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"Nausicaa is the thread that joins us all together. Us, the Doroks, even Kushana and the wormhandlers. Without Nausicaa, we would only quarrel and splinter."
Rule of thumb, Hassan, you can't kill The Messiah
The main character, simply put, loves everyone. Loves them with a deep, spiritual love that means they will shake heaven and earth, destroy gods and planets, bring nations to their knees, etc. for the person they just met yesterday. They will believe the best of everyone, and constantly give someone a second chance (though they will destroy the Big Bad). They repay cruelty with kindness and anger with calm. As long as the attacks are only against them— they're not forgiving of harm done to others. Most people think they're insane, but somehow they pull it off. Even Mary Sue and Marty Stu are impressed.
The Empathic Weapon trusts them completely, as does every animal they meet. Their every step causes flowers to bloom. Their circle of friends are in awe of them, if not somewhat in love with them. They'll even attract an Anti Hero or two who will stick around so they can at least figure out what drugs this person is taking — and where they can get some. In their hands The Power Of Love and The Power Of Friendship can be an awesome force, they may be the standard bearer for the message that You Are Not Alone and if anything can redeem a person against the odds by showing them the light of goodness, it will probably be The Messiah.
On the Sliding Scale Of Idealism Versus Cynicism, The Messiah is a heavily idealistic character. Even in a dark world, they are ideal. In the hands of a bad writer, the character can easily be mutated into a Mary Sue.
The Fool is sometimes the embryonic state of The Messiah doubled as the Idiot Hero. A Magnetic Hero has the intangable quality of earning respect and followers that some Messiah characters do but without needing the "love and forgive everyone" part. The Messiah who takes their idealisim too far into Facepalm-worthy idiocy (like seriously trying to trade the Artifact Of Doom if the villain promises not to hurt anyone) may lapse into Stupid Good or Lawful Stupid.
For the character who only thinks they're The Messiah, see the Love Freak.
Compare Martyr Without A Cause, The Paragon, The Heart, Purity Sue. This trope is not about Jesus-analogs; that's Messianic Archetype. While they and The Messiah sometimes overlap, a character having that archetype can be far-flung from being The Messiah in mind and behavior. Contrast Dark Messiah, which can stand in opposition to this but is more Messianic Archetype + Anti Hero, as well as Complete Monster.
Examples
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Anime and Manga
Comic Books
Film
- Nausicaa from Nausicaa Of The Valley Of The Wind. Though in this case, she is in fact an actual messiah figure (the Blue Clad One).
- Also from Hayao Miyazaki, Ashitaka from Princess Mononoke fits this trope perfectly (in fact if he didn't, his curse would kill him).
- Victor Laszlo in Casablanca. It says something about him that the only person in the entire movie who isn't in complete awe and admiration of the utterly heroic and saintly resistance leader and doesn't think he's the greatest thing since the invention of bread, sliced or otherwise, is the Nazi officer who has been sent to capture him, which is a ringing endorsement if ever there was one. He's so noble that he doesn't even hold a grudge that his beloved wife, believing that he was dead, has fallen in love with another man, and his example is so powerful that that other man is eventually quite willing to sacrifice his one chance at happiness by convincing her to stay with him.
- Sergeant Elias K. Grodin from Platoon which makes his dramatic death scene all the more powerful.
- WALL-E.
- Happy Feet. Ironically.
- Lady In The Water features as a secondary character a writer who, it is revealed, will in the future become The Messiah by writing a work so universally beloved and inspirational that it will inspire world leaders and ordinary people alike to work towards making the world a better place, and who will eventually die in order to save us from ourselves. By itself, not that bad. However, writer-director M Night Shyamalan chose to cast himself in this role. This caused eyebrows to be raised.
- Poppy from Happy-Go-Lucky. It was half the point of the movie.
- Luke Skywalker in Star Wars. Expanded Universe may differ, but consider that upon discovering his father is a Sith Lord and one of the galaxy's most ruthless killers, he decides—against the advice of everyone—that Dad can be saved from the Dark Side. He turns out to be right.
Literature
- Carrot Ironfoundersson from Terry Pratchett's Discworld series. He gets an idea in his head and is able to drag the rest of the world around to his viewpoint. Even to the point that he's able to arrest a dragon which had previously been terrorizing the city. His love interest Sergeant Angua (an Action Girl), and Commander Vimes both remark upon this ability of his. In Carrot's case, it may be because he is the true and lawful heir to the throne of Ankh-Morpork.
