Warning: As this trope deals with attempted Heel-Face Turns - more specifically with those meeting resistance and the natural consequences thereof - spoilers naturally abound.
Characters who struggle to be accepted while making a sincere effort to reform in Western Animation.
- Avatar: The Last Airbender:
- Young proto-terrorist Jet decides to start a new life. He goes to the heroes with an offer of assistance, but is immediately attacked by Katara, who continues to be violent toward him even after he drops his weapons, raises his hands, and swears he wants to help. They continue to be mistrustful toward him despite Living Lie Detector Toph insisting that he is telling the truth. Eventually his good intentions are proven, immediately followed by... guess what. Justified by Jet having proven to be an adept liar, manipulator, charmer, and tale-teller in his first appearance and that the last time the Gaang and Jet interacted he tried to trick Katara and Aang into murdering a whole village of innocent people.
- Later in the same series, this scenario is repeated almost verbatim with a repentant (though hopelessly tongue-tied) Zuko. Eventually, he comes to them peacefully, even going so far as to kneel before them in surrender, Katara still attacks him and chases him off, suspicious due to his earlier vulnerable moment. Later, after helping the Gaang defeat Combustion Man (whom he himself hired several episodes earlier to kill Aang), he is able to win begrudging acceptance. Katara remains unconvinced and swears to watch him closely and take bloody vengeance if he screws up even slightly. A few episodes later, she does end up forgiving him.Zuko: Hello, Zuko here. But I guess you... probably already know me. Sort of. Uh, so... the thing is, I have a lot of firebending experience, and I'm considered to be pretty good at it. Well, you've seen me... you know, when I was... attacking you. Uh... yeah. I guess I should apologize for that. B-b-but anyway, I'm good now. I mean, I thought I was good before, but now I realize I was bad. But... anyway... I think... it's time I... joined your group and taught the Avatar firebending. (pull back to show he's talking to a frog) WELL? What's your answer?!
Frog: [croak]
Zuko: ...Yeah. That's what I'd say too. How am I supposed to convince these people I'm on their side?
- Batman Beyond had Bruce doing this for a revived Mr. Freeze, while Terry thinks the man has honestly changed. He has, but unfortunately when his treatment starts to wear off and his benefactors betray him, Fries decides that he wasn't meant to have a normal life and goes after them, using a modernized version of his old suit. It culminates in one of the saddest moments in the Batman franchise where Freeze, having lost all will to live at this point, somberly remarks on how Terry is the only person who cares that he's going to die before he quietly lets himself be destroyed by the ensuing explosions. At the end of the episode, Bruce seems to have changed his mind at least to the extent of believing that Freeze sincerely tried to reform.
- Batman: The Animated Series:
- Happened in an episode where The Penguin had come out of jail and finally decided to "go straight". Batman refused to believe such thing was possible, and hounded him mercilessly... eventually, he does return to his old ways, after being betrayed by a woman he'd fallen for, and Batman has to bring him down. While remaining subtly convinced that he never really reformed. However, Penguin proves to be an aversion of both this trope and Status Quo Is God: later episodes show that the Penguin really does go straight(er), and runs a legitimate upscale night club and casino called the Iceberg Lounge. He's still engaged in some morally and legally shady business, but Batman tolerates it in order to occasionally pump Penguin for underworld info.
- In the episode "Harley's Holiday", Harley Quinn tried to reform. The chain of events that got her sent back to Arkham started with her panicking after setting off a detector in a department store. The clerk never got a chance to explain that they just forgot to remove the security tag on the dress she just bought. At the end of the episode, as she is being returned to Arkham, Batman gives her the dress, remarking that he had a bad day too, once. She kisses him on the cheek... then smiles, tosses the dress aside and kisses him full on the lips, a move that has both Robin and Poison Ivy looking on with some bemusement. Later sequels would show that when Harley did reform, she had to go into hiding owing to her part in torturing the second Robin on Joker's orders.
