Freudian Excuse Is No Excuse / Comic Books

Freudian Excuse Is No Excuse in Comic Books.

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• Aquaman: Dardanus's father Shalako sacrificed his mother in a dark magical ritual intended to help the people of Tritonis survive underwater. In revenge, the young Dardanus told the Tritonians that Shalako had been the one to curse them and turn them into proto-mermaids. Enraged, the Tritionians murdered Shalako and all his family except Dardanus, who survived by fleeing into the tunnels beneath Tritonis. The murder of his family, coupled with the long years living in isolation in the tunnels, result in Dardanus growing into a deeply disturbed young man. Despite his horrific past, no one in the series treats Dardanus as anything but a monster once his crimes come to light. During their climactic duel, King Orin I even points out that Dardanus is largely the one responsible for his father Shalako's murder, having sicced the angry Tritonians on him in the first place.
• Batman
  • The Batman Adventures: Mad Love: This is how Joker managed to win Harley Quinn over to his side. When she says that the Joker told her "secret things" he'd never told anyone else, Batman rattles off several of the Joker's phony sob stories. Batman also points out to her how the Joker has a "million" of these that he's told to gain sympathy. It nearly convinces Harley to give up on the Joker after realizing what a monster he is, but she later relapses into becoming his moll once again when the Monster Clown sends her a note and flowers. This is later adapted into an episode of The New Batman Adventures.
  • In Catwoman, Selina Kyle's childhood friend Sylvia Sinclair betrays her by allying with Black Mask and telling him her identity. Because of this, Black Mask kidnaps Selina's sister Maggie and her husband Simon Burton. Simon is tortured to death, while Maggie is tortured to insanity. When Selina confronts Sylvia, she thinks that Sylvia betrayed her because, during a heist gone bad, Selina was forced to leave her to be arrested. However, the true reason she betrayed Selina was when they were teenagers working the streets together as prostitutes, Sylvia took Selina's place during their first time so Selina wouldn't have to go through with it. Selina didn't know how to handle Sylvia after the incident, which led to Sylvia's hatred of her because she felt Selina abandoned her. Selina points out that she was just a kid and was afraid. She also says that Sylvia was not the only one who had a hard time on the streets and asks if she really thinks that justifies what she has done.
  • The Killing Joke: The Joker's "one bad day" proves to be just an excuse as he neither knows nor cares if it actually happened and Batman confronts him on how his attempt to similarly break Commissioner Gordon failed.
    Batman: Despite all your sick, vicious little games, he's as sane as he ever was! So maybe ordinary people don't always crack. Maybe there isn't any need to crawl under a rock with all the other slimey things when trouble hits. Maybe it was just you, all the time!
  • This is discussed and justified in Batman: The Ultimate Evil regarding the idea of abuse victims becoming abusers themselves. When Batman brings up how some serial killers claim they were abused as children, social worker Debra Kane immediately states absolving a person of their actions because they were abused as children is bullshit. Debra points out yes, it is possible for an abuse victim to becoming an abuser themselves, but to excuse a person's actions based on such a thing is an insult to the many, many, many survivors who went through similar, if not worse, abuse and never imitated their abusers. As she puts it, abused children don't become killers or rapists because they were abused. They have the potential to become killers, rapists, or abusers themselves depending on what, if any, kind of help they receive to heal.
  • In Knightfall, Firefly grew up with an abusive father, only for him to be suddenly orphaned and sent to live in an orphanage with his sister. While his sister was adopted, Firefly's pyromania meant he was considered a "problem child". After the mass breakout at Arkham Asylum, he begins burning down the places his potential adopters had promised to take him to before deciding against adopting him. Batman briefly shows sympathy for him in his Internal Monologue, only to note that he himself was an orphan and yet he never went to the same lengths Firefly did.
• Captain America: In a Silver Age story, Cap is a prisoner of the Red Skull who regales him of his difficult life before becoming Adolf Hitler's hatchetman. Cap dismisses that history considering that lots of people have had tough times in their pasts, including his own, and is in no mood for sob stories, especially from a monstrous Nazi like the Skull.
• Freddy vs. Jason vs. Ash: Lori (the Final Girl of Freddy vs. Jason) screams at Jason Voorhees after he brutally murders her boyfriend Will that she used to feel sorry for him, being the outcast freak who drowned at the hands of cruel kids while the irresponsible camp counselors were screwing, but she cannot anyone after he continues to take more and more lives with no signs of stopping. Too bad she doesn't have plot armor in this story and Jason doesn't care about what others think of him.
