Note: This thread was proposed by molokai198.
According to the description of Broken Messiah, it is supposed to be about when a seemingly "pure good" character/All-Loving Hero feels guilt and horror about having human flaws, which seem to others like just things everyone has. However, it is often used as a synonym for Fallen Hero, reflecting a character who was an Ideal Hero and either became evil or more cynical and an Anti-Hero. Even when it's used closer to correctly, it often is used for an All-Loving Hero who has emotional struggles, or an All-Loving Hero who has secret flaws but isn't shown to feel any guilt about it.
- Correct usage (otherwise ideal character feels guilty about having human flaw/impulse): 7/41, 17%
- Ideal character is a Stepford Smiler or otherwise suffers: 10/41, 24%
- Ideal character in fact has a flaw, but is not mentioned to feel guilty about it: 5/41, 12%
- Former ideal character/messiah figure becomes a Fallen Hero: 6/41, 15%
- Ideal character feels guilty about not being able to succeed/failing, but not a character flaw: 2/41, 5%
- Character is flawed but never appears to be ideal in the first place: 1/41, 2%
- Pothole, contextless or otherwise unclear if character fits the trope: 7/41, 17%
- "Not to be confused with" mention: 1/41, 2%
- Multiple categories/unsure: 2/41, 5%
Recommendation: Rename to something like Flawed Messiah Guilt or Not So Perfect Guilt to better reflect the trope's actual meaning and curb misuse. Misuses could be moved to tropes like Fallen Hero, Stepford Smiler, or Beneath the Mask/Hidden Depths depending on how they are being misused.
Wick check:
Broken Messiah wick check: open/close all folders
Correct usage (otherwise ideal character feels guilty about having human flaw/impulse): 7 (17%)
- Characters.Bleach Orihime Inoue: Her reaction when she realizes she's jealous of Rukia's closeness to Ichigo is this, which actually helps unleash the insecurities she had bottled up inside for a while. She gets better with some help from Rangiku and Rukia herself.
- Characters.Malazan Book Of The Fallen The Tiste Peoples: Everyone who ever encounters Trull sees him as humble, compassionate, courageous, and so on, but he himself is all too aware of his own perceived failings; seeing not just too much, but — as he believes — all the wrong things, passing judgement based on prejudices, being indecisive and easily deceived because he trusts people to be honest, and so forth...
- Characters.The World Ends With You The Players: On the surface, she's a perpetually cheerful, all-loving Nice Girl who wants nothing more but to help out others and connect with Neku in order for the both of them to perform to the best of their abilities. [[spoiler:However, as it turns out, she's actually a Stepford Smiler with a ton of issues revolving around her feelings of inadequacy and insecurity around her best friend Eri. However, Shiki HATES herself for feeling this way and Higashizawa is able to exploit this by having her undergo a Heroic BSoD due to him continually probing at her insecurities. Thankfully, Neku and Eri are able to help her learn to accept herself and she ultimately becomes more emotionally strong in the process.]]
- Characters.War And Peace: Always trying to be the all-loving Christian, Marya is horrified when she realizes part of her is happy that her father is dying because she will be able to be free to be happy when he dies.
- Characters.Warrior Cats River Clan: Introduced in The New Prophecy as the always kind and understanding Chosen One who helps to save the Clans [[spoiler: and the Tribe]], but her manga reveals she has a lot of resentment towards her Clan, and hates herself for not being capable of being a caring Clanmate, treating her Clan with kindness and loyalty. This even extends to Hawkfrost and Mothwing, who she can't help but judge once she knows they are Tigerstar's children, but she hates that she feels this way, knowing how hypocritical and unfair to them it is.
- Characters.Wings Of Fire Second Arc Protagonists: He often worries about his darkest thoughts, hating himself for them, while dragons who know him consider him a perfectly noble dragon who shouldn't have to worry about such things.
- Literature.Albert Campion: Campion when seriously contemplating ignoring his ideals, [[spoiler: i.e. seriously contemplating pointing the authorities toward his client so he could steal the man's wife,]] even falling into a Heroic BSoD and putting on some pretty thick Jade-Colored Glasses, but he's brought back to himself in the next book via Love Redeems.