- On Beast Wars, the Maximals grew to trust Dinobot, a former Predacon. But in Season 2's "Maximal, No More", Dinobot briefly redeclared his loyalty to Megatron and the Predacons when he believed Megatron was right after all. When he switched back, the Maximals were unsure of where he stood. It was only after "Code of Hero", as Dinobot single-handedly defeated the Predacons and died afterwards that he fully regained their trust.
- Downplayed in the original Ben 10 episode "Kevin 11". After Ben does something that get his cousin and grandfather angry at him (get them kicked out of a luxurious hotel for sneaking in a VIP video game room), Ben tops off that selfishness show by running away for a while and ganging up with his soon-to-be Arch-Enemy Kevin 11, causing mayhem in an attempt to steal some video games with his new "friend" and then trying to stop his "partner" when he thought it was getting too far (killing train passengers to get money). The episode ends with Max telling a regretful Ben that he is still his grandson, but his trust is something he would have to regain. The following episode carries a few remnants of this, as Ben decides he cannot be trusted at all after Max gets injured during a fight with a female crook turned cyborg, prompting him to run away again.
- In Code Lyoko, William's attempt to regain his old status with his friends was met with mostly cold shoulders. He starts regaining their trust by Code Lyoko: Evolution, but it's a slow process.
- Dagur the Deranged in Dragons: Riders of Berk spent most of the series obsessively chasing after Hiccup and Toothless, eventually joining up with Viggo Grimborn and his Dragon Hunters. In the fifth season, however, he realizes that Viggo considers him — like all of his men — completely expendable, and he quickly deserts. After a chance meeting on a deserted island, Hiccup slowly comes to accept that Dagur's Heel–Face Turn is genuine, but when Dagur shows up on Dragon's Edge a few episodes later, he is understandibly met with distrust from everyone else, who believe that he might just be The Mole for Viggo, and especially his sister Heather, who is still furious at him for killing both her adoptive family and their father. Toward the end of the episode, he proves that he really did have a change of heart by flying straight into a trap that Hiccup and his friends didn't believe him about, seemingly sacrificing himself in the process.
- Family Guy had James Woods terrorize most of the town, especially the Griffin family for several episodes. In the episode "And Then There Were Fewer," James Woods invites the Griffins and many other people to his mansion for a dinner in their honor. He claims that his girlfriend converted him to a Christian and he wants to make amends with everyone that he wronged. Naturally, everyone thinks he is lying. No one ever got to see if James Woods was true to his word since Diane Simmons killed him.
- In "Ratings Guy", Peter gets shunned and abused by the town for taking over the Neilson box system and ruining television. Brian suggests just using the boxes to request everything back to normal, only for Mayor West to take revenge by destroying the entire lot of them before he can. Peter does later manage to redeem himself under far more complex manual methods, however.
- Heckle and Jeckle sign a New Year's resolution to give up practical jokes in 1961's "Sappy New Year." But when their attempts to do good deeds are misconstrued as mischief, Heckle tries to revert back.
- Jackie Chan Adventures:
- Viper. In her first episode, she was a superthief who (mistakenly) stole the snake talisman from Jackie, double-crossing him after she discovers its power. After giving it back, she goes legit, working as a consultant for a security company, but whenever Jade calls upon her for help, Jackie always dismisses Viper for being a superthief, always prompting Viper to say "EX-superthief". Jackie eventually comes to trust her, however.
- Twice in the series (once in Season 4 and once in Season 5), Finn, Ratso and Chow got themselves on probation and Jackie refused to believe they were reformed for real. Ironically, it was around the time Jackie really started believing them that they revealed that all it took to revert them back into their criminal ways was a chance to score big.
- In the series finale, the Enforcers decide to assist the good guys a little bit, although they're still too cowardly to help that much. It seems to be implied that they turn toward the side of good, although whether that sticks or not is unknown.
