History Main / HeroicSeductress

** Elizabeth performs a [[ShowSomeLeg burlesque dance]] at the governor's ball to distract the crowd while John steals some valuable intel for the Underground Railroad. Later in the season, she reluctantly sleeps with the town Marshall (who just so happens to be her [[OldFlame ex-fiance]] and still very much infatuated with her) to keep him from taking away Boo, the runaway slave child she's been harboring.

** Witty Ritts of ''VideoGame/DragonAgeInquisition'' was actually able to weaponize this: The Hinterlands is an all-out battleground between templars and mages with civilians caught in the middle. As an Inquisition scout, Ritts was set upon by a female mage, who did not attack her. Instead Ritts [[LesYay seduced her into laying down her arms.]] If Varric is in your party he is amazed at her gift and encourages her to become an agent.

* Jackie Gayda served as one to protect Wrestling/TheWorldsGreatestTagTeam (one of them being her husband) and Wrestling/RicoConstantino when they were baby{{face}}s by using her assets to distract enemies trying to hurt them.

[[SexIsEvil Sex often has a bad reputation in fiction]]. Often, the only characters allowed [[EvilIsSexy to have any sort of sex appeal]] [[MadonnaWhoreComplex are not the ones for whom we're meant to root]]. Character types like TheVamp and the FemmeFatale run amok, doing their evil work, ruining lives and corrupting men into doing nasty things.

Frequently crosses with HookerWithAHeartOfGold, EthicalSlut and HighClassCallGirl. Sometimes even MyGirlIsASlut.

** Lucy tries to be this, but fails a lot of the time, and for reasons that aren't her own fault.

* Nancy Lee from ''LightNovel/NinjaSlayer'' is a IntrepidReporter who happens to be a [[MsFanservice sexy]], [[EveryoneLovesBlondes blonde bombshell]] who's not afraid to ShowSomeLeg from time to time to distract bad guys and help the main protagonist. In one instance, she dresses up as a prostitute in order to gain access inside a Syndicate facility. On the downside, [[SoBeautifulItsACurse her gorgeous looks tend to work against her favor]], making her a LustObject of some vile, sleazy scumbags who all have some... [[IHaveYouNowMyPretty unwholesome thoughts]] in mind for her.
* ''Manga/TheSevenDeadlySins'': Holy Knight of Liones Lady Deldry of the Order Plieodes of the Azure Sky has a magical power fittingly called "Love Drive" which she can use to seduce people into becoming hopelessly in love with and devoted to her. She has used this power to detain a demonically possessed Dreyfus for the purpose excorcising the demon.

* ''[[FanFic/{{Bird}} Bird]]'': Ingénue's role in [[Literature/{{Worm}} canon]] was ambiguous, but as a gang leader in Brockton Bay she plays this role. This leaves her as either a very atypical villain or a hero with a checkered past and phenominally bad PR.

* ''WesternAnimation/{{Aladdin}}'': Jasmine had her moment by keeping Jafar distracted long enough for Al to get the lamp back. It backfired, since Al was (rightly) too squicked out upon seeing her kiss Jafar to keep moving toward the lamp, losing a few crucial seconds.

* ''Film/WonderWoman2017'': Steve's scheme to get information from Dr. Maru involves at least an element of this, since he starts a conversation implying that he's turned on by her homicidal genius. We never find out how far he was willing to go with it, since Diana interrupts.

* "Mary" from Creator/RobertAHeinlein's ''Literature/ThePuppetMasters'' is walking death with hands/feet, with knives, and with guns. [[GunNut Lots of guns. Everyone of the guns.]] But her principle weapon is her sex appeal, which "Sam" is happy for her to use on him, but which is more useful for detecting aliens, [[spoiler:due to their not understanding human emotions like physical attraction]].

* The eponymous [[Literature/BookOfEsther Esther]] wins a [[CastingCouch "beauty contest"]] to find a new queen, and saves her people from destruction by using her charms and sex appeal. She did this by being the sexiest girl and the best lay out of an entire harem of women chosen specifically for their beauty and sexuality. It would be like if US presidents chose consorts by selecting their favorite lay from a harem of pornstars, models, and beauty queens, and then one of those chosen consorts then used her position to get slavery abolished / civil rights enacted / favorable conditions for Native Americans.
* In ''Literature/TheEpicOfGilgamesh'', a wild man named Enkidu (who later becomes TheLancer to the eponymous Gilgamesh), spends a week with a temple prostitute named Shamhat, who teaches him how to be civilized. He curses her for that, because if he had just stayed in the forest and lived as a wild man, he wouldn't have experienced so much loss during his and Gilgamesh's adventures. The Sun God sets him straight, by pointing out that even though it doesn't ''always'' seem that way, becoming civilized has made Enkidu's life better, and he ''owes'' Shamhat for that. Enkidu takes back the {{Curse}} he put on Shamhat.

