History Main / PreInsanityReveal

* ''Literature/CiaphasCain'': One of Amberley Vail's retinue is a soldier named Simeon who was implanted with a remote controlled drug dispenser and transferred to a penal legion (where Vail found him). He flinches every time he sees Cain's commissar uniform, so Cain asks what his deal is. She tells him he snapped under pressure and started executing men for failing to salute a superior officer... while on the receiving end of an artillery barrage. Cain notes that preventing that sort of breakdown is why they have commissars in the first place. Vail then says Simeon ''was'' the commissar.

* ComicBook/HarleyQuinn was once a promising young psychologist ([[DependingOnTheWriter or psychiatrist occasionally]]), and while she was definitely a bit arrogant and narcissistic, she didn't go fruit loops until after she tried to cure ComicBook/TheJoker.
* ComicBook/TheJoker himself, [[MultipleChoicePast depending on the version]], may have been an ordinary comedian before he went crazy and became a super-villain.

* ''Literature/LordOfTheRings'': Gollum is a prime example. Originally a hobbit named Sméagol, he was corrupted mentally and physically by the Ring by the time Bilbo meets him in The Hobbit.

* In the ''VideoGame/{{Warcraft}}'' universe, Drek'thar mentored future Warchief Thrall in the ways of the shaman, and serves as the chieftain of the Frostwolf Clan. Despite his blindness, he was an extremely powerful shaman, fierce fighter, and wise leader. However, he became senile with age, and now his rare moments of lucidity are indications that something is about to go very, very wrong.
* In ''VideoGame/WatchDogs'' Aiden meets two former [=CtOS=] employees who helped develop the operating system but later fell into obscurity and became shunned by Chicago.
* Playing through the Story and Arcade modes for Arakune in the ''VideoGame/BlazBlue'' games reveals that the crazy, incoherent, black blob that he is was once a normal human scientist who dedicated his life to study of the Boundary. Even as he was exposed to seithr the closer he came to the Boundary, he became aware that he was transforming, and that he couldn't stop. In his final moments as a human, it was business as usual as he continued recording his research and studied the Boundary.
* In ''VideoGame/EscapeFromMonkeyIsland'', the deranged hermit Herman Toothrot is revealed to be Elaine's grandfather, the former Governor of Melee Island, who has been missing for years and presumed dead, but actually just got shipwrecked and lost his memory.
* In the Usborne type-in game ''Island of Secrets'', the unnamed scavenger is actually the missing scholar Median; his memory can be restored by giving him the correct two objects and saying "Remember old times".

Related to HiddenDepths, LossOfIdentity, WasOnceAMan, SanitySlippage, and UsedToBeASweetKid. May also involve CerebusRetcon, RichesToRags, TwoAliasesOneCharacter or AmnesiacDissonance.

* ''WesternAnimation/ElTigre''. The several-generations-back original holder of the belt buckle started out sane, but slowly lost his mind from trying to decide whether to be good or evil. We finally meet him in the Day of the Dead episode. Because he's been dead and without he belt buckle for so long, he's mostly lucid, but the insanity is still lurking under the surface.

* In ''VideoGame/EscapeFromMonkeyIsland'', the deranged hermit Herman Toothrot is revealed to be Elaine's father, the former Governor of Melee Island, who has been missing for years and presumed dead, but actually just got shipwrecked and lost his memory.

* ''VideoGame/BorderlandsThePreSequel'' shows what Jack was like before he became series BigBad Handsome Jack. The game shows that Jack was always dangerously ambitious and more than a little manipulative, but was at the very least rational with some redeeming qualities, in contrast to the CompleteMonster he turns into when he becomes Handsome Jack.

* Early on in the "Dead End Kids" arc of ''ComicBook/{{Runaways}}'', Victor is pursued by Tristan, a hideous and seemingly deranged man with giant metal wings who seems to hate him for reasons he can't figure out. After the team is sent back in time to 1907, Victor meets Tristan's younger self, who's far more normal, or at least as normal as a big dude with metal wings can get. Unfortunately for Victor, Tristan has designs on Lillie, a local girl who becomes smitten with Victor, and he thinks Victor's out to steal "his" girl. Furthermore, the Runaways end up inadvertently causing a catastrophe that leaves Tristan horribly disfigured.