- Hawkg- er, Shayera Hol went through this a little, especially with Wonder Woman, upon her return in Justice League Unlimited after she had turned out to be The Mole for her people, who in turn, almost destroyed the Earth. WW and Shayera eventually came to see eye to eye, though they never exactly became friends again. In a subversion, though, she is not rejected by the League at large (Superman, Flash, and J'onn
(or Batman)vote for letting her stay; GL withholds his vote but it's obvious that he trusts her) but she resigns voluntarily before they can announce the result of their vote. - In Lady Lovely Locks this trope is discussed, but ends up averted in "The Bundle," with Hairball taking advantage of Lady's kindness to betray her. Lady feels awful that Hairball was lying, but says that if they did think he was causing trouble and he wasn't, they'd feel even worse.
- The Legend of Korra:
- Played with during the third season, where it's revealed that Lin Beifong has a younger half-sister named Suyin, who's the head of a prosperous metal bending city she personally founded. Suyin was never evil, but she was a delinquent who committed petty crimes in her youth, with one incident — serving as a getaway driver and assaulting Lin when the latter tried to arrest her— resulting in Lin getting her scar and their mother Toph having to retire early as the police chief to avoid an embarrassing scandal. Suyin was exiled from Republic City, but never officially punished by the law, and she didn't apologize to Lin. Thirty years later, Lin still refuses to believe Suyin learned anything about responsibility when Suyin acts like they're cool, refusing to apologize still, and lies to Korra that they were just different people acting out in response to a neglectful mother. Lin is able to forgive Suyin after the two have a much needed "talk", though.
- Similarly, Toph and Lin are estranged owing to what happened with Suyin, and that Toph is terrible at being a mother. It's zigzagged in that Toph doesn't understand what she did wrong, at first; she uses the same brusque attitude on her daughters that she does for her close friends. It's cute with friends, but not with family members that relied on you for physical and emotional security. They ally briefly to rescue Suyin and the other Beifongs from Kuvira's war camp, but when Toph tries to impress her brashness on Lin and assumes they're cool, Lin blows up at her and says this is why they didn't talk for decades. Toph gets a Jerkass Realization when Lin says they're done after they save their family, and works to make up for her bad attitude so they can part on good terms. It Runs in the Family, apparently.
- Repeated in season 4 with Bolin, although he was never really evil, just gullible. Even though he turns against Kuvira and brings back vital intel on her spirit vine weapon, Opal is still furiously pissed at him until he helps her and Lin rescue the rest of the Beifong family; it takes risking his life to save Zhu Li to convince her that he deserves a second chance.
- "Bully Goat" from the animated Llama Llama series has this briefly for Gilroy Goat when Nelly Gnu tries to stop him from playing in a game even after he had already apologized for being a meanie. Fortunately, Llama Llama puts the kibosh on it right away since it's fairly obvious his apology was sincere.
- The Mask has an example with Peggy in the pilot episode. Despite the fact that she's no longer working with Tyrell in the movie, Stanley is really quite upset on that one.
- My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic:
- After having been the Big Bad for the series premiere, a reformed Nightmare Moon (now going by her original persona of Princess Luna), shows up on Nightmare Night in the second season's "Luna Eclipsed". Seeing how the day she appeared on was all about ponies fearing her old, evil persona, her arrival on a black chariot, her booming, boisterous, echoing voice that she insists all princesses must speak in for their subjects to listen to them, and her use of Spock Speak and Royal "We", has everypony is too frightened to even give her a chance. (The way her mood warps weather doesn't help either). Subverted in that the end of the episode reveals that every one knows that she's reformed and do fully accept her. They just figured she knew about the holiday and was having fun with it, leading her join the festivities with gusto.
- Discord, the Big Bad of the season 2 premiere, is reformed by Fluttershy the following season, but she's the only person that gives him an honest shot, leading to a Redemption Failure at the end of season four where he joins up with that episode's villain. Ironically, it's the aftermath of this that finally makes the others accept him.
- Despite turning over a new leaf at the end of "Magic Duel", Trixie notices that other ponies still avoid her and whisper about her past deeds behind her back. It also turns out that Twilight wasn't quite as forgiving to Trixie as she originally let on, though as she states when called out on it, she claims this is more to do with the fact that Trixie still kinda acts like a smug jerk towards her.
