Han Solo: That's right, yeah. I got some old debts I've got to pay off with this stuff. Even if I didn't, you don't think I'd be fool enough to stick around here, do you? Why don't you come with us? You're pretty good in a fight. We could use you.
Luke: Come on. Why don't you take a look around? You know what's about to happen, what they're up against. They could use a good pilot like you. You're turning your back on them.
Han Solo: What good's a reward if you ain't around to use it? Besides, attacking that battle station ain't my idea of courage. It's more like... suicide.
Luke: All right. Well, take care of yourself, Han. I guess that's what you're best at, isn't it?
[starts to storm off]
Han Solo: Hey, Luke... may the Force be with you.
[Luke exits. Chewie growls]
Han Solo: What're you lookin' at? I know what I'm doin'.
Fairly often in fiction, a Dedicated Loner character will appear. He (or more rarely, she) is pretty useless, evil, or just a little strange. However, sometimes these Switzerland types are in possession of just enough power to sway the final battle, should they choose to get involved. If they do, the chances are excellent that they'll end up throwing in with the Good Guys at the very last minute and providing the decisive element in the victory over evil. Sometimes they provide a little more decisive element than necessary.
These unaffiliated loners may initially refuse to join a side for many reasons. They may not care about the conflict in question ("Eh, meet the new boss, same as the old boss"), or may not care enough to consider it worth risking their own precious skins ("I'm not stupid, I'm not expendable, and I'm not going,") or may have reasons to hate both sides of the fight equally ("A plague on both your houses; I hope you annihilate each other completely and leave the world a better place.") Generally, they relish their uninvolved status, although you may see them randomly helping out the Good Guys (or even the Bad Guys) once or twice just because it livens up a dull day.
Occasionally, this particular loner gets stuck with what might be called a "destiny choice", especially if he appears in Epic Fantasy — the character's personal salvation depends on his making the "right" choice at a certain juncture. The salvation of the rest of the World As We Know It becomes something of an afterthought. The moment of choice will be accompanied by loud exhortations from the Good Guys to "Choose well!" If the loner character manages to screw up "the big choice", it's definitely a subversion.
If you want to bring one of these guys over on to your team, there are a couple of simple suggestions you might want to follow:
If You Are The Good Guys: Don't attempt to bribe him through false displays of affection. He'll see right through it and scorn you for the attempt. Bribing with cold hard cash or other valuable commodities might work, but make sure the bribe is of an appropriate size; these guys never come cheap. They will be offended if the offered price undervalues their worth. Generally, trying to guilt them into helping you out won't work either, although there are exceptions. Your best bet is to win them over with a genuinely unforced gesture of friendship or affection, with no agenda behind it. Picking an attractive member of the appropriate gender to offer this gesture may be effective, but again, don't pander or it will backfire. You can also try reason: "Do you want to live in the kind of world the Big Bad is going to create? No? Then make yourself useful!" The odds are in your favor if you don't mess it up by being too obvious.
If You Are The Bad Guys: Whatever you do, do not choose this character as a subject to randomly display how evil you are. If he wasn't inclined to help those other twits out at first, dropping him into a tank of flesh-devouring blood eels to prove your villain credentials won't help. He'll happily forget whatever grudge he had against the Good Guys and join up with them in order to take you down. Displays of affection are out since you're Evil. But, since you are Evil, chances are you can outbid the Good Guys either in mercantile goods or in offers of worldly power. Good, in addition to being dumb, is also often cash-strapped. Remember that the odds are against you in this effort, however; if the loner refuses your carefully considered and politely delivered bribe, kill him immediately. Do not take half measures! These types are noticeably difficult to dispose of, and if you fail to kill him, well...remember what we told you about the tank of blood eels? Same deal, only more so.
Note that this is not the same as either a Heel–Face Turn or a Face–Heel Turn. Someone who Defaults To Good was neither a Heel nor a Face to begin with; they are affiliated with neither side until some critical point very late in the story. For most of the tale, they are looking out solely for themselves, or possibly affiliated with a third group that is not taking an active part in the main conflict.
Defaulting To Good is sometimes a Changed My Mind, Kid moment. Compare Rousseau Was Right.
Examples:
- Subverted, then played straight by Rabat in Vandread flees before the final battle at the end of season 1. Despite pleas from the crew of the Nirvana, he never comes back. Then at the end of season 2, he not only fights in the final battle, but brings a whole fleet with him!
- Averted with Amon Garam (Adrian Gecko) in Yu-Gi-Oh! GX. After being neutrally helpful (but manipulative!) throughout the first arc of season three and then showing his own goals in the second (but still a bit helpful, if distant), you get to the spot right after Haou has been defeated, where he steps up and sacrifices the woman who loves him and that he loves back in order to control Exodia. Then, he starts his plan to become king of the world. But then it's double subverted (without being subverted in the first place, get over it) when he reveals himself as a Well-Intentioned Extremist.