[[AC:{{Anime}} and {{Manga}}]]

[[AC:ComicBooks]]

[[AC:{{Film}}]]

[[AC:{{Literature}}]]

* ''Literature/LordOfTheRings'': Gollum is a prime example. Originally a hobbit named Sméagol, he was corrupted mentally and physically by the Ring by the time Bilbo meets him in The Hobbit.

[[AC:LiveActionTV]]
* A downplayed version in ''Series/DocMartin'' with PC Penhale, who was by all accounts a competent and professional police officer before he was kicked in the head by a horse and became the goofy, quirky, lovable dullard we all know.

[[AC:{{Theatre}}]]

[[AC: VideoGames]]

[[AC:{{Webcomics}}]]

[[AC:WebOriginal]]

[[AC:WesternAnimation]]
* ''WesternAnimation/AdventureTime'': The Ice King was a historian named Simon Petrikov until he put on the Ice Crown, which gave him ice powers and immortality but made him slowly lose his mind. This has been a real TearJerker throughout the series.

* ''WesternAnimation/ElTigre''. The several-generations-back original holder of the belt buckle started out sane, but slowly lost his mind from trying to decide whether to be good or evil. We finally meet him in the Day of the Dead episode. Because he's been dead and without he belt buckle for so long, he's mostly lucid, but the insanity is still lurking under the surface.

* In the comic book version of ''ComicBook/{{Wanted}}'' Mr. Rictus, a Joker expy, was a highly moral and religious man until a NearDeathExperience showed him that there was no afterlife, so he became an OmnicidalManiac.

* In the ''Series/DoctorWho'' serial "The Greatest Show in the Galaxy" the mad character Dead Beat is really the shellshocked former leader Kingpin. He regains his sanity at the story's climax.

* One ''WesternAnimation/BugsBunny'' cartoon had a man escape the clutches of "Pirate Sam" (Yosimite Sam). The scraggly, ratty looking man in chains [[NoFourthWall looks at the viewer]] and says "I was a human being once!" before running away. Kinda dark for a Merry Melodies cartoon.

* The EvilMatriarch Precia Testarossa we get to see in the original ''Anime/MagicalGirlLyricalNanoha'' was driven psychotically (and abusively) insane by [[spoiler:the death of her daughter Alicia]], which also served as her StartOfDarkness. In ''Anime/MagicalGirlLyricalNanohaAs'', as well as ''[[TheMovie The MOVIE 1st]]'', we are then shown flashbacks of Precia from before that, when she had been an all-round nice and hard-working single mom who doted over her daughter like no tomorrow.

* Inverted in ''Literature/ZenAndTheArtOfMotorcycleMaintenance''. In the first half of the book, oblique references are made to a character named "Phaedrus"; we're told little about him except that "he was insane." This turns out to be [[spoiler:the narrator himself, before he was hospitalised and given electroshock therapy.]]

* Dr Walter Bishop, the avuncular MadScientist of ''Series/{{Fringe}}'', gets a few flashback episodes showing him to have been a much calmer and much darker character before the personal tragedy that laid the way for the series. It turns out [[spoiler:he deliberately had part of his brain removed because he didn't like what he was becoming.]]

* Playing through the Story and Arcade modes for Arakune in the ''VideoGame/BlazBlue'' games reveals that the crazy, incoherent, black blob that he is was once a normal human scientist [[spoiler: who dedicated his life to study of the Boundary. Even as he was exposed to seithr the closer he came to the Boundary, he became aware that he was transforming, and that he couldn't stop. In his final moments as a human, it was business as usual as he continued recording his research and studied the Boundary]].
* In ''VideoGame/EscapeFromMonkeyIsland'', the deranged hermit Herman Toothrot is revealed to be [[spoiler:Elaine's father, the former Governor of Melee Island]], who has been missing for years and presumed dead, but actually just got shipwrecked and lost his memory.

* In ''Webcomic/GamingGuardians'', the Scarlet Jester, the Joker-like foe who kills main character Graveyard Greg's best friend, or is killed by a time-traveling Greg before he can do so, is eventually revealed [[spoiler:to be the time-traveling Graveyard Greg himself, losing the last of his sanity after being sent into the past as punishment for [[WellIntentionedExtremist the crimes he committed in setting up his first time travel]]]].

Related to HiddenDepths, LossOfIdentity, WasOnceAMan, and SanitySlippage. May also involve CerebusRetcon, RichesToRags, TwoAliasesOneCharacter or AmnesiacDissonance.

* ''Webcomics/EmergencyExit''. CloudCuckooLander Eddie is revealed to have forced a portal into his own head in order to keep the BigBad from getting it, which is what made him into the nutty ManChild we know.