* ''Literature/SpecialOperations'': Both Finn's sister Anna and Louise Laval are heroic, yet complicated, versions, doing this to get information form German pilots, but possibly developing real feelings for them in the process. [[spoiler: Anna's boyfriend -who she doesn't appear to have ever had sex with- is aware of what she's doing and is actually using her, while Louise's got her pregnant, getting her shunned by her family, although this causes him to provide aide to the resistance]].

** The episode "Mirror, Mirror" shows Lieutenant Uhura getting minxy with Mirror-Sulu, so that he doesn't notice a warning light that signals transporter tampering by Chief Engineer Scott. Once the danger is past, Uhura switches off the sexy.

** On many other occasions, she's used her inherent sex appeal to extract information, or to keep attention on her and be a distraction while her teammates are working.

* Sloan Sabbith of ''Series/TheNewsroom'' is a [[DownplayedTrope minor]] example, in that she isn't so much a "hero" in the classical sense. She is however a morally upright, utterly brilliant and stunningly attractive woman who Mac hires to report on economic news specifically because she is both A: eminently qualified, and B: so attractive that keeping the audience's attention won't be an issue. Aside from that, she once also charmed a teenage lech into giving her his phone (during a breaking news story that required a phone, while Don was using hers), and on another occasion, told a former student of hers that she was single (she wasn't, but her lover was in the room and indicated that saying so would be ok) in order to get information that could save their jobs.

** By extension, the other Consorts in her employ are also this trope--but nowhere near her level of skill.
* You can play this type of character in ''VideoGame/DragonAgeOrigins''. For example, one of the bargaining chips you can use to convince a pirate queen to mentor you, to convince a demon to stop possessing a child, or to solve a SuccessionCrisis is to sleep with (or in the last case marry) the person involved.

* Witty Ritts of ''VideoGame/DragonAgeInquisition'' was actually able to weaponize this: The Hinterlands is an all out battleground between templars and mages with civilians caught in the middle. As a Inquisition scout Ritts was set upon by a female mage, who did not attack her. Instead Ritts [[LesYay seduced her into laying down her arms.]] If Varric is in your party he is amazed at her gift and encourages her to become an agent.

* Miss Fortune in ''VideoGame/LeagueOfLegends'' is implied to be this. In her biography, it's stated she uses her great number of lovers to help her get rid of the ''Main/PirateKing'' Gangplank. Shown directly in the comic ''Fortune Smiles'', when she invites to dinner a rival local crimelord and seduce him to gain him to her side. It's debatable how heroic she is, however, given some of the downright immoral stuff she does in her line of work (such as in her color story).
* The [[HookerWithAHeartOfGold Escort]] from ''VideoGame/TownOfSalem'' has the ability to Roleblock targets, preventing them from using their night abilities. She is on the side of the town though, and thus is supposed to help stop TheMafia by... Distracting their members.
* Your character in ''VideoGame/VampireTheMasqueradeBloodlines'' if you have a high seduction stat. Mostly only applicable if female in the vanilla game, but the very popular unofficial patch makes this much more possible for male player characters as well. Going in hand with being a vampire, seduction is very much a part of your character's arsenal if they have the appropriate stat, and can be used while playing as a perfectly kind and empathetic character. You can also be TheVamp, if you play as a not-so-nice character.

* ''Disney/{{Aladdin}}'': Jasmine had her moment by keeping Jafar distracted long enough for Al to get the lamp back. It backfired, since Al was (rightly) too squicked out upon seeing her kiss Jafar to keep moving toward the lamp, losing a few crucial seconds.

* ComicBook/BlackWidow started off as a villain, but did a HeelFaceTurn and started working for SHIELD. She still uses sex to get information out of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s enemies. It is part of her "specific skillset" after all.
* Marvel Comics has Venus, who is a [[GorgeousGreek Greek nymph]] that started out as an evil temptress, but was [[CursedWithAwesome cursed]] by a wizard to have a soul as "beautiful" as her appearance. Now, she uses her beauty and {{Glamour}} powers to help people.

* ComicBook/SteveTrevor regularly plays at being interested in foes, often Nazi spies, in order to carry out his job as an intelligence officer and has done so since his earliest appearances.
** In ''ComicBook/SensationComics'' Steve pretends to be enthralled by the beauty of a woman claiming to be the descendant of Helen of Troy who has taken multiple US military men prisoner to distract her while ComicBook/WonderWoman rescues the prisoners. While his ploy works at first and "Helen" is taken in by his flirting he gives up the game when he panics thinking Wonder Woman has been injured.

* ''Disney/{{Aladdin}}'': Jasmine had her moment by keeping Jafar distracted long enough for Al to get the lamp back. Backfired, since Al was (rightly) too squicked out upon seeing her kiss Jafar to keep moving toward the lamp, losing a few crucial seconds.

