Needs a lot of help; turning into Hero I Don't Like: Designated Hero

People seem to be coming to this page with two ideas in mind: This trope is either caused by Bad Writing because the author didn't realize he was making an unlikeable protagonist, or that they did know that they were making an unlikeable protagonist, and that was the point.

For example, the Lost example had a Justifying Edit about how Jack was literally a Designated Hero because the other survivors just started looking at him for instruction, and a large part of the show is about him crumbling under the pressure. This got axed for being Natter.

But is that valid? If not, we need a new trope, or at least expand this one to better encompass that definition. Because a lot of this page is complaining about heroes you don't like.

Fixed the link. One part of that split proposal is YMMV. (Hell I think the trope should be YMMV.)

edited 11th May '11 3:05:52 PM by Raso

Why in the world isn't it YMMV? This seems like an obvious one. The invoked one would objective, but the current trope as written is clearly subjective.

On the note of that example, I have actually seen this misused in places as "guy picked to be hero" along those lines. It's not serious enough that I would call for a rename, but it has cropped up more then once.

And why is this not YMMV?

Okay, I put Designated Hero and Designated Villain on the YMMV index, so that's done. But we still need to deal with the objective trope.

There are two tropes here: The out of universe trope, where the "hero" is designated by the author. Basically, The Wesley as the hero. That's what the trope was written as, and examples that fit under the second trope (below) are getting axed.

The second trope is in-universe, when a character gets designated by the other characters. This one is completely objective.

So what's a good name for the second one?

Lead Us Main Character?

Also, I thought that the OP was saying it needed to be split into its current definition and one where the author was -delibrately- trying to make an unlikable protagonist, to which I was going to note that that's an Anti-Hero. If that's not what's being said, excuse me.

edited 12th May '11 3:42:40 PM by savage

Uh, I don't know why its subjective. Character who does little to anything heroic but is called a hero anyway sounds pretty objective.

Randy Orton has had one Pet the Dog moment since turning face. One, and all it showed is that he could still show restraint, not that he was a good guy. Its because people cheer that he's a good guy, not his actions.

If people are nattering, I'd just ax the natter. If it was an intentional example it should have been done like this.

• Blah Blah from lost is looked to by other characters for guidance and completely crumbles under the pressure. This creates drama.

How it should be typed is.

• Blah blah from Lost is a designated hero.
  • Actually, that was done on purpose because how dare you accuse my show of a false wrong!

Your answer lies in the third post of this thread:

If you don't know already, The Wesley is a Subjective Trope.

edited 26th Aug '11 2:38:43 PM by MarqFJA

Don't we already have a trope for "hero is designated as such in-universe", anyway?

I hope I'm not reviving a dead discussion, but I thought I'd add my two cents.

I say split Designated Hero between the unintentional examples (which, as written, is what this Trope is about) and the in-universe examples (Captain Hammer is a key point; in Universe he is the Designated Hero, but out of universe the story is designed to show he isn't heroic). As it is both are added in, which is confusing as you have characters that the writers intended to be heroic but didn't come across that way, and characters that were written to be jerkasses and the like and the fact that the people in universe think they're heroes is Play For Laughs.

Although the last post I saw about this raised the issue of what to call it. Since I'm bad at names, I'll just suggest we call it The Captain Hammer.

A couple of notes.

First, in TRS, if it isn't locked, it's always acceptable to add to it. In fact, since we're trying to clear it out, dusting off stagnant threads to try to resolve them is recommended.

Second, we are trying to move away from character-named tropes, particularly if they require familiarity with the work to understand. So naming a trope "The Captain Hammer" wouldn't work.

Personally, I'd like to just strike out the "complaining about heroes you don't like" entries and go strictly with the in-universe cases. I think it would make the page much cleaner... also, a note that it's In-Universe only will help prevent future flame wars (it has been quite a problematic trope in the past).

I suppose that would work best, although it seems a bit defeatest in the long run since the original intent was for instances where the author intented for a character to be the hero, but they're written as too much of a jerkass or an asshole to be heroic at all.

Still, I guess that means we have to re-write the trope and prune the out of universe examples. I'm no word smith and I've got a case of the tireds, I'll let someone else come up with a good reply.

You can't win every battle, though. Know When to Fold 'Em. I'd rather admit a small defeat rather than continue an argument that'd end up causing more problems for the wiki in the future than I'd want to deal with.

The Linkara quote will have to go since it will no longer apply. And we will need to make it clear it is only for in-universe examples of "heroes" intentionally written to not be heroic.

Can we get a crowner in here just to strt to get this done? I think we have an agreement, and I'd feel better if I knew there was a concensus before trying to clean up the article.

Bump.

Sadly this one keeps dying and it really needs some helps. The natter is atrocious, and the trope itself isn't very well-defined and depends on a lot of subjective values. I don't know how to make a crowner.

Even if you make a crowner, what options do we have?

Totally agree this is a mess, though.

Alright here are the options as I see them. Please add or revise as you see fit.

Split the trope into "in-universe" and "out-universe examples": The trope should be split into two examples. One part of the trope describes a 'Hero' who is acknowledged in book canon as a hero but it is plain to the reader and intended by the author not to actually be heroic. Captain Hammer is an Example, as is the "Hero" from Megamind. This may or may not actually be a trope.

The other half of the trope is when the creators clearly intended the hero to be heroic, but either through bad writing, Informed Attributes or other problems, the hero comes off as kind of a jerk and not very heroic. This is the part of the trope I am very iffy on, and am thinking that we maybe need to just cull all these highly subjective examples (Twilight is listed, for example, and I know there are fans of the series who would argue that the Cullens are genuinely heroic).

So our options are as follows:

1. Split the trope, rename one of them and split the examples, keeping all examples and trimming the massive amounts of natter. Be sure that the trope for in-universe examples is clear and objective. Make sure the trope for subjective "jerk hero" is placed on the proper page and cleaned up of natter.

2. Redefine the trope to mean "Captain Hammer" not "the Cullens", and cull all examples not following that definition. Be sure that the trope for in-universe examples is clear and objective.

3. Do away with the page completely, as there are probably hero tropes that fit most of the good examples, and the bad (highly subjective) examples can happily be done away with.

Thoughts? Here is the crowner: [1]

edited 25th Feb '12 12:10:36 PM by OriDoodle

The first possible split you listed sounds too close to Villain Protagonist and the like.

And don't worry, I'll make the crowner, I just hope we get some more discussion on this, since this is a quite problematic page.

I went ahead and made the crowner, but dunno how to link it to the thread. Anyway yes, I'd like this decided so I can start sweeping.

Dump the crowner URL in a post or a link for it, then holler it so that a moderator can hook (attach) it to the thread.

Killing the natter is not tied to TRS. Just nuke it. But we'll need to work on this so it doesn't show up again.

It should be noted that if we decide to do away with the page completely, we're going to have to work out where some of the legitimate hero examples go.