Ideal character is a Stepford Smiler or otherwise suffers: 10 (24%)
- AllLovingHero.Anime And Manga: Tohru Honda from Fruits Basket is kind to everyone, forgives even the most evil, and encourages everyone she befriends to overcome their issues with her love. However, Tohru actually turns out to be a Deconstruction, being more of a Broken Messiah: even though she is genuinely all-loving, she also tries to help others because her low self-esteem and grief over her deceased mother make her feel like she doesn't deserve to have others be kind to her, causing her to sideline her own problems and hide them behind her relentlessly upbeat attitude. Rin, in a moment of insight, notes that under her bright smile, Tohru is "quietly falling apart", and part of her Character Development is allowing herself to be helped and feeling worthy of being helped.
- Characters.Fruits Basket Tohru Honda:
- Tohru obsessively sidelines her own needs and problems, ostensibly because she wants to take care of her friends, but really because she can't face her trauma. It's eventually revealed she has severely low self-esteem and an unhealthy inability to move on from her mother's death.
- Deconstructed Character Archetype: Of the All-Loving Hero. While a genuinely kind person who sees the best in everyone, Tohru is also a Broken Messiah who focuses on helping other people because her low self-esteem and grief over Kyoko's death makes her believe that she doesn't deserve any kindness for herself. As a result, she constantly sidelines her own problems and hides her insecurities behind her upbeat attitude. Part of her Character Development is allowing other people to help her, and to feel worthy of being helped.
- Characters.Maiden Rose: So much. He's held to higher standards than anybody else, Can't Have Sex, Ever, and is going against these beliefs that have been programmed into him to be in a secret gay relationship with an enemy soldier whom almost everybody despises. Love Hurts.
- Characters.Merlin The Character: Merlin appears nice and cheerful most of the time but the more tragedy he goes through, the more it becomes just a mask.
- Characters.Tokyo Babylon: All-Loving Hero: Subaru is an innate compassionate person and will always listen to people's troubles, empathize with them and try his best to help them. It's also demostrated that he holds back his own power when dealing with his cases, as he's afraid of hurting others with his might and prefers to let himself be hit. [[spoiler: Even when he grows sad and bitter after Seishirou's betrayal and Hokuto's death, "Start" and X/1999 have him' still showing genuine kindness to those who really need it, like Kamui or the characters from "Start".]]
- Characters.Vault Hunters Wanted Vault Hunters:
- She is an All-Loving Hero who is a Badass Adorable and Genki Girl, though [[spoiler:after Dion's injuries, she has become more a Stepford Smiler and Broken Messiah due to emotional trauma and grief]].
- Real Song Theme Tune: "We are broken"
by Paramore. Describes her [[spoiler: Broken Bird / Broken Messiah aspect of her personality, as well as her dependence on Dion for emotional stability]].
- DeconstructedCharacterArchetype.Anime And Manga: Fruits Basket: Tohru Honda deconstructs the All-Loving Hero. While a genuinely kind person who sees the best in everyone, Tohru is also a Broken Messiah who focuses on helping other people because her low self-esteem and grief over Kyoko's death makes her believe that she doesn't deserve any kindness for herself. As a result, she constantly sidelines her own problems and hides her insecurities behind her upbeat attitude. Part of her Character Development is allowing other people to help her, and to feel worthy of being helped.
- Music.Rattle And Hum: "Love Rescue Me," as Bono put it, is "about a man people keep turning to as a saviour but his own life is getting messed up and he could use a bit of salvation himself."
- ThePollyanna.Anime And Manga: Bleach: Orihime Inoue is ultimately a subversion. She seems to be this in the first arcs, but she's later revealed to be a Stepford Smiler who hides her massive self-esteem and lonely issues behind her smile... and once she's taken out of her more-or-less safe Karakura environment, she's subjected to a Break the Cutie process. [[spoiler: She arguably plays this straighter when she's back home, but it can also be seen as a coping mechanism: she does state that she's had a rough life, but is trying not to dwell on it anymore.]]
- YMMV.Fruits Basket: Iron Woobie: Tohru is essentially abandoned by the paternal relatives she had left (aside from her grandfather) due to their dislike of her mother Kyoko's Former Teen Rebel past and then she passed away shortly before the start of the series, but Tohru faced it with a smile, something that many characters find as admirable. While this is initially played straight, the latter half of the manga makes this a Deconstructed Trope with the reveal that she is also a Broken Messiah Stepford Smiler affected by [[spoiler:how, during her father's funeral, she listened in on her relatives who weren't aware and could care less, that Tohru can understand them talking about how she didn't resemble her father and that it's no consolation because of how much they hate Kyoko for her former social standing. Then there's also her being told off by Kakeru to quit her whining at Kyoko's funeral. Why? Because he believed that Tohru is being self-centered as she grieved for her mother. To drive the knife even further for her? He adds that she's not the only one who lost a parent in his belief that Tohru is being self-centered for grieving]]. All those things only made Tohru feel even worse about herself, and it's later made clear that bottling up her feelings is damaging her in the long run.