* The ''Film/AustinPowers'' movies gave us a couple examples:
** Austin is a male example. He sleeps with Alotta Fagina to get info in Dr. Evil's plan and later uses his "mojo" to defeat the fem-bots.

* The episode "Mirror, Mirror" from ''Series/StarTrekTheOriginalSeries'' shows Lieutenant Uhura get minxy with Mirror-Sulu, so that he doesn't notice a warning light that signals transporter tampering by Chief Engineer Scott. Once the danger is past, Uhura switches off the sexy.

* [[HookerWithAHeartOfGold Inara Serra]] in ''Series/{{Firefly}}''.
** In the series as a whole, she is a minor example. Her status as a Companion granted the Serenity crew a level of respectability, allowing them to get around more easily.
** In a full-blown moment of the trope, Inara's involvement with the son of the guy who runs Canton gave him the confidence he needed to stick up to his [[AbusiveParent dad]], and sooner or later, when the responsibility passes to him, he'll rule with a gentler hand.

* ''Series/GameOfThrones'': Margaery Tyrell. She's sexy and she knows it. And what does she do with her sexiness? Keeps [[TheCaligula Joffrey]] from being ''too'' cruel. Given the GrayAndGreyMorality of the show, may be a case of PragmaticVillainy; she seems to see befriending the people as a path to power, rather than getting power in order to help the people.

* ''ComicBook/SensationComics'': ComicBook/SteveTrevor pretends to be enthralled by the beauty of a woman claiming to be the descendant of Helen of Troy who has taken multiple US military men prisoner to distract her while ComicBook/WonderWoman rescues the prisoners. While his ploy works at first and "Helen" is taken in by his flirting he gives up the game when he panics thinking Wonder Woman has been injured.

** Maupassant also uses the trope in "Boule de Suif," in which the title character [[note]]It's a nickname that means something like "Dumpling" or "Butterball"[[/note]], a HookerWithAHeartOfGold, is pressured by her traveling companions to sleep with one of the German officers occupying the city of Rouen (it's set during the Franco-Prussian War) so that they can leave the city. After she does so and they escape successfully, [[UngratefulBastard they all snub her]].

* ''VideoGame/DragonQuestVIII''[='s=] Jessica Albert is this through GameplayAndStorySegregation. Many of her special skills in battles are seducing based that lets her debuff enemies. All her alternate costumes are also heavy on the fanservice. In the actual game though, she's actually more of the [[DCupDistress exact opposite.]]

* Played with in ''Manga/SoulEater''. Blair is a magical cat who likes to take the form of a voluptuous woman. While not really a hero (she's the main characters' roommate and enjoys teasing Soul), she does help out [[ItMakesSenseInContext when the son of Death gets trapped in a book.]] When they enter the book, it temporarily [[GenderBender flips everyone's gender]] and a [[TheVamp lust demoness]] tried to distract our heroes. Cue Blair turning into MrFanservice and blasting it.

** Maupassant also uses the trope in "Boule de Suif," in which the title character [[note]]It's a nickname that means something like "Dumpling" or "Butterball"[[/note]], a HookerWithAHeartOfGold, is pressured by her traveling companions to sleep with one of the German officers occupying the city of Rouen (it's set during the Franco-Prussian War so that they can leave the city. After she does so and they escape successfully, [[UngratefulBastard they all snub her]].

* Played with in Manga/SoulEater. Blair is a magical cat who likes to take the form of a voluptuous woman. While not really a hero (she's the main characters' roommate and enjoys teasing Soul), she does help out [[ItMakesSenseInContext when the son of Death gets trapped in a book.]] When they enter the book, it temporarily [[GenderBender flips everyone's gender]] and a [[TheVamp lust demoness]] tried to distract our heroes. Cue Blair turning into MrFanservice and blasting it.

* Miss Fortune in ''VideoGame/LeagueOfLegends'' is implied to be this. In her biography, it's stated she uses her great number of lovers to help her get rid of the ''Main/PirateKing'' Gangplank. Shown directly in the comic ''Fortune Smiles'', when she invites to dinner a rival local crimelord and seduce him to gain him to her side.

* Witty Ritts of ''VideoGame/DragonAgeInquisition'' was actually able to weaponize this: The Hinterlands is a all out battleground between templars and mages with civilians caught in the middle. As a Inquisition scout Ritts was set upon by a female mage, who did not attack her. Instead Ritts [[LesYay seduced her into laying down her arms.]] If Varric is in your party he is amazed at her gift and encourages her to become an agent.

* Marvel Comics has Venus, who is a Greek nymph that started out as an evil temptress, but was [[CursedWithAwesome cursed]] by a wizard to have a soul as "beautiful" as her appearance. Now, she uses her beauty and {{Glamour}} powers to help people.

* In the fifth episode of ''Anime/TheHeroicLegendOfArslan'', Farangis seduces Pelagius to lure him into compliancy before bringing him in towards Arslan.