• Green Lantern: Amon Sur was the son of the legendary Green Lantern Abin Sur, who grew up to be a leader of the Black Circle Crime Syndicate. It was implied he was trying to live up to his father's accomplishments and was angry that his father was not around to raise him. He tries to get revenge on Hal Jordan (whom he blames for his father's death) and he goes on to say how he should have been different and how his father was never there for him and he blames the Green Lantern Corps for his messed up life. Hal, who went through similar stuff with his own father, has No Sympathy and points out to Amon that not having a father does not excuse his crimes.
  Amon Sur: Things should have been different. I should have been different. My father was never there for me. He was never there because of the damn Green Lantern Corps. What I became for so long was their fault.
  Hal Jordan: You've got to be kidding me. You don't get a free pass because your father wasn't there. No one else did.
• Irredeemable: This is delivered to the Plutonian. On the one hand, he did have a very raw deal, being tossed from one foster home to another after his families discovered his powers and had no idea how to handle them, as well as a Friendless Background due to being unable to play with the other kids because he would accidentally hurt them with his powers. And then there are the circumstances of his birth — he was originally an alien probe that took on a human baby's form after reacting to the powerful emotions of an insane woman who had killed her child, which might have corrupted him from the start. He also lived in the woods as a feral child, known as the Wolf Boy for a brief period. But he also got a few good lucky breaks, such as a caring foster father who genuinely wanted to teach him right from wrong (although admittedly he didn't always go about it in the best ways), a girlfriend, and the love of at least 90% of the human race, but it wasn't enough, as he was already severely psychologically damaged by the time things began looking up for him and having good things in life does not negate nor heal any of the damage he went through prior, and it's very likely he did not get any therapy either (which probably would've done him a lot of good). Regardless though, he still killed millions of innocents (some for the pettiest and self-centered of reasons at that) and numerous characters, including his biological parents, tell him to his face that the treatment he endured doesn't justify any of his atrocities.
• The Legend of Korra: Ruins of the Empire: Opal as a kid had this response to Kuvira being a Big Sister Bully to her about crushing a dollhouse they both liked. She said Kuvira may have been abandoned but that doesn't mean she should get treated mildly all the time.
• Maus: Vladek alienates everyone with his obnoxiously stingy and controlling behavior. He claims his behavior came from being in the Nazi death camps, which is something that his son, Art, who was born after World War II, believed during his childhood. However, Mala, who also survived the camps, points out how she didn't end up like that and neither did any of their friends who are also Holocaust survivors.
• In Miles Morales: Spider-Man (2022), Tiana Toomes has absolutely no sympathy for Rabble and her revenge plot, rightfully calling out how Rabble's trauma doesn't give her an excuse to inflict it on others, especially when the target of her wrath (Miles) isn't to blame. While Rabble is initially framed as somewhat sympathetic in her introduction, her vendetta is so petty that both Miles and Tiana are both Disappointed by the Motive.
• In My Friend Dahmer, an autobiographical comic by a guy who went to school with serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer, the author believes Dahmer to be a tragic figure... but makes it very clear that he loses all sympathy for him as soon as he actually commits murder.

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• New X-Men: Academy X: Kimura was born to an abusive alcoholic father and a negligent mother. Her school life was similar, as she was abused and tormented by her peers. Through unspecified means at some point in time, Kimura's grandmother became her caregiver. At once, her grandmother tried to heal the emotional damage inflicted upon Kimura through nurturing, love, and understanding. However, by that point, the emotional scars were permanent and her grandmother's attempts to reach her were futile. After her grandmother's fatal heart attack, Kimura took off, eventually coming into contact with the Facility. She then underwent some unspecified procedure that granted her physical invulnerability, density control, and reconstruction, and exacted revenge against those in her past who had wronged her. During her time at the Facility, Kimura eventually assumed the same abusive role as the people who victimized her in the past, particularly to Laura. When Emma Frost learns of this by reading her mind, she admits that Kimura's past was horrible and no child deserves the life she was born into, but is not sympathetic towards her, and is in fact deeply disgusted. Emma points out that Kimura became the very person she hated and feared growing up by making Laura her victim and inflicting on her the same horrible life she lived through and didn't care because even though she knew all too well the pain Laura suffered, she enjoyed being on the other side of it for once. Emma doesn't hesitate to mind-wipe Kimura, making her forget about her grandmother — the only influential positive person in her life — creating "a deep void that will cause [her] pain for a lifetime."