Ideal character in fact has a flaw, but is not mentioned to feel guilty about it: 5 (12%)
- All-Loving Hero: If such a character has moments where they are Not So Above It All or fall short of this standard, you're likely to be in front of a Broken Messiah.
- Anime.Towa No Quon: Quon, with a bit of The Paragon in there as well, as he encourages the other Attractors to learn to use their abilities for good. [[spoiler:Overlaps with Broken Messiah in Chapter 6, where he comes close to killing the Big Bad in revenge for Towa, despite knowing that it goes against his ideals.]]
- Characters.Disgaea Hour Of Darkness: Flonne does several deeds during the course of the story that are considered less than appropriate for an angel (helping Laharl to become the overlord and beating Gordon, for example). She doesn't realize it's treason against Celestia's dogma before it's too late and desperately tries to explain it away, but she doesn't fool anyone, not even herself.
- Characters.Lady Jewelpet: Out of the Petit Ladies, she has the most noble intentions (wanting to create a peaceful world), but she also becomes the easiest target for the Beasts because of her single-mindedness in doing everything herself.
- Characters.Towa No Quon: In the finale, he comes close to killing Kamishiro in revenge for [[spoiler:Towa's death]], despite knowing that it goes against everything he stands for.
Former ideal character/messiah figure becomes a Fallen Hero: 6 (15%)
- Characters.Death Note Light Yagami: Invoked word for word in the first opening credits ("Doushite? Boku wa kowareta meshia?"). Light was the first victim of the Death Note — he was very nice and very pure before realizing the notebook was real — then it was only a matter of how fast and how far he would fall.
- Characters.Final Fantasy XV Ardyn Izunia: Being rejected by the very people he saved over two thousand years ago broke him hard enough to drive him into Rage Against the Heavens. Episode Ardyn further reveals that what little sanity he had left shattered after experimenting with Cannibalism Superpower on humans and gods. Let's make this clear: Ardyn retained some semblance of sanity after eating thousands of demons and millennia of imprisonment. All it took to truly break him was mind-reading some humans and a god who secretly hates the people who worship him. Hard to be a shepherd of the people if you know how diseased your flock is and how apathetic your gods are.
- Characters.Inuyasha Supporting Characters: After being revived, she angsts at the world and "Inuyasha" for killing her and is more focused on revenge and smiting evil than helping others like she used to.
- Characters.Undertale Flowey: As someone who was a huge cinnamon roll with a big heart in his previous life, being stripped of the ability to feel love and compassion was terrifying to him, and even eventually led to his being Driven to Suicide. Given how sadistic he eventually became, his fear was certainly justified.
- Characters.Yu Gi Oh GX Jaden Yuki: His failure to save his friends has driven him over the edge.
- DarkAndTroubledPast.Final Fantasy: [[spoiler: Ardyn]] from Final Fantasy XV fits this trope to a T. [[spoiler: He was a healer of a plague that turned people into monsters, but at the cost of him taking in several of them into his own being. He was ostracized and shunned for this and forgotten by history]].
Ideal character feels guilty about not being able to succeed/failing, but not a character flaw: 2
- Characters.Naruto Naruto Uzumaki: Temporarily had this spectacularly happen to him in Chapter 476 when he has a panic attack over not knowing how to help Sasuke.
- Characters.Re Zero Subaru Natsuki: Becomes this in the ending of Arc 3 and realizes that he [[spoiler:failed in keeping everyone safe and can't go back in time to fix the problem.]]
Character is flawed but never appears to be ideal in the first place: 1 (2%)
- Characters.Junjou Romantica: His default mode is acting like a Tsundere to Akihiko, along with his usual brash, childish and idiotic personality. Not to mention, anything concerning about Akihiko also can result him into becoming this, too.
Pothole, contextless or otherwise unclear if character fits the trope: 7 (17%)
- Fetishized Abuser: Klaus von Wolfstadt of Maiden Rose is a Conflicted type variety: very rough when he sexes up his secret boyfriend Taki Reizen, and completely screwed up due to his past and his currently very difficult position in Taki's land.
