  • Knights of the Old Republic Jolee Bindo. You find him living in a hut on the surface of Kashyyyk, which is largely populated by dangerous animals and reckless young Wookiees.
  • In Kult: Heretic Kingdoms, one of Alita's tasks is to track down a hermit who lives in the woods, as a favour to the forest's guardian. He's found, but only as a ghost. Since he's a religious hermit, and Alita's job is to enforce a ban on religion, their interaction is a bit rocky, but the hermit's new posthumous status makes their debate purely academic.
  • The Legend of Spyro:
    • The Chronicler has been living on the White Isle in solitude for over a thousand years, until Spyro and Sparx, and eventually Ignitus, come along.
    • The Legend of Spyro: Dawn of the Dragon: While exploring Avalar, Spyro and Cynder encounter an old cheetah hermit who lives alone in the wilderness rather than among the other cheetahs in the village. His time alone is shown to have taken a toll on him, as while he's wise and well-informed he's also a touch deranged and his advice is couched in taunts and ominous implications and punctuated by bursts of cackling.
  • The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past: Sahasrahla is an old, wise man who chose to move out of Kakariko Town and live alone in the ancient ruins of the Eastern Palace.
  • Misericorde: Hedwig is an anchoress, meaning she swore a sacred vow to live an isolated life devoted to prayer and spiritual contemplation. To that end, she has lived in a tiny cell for most of her life, with most of her time given over to copying scripture or offering spiritual guidance to the occasional visitor. Extraordinary circumstances force her to break her vow, come out of her cell, and mingle with the other nuns of Linbarrow Abbey, causing her immense discomfort.
  • Monster Hunter: Alatreon is a powerful and hostile dragon that craves solitude so much that it deliberately makes its home in dangerous and inhospitable locations where no other creature can live. It's usually found in volcanic calderas, but the bottom of the ocean works just as well.
  • Quest for Glory I: So You Want to be a Hero: 'Arry the 'Ermit is very friendly and loves company, but is still very much a 'ermit.
  • Stardew Valley:
    • Linus is an old man who made the conscious decision to live in a tent by the lake in the mountains near Robin's house, living off wild forage (and leftovers fished out of people's garbage cans). He's something of an outcast among the other villagers, but if the player befriends him he'll teach them a few cooking recipes, and how to make Wild Bait for fishing.
    • Patch 1.5 introduced Birdie, an old woman living alone in a hut on Ginger Island, she survives by fishing and foraging wild fruits and vegetables. She gives a Chain of Deals quest that concludes with the player giving her a locket that belonged to her late pirate husband.
  • Touhou Project has Kasen Ibaraki, The One-Armed, Horned Hermit. She lives on her own, and is about as eccentric as most people in Gensokyo. However, she is also tasked with aiding people with her wisdom, so she's not a complete recluse. Though called an Evil Hermit, Seiga Kaku is not much for isolation (what with masterminding religious takeovers and living with a zombie).

    Web Animation 
  • RWBY: In the Remnant fairytale, the Story of the Seasons, The Old Wizard lived in an isolated cabin in the middle of a forest. He received no visitors and hadn't even left the house to step outside in centuries when the four heroic sisters encountered him. Through their compassion and persistence, they encouraged him to accept their presence, their help and to even step into the sunlight, transforming his life for the better. In return, he rewarded them with his magical powers so they could use them to help humanity. Volume 5 confirms he is a previous incarnation of Professor Ozpin, and Volume 6 heavily implies the Old Wizard was reeling from a terrible tragedy; Ozpin demonstrates that he still retains that trauma response when the heroes' discovery of the secret he's been keeping about Salem causes him to emotionally collapse and isolate himself in the back of Oscar's mind; he doesn't recover enough to return until the very end of Volume 7.

    Webcomics 
  • Kidd Commander: Jocasta lives alone in a shack. Phineas tells her: "Dunno why you bother locking it. No one else is gonna walk all the way out here to see you."
  • Unfamiliar: Babs became one as a result of her siren powers constantly drawing unwanted attention to herself.

    Web Videos 

    Western Animation 
  • Batman Unlimited: Mechs Vs. Mutants sees Mr. Freeze perfectly content with being one and staying in the Arctic until the Penguin talks him into returning to Gotham.
  • The Legend of Korra: Toph is revealed to have become one, living in solitude except for the occasional raid on the swamp tribes. She claims she knows what's happening all over the world via the roots of the World Tree.
  • Mr. Sultana on Pinky and the Brain claims to have taken the advice of a career consultant to become a "paranoid recluse."
  • Quest for Camelot: Garrett, a blind orphan who had managed to survive living alone in the woods. He even has a theme song he sings.
  • The Ren & Stimpy Show: In "Hermit Ren", Ren becomes a hermit to get away from Stimpy.
  • Shrek: The titular character is firmly this for much of the film. He hates that people tend to judge him before they properly know him, which is why he feels he's better off being on his own. Of course, this attitude is dropped by the end of the film when he befriends Donkey and realizes he's in love with Fiona.
  • Up: After the death of his wife, Ellie, Carl lived his life as a recluse. He sat beside his late wife's empty chair in their house surrounded by objects and memories as a city grew around him.
  • "The Mad Hermit of Chimney Butte", an episode of Walt Disney Presents. Donald Duck is the titular hermit, who got tired of living near people and moved further and further away from civilization, eventually ending up in a remote desert butte, shooting at anyone who comes near. The episode ends with the butte being destroyed during an atomic bomb test; fortunately, Donald survived and decided that being around people wasn't so bad after all.

 
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The Mad Hermit...

In this Disney show, we meet a shotgun-wielding hermit, who turns out to be one D. Duck, who fires at every living creature he sees. He can even spot the cameraman from a mile away.

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