  Emma Frost: You are a bully, plain and simple. A product from your past... Being kicked around your whole life by an alcoholic father and uncaring mother at home, only to find the same waiting for you from your peers in the schoolyard, day in and day out. You were born into a life you did not deserve... A life no child deserves. Someone needs to fill the role of the victim and you played that part for so many until your grandmother came to your rescue. She called you her "sweet child." She did everything she could to undo the damage everyone else had done. But sadly she came too late, all that hope and good you held onto was beaten out long ago. After your grandmother's heart attack, you found your way to the Facility to the men that could give what you wanted badly... Revenge. A hollow prize, but one you begged for. And once you'd gotten the best of those who wronged you, you became the very person you hated and feared growing up. And X-23 played the role of your victim. Like you, Laura didn't deserve that horrible life, no child does, remember? But you didn't care. Even though you knew all too well the pain she suffered, you enjoyed inflicting it. You still enjoy it. That's why you're a bully.
• The family of Jake Gallows, The Punisher 2099, was killed in a completely random, senseless act of violence. He finds their killer and is treated to the tale of his tragic upbringing: Kron Stone claims his parents, though rich, never loved him. They were never home and left a robot to care for him but never bothered to program it, causing it to default to veterinarian mode. Jake is not sympathetic.
  Kron: Do you know what it's like to be fitted with a collar, live in a kennel, and be fed on dog meat?!
  The Punisher: No, but I know what it's like to have your family butchered by a crazy with a sob story.
• Rapunzel's Revenge: Gothel tries to justify that because her parents abandoned her, she's entitled to take this world by storm. Gothel's backstory hardly outweighs that fact she's become a power-hungry tyrant who rules the land with an iron fist, enslaves those who defy her, and stole Rapunzel from her real parents. Rapunzel certainly won't hear any excuses for such barbaric behavior.
• Rogue Sun: By the end of the first story arc Cataclysm, it is revealed that the murderer of Rogue Sun (Marcus Bell) is his ex-wife, Gwen Siegel, the mother of the new Rogue Sun (Dylan Michael Siegel). It is revealed that Marcus rescued Gwen and then asked for her number; eight months later, they were married. After having Dylan and spending two years married to Marcus, where she would patch up his wounds, one day after being gone for six months, Marcus told Gwen that he was leaving her, shocked Gwen asked if there was someone else. Marcus just answered that it was complicated and wished he could tell her more; he just told Gwen that he didn't love her anymore and getting together with a mistake. Gwen was outraged after all they'd been through together and asked what about their son who would remember him; Marcus told Gwen to tell Dylan what she wanted to tell him. Years later, when Dylan, a teenager Marcus re-appears and wants to be a part of Dylan's life. Gwen is rightfully suspicious of Marcus wanting to be a part of Dylan after all this time and wonders if he has ulterior motives. After arguing about Dylan, Marcus tells Gwen that she can't stop him from being in Dylan's life because he's a superhero. Gwen makes a secret deal with some type of supernatural being for powers and kills Marcus. Dylan was heartbroken to learn that his mother was the murderer and eventually had to defeat her; he hoped there was a way to get rid of her powers to make her normal, but because it's unknown how she got her powers, there was no way to get quickly rid of her powers, and she needed to be imprisoned. Before she is imprisoned, Gwen tries to justify her actions to her son Dylan, saying she has done all of this for him; Dylan tells her that this all happened because she didn't trust him, that she thought that if given a choice, he would've left her like Marcus did and that she was just wanted to hurt Marcus so bad that she was using Dylan as an excuse.
  Gwen Siegel: I forgive you for what you're about to do. But please, just be better than your father. Someday you'll realize that everything I did, I did to—
  Dylan Michael Siegel: To protect me? That's Bullshit. All of this happened because you didn't trust me, Mom!
  Gwen Siegel: When you're older, you'll understand—
  Dylan Michael Siegel: Oh, I understand just fine. You thought if you gave me a choice, I'd choose life with him over you.
  Dylan Michael Siegel: You wanted to hurt him, so you used me as an excuse.