- Troubled Abuser: Klaus from Maiden Rose (drug-addicted, with lots of conflicting loyalties, a love interest with his own and strong issues);
- Anime.Inuyasha The Movie Affections Touching Across Time: Non-Serial Movie: Inuyasha has learned the Backlash Wave and Rin is traveling with Sesshomaru, which sets the film at some point after episode 54 of the anime. However, Sesshomaru lacks Tokijin, Kikyo is still a Broken Messiah who is pissed off at the world, and Inuyasha still requires his opponent's demonic aura in order to perform the Wind Scar, which are all only possible prior to episode 45.
- Fanfic.A Knights Tale As Inquisitor: Who else?
Arturia: [thinking] A broken messiah for a broken world then, huh?
- Fanfic.Dragon Ball Zero: Bully Brutality: Faid attempts to attack Alpha using the Aura Slide... AKA, a move that slices open people... AKA, Zamasu' (A Broken Messiah) signature move...
- Manga.D Gray Man: Allen Walker most certainly suits this, do to his ever growing situation with the 14th and undoubted selflessness. His confusion in his purpose and discovering of why the 14th plagues him leaves him in an almost ideal situation for this trope.
- TroubledFetalPosition.Anime And Manga: Bleach: In chapter 199, Orihime adopts this position as she tells Rangiku about her insecurities.
"Not to be confused with" mention: 1
- VisualNovel.Messiah: Not to be confused with the main trope All-Loving Hero (fomerly known as "The Messiah"), or any of its related tropes, Messianic Archetype, Messiah Creep, or Broken Messiah.
Multiple categories/unsure: 2 (5%)
- Characters.Blaz Blue Litchi Faye Ling: [[spoiler: She starts as an All-Loving Hero, but in her quest to Find the Cure! for Arakune, her efforts so far didn't produce any results, and with her only source of help that she trusted (Kokonoe) flat out refused as well being afflicted with the corruption which, if left behind, will consume and kill her, drove her to desperation and eventually joining NOL, an act she truly despised of. Even compounded with the fact that two of her main co-workers/superiors turn out to be the worst men to ever exist, she tries to hide this fact and still acts as kind as before.]] This one seems like a combination of Fallen Hero and Stepford Smiler
- DeconstructedTrope.Western Animation: Hey Arnold!: In the deceptively named episode "Deconstructing Arnold", they seem to deconstruct All-Loving Hero: When Helga points out that Arnold is always giving unsolicited advice to other kids, spoiling their fun, every other kid (included best friend Gerald) agrees. Arnold decides to stop helping others as a result. Then we discover... that Arnold is still the same good, happy kid. He's not a Broken Messiah from it. However, as expected, the kids' plans backfire and they need help in resolving them, only for Arnold to remind them that they didn't want his advice. They then go to Helga, whom she initially doesn't see the big deal and decides to give them advice. Helga being a Jerkass Woobie only manages to make things worse for everybody, including herself, because everyone blames her for her ill advice. We discover that the kids' problems would be relatively easy to solve... if they had the character to be able to do the right thing, instead of the doing the easy thing. Arnold wasn't All-Loving Hero because he gave advice, he gave advice because he was an All-Loving Hero, truly loving and caring for others and encouraging the kids to do the obvious, right thing no matter how painful, while Helga's solutions were not the best; most involved shifting the blame, while one was just poorly, thought out and that never solves any problem. The tropes Humans Are Flawed and All-Loving Hero was deconstructed and reconstructed. It results with Helga asking Arnold to be an All-Loving Hero again. She even Lampsahdes that she's no good at giving advice and that they need him. The episode concludes with Arnold telling his friends the true advice they needed while Helga looked from afar, happy things we back to normal. this one says the character is not this trope even though it seems to be an accurate description of the trope, I'm not sure what the person writing the example thought the trope meant.
Edited by GastonRabbit on May 8th 2023 at 9:50:58 AM
Trope Repair Shop:
Broken Messiah
5th May '23 6:24:35 AM
Crown Description:
Broken Messiah is heavily misused, and the relatively low wick count means the trope wouldn't be thriving if the misuse was removed without sending the trope back to TLP. What should be done with Broken Messiah?
Total posts: 26
The only remaining wicks are for a Pantheon entry, and since I already asked them to remove/change them, I'll go ahead and close this thread.
Patiently awaiting the release of Paper Luigi and the Marvelous Compass.