History Narm / KingdomHearts

** Pete's Lion form in the Pride Lands, despite the fact that Pete is actually an anthropomorphic cat, they just tacked on petes face to a chunky lion body, with his mane looking like [[WesternAnimation/MadagascarEscape2Africa Makunga's]].

* Mena Süvari's performance as Aerith. To say her delivery is [[DullSurprise lifeless]], even for someone who died in her own game, would be an understatement.

* While it's [[{{Understatement}} perfectly understandable]] why Kairi would hate Xehanort, it's a little ridiculous when [[spoiler: she begins acting foolishly and recklessly aggressive toward a memory of him, who outright acknowledges the fact that he's just a memory and isn't acting remotely threatening - he's just standing there and casually speaking to her.]]

* The first part of Keyblade Graveyard [[spoiler:when Terra-Xehanort strikes down Ventus, Aqua just stands there in shock, not even bothering to fight back against him.]]

* It seems there is a pattern that if the character doesn't have a high quality facial model even if the situation needs it, the scene is ruined. Well, in that case, Donald and Goofy's HQ facial models are underused so much in the first game, that any time they talk, they look so blank. [[http://youtu.be/_EE7HREV00w?t=6m35s This scene (Video link skips to 6:35)]] from the original ''Kingdom Hearts'' is one of the worst examples. It seems like they were trying to be sad, [[spoiler:since they're leaving Sora because Riku has the Keyblade,]] but couldn't the creators at least make their models frown? It probably made much more sense in a lot of scenes back when the games were only on sub-HD resolutions since it wouldn't have been nearly as noticeable, but in the HD ports it looks especially jarring, and kind of where the pre-HD games haven't aged very well. [[note]]There are good reasons for the use of lower-quality facial models, however. Simply put, performance and time/budget for facial animation, especially when doing facial animations entirely by hand (keep in mind at this time tools for facial animation in games were much less robust, and [[VideoGame/HalfLife2 one of the first pioneers for in-engine facial animation toolsets]] came out two years after the original ''Kingdom Hearts'' and only just a year before ''II''). Textured faces (or in the case of Donald, Goofy, Mickey, etc. simplified/limited facial models/animations) are basically to increase performance (because, well, you don't want framerate drops in the middle of your cutscenes), for two reasons - firstly, lower polygon count, and secondly, skeletal animations are ''actually pretty expensive'' in terms of processing, especially on older hardware like the Playstation 2. Nowadays fully-modeled and animated character faces and expressions are virtually ubiquitous in AAA games, and there are tools and workflows that make animating faces easier, especially code that allows the developer to direct a character's gaze dynamically, as well as automatic lip-sync and facial morphs that allow for much easier facial animation in most cases.[[/note]]

* It seems there is a pattern that if the character doesn't have a high quality facial model even if the situation needs it, the scene is ruined. Well, in that case, Donald and Goofy's HQ facial models are underused so much in the first game, that any time they talk, they look so blank. [[http://youtu.be/_EE7HREV00w?t=6m35s This scene (Video link skips to 6:35)]] from the original ''Kingdom Hearts'' is one of the worst examples. It seems like they were trying to be sad, [[spoiler:since they're leaving Sora because Riku has the Keyblade,]] but couldn't the creators at least make their models frown? It probably made much more sense in a lot of scenes back when the games were only on sub-HD resolutions since it wouldn't have been nearly as noticeable, but in the HD ports it looks especially jarring, and kind of where the pre-HD games haven't aged very well. [[note]]There are good reasons for the use of lower-quality facial models, however. Simply put, performance and time/budget for facial animation, especially when doing facial animations entirely by hand rather than engine features like automatic lip-syncing. Skeletal animations are actually pretty expensive in terms of processing, especially on older hardware like the Playstation 2. Nowadays fully-modeled and animated character faces and expressions are virtually ubiquitous in AAA games, and there are tools and workflows that make animating faces easier.[[/note]]
** Another major source of narm is that these static faces default to having a huge grin, especially notable with Disney characters like Sora and Simba. The Lion King characters are especially bad in this regard, with huge permanently frozen face splitting grins.

* It seems there is a pattern that if the character doesn't have a high quality facial model even if the situation needs it, the scene is ruined. Well, in that case, Donald and Goofy's HQ facial models are underused so much in the first game, that any time they talk, they look so blank. [[http://youtu.be/_EE7HREV00w?t=6m35s This scene (Video link skips to 6:35)]] from the original ''Kingdom Hearts'' is one of the worst examples. It seems like they were trying to be sad, [[spoiler:since they're leaving Sora because Riku has the Keyblade,]] but couldn't the creators at least make their models frown? It probably made much more sense in a lot of scenes back when the games were only on sub-HD resolutions since it wouldn't have been nearly as noticeable, but in the HD ports it looks especially jarring, and kind of where the pre-HD games haven't aged very well.