- Discworld also has Brutha, the last true believer of the Great God Om. His sheer basic decency extends to everyone from tortoises to the Big Bad, twice and he brings in a new and more tolerant era for his Corrupt Church.
- Bobby from the Pendragon series. He seems to be able to make friends with all of travelers in every world in a matter of minutes of meeting them. And, it was said on more then one occasion he would be the only one to beat Saint Dane. he does.
- Rama, in The Ramayana. When a plot causes his rightful throne to go to his brother Bharata, Rama is delighted for his brother's good fortune, without any concern for his own loss of status. When he's exiled by this same plot, he has to talk the entire country (including Bharata) out of coming with him. He collects allies everywhere he goes, just by dint of his goodness. Rama and Sita are supposed to be the great lovers beyond time and space, but the effect is more that Rama loves everyone, everyone loves Rama, and Sita is a member of "everyone".
- Andy Dufresne, the main character of Stephen King's story Rita Hayworth And The Shawshank Redemption is The Messiah of the story, which is remarkable considering the near hopeless circumstances that he finds himself in (one might even interpret him as The Woobie). There are several symbolic parallels between him and Jesus Christ which shape the entire message of the book, that "hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things and no good thing ever dies".
- Alyosha, the third and youngest of The Brothers Karamazov, loves all and is loved by all. Dostoevsky uses an entire chapter to illustrate how it would be impossible to not trust him. Everyone - and we mean everyone - in the book confides in Alyosha, and at times these discussions seem to resemble a priest taking confession. The story in the Bible of Jesus Christ being tempted in the desert by the devil has its parallels in some of Alyosha's discussions. For bonus points, he starts off as a novice monk in the nearby monastery.
- And as for Crime and Punishment... Sofya, anyone?
- We might as well add Prince Lev Nikolaievich Myshkin from The Idiot as well. In general, Dostoevsky might be entirely too fond of this trope.
- Everybody in The Land except Thomas Covenant, the bad guys and the Bloodguard is, personality-wise, The Messiah.
- In Anne Bishop's Black Jewels trilogy, Jaenelle is the most recent (and implied to be the most powerful ever) incarnation of Witch, essentially born from the collective dreams of the races who facilitates their reconciliation and eventually nearly kills herself in order to save her people.
- In The Lord of the Rings Aragorn's attachment to the other members of the Fellowship, as well as a large number of people he encounters during the books, qualifies him for this trope.
- Elua in the Kushiel's Legacy novels by Jacqueline Carey. Christ himself, albeit sporting a different name, is also in the series, but the religion of the main characters focuses on Elua. (Born of a mixture of Yeshua ben Yosef's blood and the Magdalene's tears, flowers arose where he walked, seven angels descended from Heaven to be his travelling companions, etc.) His single commandment to the race of people descended from him and his angelic followers was "love as thou wilt".
- Adil, one of the main characters in Sahar Khalifeh's Wild Thorns. A Palestinian who works in Israel (the book was written in the 70s') to support his nine family members, and always looking out for his fellow workers. He's more than once described as trying "to solve the Middle East conflict all by himself." Even his cousin who considers him a traitor for working in Israel cares strongly about him.
- Eriond in The Belgariad and The Malloreon. He's a small child in the former, although he is very trusting and generous. (He's been raised to be a complete innocent, so that he can handle The Orb, which tends to destroy anyone who touches it with less than completely pure motives.) By The Malloreon he's grown into the position. He's very mild in temperament, and even when he gets very angry (at one point they're in a Temple of Torak and a major sacrifice ritual (human, of course) is going on all he does is put out the temple fires — since if the hearts can't be burned, there's no way to continue the sacrifices.)
- Finny in A Separate Peace, who never sees anyone as an enemy, and believes that "when you really love something, then it has to love you back, in whatever way it has to love." Many readers (and English teachers) see him as a Christ figure.
- Mike in Robert A Heinlein's Stranger In A Strange Land. He's a walking Jesus allegory, but beside that he has an innocence so strong it even scares people a bit.
- Jesus. Also the trope maker of Messianic Archetype of course, but the forgiveness and unconditional love preaching makes him a partial Trope Maker for this one.
- Les Miserables: Jean Valjean, who in turn learned forgiveness from the Bishop of Digne after 19 years of prison made Valjean bitter and hatefull.
- Samuel Pickwick, Esq. It's the main reason he's funny.