- Guts, from Berserk, was a freelancing career mercenary who only went where the money was and didn't pick sides. When he's first introduced as a teen mercenary, he's fighting for the Tudor Empire (and they won the battle because of Guts), but then immediately leaves the job after his contract is fulfilled. But after being spotted by Griffith and his mercenary army, of which Guts helped fight against, Guts was recruited to the Band of the Hawk, who were employed by the Kingdom of Midland to help fight against Tudor. When Guts went from default to the side of Midland, the kingdom got a HUGE advantage during the war.
- Inuyasha: Sesshomaru's personal goals left him in conflict with Inuyasha's group but uninterested in either the Big Bad or the plot-driving Dismantled MacGuffin. However, the Big Bad kept trying to manipulate his Sibling Rivalry to take out the heroes and his Morality Pet to neutralise his own power. This drove Sesshomaru from being a random element, through the The Only One Allowed to Defeat You and I Was Just Passing Through Anti-Villain stage, into being an openly helpful Anti-Hero. Without Sesshomaru throwing his lot in with the good guys, the Big Bad and Artifact of Doom could never have been defeated. In short, the Big Bad should have read the 'If You're the Bad Guy' advice.
- During the Civil War Crisis Crossover event, the Anti-Registration side led by Captain America attempted to recruit Namor to their cause. Despite Namor being predisposed towards them thanks to his old friendship with Cap (and the fact that Susan Richards, who he still carried a torch for, was doing the asking), he declined since in his role as King of Atlantis he felt a schism between Cap and Iron Man to not be his problem. He eventually leads an army of Atlanteans to aid Cap's forces in the final battle, partially because Iron Man's Pro-Registration side tried to pressure him into formally siding with them, something the notoriously independent-minded Namor considered insulting. Cap's decision to surrender makes his choice pointless.
- As noted in the starting quote, Han Solo is the most famous example of this trope. While he certainly wasn't the first to pull this move, people of a certain generation will never forget "YAHOOOOO! You're all clear, kid. Now let's blow this thing and go home."
- From the Star Wars Legends, Talon Karrde, Mara Jade, and the rest of the Smugglers' Alliance in The Thrawn Trilogy. Took a Mistreatment-Induced Betrayal to convince Karrde and Jade, and they had a hard time convincing the others. When they tried to do so, perhaps having realized his previous mistake with Karrde's organization, Thrawn gave specific orders to leave the other smugglers alone so that they'd continue to have no dog in the fight. A less intelligent informant of Thrawn's managed to ruin this in a play for personal glory, bringing most of the other major groups on board with forming the Smugglers' Alliance.
- The real ur-example has to be Rick, the original Mr. "I stick my neck out for no one," from Casablanca. He pulls it off so well he gets Captain Renault to turn right after him.
- Gabriel winds up doing this in Supernatural. He helps advance the villain's agenda in his second appearance, and tries to advance it in his third, because he thinks the whole destined mess should be gotten over with as quickly as possible, but he doesn't actively back either side. His official story is he doesn't care; it's pretty clear he doesn't want to be responsible for either side losing because he cares about them both, but then:
Gabriel: I've been riding the pine a long time, but I'm in the game now. And I'm not on your side, or Michael's. I'm on theirs.
Lucifer: Brother, don't make me do this.
Gabriel: No one makes us do anything.
- Averted in Lloyd Alexander's The Iron Ring. The neutral king Bala, who has been curt to both good and bad sides, not only throws in with the bad guys in the final battle, but tips the scales greatly in their favor.
- In The Fionavar Tapestry, by Guy Gavriel Kay, the big Destiny Choice goes to Darien, son of the Big Bad. He chooses for Light (of course) and, well, you can guess how that ends up.
- In Susan Cooper's The Dark is Rising series, just before the climactic battle in Silver on the Tree, the forces of the Dark attempt to stick John Rowlands (who, being human, is a part of neither the Light nor the Dark and is not even really aware that there is a conflict going on) with this choice, bribing him with a promise of freeing his possessed wife from their control in exchange for his deciding in their favor on a matter critical to the outcome of the big battle. He is not fooled, however, and this little move causes him to side decisively with the Light, as he both rules in their favor on the matter in contention, and goes on to play a small but vital role in the final victory.
- In David Eddings' Malloreon Cyradis, explicitly described as the incarnation of True Neutral, has the sole purpose of deciding whether the Child of Light or the Child of Dark won. It's described as being as random as a coin flip, but needless to say, she picks good. It helps that the forces of Dark blatantly tried to cheat.
- Well, the good also cheated by removing her blindfold, which led to her losing her prophetic powers.