* ComicBook/HarleyQuinn was once a promising young psychologist ([[DependingOnTheWriter or psychologist occasionally]]), and while she was definitely a bit arrogant and narcissistic, she didn't go fruit loops until after she tried to cure ComicBook/TheJoker.

* Harley Quinn from the {{DCAU}} was once a promising young doctor, and while she was definitely a bit arrogant and narcissistic, she didn't go fruit loops until after she tried to cure TheJoker.
* TheJoker himself, [[MultipleChoicePast depending on the version]], may have been an ordinary comedian before he went crazy and became a super-villain.

* ''Literature/CiaphasCain'': One of Amberley Veil's retinue is a permanently combat-drugged lunatic named Simeon who flinches every time he sees Cain's commissar uniform. Cain asks what his deal is, she tells him he was in a PenalLegion, snapped under pressure and started executing men for failing to salute a superior officer... while on the receiving end of an artillery barrage. Cain nods sympathetically, but notes that preventing that sort of breakdown is why they have commissars in the first place. Veil then says Simeon ''was'' the commissar.

!Examples

[[AC: VideoGames]]
* In the ''VideoGame/{{Warcraft}}'' universe, Drek'thar mentored future Warchief Thrall in the ways of the shaman, and serves as the chieftain of the Frostwolf Clan. Despite his blindness, he was an extremely powerful shaman, fierce fighter, and wise leader. However, he became senile with age, and now his rare moments of lucidity are indications that something is about to go very, very wrong.
* In ''VideoGame/WatchDogs'' Aiden meets two former [=CtOS=] employees who helped develop the operating system but later fell into obscurity and became shunned by Chicago.
* Playing through the Story and Arcade modes for Arakune in the ''VideoGame/BlazBlue'' games reveals that the crazy, incoherent, black blob that he is was once a normal human scientist [[spoiler: who dedicated his life to study of the Boundary. Even as he was exposed to seithr the closer he came to the Boundary, he became aware that he was transforming, and that he couldn't stop. In his final moments as a human, it was business as usual as he continued recording his research and studied the Boundary]].

* In ''Webcomic/GamingGuardians'', the Joker-like foe who kills the main character's best friend, or is killed by a time-traveler before he can do so, is eventually revealed [[spoiler:to be the time-traveling main character himself, losing the last of his sanity after being sent into the past]].

* In ''Videogame/{{Watchdogs}}'' Aiden meets two former [=CtOS=] employees who helped develop the operating system but later fell into obscurity and became shunned by Chicago.

This is a BackStory trope: if the character is first shown as sane, then it\'s SanitySlippage or one of the other MadnessTropes.

Can be a TearJerker or FateWorseThanDeath, since the character\'s mind has been destroyed without affording him the peace of death. If he is still aware of what\'s happening it may be AndIMustScream.

How he went crazy is not always that important, although it often involves some form of uncontrolled magic or {{Phlebotinum}}, or WithGreatPowerComesGreatInsanity. It is also possible for a character to use ObfuscatingInsanity in order to hide his past, although it doesn\'t count if he is still working undercover.

\'\'\'Examples will contain spoilers by default. There are no spoiler tags.\'\'\'

* The EvilMatriarch Precia Testarossa we get to see in the original \'\'Anime/MagicalGirlLyricalNanoha\'\' was driven psychotically (and abusively) insane by [[spoiler:the death of her daughter Alicia]], which also served as her StartOfDarkness. In \'\'Anime/MagicalGirlLyricalNanohaAs\'\', as well as \'\'[[TheMovie The MOVIE 1st]]\'\', we are then shown flashbacks of Precia from before that, when she had been an all-round nice and hard-working single mom who doted over her daughter like no tomorrow.

* It\'s mentioned several times in \'\'ComicBook/TheSandman\'\' that the youngest of The Endless, Delirium, was once Delight, the personification of joy and happiness, but changed to Delirium long before the onset of the story for reasons unclear. She\'s a bit of a MadGod. In a few flashbacks, we get to see her before her MadnessMakeover.
* Harley Quinn from the {{DCAU}} was once a promising young doctor, and while she was definitely a bit arrogant and narcissistic, she didn\'t go fruit loops until after she tried to cure TheJoker.