- As pointed out by the Nostalgia Critic, Charlie from the Tim Burton remake. I'm not going to add any links that require brackets. I've done too much of that today already.
Live Action TV
- Daniel Jackson in Stargate and Stargate SG-1. No surprise that later, by the end of the fifth season, he evolves into a Messianic Archetype as well.
- Dr. Molly Clock in Scrubs.
- Peter Petrelli of Heroes embodies this to a point that's almost Genre Blindness or even Idiot Ball. He's so sweet and trusting that he'll even cast his lot in with the villain if he has a convincing enough sob story.
- Flash Gordon from the Sci-Fi channel TV adaptation is very much The Messiah, whose idealism and altruism inadvertantly manages to bring together several tribes of highly eccentric crazies (including multiple members of the Big Bad's faction), who've spent decades hating each other.
- The Doctor from Doctor Who and Angel from Angel have elements of this trope. Neither is universally loving or even all that nice, but they will go to any lengths to right a wrong that they've just stumbled on. Further, they both have a powerful draw on everyone else. Evil characters obsess over them; good characters leave their lives behind to join them, and often end up making even bigger sacrifices.
- One quote from the episode "Last of the Time Lords" makes this painfully clear about the Doctor. "You wouldn't listen. Because you know what I'm going to say... I forgive you."
- Constable Benton Fraser from Due South makes himself something of a local hero in the slum neighborhood of Chicago he lives in, unwittingly and unerringly winning the hearts of nearly everyone around him due to his constant, unwavering kindness to his fellow man. His partner, Ray Vecchio (and later Ray Kowalski), his friends, and even his boss are fiercely protective of him when danger arises. His lack of street smarts and general naievete can cause problems, though, and they sometimes wonder about his sanity.
Fraser: You mean you're using some promotional ploy to get something for nothing?
Ray: Welcome to the United States of America, Fraser.
- Locke in Lost, especially apparent in season 5. Perfectly contrasted with his mirror opposite and occasional sidekick, Dark Messiah Ben.
- Xander Harris in the Season Six finale of Buffy The Vampire Slayer. The Zeppo steps up for what will be his best moment, even getting razzed later on for bragging on it. In the S6 finale, he goes to and refuses to leave the side of Dark Willow as she prepares to destroy the world. Though set up for this by Giles and the Coven whose power he's borrowed he still manages to shine. Despite her worst, he gets to her, holding her as the good magic defeats the bad, allowing it to work through her, and saying simply "I Love You", over and over again. A quick ref to how "This carpenter is gonna drywall you." lampshades the idea.
- Kaylee from Firefly she has only ever hurt Reavers (and at that not very much considering,) she was the first to accept Simon and River as part of the crew. She seems to be the least violent person in the 'verse. She even likes Jayne, making her one of only two people to like him after getting to know him (the other is his mother). Her bright and cheery personality makes people tend to gravitate toward her, and her love and respect for them solidifies her as the messianic idealized character on an otherwise somewhat cynical show.
- Despite being an atoning petty criminal and Jerkass, and a Book Dumb hick, the titular character of My Name Is Earl has a real knack for getting along with people, is actively working hard to become a better person by righting all his past wrongs, in the process making his town a better place, and is willing to make great sacrifices for the people he cares about. Sometimes he relapses, but he brings up some interesting questions on morality and what makes a good person.
- Dean Winchester from Supernatural. At first, mostly because he's the only member of the Winchester family who hunts for the sake of saving people instead of revenge. Also, he's the most selfless and martyr-like individual on the show. By Season 4, however, this becomes nearly Word of God as after he's sent to Hell, God sends an army of angels to save him and resurrects him. The title of the episode this happened in brings even more religious allusions: Lazarus Rising.
- And now, he's apparently the human vessel for St. Michael, the only angel powerful enough to stop Lucifer.
Video Games
- Terra Branford form Final Fantasy VI is a clear example of this late in the game. In the World of Ruin, she ends up caring for orphans whose parents were murdered by Kefka and eventually Terra finds her purpose. To fight to protect those who need it as well as ensure a better future. Love drives her.
- Celes Chere could also fit this trope in the World of Ruin portion of the game.
- Lloyd from Tales Of Symphonia. He eventually transforms everyone in the party (and the world) for the better. He gives corny speeches explaining that everyone has the right to live freely, and inspires comments from his circle of friends on how softhearted, kind, strong, etc. he is.
