History Main / DoomedMoralVictor

* [[UsefulNotes/Philippines Jose P. Rizal]].

* Jose P. Rizal.

**** Alot less impressive? while the stories say the persians had a million man army (probably over inflated) the greeks had in that pass at most 7000 soldiers only the 300 Spartiates were proffesional soldiers, the rest as the movie points out were craftmen, merchants or slave performing supporting roles. Probably everyone engaged the enemy anyways so we have 7000 men fighting somewhere between 70,000 to 1,000,0000 soldiers. Thats a 1:10 or 7:1000 ratio. Regardless of the tactical advantages, it is one hell of a feat to last more than a day against those odds. They werent Doomed moral victors in the sense of their death as inspiration to the greeks, but they definitely instilled the fear of their gods to the persians.

* [[spoiler:Jesus Christ]]. According to [[TheBible the Bible]], [[spoiler:dying for humanity]] was his entire ''raison d'etre.''

* Pulled off well in ''FinalFantasyVII: Crisis Core''. Zack Fair dies in a heroic LastStand against the corporate army that has been hunting him down like a dog, and while he doesn't even come close to bringing down Shinra, his death empowers the guy who does...

-->''"The tyrant dies, his rule ends. The martyr dies, and his rule begins."''\\
-- '''Søren Kierkegaard'''

* Parodied in ''LifeOfBrian'', where instead of the PFJ coming to rescue Brian from the cross, they leave him up there precisely for this trope, much to his dismay.

* Also happens in {{Basilisk}}, where [[spoiler: Oboro can only free herself from her role as a XanatosSucker by killing herself rather than her major rival ''and'' love interest.]]

-->''"They have guns, I don't. They can shoot me dead, but the moral high ground is'' mine."\\
--'''[[DoctorWho The Doctor]]''', ''"Army of Ghosts"''

* Regardless of your religious views, [[UsefulNotes/{{Christianity}} Jesus Christ]]. His teachings were peaceful, but his popularity made him an annoyance to the religious authorities. They arranged for his gruesome torture and murder -- and this started a revolution that would outlive not just those authorities but the mighty Roman Empire itself, and has become one of the largest religions in the world.
** Yes, and that is the reason it is in the religion section.
*** No, actually, the effect is what make's it a realization. No doubt the story (true or not) has started the biggest ideological movement in the history of the world. I would say that qualifies for the real life section.

- '''Søren Kierkegaard'''

-->''"They have guns, I don't. They can shoot me dead, but the moral high ground is'' mine."
->'''[[DoctorWho The Doctor]]''', ''"Army of Ghosts"''

[[{{Spartacus}} http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/spartacus.jpg]]
[[caption-width:320:[[IncrediblyLamePun Hang in there, buddy]].]]

* ''One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest'', as [[spoiler: the death of Billy inspires McMurphy to attack Nurse Ratched, and the lobotomy of McMurphy inspires the Chief to escape, and one assumes the others escaped through the hole in the window as well, though that isn't shown.]]

*** One Westerner said to his tour guide what a shame what happened there and the guide responded with, "[[ExtraStrengthMasquerade Yes, it is terrible how those terrorists killed all those troops]]." SoYeah.

A villain, often an EvilOverlord with ZeroPercentApprovalRating, harms the hero or his people who are not nearly as high ranking and powerful. Despite being hopelessly outmatched, the brave hero strikes back and wins some battles through cleverness, willpower and sheer greatness.

Ultimately though, he gets the worst of it in a very nasty way and finally bites the dust, DefiantToTheEnd, with [[HeroicSpirit fighting spirit]] and charisma intact, if nothing else. He will show that through shouting or growling a lofty FacingTheBulletsOneLiner or by dying [[ObiWanMoment calmly and full of dignity.]] In fact, the moment itself can be a CrowningMomentOfAwesome in the hands of the right sort of hero.

A cynical viewer may wonder why his dying a miserable death after losing everything he ever had would encourage anyone to get on this villain's bad side, but the [[DyingLikeAnimals oppressed masses]] are animated by the notion that no matter how intimidating the opponent is, [[FightingForSurvival it's still possible to resist.]] These rebels sometimes lose too, which makes them all Doomed Moral Victors. Either that or a lot of people just liked this person, and now they're really pissed.

Not to mention that the hero will be [[DiedHappilyEverAfter reunited with his loved ones in the afterlife]] (provided the setting has one, of course,) while the villain (especially in the case of [[WhoWantsToLiveForever immortality]]) will never see them again.

See TragicHero for a failing hero whose fate is his own fault. Contrast TragicDream. See also AsLongAsThereIsOneMan, MyDeathIsJustTheBeginning, EvilCannotComprehendGood, LastStand.

* In ''{{The Untouchables}}'', [[spoiler: the death of Jim Malone.]]
* TheWickerMan, as per the quote above.
* Wait... No one has put ''{{The Matrix}}'' here yet? wow...

* The fourth book of Jerry Pournelle's ''[[CoDominium War World]]'' anthology series has a short story by S.M. Stirling called "Kings Who Die", in which a scholar/soldier-turned-bandit-refugee-turned-tribal-founder deliberately invokes this trope when he martyrs himself fighting a vastly superior foe in [[CombatByChampion single combat]]; he chooses to become a legend to inspire his newly-established society.

*Jesus Christ. According to [[TheBible The Bible]] dying for humanity was his entire ''raison d'etre.''
** Though ultimately subverted in that he came BackFromtheDead after 3 days.