* It seems there is a pattern that if the character doesn't have a high quality facial model even if the situation needs it, the scene is ruined. Well, in that case, Donald and Goofy's HQ facial models are underused so much in the first game, that any time they talk, they look so blank. [[http://youtu.be/_EE7HREV00w?t=6m35s This scene (Video link skips to 6:35)]] from the original ''Kingdom Hearts'' is one of the worst examples. It seems like they were trying to be sad, [[spoiler:since they're leaving Sora because Riku has the Keyblade,]] but couldn't the creators at least make their models frown?

* The series is very averse to having {{Non Player Character}}s around, usually only having a half-dozen or so per world and they're always named characters important to the story. This can lead to positively ridiculous scenarios when there aren't crowds of people when there should be, such as the ball of ''Cinderella'' or the Festival of Fools for ''The Hunchback of Notre Dame'' -- it's just the four or five plot important characters in an empty room/field. [[https://i.imgur.com/UOyQs2w.png This screenshot about sums it up.]] Sometimes the game attempts to HandWave this by explaining the absence of others (they fled from the Heartless or other villains, they were turned into Heartless, they're all scared and staying inside, etc.), but more often it doesn't bother. Thankfully ''III'' finally averted this by populating the worlds with extras. ''Dark Road'' would further attempt to justify this by explaining that the restoration process the worlds had to go through after being destroyed in the Keyblade War restores the people last, and since time flows differently in each world, some of them haven't been completely restored yet.

* Woody's bit in the end of the Toy Box world where he confronts Young Xehanort's HannibalLecture by straight up declaring that Xehanort has no friends and that clearly no one loved him. It feels like the equivalent of a schoolyard burn, while also practically talking shit about the overly-dramatic speeches the villains of the series are known for. This is also why it's NarmCharm, as the fans love it so much that its become MemeticMutation, as Woody is one of the only characters in the entire franchise that '''knocks Xehanort down from his SmugSnake attitude'''.

''Franchise/KingdomHearts'' has some [[Funny/KingdomHearts unironically funny]] moments. But there are some... [[{{Narm}} awkward]] moments that can make players cringe. Most of the fanbase see these as NarmCharm though.

** [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7_6mpKet-KI This scene]] where he says "Say fellas, did somebody mention the Door to Darkness?" and then just stands there menacingly wearing ''that outfit'' is infamous.

[[folder:Kingdom Hearts [=0.2=] Birth by Sleep: A fragmentary passage]]
* The ending, in which Mickey loses his shirt. It's meant to explain why he looks the way he did in the ending of ''Kingdom Hearts 1'', but the fact that he [[spoiler:gets hit by a swarm of Shadows and the impact causes his shirt to ''dissolve'']] seems outright hilarious. The worst part is that if the goal was to preserve continuity for Mickey’s clothes, it fails at even that because his shoes look different from the shoes he had in ''Kingdom Hearts 1''!
[[/folder]]

* Mickey Mouse is easily one of the biggest sources of unintentional comedy. They tried so hard to portray him as a [[TookALevelInBadass badass]] in such an overly serious way, giving him dramatic lines like ''"[[{{Revenge}} They'll pay for this]]"'' [[note]] (said with a DeathGlare and in response to Goofy's DisneyDeath, which is Narm in itself) [[/note]] and having him be one of the most powerful characters in the setting. The problem is his character just ''cannot'' work this way. The way he acts clashes with his canon personality so badly it's impossible to take any of it seriously.
** [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7_6mpKet-KI This scene]] where he says "Say fellas, did somebody mention the Door to Darkness?" and then just stands there menacingly is infamous.

* The entire premise of the ''Kingdom Hearts'' series can be either this or NarmCharm to newcomers -- specifically, the MoodWhiplash created by the sight of spiky-haired anime characters fighting demons and having amazing, visually orgasmic anime battles with [[ImpossiblyCoolWeapon impossibly cool anime weapons]] (complete with {{Single Stroke Battle}}s, InstantRunes, {{Magic Missile Storm}}s, flashy {{Criss Cross Attack}}s, etc.), juxtaposed with the whimsical cartoonishness of Disney characters and settings. Similarly, the sight of Mickey Mouse unexpectedly taking a level in badass, anime-style, can be also hard to take seriously.

* In the English version, Creator/RutgerHauer's Xehanort isn't nearly as much a LargeHam as Creator/LeonardNimoy's version or even their [[Creator/ChikaoOhtsuka Japanese]] [[Creator/AkioOhtsuka counterparts]] in his line delivery. Then comes the FinalBoss battle, and it's almost understandable why he isn't when he yells, "COME, KINGDOM HEARTS!" in a high pitched and almost squeaky voice, making Xehanort sound far from intimidating.