- Colette arguably fits the description even more, but due to Lloyd's main (and player) character status, she gets much less of a chance to shine.
- Mithos, the legendary hero from the game's back story, was also a messiah. With his three companions and a belief in The Power Of Friendship, he saved the world from a magitek war. What subsequently happened to him is revealed later on in the game, and it's not pretty.
- Zidane Tribal from Final Fantasy IX is an example, despite the fact that he is a lecherous thief. His line in the game's character montage is "You don't need a reason to help people". In fact, multiple characters throughout the game actually complain about how kind Zidane is to everybody that he meets.
- Captain Brenner/O'Brian from Advance Wars: Days of Ruin commands the remnants of a military unit in a post-apocalyptic earth, held together by his own leadership ability and charisma, and uses it to unconditionally rescue survivors and help people. After The Plot Reaper is through with him, main character Will/Ed picks up the torch as well.
- Sora from Kingdom Hearts, who has friends all over the multiverse, and seems to hold them all in the same high regard. He even has an Empathic Weapon that runs on The Power Of Friendship. How savvy of you, Square Enix!
- Kyle Hyde of Hotel Dusk: Room 215 is something of a messiah who never planned to be. He only goes to the titular hotel on business with his company, Red Crown, and possibly to get a lead on the man he's been pursuing for three years, Brian Bradley. It turns out that all the other patrons of the hotel all have big problems tied to the hotel, Bradley, and the art theft organization he joined, Nile, including manager Dunning Smith, pining for his kidnapped daughter; Jeff Damon, who ran away from home with money and a gun after getting sick of his father's shady legal dealings; Kevin Woodward, trying to get his head around his malpractice suit and his wife somehow (through Nile) producing the money for a settlement; Helen Parker, searching for her lost son who loved to frequent the hotel; Martin Summer, who plagiarized that son's text for a novel and led to his disappearance and others. Through the course of one night at Hotel Dusk, Kyle Hyde manages to "take out [all of their] garbage" with evidence, questioning, and occasional tough love, and give them the strength to keep working to resolve their problems. He doesn't even want to arrest the person he's looking for despite what he did, he just wants to ask him "why?".
- Ion from Tales Of The Abyss. Luke eventually too, but to a lesser degree.
- Talim from Soul Series. Only when you play as her as protagonist, but she definitely fits this trope.
- Yggdra Union has three. Yggdra, the titular character, becomes a wise and loving monarch over the course of the story; the main antagonist, Gulcasa, is one to his own people to the point of dying trying to save them in a really twisted and tragic way; and then there's Nessiah, Gulcasa's friend and tactician (and fallen angel, let's not forget), who is actually something of a fallen messiah figure—he was the real deal once, but he essentially had the idealism and love for all living things tortured out of him when he was thrown out of Asgard for refusing to fight in its wars.
- Elly/Sophia from Xenogears who embodies selfless love and self-sacrifice across dozens of incarnations.
- Jaina Proudmoore in the Warcraft series. She's probably the most basically decent person (that doesn't go crazy and try to kill everyone) in the entire series, even helping a race she was raised to hate kill her father for peace and to genuinely honor the bond that Theramore acquired with the orcs. This even carries into World Of Warcraft where it seems everyone has taken a level in jerkass/incompetent.
- Anduin Lothar was either this or Too Dumb To Live in Warcraft II, where he tried to negociate peace with the orcs (who were still Always Chaotic Evil back then).
- Thrall is probably the best example. He's not a perfect one, but he comes to save his people and leads a religious rival including fighting off demons to free his people, and that's after he saved them from slavery and a meaningless existence in slave camps. Thrall is also generally the voice of reason, attempting to avoid war with the Alliance, knowing that it will only bring ruin and death. It also helps that he's the Messiah of a Proud Warrior Race making him a bit more interesting than most.
- Deconstructed in Fate Stay Night's "Unlimited Blade Works" route. Shirou is a Messiah who lives by the creed of 'I will save everyone!' while Archer, a Dark Messiah, points out that even Shirou knows you can't save every single person, so Archer will help the maximum number of people possible... Throwing innocent people to the wolves when necessary to prevent a larger crisis. Archer is also Shirou's future self, and implied to be the same Shirou from the Fate storyline. Basically, you can follow the ideals of the Messiah but it's going to totally screw you up inside if you're not careful or don't have a clear reason to do so, and in any case it simply doesn't work if you follow the ideal exactly.