• In Seven Soldiers, Sally Sonic became magically trapped in the form of a teenager for decades, causing her to suffer abuse and degradation at the hands of a failed superhero who had a grudge against her late father. She uses this as an excuse for seducing married men, culminating in her encouraging mentally unbalanced scientist Lance Harrower to perform dangerous experiments on himself to try and gain superpowers, thinking that if he became a superhero, he and Sally could be together. These experiments ultimately killed Lance and turned his wife Alix into the Bulleteer. When Bulleteer finally confronts Sally about the carnage her selfishness has caused, Sally tries to kill her, all the while insisting that Lance's obsessions were Bulleteer's fault because she failed to please him. Bulleteer finally has enough of Sally's excuses and beats her with an engine block, saying that she doesn't care what kind of shit Sally went through, she had no right to mess with Lance's life or hers.
• Spider-Man:
  • Flash Thompson wasn't truly a villain, but this was the reason he was such a jerkass in high school; his dad was an angry alcoholic who abused both him and his mom. A story arc in the 90's involved Flash — directionless, lonely and increasingly bitter — developing a drinking problem like his father before him, leading to a car crash that got Flash arrested again and cost him his job as a school gym teacher. By this time, Flash had begun blaming much of his troubles on his family in general and his father in particular, but a violent confrontation with his father finally forced Flash to realize that he had become the same sort of self-deluded wreck his father was and that only he could take responsibility for fixing his life. Flash sobered up and started trying to turn his life around.
  • The second Venom, Angelo Fortunato, was bullied and ridiculed his whole life, as well as abused by his father, who bought the Venom symbiote from Eddie Brock and gave it to his son in the hopes of getting him to man up. During his fight with Spider-Man, he ends up killing a cosplayer dressed like the web-slinger, to which Spidey decides to stop holding back and give him a verbal beatdown, rebuking Angelo's crappy past and pointing out he himself was a bully magnet but didn't become a killer.
    Spider-Man: You weren't bullied any more than I was, Angelo. You weren't punched or kicked or spat upon any more than me. You were given great powers and you used them to kill people, you little freak.
  • Kaine Parker, one of Spider-Man's clones, is noted to have suffered in the past. When the Kravinoffs embark on a warpath against Peter's "spider family" in the Grim Hunt storyline, Kaine is fully prepared to bail out, insisting to Peter that they can't win and they should just "run and screw the rest." In response, Spidey actually punches Kaine in the face, telling him that the difference between them is the fact that he doesn't use his life's misery as an excuse to give up the good fight.
    Spider-Man: I know you've had a crappy life, and done bad things, I get it... but I never realized what a piece of garbage you were until this moment. How can you share my DNA and be so damn selfish? We've all been hurt! We've all suffered! But the real difference between us is that I never used it as a crutch. You call it "guilt"... I call it responsibility. And by God, even if it means walking into the lion's den and not coming out... I'm not going to stand by and let people die to save myself.
  • In an Anti-Bullying PSA Comic, Spider-Man faces a new antagonist called the Brace. Peter soon recognizes the Brace as someone from his school days, who he remembers getting bullied. He later admits this to a police officer, and feels responsible for the Brace’s downfall, by being too scared to stand up to the bullies back then. The police officer responds by pointing out that she too was bullied in her youth, but that only encouraged her to become a cop so she could be there for other victims and give them the help which she never got. She also recognizes that Peter himself was bullied, but he still made the good and right choice in becoming a hero, too.
  • Norman Osborn's abusive father is brought up several times in Revenge of the Green Goblin, but it doesn't excuse his horrific actions at all.
• In Star Wars Clone Wars Adventures #8 One of a Kind: Vianna D'Pow, Zeltron bounty hunter is revealed to have been bullied as a child because of her albinism - Her fun-loving species mistreated her and "taught her how to hate" so she consideres holier-than-thou characters to be hypocritical. His opponent Obi-Wan was unimpressed and remarked the problems in her excuse; she was angry at him "psychoanalyzing" her.
• S.W.O.R.D. (2020): Fabien Cortez had one of the most pathetic on record - he tries claiming he had a hard life because while he and his sister were rich, they weren't rich enough, being denied some of their old money wealth because they were Mutants. Magneto shoots this down by daring Fab to claim he had a harder life than him.