- Played for Laughs in The Powerpuff Girls (1998) episode "Mime For A Change" where friendly Rainbow the Clown is mutated into the villainous Mr. Mime. After the girls cure him with The Power of Rock, they immediately beat him up and throw him in jail for his crimes despite him having been Not Himself. Craig McCracken himself would regret the ending, stating that he wouldn't do it today.
- In The Simpsons, Sideshow Bob, after one of his many stints in prison, has legitimately reformed. However, Bart and Lisa don't believe it (with good reason, given past experience), and when Bob's brother's plot is foiled, they both get taken away to jail.
- In South Park: Post Covid, Eric Cartman of all people had a Heel–Face Turn in the Bad Future, which Kyle initially refuses to believe as a result of Crying Wolf. Even after meeting his wife and children, Kyle is absolutely convinced it's all an elaborate prank on him with Cartman even lampshading how ridiculous it sounds (which in all fairness, is absolutely something he would've done in his younger years but decades had passed since then).
- Peridot in Steven Universe, following her truce with the Crystal Gems in the latter half of season two. While she does undergo a Heel–Face Turn, her frequent unintentional insults, superiority complex, and inability to properly explain her intentions led even Steven to have doubts about her having changed for the better until the end of "Message Received", where she ends up insulting Yellow Diamond to her face.
- In Steven Universe: Future, after defeating the Diamonds by Talking the Monster to Death they genuinely make an effort to be better people and undo the damage they caused but everyone, especially Steven, is understandably uncomfortable around them. This comes to a head when Steven tries to kill White Diamond during a nervous breakdown.
- WordGirl:
- In the episode "Tobey Goes Good", Tobey appears to have legitimately reformed but is eventually pushed back to the brink of villainy, confirming Word Girl's belief of his insincerity. He later claims "I hadn't changed into a no-good do-gooder! It doesn't pay to be nice!"
- Likewise, Harmless Villain Chuck the Evil Sandwich Making Guy has attempted reform in at least three episodes, "Chuck the Nice Pencil Selling Guy", "Chuck Makes a Buck" & "Lunchlady Chuck." Subverted somewhat in that WordGirl doesn't reject him (indeed, she encourages him to reform), but some other factor causes him to become evil again (In the first, he tries to kill his boss, played by the late Peter Graves, when he finds out that he hates sandwiches. In a cruel twist, it's revealed at the end that the guy liked grilled cheese, but was unaware it was a type of sandwich, meaning Chuck went back to crime for nothing.
- Xiaolin Showdown:
- In "The Apprentice" episode, no one but Omi believes that Jack is really on the good side. It's revealed later that he didn't think any of the monks, Omi included, believed he could be good, even though his change was genuine, and he returned to being evil because he was afraid he would fail, as per everyone's expectations.
- When Chase Young used a Shen Gong Wu to induce Omi into becoming Heylin, Kimiko commented, not knowing the truth about the Wu, that she'd expect Raimundo to betray them (as he had done before in Season One). Raimundo didn't take offense.
- X-Men: Evolution:
- Similar to Spike in Buffy, Avalanche once tried to join the good guys to get closer to Kitty, but Logan and Scott end up blaming him for some recent Joyrides. Justified however, in that Avalanche did everything he could to make them not trust him: He failed two tests on purpose for the sake of annoying Scott/showing off to Kitty, taunted Scott after his car was trashed and though he knew who was joyriding, didn't even try to defend himself from the accusations. Considering the way he always acted towards him, Scott's attitude and mild hazing is understandable and, while often forgotten, he did try to give him a chance at first but was put off by the fact that Lance was still fairly antagonistic towards him, and in he end apologized for acting unfairly. At least Lance did honestly try to help eventually.
- Rogue inverted this trope in Evolution, refusing to trust the X-Men for most of season 1 for what she thought was a series of attacks on her. These were staged by Mystique.
- A genuinely reformed Yuck from Yin Yang Yo! is suspected by the twins (and only them) of actually being a Falsely Reformed Villain... and their harsh treatment of him — up to and including beating him senseless and smashing a statue he'd made dedicated to their new friendship in the process — finally drives him back to evil. Nice Job Breaking It, Javerts!
