Horrible Judges of Character in Comic Books.
- The Defenders: In the future of the Guardians of the Galaxy, the Sisterhood of the Badoon let the Brotherhood of the Badoon run off into the universe and do whatever, since despite their entire history being one of violence and sexual oppression, the Sisterhood thought the Brotherhood had gotten over all that and were as peaceful as them. They weren't. The Sisterhood are pretty embarrassed to learn the truth.
- In Elseworld's Finest: Supergirl & Batgirl, Supergirl thinks that murderous, egomaniac, xenophobic, jerkass and Manipulative Bastard Lex Luthor is "the most wonderful man in the world" . To be fair, he was a master manipulator who deceived everyone but Batgirl and Bruce Wayne, and after discovering his true colors, Kara turns on Luthor at once.
- The Eye of Mongombo: Cliff Carlson’s ex-boss Norbert Nuskle may be a Jerkass and all, but he’s convinced that the Colombian drug plantation he’s in is just an ordinary farm.
- In G.I. Joe (IDW), Cobra Commander is so certain that he's corrupted Chuckles to Cobra's side that he eventually stops taking any precautions around him. Naturally, that’s what Chuckles was waiting for. The Commander doesn’t realize what’s really going on until Chuckles points a pistol right at him. Cue headshot.
- Subverted in Fables. Ambrose, who up until the 8th book had been a not too bright Nice Guy sets out to restore his kingdom in the homelands. He recruits dead fables in the Witching Well, promising them a physical body and a chance at redemption for their sins. This includes Shere Khan and Bluebeard, both of whom betrayed the fable community and plan to betray him for control of his kingdom. Not only does Ambrose know, but it's also all part of his plan.
- The Incredible Hulk: Betty Ross actually fell for Glenn Talbot, a Jerkass at best, and a sociopathic Smug Snake at his worst.
- Iznogoud: The Caliph has Iznogoud — a man who tries to carry out an evil scheme to get rid of him on any day ending in "Y" — as his grand vizier and most trusted adviser. You do the math.
- The Mighty Thor: Everyone who believes Loki (god of lies and evil) when he says that this time, he's definitely changed and isn't planning to betray someone or everyone.
- Sonic the Hedgehog (Archie Comics):
- This is pretty much King Max's defining trait. He trusted the original Dr. Robotnik to the end and never suspected his true colors until it was too late. Issue 233 reveals him to have a history of this; Harvey Who explicitly warned him not to trust Warlord Kodos, not to let Ixis Naugus remain in the kingdom, not to exile Nate Morgan, and finally not to take the original Robotnik in, but Max ignored him every single time. Possibly justified as Max revealed much earlier that, except for Sally and Elias, the Acorn royal family used a magic pool called "The Source of All" to guide their actions, meaning Max never developed the right skills for ruling. That or the Source told him to trust them for unknown reasons. Either way, there's a reason he's been given the title of Maximilian the Cursed.
- Even after watching him try to turn the Council of Acorn into his brainwashed servants, Geoffrey still believes there's some good, moral side to Ixis Naugus that he can appeal to, trying to cling to some illusion that the man he devoted so much of his life to could make the right choice. Needless to say, this backfires horribly.
- Colin Kintobor, Robotnik/Eggman's brother, fits the bill perfectly. Prior to the Great War, he was the one who judged Robotnik for using his fellow Overlanders as test subjects for weaponry, sentencing him to prison for doing so and ordering his death when he escaped. Despite this, while not privy to the many atrocities Robotnik committed, when he returned to Mobius, Colin was still quick to trust Eggman, who is technically an Alternate Self to his now-deceased brother Robotnik but still boasts of having dealt with his Colin and determined to add this one to the list, over Sonic and the Mobians and judge his brother as having reformed. It's not until Eggman himself personally confirms that Hope's suspicions over him being behind the Robians are true, and the reveal he's been subjecting Colin and the rest of the Overlanders to radiation poisoning with the intent to roboticize them all as well, that Colin realizes that his brother regardless of version is just as evil as ever.
- Spider-Man examples:
- The idiot who authorized giving Norman Osborn the authority he had during Dark Reign fits the list, plain and simple. (It was at first assumed to be President Barack Obama, due to the shade of the hand presenting Osborn, but it was later retconned that Obama's predecessor was the one holding the Idiot Ball. Obama just decided to keep holding the damn thing)
- And although even his son Harry told him off during that mess, after the events of Superior Spider Man, Harry's former wife and Peter's former friend Liz Allan has been seen in a new alliance with Norman Osborn as he attempts to establish a new identity and corporation (now that his identity as the Green Goblin is no longer a secret). Whether she is doing this entirely out of free will is unknown, but it's very possible that the biggest reason is to ensure a better future for her own son.