- It also helps that she was developing a crush on one of the good guys before making the aforementioned choice. And, thanks to her seer powers, knew she would have a deliriously happy marriage to the guy in the event that Light triumphed. Makes you wonder why the Dark thought letting her choose was a good idea.
- Subverted, like so many things, in George R. R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire. Lord Eddard Stark thinks he has secured the vital loyalty and aid of "declared neutral" Petyr "Littlefinger" Baelish. However, that fellow has gone over to the Bad Guys instead. The results are not pretty.
- Riana, The One Immortal, in the novel Lord Brother by Carolyn Kephart. A very powerful magic-user but chronically neutral, she's initially only concerned with lounging around and having sex with the main character or whatever other gorgeous man might come her way. By the end, she's moved to provide what is almost a Deus ex Machina to help the good guys.
- In Garth Nix's Old Kingdom series, this role falls to Yrael, also called Mogget. Choosing to support Orannis means all of creation gets destroyed, with the possible exception of Yrael himself, but on the other hand, the good guys have kept him enslaved for thousands of years, after he chose neutrality the first time...
- In Dungeons & Dragons cosmology, St. Cuthbert, the god of justice and retribution, may be the Ur-Example for that setting. He has Lawful Neutral as an In-Universe alignment, but sources say that he sides with Good when given the choice, because Evil beings break laws more often than Good ones. (He does not allow evil worshippers, and many Paladins are among his clergy.)
- Subverted in Exit Fate. The Hero, Daniel Vinyard, assumes that Pereious and the mountain tribes are going to do this after Almenga's unexpected acts of aggression and, if not, that he'll be able to convince them due to knowing that he's a Magnetic Hero. Turns out, the big guy actually wants nothing to do with the upcoming war, is going to stay completely neutral in the fight, and even flat-out tells Daniel that they're still enemies (albeit this one has a Worthy Opponent vibe to it).
- Twice in Final Fantasy VI. First is the mayor of Narshe, who insists on staying neutral despite having already been invaded by the Empire once; only a second (and much larger-scale) invasion finally sways him. Later comes Setzer, who wasn't a fan of the Empire but refused to officially take sides until the Returners convince him, in part with a rigged coin toss. (The SNES translation mistranslated Setzer's view, though, making his joining the Returners seem more like a Heel–Face Turn. The GBA translation is more true to the Japanese original.)
- In Suikoden V, Gizel Godwin's Fatal Flaw is that he simply cannot resist pissing off neutral factions with his intrigues. The vast majority of Falena's factions considered the whole Prince vs. Godwin fight to be not their problem, or else actively supported the Godwins, but due to something that the Godwins either did in the Back Story or during the game's story, became enemies of the Godwins and supported the Prince's army. By the end of the game, the entirety of Falena has either rallied behind the Prince or been wiped out in the fighting.
- Knights of the Old Republic: Jolee Bindo is technically of neutral alignment, and doesn't really see the whole Light Side and Dark Side conflicts the same way as the rest of the party, pointing out that this latest conflict isn't much different than any other conflict. Heroes and tyrants rise and fall, historians sort out who goes where and the galaxy keeps running. However, as much of a good show he puts up about being neutral, he often pushes for light-side actions, gets very snarky at a Player Character picking a petty dark side action, and is the first to speak up against Bastila and the case she makes for joining her and ruling the Sith. He may veer into Good All Along, because he knew what the Player Character was the whole time and joined to keep an eye on them, but he's just not the Jedi definition of "good."
- In Kill Six Billion Demons, the powerful angel called Vigilant Gaze Purges the Horizon is introduced as a ponderous observer who makes no judgement and takes no action. Two books later, he's impressed enough with White Chain being the only angel who's actually trying to do good, particularly in contrast with the Omnicidal Maniac Knight Templar Juggernaut Star, that he sides with White Chain. His dialogue suggests he was always theoretically good, but taking it into practice is another matter.
"God, called Yisun, has entrusted us with the world itself! How can we be so prideful as to judge it? She is the only one of us not afraid of fulfilling her duty, yet we spurn her! No longer! By my honor as a Knight of the Holy Concordance — unhand our sister!"
- Subverted in an episode of She-Ra: Princess of Power. Both the Rebels and the Evil Horde court a magical being (in the form of a talking tree) to get it on their side. Just when you think it'll go with the good guys, instead it says, "I choose to - think about it" and vanishes.
- Red X from Teen Titans. While on the whole an unrepentant thief and a Chaotic Neutral character who is on his own side, whenever it really counted, he chose to side with the heroes rather than the villains. Especially notable considering the fact that in both cases he did have the option to just walk away and choose neither side.
- Asajj Ventress from Star Wars: The Clone Wars seems to routinely default to good after her master's betrayal causes her to undergo a significant Morality Adjustment that eventually has her end up falling somewhere between Anti-Hero and Anti-Villain status.