* In the comic book version of \'\'ComicBook/{{Wanted}}\'\' Mr. Rictus, a Joker expy, was a highly moral and religious man until a NearDeathExperience showed him that there was no afterlife, so he became an OmnicidalManiac.
* Early on in the \"Dead End Kids\" arc of \'\'ComicBook/{{Runaways}}\'\', Victor is pursued by Tristan, a hideous and seemingly deranged man with giant metal wings who seems to hate him for reasons he can\'t figure out. After the team is sent back in time to 1907, Victor meets Tristan\'s younger self, who\'s far more normal, or at least as normal as a big dude with metal wings can get. Unfortunately for Victor, Tristan has designs on Lillie, a local girl who becomes smitten with Victor, and he thinks Victor\'s out to steal \"his\" girl. Furthermore, the Runaways end up inadvertently causing a catastrophe that leaves Tristan horribly disfigured.

* \'\'Film/TheAdventuresOfBuckarooBanzaiAcrossThe8thDimension\'\'. When Dr. Emilio Lizardo first appears he\'s locked up in an insane asylum and acts crazy. While he\'s undergoing self-inflicted electroshock therapy there\'s a FlashBack of what happened to him. He was originally a scientist who worked with Professor Hikita to develop a prototype version of the Oscillation Overthruster. During a test of the device he was possessed by the Red Lectroid leader Lord John Whorfin.

* \'\'Literature/TheBeyonders\'\': The Blind King invokes this by pretending to be a crazy old man who thinks he\'s king. If his true identity as the Prince were found out, he would be hunted down and killed.
* \'\'Literature/LordOfTheRings\'\': Gollum is a prime example. Originally a hobbit named Sméagol, he was corrupted mentally and physically by the Ring by the time Bilbo meets him in The Hobbit.
* \'\'Literature/CiaphasCain\'\': One of Amberley Veil\'s retinue is a permanently combat-drugged lunatic named Simeon who flinches every time he sees Cain\'s commissar uniform. Cain asks what his deal is, she tells him he was in a PenalLegion, snapped under pressure and started executing men for failing to salute a superior officer... while on the receiving end of an artillery barrage. Cain nods sympathetically, but notes that preventing that sort of breakdown is why they have commissars in the first place. Veil then says Simeon \'\'was\'\' the commissar.
* In \'\'Literature/GreatExpectations\'\', Miss Havisham used to be sane, but went mad after discovering that her fiancee had swindled her out of her fortune and run off on what was supposed to be their wedding day. She shut herself off from the rest of the world, never leaving her house or even changing out of her wedding dress, and eventually conceived of a plan to adopt a girl so that she could raise her to break men\'s hearts the way that her fiancee broke hers.
* Ben Gunn in \'\'Literature/TreasureIsland\'\'. Once a part of Captain Flint\'s crew, though unliked by his shipmates. He knows the location of Flint\'s treasure, but no one believes him. Marooned on a deserted island, he becomes more than a little addled, talks in the third person and has an obsessive craving for cheese.
* Inverted in \'\'Literature/ZenAndTheArtOfMotorcycleMaintenance\'\'. In the first half of the book, oblique references are made to a character named \"Phaedrus\"; we\'re told little about him except that \"he was insane.\" This turns out to be [[spoiler:the narrator himself, before he was hospitalised and given electroshock therapy.]]

* A downplayed version in \'\'Series/DocMartin\'\' with PC Penhale, who was by all accounts a competent and professional police officer before he was kicked in the head by a horse and became the goofy, quirky, lovable dullard we all know.
* In the \'\'Series/DoctorWho\'\' serial \"The Greatest Show in the Galaxy\" the mad character Dead Beat is really the shellshocked former leader Kingpin. He regains his sanity at the story\'s climax.
* \'\'Series/BabylonFive\'\'
** In [[Recap/BabylonFiveS02E05TheLongDark \"The Long Dark\"]], crazy homeless doomsayer Amis (played by Creator/DwightSchultz) is arrested early in the episode for disturbing the peace. When Amis starts saying \"Incoming! Incoming!\" in his sleep, Garibaldi realizes he\'s a [[GreatOffscreenWar Minbari War]] veteran.
--->\'\'\'Guard:\'\'\' How do you know?
--->\'\'\'Garibaldi:\'\'\' I\'ve had that same dream.
** A major plot point in [[Recap/BabylonFiveS03E13ALateDeliveryFromAvalon \"A Late Delivery from Avalon\"]]. The man who arrives on the station convinced he\'s KingArthur returned in Britain\'s hour of need is really David [=McIntyre=], a retired [=EarthForce=] gunnery sergeant wracked with guilt over firing the shots that triggered the Minbaris\' RoaringRampageOfRevenge.
* Dr Walter Bishop, the avuncular MadScientist of \'\'Series/{{Fringe}}\'\', gets a few flashback episodes showing him to have been a much calmer and much darker character before the personal tragedy that laid the way for the series. It turns out [[spoiler:he deliberately had part of his brain removed because he didn\'t like what he was becoming.]]

