The Woobie Cleanup

Sure to Gnowee.

Gnowee.

Gnowee.

~Orangutans, ~Keshali, please post your write-ups here and add them to the The Woobie Drafts. Not doing so makes it hard to track down approved examples. Ana from Romani Mythology and Gnowee from Aboriginal Australian Myths need one more vote.

Edited by IukaSylvie on Aug 15th 2019 at 8:54:48 PM

Hi, I've been working on updating the Blue Exorcist pages recently and I think several characters fall into Woobie subgroups. I'm rather inexperienced so tell me if I'm doing it right.

This is the current entry on the Woobie example page Meet Okumura Rin, the main character of Blue Exorcist. He was constantly harassed by other children when he was young, called a demon because of his temper and Super Strength. When he's fifteen, his father reveals to him that — surprise! — Rin is actually a demon (the half-demon son of Satan and a human woman, to be specific). His powers have been mostly suppressed by being sealed in a sword called Koumaken. If he unsheathes Koumaken, Rin will lose his humanity forever. Rin flips out at his father when he finds out, which catches his dad off guard. Satan takes this opportunity to possess Rin's adoptive father and meet his son. Rin's father's body can't take the strain, and he dies. Of course, Rin has to draw Koumaken and loses his humanity shortly after. Then, at his father's funeral, a "family friend" who he was told to rely on gives him three options: Die the easy way, die the hard way, or kill the people trying to kill you. Rin takes a fourth option and chooses to become an exorcist. He goes to exorcist school, where he finds out that his younger twin brother Yukio has known about Rin's powers before Rin did and is a teacher at the school (he had been training to be an exorcist since he was seven). Said brother tells him that he should either turn himself over to headquarters "or just die, please". Even though they reconcile, it still had to hurt. As Rin slowly makes friends with exorcist classmates, he finally has something to be happy about. Then his half-brother shows up and starts curb-stomping his friends, forcing Rin to expose his true nature to them. Things get... awkward, to say the least. And it gets worse: Turns out he has serious Survivor Guilt about the above incident with his foster father and is a SERIOUS Type A Stepford Smiler. Even when he's about to executed and firmly believes that he is a monster who deserves to die, he will smile and fake being okay and happy, just for the sake of his friends. His brother Yukio isn't much better being a Child Soldier who constantly questions what his and his brother purpose is in all of this, is a Broken Ace who is secretly envious of his elder brother and even on some level hates him...but hates himself even more and, on top of that, he just might not be completely free of being a child of Satan.

I feel that Rin should qualify as an Iron Woobie for the way he works to improve himself and win people over. Yukio is more of a Jerkass Woobie because he is sympathetic, but he also goes out of his way to shut people out and he's sometimes downright distainful of Rin.

I'm sorry. I'll do a better one of these once I've looked though the thread for more examples.

Please do a proper effort post.

I'm still not sure how this goes. I wish I knew how to bold on mobile.

Who are they?

Rin Okumura is the main protagonist of Ao no Exorcist/Blue Exorcist. At the beginning of the series he's shown to be an outcast and a dropout, alienated from his surroundings and increasingly from his family. He starts to see demons and in short order it's revealed that he's actually the biological son of Satan, and that his powers that were sealed at birth are now awakening. He has a fight with his adopted dad, who then gets possessed by Satan and dies saving Rin from him. Rin is later approached by a mysterious friend of his adopted dad and told to die, but instead says he wants to be an exorcist like the man who raised him. He's enrolled in the training course, where he finds out that his twin brother has known everything the whole time, blames him for their adopted father's death, and thinks Rin is dangerous. Rin is determined to follow through with becoming an exorcist, and is cheerful most of the time. He suffered major rejection in one arc, but was able to recover, and has remained fairly stable for the next several arcs, up until the events of the Beyond the Snow arc forced him to face his weak points more thoroughly. As of the most recent arc he's learned the darkest parts of his history and is currently struggling with both suicidal feelings and a recently realized demon personality trying to take advantage of his weakened mental state.

Can they defend themselves

Kind of? Rin is strong enough to overpower most demons even early on, but for the purpose of living in human society he's a minor and too ignorant of his own situation to be able to take care of everything himself. He can fight, but he can't deal with the politics surrounding him yet. He has however made himself useful enough that they can't execute him for Satan's crimes.

Sympathy Standard

Rin is a victim of circumstances. He was Locked Out of the Loop for most of his life and is constantly behind those who grew up knowing about demons. He wants friends above all else and fears being alone. Many fear him for what he is.

Veredict

?

Sounds like vanilla Woobie to me. Yes to him.

Edited by Bookworm50 on Aug 16th 2019 at 3:19:10 AM

And again

Who are they?

Yukio Okumura is the younger twin brother of Rin Okumura. As a child he was bullied and constantly terrified because he could see demons from birth. At age 7 he entered exorcist training, becoming a child soldier and eventually the youngest person ever to pass the exam, all of which he had to keep secret from Rin. He's incredibly smart and talented and popular, but underneath the mask of the perfect son and student he's a stressed out wreck who can't bring himself to open up to anybody even when he has the opportunity. He both loves and hates Rin and their adopted dad, and deeply resents the struggles he's endured in his life.

Can they defend themselves

To a degree. He's an established exorcist held in high regard, but he's not so high ranked that he can really affect anything. He's a strong exorcist, but still only human at first. Later he finds out Satan is living in his eye and won't let him die no matter what, and he's suicidal anyway, so he loses all sense of caution and starts fighting back to his heart's content. He was warned to do something about his stress levels early on as they would weaken him against demons, but he ignored the advice.

Sympathy Standard

Like Rin he's a victim of the circumstances of his birth. While privy to more information than Rin, his knowledge was far from complete, and it drove him crazy. His internal struggles and frustration with his life are understandable, but he also passes on several opportunities to improve things.

Veredict

Personally I think of him as a Jerkass Woobie.

Edited by Bookworm50 on Aug 16th 2019 at 3:18:15 AM

Sounds like a Jerkass Woobie. Although being crazy doesn't always make you a Jerkass. Eitherway yes to him and the other candidates I missed.

~Bookworm 50, please read the Text-Formatting Rules and the effort post template to improve your writing. Anyway, Rin and Yukio.

Edited by IukaSylvie on Aug 16th 2019 at 11:02:43 PM

Rin and Yukio.

Sure to Rin and Yukio.

Should the entries from YMMV.Requiem For A Loud be removed as they haven't been approved by the thread?

Rin and Yukio.

otemple700 made this change to Mamako's entry on Do You Love Your Mom and Her Two-Hit Multi-Target Attacks? without consulting us: Poor Mamako just wants to keep her son safe, but he's really distant from her and complains about every little thing. Moreover, he's already brought her to tears in the first chapter, saying that she butts in too much and that he doesn't want to be her son. That said, he isn't wrong about her overbearing nature.

I'd say burn it.

Burn the change or the entry?

The former.

Thanks for the clarity.

I clarified that I wanted the change burned, but why did you burn the entry instead?

Oops, it seems I got my words mixed up. Xc

That being said, Elfen Lied Fan 90 doesn't seem in favor of keeping her.

On the topic of Requiem for a Loud, it would be an edit war if I were to remove them again.

In addition: Please wait for two weeks when I already done watch the anime tyvm. The anime is still ongoing yet

(Referring to Mommy Isekai)