- The biggest part of the deconstruction is arguably Shirou's psyche. Basically, his personality and reason for existing was shattered when his parents and his entire life was destroyed in the fire ten years ago — being saved by Kiritsugu made his entire being revolve around that event, to the degree that Shirou has no sense of self and can only define himself by helping others, even if the recipients neither want, appreciate nor need his help.
- Aeris/Aerith from Final Fantasy VII. The idealistic one in a group of people who are technically terrorists, she winds up martyred for her cause. Her "light in a dark place" role is obvious from the beginning, where she's hanging out in a church and somehow has flowers, sunshine and a nice little waterfall in the middle of the most putrid slums on the planet.
- Erana from the Quest For Glory games is a powerful mage whose pure and loving influence has remained throughout the different lands even after she is gone, exuding peace and harmony, planting flowers and generally encouraging selfless good deeds. Also, she sealed away an Eldritch Abomination by sealing herself away with it, forever locked inside an icy tomb in order to ensure that the evil being never returned to the world. And you learn all this without even meething her.
Webcomics
Web Original
- Shandala from Broken Saints fits this to a tee. Hell, pretty much all the tropes used in the description at the top of the page apply to her. Of course, when in the course of the story, it comes time for Break The Cutie, things get really ugly...
- Neil Sinclair of Survival Of The Fittest V3. No matter how many times he is knocked back by more cynical or pessimistic characters, he keeps on trying, time and again, to gather as many students he can in an attempt to escape. His hugely idealist approach includes but is not limited to inviting a classmate into the group who had previously killed one of the other members of his group - S.A.D.D.
- And now, his group has fallen apart after his death.
Western Animation
- Initially, Katara from Avatar The Last Airbender, especially obvious in episodes like "Imprisoned," "The Desert," "Crossroads of Destiny," eventually reaching what was assumed by some villagers as literal messianic levels in "The Painted Lady." Then the Scale tipped toward closer to Cynical, and The Lancer passed the Idealistic baton to its proper character, The Hero, Aang. Katara, meanwhile, slid some towards Well Intentioned Extremist territory...
- The Flash, from Justice League Unlimited. Don't believe us? Look at what happens when he's not around.
Wonder Woman (to villain, who has seemingly just killed Superman): I'm going to punch a hole through your head.
Flash: We don't do that to our enemies.
Wonder Woman: Speak for yourself.
Flash: I'm trying to speak for Superman.
- The above is a fine example. A better one would be the fact that his death causes an alternate-Superman to decide to try the Knights Templar boots...and disintegrate Lex Luthor. For starters.
- Flash is even nice to his villains. He plays darts with the Trickster, and can get him to go to jail just by asking. He knows every single person in his city, is willing to do mundane chores (with his Super Speed, of course) for them in between superheroing, and kids adore him.
- He can even convince Ultra-Humanite to dress up as Santa for some kids and then surrender to the police with minimal effort.
- Starfire in Teen Titans is said to be the "heart" of the team. Just like Flash above, things aren't pretty if she disappears.
- Ma-Ti in Captain Planet And The Planeteers, who's supposed to hold the group together with his 'awesome' power. His first apparition has him gently subduing a jaguar to save a monkey
- Lazlo from Camp Lazlo. Consider this line from the episode "Burpless Beans":
Edward: Lazlo, why do you hate me?
Lazlo: I don't hate you, Edward. I love everybody!
- In Ben 10 Alien Force, Ben Tennyson has borrowed not only Sailor Moon's Transformation Sequence but her steadfast refusal to sacrifice lives and her power to heal the villains' victims with the Empathic Weapon.
Real Life
- Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi preached love for all humankind, and was Badass enough to find a way to harmonize his staunch Thou Shalt Not Kill philosophy with unflinching resistance to the tyranny of British colonial rule. (And the tragedy of Hindu/Muslim violence, and just about any other kind of injustice you can think of ...)
- Similarly, Martin Luther King Jr., and many other prominent leaders of the nonviolent branch of the civil rights movement.
- Siddharta Gautama, aka Buddha. Possibly the Ur Example.
- Fred Rogers. And if you need to have it explained to you why he qualifies, then you have this troper's condolences.
- I'd say Jesus, the trope namer deserves a spot here. What supernatural things the bible says he did may be refuted, but he taught the Importance of unconditional love and what not.
Cleanup efforts for this trope are ongoing - need help confirming examples for which not enough details are provided.. Help us out by contributing to the thread in Trope Repair Shop
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