* In \'\'Theatre/SweeneyToddTheDemonBarberOfFleetStreet\'\' (as well as the Creator/TimBurton [[Film/SweeneyToddTheDemonBarberOfFleetStreet film adaptation by the same name]]), the homeless madwoman that hangs around the barber shop is revealed to be Sweeney\'s long-lost wife, Lucy. Unfortunately, this isn\'t revealed--either to Sweeney or the audience--until \'\'after he murders her\'\'.

* \'\'Webcomics/EmergencyExit\'\'. CloudCuckooLander Eddie is revealed to have forced a portal into his own head in order to keep the BigBad from getting it, which is what made him into the nutty ManChild we know.
* Mituna from \'\'Webcomic/{{Homestuck}}\'\' was a powerful psionic with strong prophetic abilities. He constantly (and correctly) warned his friends that they were doomed, until \"one day he lost all those abilities when he badly overexerted himself.\" What exactly he did is unknown, but it seems to have been some great act of heroism. Now he barely has the mental capacity to speak understandably and constantly goes back and forth between being completely passive and spewing incoherent vitriol.

* While Freelancer Agent Maine from \'\'Machinima/RedVsBlue\'\' wasn\'t the nicest person, he was still a loyal team mate. However, he gets shot in the throat on one mission, losing his ability to talk. The AI called Sigma was implanted into him so he could have a sort of voice through Sigma. But as time went on, Sigma\'s ambition for Metastability (the point where an AI could be considered human) drove the Maine mad as Sigma corrupted him, and he began killing others under Sigma\'s control. At that point, Agent Maine became the AxCrazy Meta. Even when Sigma and the other AI fragments were destroyed, the Meta was still an EmptyShell bent on carrying out Sigma\'s goal.

* In the \'\'VideoGame/{{Warcraft}}\'\' universe, Drek\'thar mentored future Warchief Thrall in the ways of the shaman, and serves as the chieftain of the Frostwolf Clan. Despite his blindness, he was an extremely powerful shaman, fierce fighter, and wise leader. However, he became senile with age, and now his rare moments of lucidity are indications that something is about to go very, very wrong.
* In \'\'Videogame/{{Watchdogs}}\'\' Aiden meets two former [=CtOS=] employees who helped develop the operating system but later fell into obscurity and became shunned by Chicago.
* Playing through the Story and Arcade modes for Arakune in the \'\'VideoGame/BlazBlue\'\' games reveals that the crazy, incoherent, black blob that he is was once a normal human scientist [[spoiler: who dedicated his life to study of the Boundary. Even as he was exposed to seithr the closer he came to the Boundary, he became aware that he was transforming, and that he couldn\'t stop. In his final moments as a human, it was business as usual as he continued recording his research and studied the Boundary]].

* \'\'WesternAnimation/AdventureTime\'\': The Ice King was a historian named Simon Petrikov until he put on the Ice Crown, which gave him ice powers and immortality but made him slowly lose his mind. This has been a real TearJerker throughout the series.
* \'\'WesternAnimation/GravityFalls\'\'

* One \'\'WesternAnimation/BugsBunny\'\' cartoon had a man escape the clutches of \"Pirate Sam\" (Yosimite Sam). The scraggly, ratty looking man in chains [[NoFourthWall looks at the viewer]] and says \"I was a human being once!\" before running away. Kinda dark for a Merry Melodies cartoon.
* In an episode of \'\'WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons\'\' framed as an \'\'Series/{{Up}}\'\' style documentary, we meet Eleanor, who is both a doctor and lawyer--and then see burn-out turn her into the CrazyCatLady.
* \'\'WesternAnimation/ElTigre\'\'. The several-generations-back original holder of the belt buckle started out sane, but slowly lost his mind from trying to decide whether to be good or evil. We finally meet him in the Day of the Dead episode. Because he\'s been dead and without he belt buckle for so long, he\'s mostly lucid, but the insanity is still lurking under the surface.