* At the end of the cutscene in which the Second Keyblade War begins in earnest, we pan to Master Xehanort who begins observing the battle from his perch. Upon a close-up, he gives a “nyeah” while grinning at the camera. It’s really silly and a bizarre deflation of what had been a fittingly ominous and epic cutscene depicting the beginning of Master Xehanort’s endgame he’d been planning since the beginning of the series.

** The climactic scene of Simba hanging off the tip of Pride Rock before Scar's JustBetweenYouAndMe moment doesn't seem so climactic when you take into account that, were Scar to throw Simba down, he would not really be falling that great a height and, unlike in the movie, the whole place is not on fire. In regular gameplay you can jump off of the clip to no ill repercussions. Add in the lack of flames in Simba and Scar's final clash, as well as the lack of the awesome music that really bolstered the epicness of the original scene, and you’re left with a very underwhelming finale to the story.

* Due to GameplayStorySegregation, we have a scene where Kairi and Riku [[spoiler: are both wielding Keyblades and having trouble...against ''common Shadow Heartless''. Kairi swings at a Shadow and misses badly, while Riku swings twice only to have the Shadow dodge by ''jumping over his head'' BOTH TIMES.]]

* Goofy's "death" scene in the 1000 Heartless battle. The game plays this very seriously, with Mickey going on about how they'll pay for this...only for the next cutscene after to show Goofy alive and well, because the boulder just knocked him out and nobody bothered checking for a pulse or any sign that he was alive or dead. It's just a very strange scene whose intention feels confusing.

** The climactic scene of Simba hanging off the tip of Pride Rock before Scar's JustBetweenYouAndMe moment doesn't seem so climactic when you take into account that, were Scar to throw Simba down, he would not really be falling that great a height and, unlike in the movie, the whole place is not on fire. In regular gameplay you can jump off of the clip to no ill repercussions. The fact that after the cutscene you can find some [=NPC=] lionesses just calmly walking around the base of Pride Rock and spouting some WelcomeToCorneria lines instead of, you know, ''[[ApatheticCitizens helping out the son of their previous ruler who is fighting the guy who killed the aforementioned previous ruler]]'' doesn't help at all. Add in the lack of flames in Simba and Scar's final clash, as well as the lack of the awesome music that really bolstered the epicness of the original scene, and you’re left with a very underwhelming, boring finale to the story.
*** The fight right after it against Scar powered by darkness, while sort of cool by itself, is nowhere near awesome enough to redeem the scenes beforehand, and it even included some additional narm with Pete inexplicably claiming that Scar had just become a heartless even though he clearly didn’t, making him look like he has a very poor understanding of how his own universe works. ([[FridgeBrilliance Although to be fair]], considering this is [[TheDitz Pete]] trying to understand [[KudzuPlot Kingdom Hearts lore]], it actually does make some sense for him to come to such a wrong conclusion.)

** There is a reenactment of a scene from ''WesternAnimation/{{Mulan}}'' [[SugarWiki/MomentOfAwesome where Shan Yu runs down the mountain alongside his soldiers on horseback]]. This time, there are no horses and instead of human soldiers, he runs alongside the Heartless. Okay. That's cool... but of all the Heartless to choose from, they chose ''[[http://www.khwiki.net/images/b/bb/Rapid_Thruster_KHII.png Rapid Thrusters]]'' and no others. The scene is so underwhelming and it's just ridiculous seeing Shan Yu fiercely running down the mountain with these guys behind him.
*** What makes it even worse is that it's not like there's, ya know, an entire ARMY of them, which might look kind of impressive, but there's maybe two dozen at most, and the cutscene plays it out like this is a serious threat, when the ensuing battle consists of Sora basically slaughtering them until the timer runs out.
*** The manga fixed this a bit: Shan Yu arrived with human soldiers first, but then they appear to be [[FamilyUnfriendlyDeath blown up]] [[GoryDiscretionShot semi-offscreen]] by the Imperial Army's fireworks. After this, the Rapid Thrusters emerge from the smoke, suggesting that those Heartless ''were'' Shan Yu's human soldiers.

* There's a scene where Shan Yu attacks an entire village in Sora's absence. When Sora and his friends find the village burned down, they see Shang collapsed on the ground in immense pain, and it's implied that he's been stabbed (though no blood is shown). Despite this, Sora and Mulan not only don't seek medical attention for Shang, they also have no issues with asking him to find any remaining villagers.