- Aunt May was played like this a lot in the 1960s, especially with regards to "that awful Spider-Man" and Doctor Octopus (who charmed the socks off her and almost married her). That she liked to tell Peter that bohemian party-girl Mary Jane would make a good future wife for him seemingly was another instance of this, but in the 1980s it turned out that she was actually right. It was also later stated — in her backstory — that she almost married a murderer named Johnny Jerome. (How did that end? Long story short, it was right before she met Ben, who was quite the chivalrous type way back then, especially when he saw a Damsel in Distress.)
- A minor example involving Spider-Man: When Joe Robinson was in legal trouble for withholding evidence in a murder involving Tombstone, Joe's attorney Cynthia Bernhammer starting dating Nick Katzenberg, a sleazy tabloid paparazzi with no morals who specialized in making celebrities, including Spider-Man, look bad. In fact, she was the only person who didn't hate him, and even she wondered at one point why she was attracted to a "lowlife worm" (as she put it) like him. Although, it's not known what became of their relationship, as Cynthia stopped appearing after Joe was pardoned, and Nick was eventually killed off.
- Of course, that was nothing compared to Glory Grant, J. Jonah Jameson's secretary at the Daily Bugle. Her one-time lover Edwardo Lobo was a Mexican mobster and a mutant werewolf; she didn't know at first, but even after she found out, she was okay with it! She continued to love him until the very end, when a gang war between the Lobos Syndicate and The Kingpin's organization concluded in a violent and bloody melee, which resulted in Spidey grappling with Edwardo in werebeast form. Glory grabbed a gun that had been dropped by the Kingpin's Number Two, and actually tried to shoot Spider-Man to save Edwardo; but she missed, hitting Edwardo instead and killing him.
- JJ himself was, for a while, in the habit of blindly trusting whichever soon-to-be supervillain had announced Spider-Man was in their sights, most notably with Mysterio.
- The idiot who authorized giving Norman Osborn the authority he had during Dark Reign fits the list, plain and simple. (It was at first assumed to be President Barack Obama, due to the shade of the hand presenting Osborn, but it was later retconned that Obama's predecessor was the one holding the Idiot Ball. Obama just decided to keep holding the damn thing)
- Superman: The braintrust in charge of the cloning programs in Superman: At Earth's End decided to pass over the likes of Elvis Presley, Lex Luthor, and John F. Kennedy, to clone Hitler. Twice. (Granted, cloning Luthor would also have been a mistake, but at least he would have been a better choice than Hitler.)
- Thunderbolts: In an issue of Spider-Man Team-Up before the team's big secret is revealed to the world, Spidey is having doubts about the Thunderbolts. When he hears Ol' JJ saying how the Thunderbolts are great (probably not coincidently because they're hunting Spider-Man at the time), Peter becomes convinced there's something very wrong with them.
- In The Transformers: Robots in Disguise:
- Soundwave somehow concludes that Galvatron is the ideal candidate to lead the Decepticons away from Megatron's tendencies and towards being heroic champions of freedom. Galvatron's history of pointless butchery dates back to the Miocene Epoch.
- Part of the reason Arcee was so screwed up mentally for so long was she decided to trust Jhiaxus, a Mad Scientist who looks like The Igor and let him experiment on her.
- Alpha Trion helped put Nova Prime in charge. Six million years later, he assures Optimus that Nova's statement that everybody would "be in their place" didn't sound nearly as sinister at the time.
- The W.I.T.C.H. series has Princess Elyon who believes her megalomaniacal brother and his fifty-foot snake henchman over her closest friends and the ones who raised her for years. She gradually grows out of this habit. Her TV equivalent, not so much.
- X-Men: It's a recurring theme that for someone with a doctorate in psychology, Val Cooper is appalling when it comes to judgement calls. She's good friends with Henry Gyrich, who is quite open in his hatred for all superpowered beings (and isn't exactly much nicer to anyone else), thought John Walker was a good choice to replace Captain America (she rejected Sam Wilson for being black. Nothing personal on her end, she just figured America wouldn't accept it), and let an openly anti-Mutant racist be in charge of the government's Sentinel squad.