• Supergirl: In Who is Superwoman?, the titular character is revealed to be Lucy Lane, the younger sister of Lois Lane, who at first appears to be a hero but reveals her true colors when she not only attacks Supergirl, but saves Reactron from her, killing the supervillain's ex-girlfriend in order to cover up his survival. She is working for her father, General Sam Lane, implanted in New Krypton as a spy. Lucy's Backstory reveals she has always felt overshadowed by Lois, and moved to Metropolis thinking that maybe her father would pay more attention to her if she hung out with her sister, but this came at the same time that Lois and Sam grew apart over Superman. After her father's death, Lucy joined the U.S. Army and rose quickly through the ranks. During the Amazon attack on the United States, she was nearly killed by two Amazons but saved by Codename: Assassin. Awakening in Project 7734, Lucy's father convinced her to join him, and her sole motivation became to make him proud of her, no matter what. In Day of the Dollmaker, Lois visits Lucy after she has been captured and imprisoned for her crimes. Lois is disgusted by her sister, as she thought Lucy joined the military to honor their father, but now wonders when she stopped being her sister and started being a monster. When Lucy tries to justify her crimes by saying she was only following their father's orders, Lois calls that a pitiful excuse and calls Lucy out on allowing herself to become a killing machine to impress a man that did not even care for them when they were kids. Lois declares that she cannot forgive their father for his crimes or Lucy for being so stupid.
• Teen Titans: Jade Nguyen was sold into slavery at a very young age and was never given a proper outlet to express her emotions since doing so in such a place would've been a death sentence. As an adult, she's tried to live as both "Jade" and "Cheshire," where Cheshire's the one who channels her anger and hostility while Jade gets to live peacefully. Her reliance on the Cheshire identity as an emotional crutch has left her incapable of expressing her emotions healthily. Until the build-up of horrific events (nuking Qurac, forsaking Lian's life) left her wanting only to be Cheshire so she wouldn't have to face her guilty conscience. It implied that deep down, Jade seems to genuinely understand that whatever sort of trauma she went through doesn't justify the horrible things she's done. While in her cell after fighting Roy, Jade looks back on some of the worst acts she's committed and silently regrets knowing it was her own damn fault they happened. Unfortunately, by now, it's too painful for her to think otherwise, or she might lose what little sanity she has left.
• The Transformers: More than Meets the Eye: Whirl has a harsh past that goes some way towards explaining why he's a Heroic Comedic Sociopath...but the comic also shows that he deliberately refuses to deal with it healthily, because he knows he's done a lot of messed-up stuff and spending his time angry stops him from feeling the guilt. He's the second biggest Death Seeker in the main cast, exceeded only by Chromedome.
• Ultimate Fantastic Four: When the Reed Richards of Earth 1610 was a child, he was abused by his father, who had no interest or tolerance for Reed's love of science. He wasn't respected by his peers, bullied in high school, and wanted to change the world, but couldn't change it the way he wanted to because he felt no one would let him. He felt guilty over his role in the Ultimatum event, which killed millions in New York alone, then Sue rejected his marriage proposal, his teammates all quit the Fantastic Four, and finally he was prodded to be a worldwide savior by Kang the Conqueror. However, this does not justify his actions. He still had a loving mother and two supporting sisters, and a best friend in Ben, who protected him from bullies as a child and in high school. He was accepted into the Baxter Building, where his genius could be nurtured, found a new father in Franklin Storm, and a new family in Sue, Johnny, and Ben. Yet when things fall apart, he turned against his former love and friends and murdered his whole family. This was best summed up by an alternate animal world version of Miles Morales.
  Miles Morhames: He committed genocide and tried to rewrite the rules of physics, economics, and society to make himself feel better and impress a girl.
• X-Men:
  • The X-Men and Professor X have given Magneto this speech many times (Magneto is a Holocaust survivor, and takes his hatred of the Nazis who killed his family and ruined his life out on others). Occasionally, he listens.
  • Proteus had a rough deal. He was conceived by force, and his mutant powers developed in the womb, allowing him to feel his mother's hatred for the circumstances that brought him into the world. Then, when he was a teenager, he develops powers that destroys his body and forces him to steal the bodies of others just to live. However, during an unwanted resurrection in the '90s, neither Archangel or Feral of X-Force are remotely sympathetic to his plight, pointing out that A: Others have had crappy lives and they aren't responsible if Proteus can't handle it (Feral's P.O.V.) and B: with how powerful and insane Proteus is, they can't really stop and feel sorry for him (Archangel).

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