* The scene where Mulan's disguise is discovered by Li Shang is pretty bad, too. It sacrifices Mushu to take a level in [[TheScrappy scrappiness]] by being MotorMouth and accidentally reveal Mulan's identity. Thankfully, the manga uses the scene from [[WesternAnimation/{{Mulan}} the movie]] (with minor changes) instead.
** There's also the fact that in the movie, Shang does not know that Ping/Mulan has a dragon companion -- in the game, he sees Mushu after the battle in the avalanche and has [[UnusuallyUninterestingSight absolutely no reaction to it]]. Apparently, [[DeliberateValuesDissonance Mulan being a woman]] [[SkewedPriorities is far more unusual and worth questioning]] than the fact that she has ''a frikkin' dragon'' with her. [[FridgeBrilliance Then again]], considering they've just fought a legion of monsters (Heartless), maybe a talking dragon is indeed not that unusual for him.

* [[spoiler:Goofy's "death"]] during Hollow Bastion's WhamEpisode. Some narm is to be expected when such happy, colorful Disney characters try to pull off a serious moment, let alone something as heavy hitting as [[spoiler:the death of a classic and beloved character]], but this one in particular takes the cake. Many players just ''can't'' take the idea seriously in the first place. Even without that, any tear-jerking potential the scene may have had is deflated somewhat when [[spoiler:Goofy's revealed to be perfectly fine ten minutes later]], leaving the player to wonder what the point of this scene was.

** Early on in the game, Aqua delivers the line "[[TemptingFate Together... always!]]''. Not only is it so obviously setting them up for a fall, but the delivery of the line is extremely forced.

* The boss battle against Sparky/Experiment 221 in Deep Space only happens because Dr. Jumba released him after he becomes offended by Terra's statement that Experiment 626 isn't as monstrous as Jumba thinks, and after Terra defeats Sparky, Sparky just reverts back into a ball and is never mentioned again. Really, it looks more like the developers wanted to include Sparky into the game yet they didn't know how. Terra's [[DullSurprise lack of reaction]] over this only makes it worse.

*** Riku has a section where he's running through Paris from the Wargoyle, desperately trying to escape as the city burns...while [[SoundtrackDissonance lighthearted battle music plays]] that ruins the mood completely. The same track continues into Frollo's followup scene at the miler's, really undercutting any menace he had.
** Later, Sora finds Quasimodo with Esmeralda in the Cathedral. Again, the lack of context or any prior characterization of Quasimodo makes it easy to see him as completely crazy rather than just childish when he tells Esmeralda that the bells "like her". He then tells Esmeralda that she could stay with him in the cathedral forever, which comes off as incredibly creepy given that the game, unlike the movie, has not actually established Esmeralda as being trapped in the cathedral.
** Frollo ranting to Phoebus about how despite his efforts to exterminate gypsies, they "thrive"... while the camera pans over the ''completely empty and silent'' gypsy camp. Uh, yeah, they sure are "thriving".

[[folder:Kingdom Hearts: Melody of Memory]]
* The debut trailer alone already managed to have a moment of major narm. The overall tone is very lighthearted as the footage shows Sora and co. revisiting various moments of the series with the timed button presses typical of rhythm games. This isn’t a problem for the most part as, for example, [[WesternAnimation/{{Hercules}} the Olympus Coliseum moments]] fit right in with this tone. However, for some odd reason, they include [[DeathIsDramatic XION’S DEATH]] as part of this rhythm game footage. Turning what was otherwise a TearJerker into a joke with the footage of Sora gliding into items to timed button presses next to this dramatic death scene. A little mitigated with the knowledge that [[spoiler:Xion comes back to life as of KH3]], and the jury’s still out on whether this will be better in context during the full game, but still a very awkward tonal choice for the trailer nonetheless.
[[/folder]]

** The climactic scene of Simba hanging off the tip of Pride Rock before Scar's JustBetweenYouAndMe moment doesn't seem so climactic when you take into account that, were Scar to throw Simba down, he would not really be falling that great a height and, unlike in the movie, the whole place is not on fire. In regular gameplay you can jump off of the clip to no ill repercussions. The fact that after the cutscene you can find some [=NPC=] lionesses just calmly walking around the base of Pride Rock and spouting some WelcomeToCorneria lines instead of, you know, ''[[ApatheticCitizens helping out the son of their previous ruler who is fighting the guy who killed the aforementioned previous ruler]]'' doesn't help at all. Add in the lack of flames in Simba and Scar's final clash, as well as the lack of the awesome music that really bolstered the epicness of the original scene, and you’re left with a very underwhelming, boring finale to the story. The fight right after it against Scar powered by darkness, while sort of cool by itself, is nowhere near awesome enough to redeem the scenes beforehand, and it even included some additional narm with Pete inexplicably claiming that Scar had just become a heartless even though he clearly didn’t, making him look like he has a very poor understanding of how his own universe works. ([[FridgeBrilliance Although to be fair]], considering this is [[TheDitz Pete]] trying to understand [[KudzuPlot Kingdom Hearts lore]], it actually does make some sense for him to come to such a wrong conclusion.)