I Don't Want To Know What I'm Capable Of

[redbrunja]

So, the combination of reading Side Jobs while my mom is reading Dragon Bones made me realize another one of my bulletproof kinks: people who are LEGITIMATELY* afraid of what they're capable of and struggle with where their moral lines are.

Examples would be: Harry  Dresden; Ward of Hurog; Alexandra Udinov, daughter of Nikolai Udinov (BANG. BANG.) (I'm on the fence about The Doctor.)

What do you think of this trope? Who are your favorite characters who embody it? Tell me in the comments.

*By which I mean, it's not just that these characters have moral qualms but have to actively safeguard themselves against being as bad as the people they're fighting. So I would argue that Sarah Coner wouldn't apply but Raylan Givens is SO MUCH THIS. And yes, I have noticed that it is a VERY male-dominated trope.

Comments

[anat-astarte.livejournal.com]

people who are LEGITIMATELY* afraid of what they're capable of and struggle with where their moral lines are.

I've always loved this trope. I can't think of any character that I know would embody it though, since they always seem to cross the line for some necessary evil or other :D

[keirelle.livejournal.com]

John Mitchell from Being Human. He is all about trying to not be as bad as he could be. It's in his vampiric nature to kill as much as possible, but he's constantly struggling to not be that person.

[darkeyedwolf.livejournal.com]

XENA.

All others are pale imitations!

[birdsarecalling.livejournal.com]

The Doctor is tough. It's clear that he hates himself for some of the things he's done, but he seems too accustomed to his own power to be really afraid of it.

As far as characters who embody this trope, I'm really liking the magician Anders, from the game Dragon Age 2.

In the DA universe, mages are vulnerable to possession by powerful spirits that live in the collective unconscious, most of which are nasty "demons" that embody things like lust, rage, and hunger. This means that everyone else is terrified of mages (not without good reason) and they get carted off to glorified prisons while they're still children.

Anders was one of those kids. In school/prison he trains to be a magic doctor. He escapes, and does what he needs to do to live free. But one day he runs across an unusual type of spirit -- a spirit of justice, rather than baser human emotions. He decides to merge with it in order to gain the power to help his brethren, because he feels guilty about having only cared about his own survival.

Unfortunately, Anders' pent-up anger about the whole situation transforms the spirit into a spirit of vengeance. Anders immediately realizes that he's made a huge mistake, but can't do anything about it. He spends the next ten years desperately trying to be more of an activist than a terrorist... only to fail spectacularly, because in the end, he is what he is.

I like the tragedy of the whole thing. Plus the fact that it takes an empathetic (metaphorical) look at what might drive a person to terrorism, without excusing terrorist acts themselves.

[mildmay.livejournal.com]

I think this is a tough trope to pull off without seeming preachy. I want to like it, but often don't because of the way the narrative is handled. I need to feel like the character(s) are honestly struggling and don't just BELIEVE they're capable of awful things but KNOW they are because they've actually done those terrible things. And I need the narrative to back off, and let me interpret the character and his or her morality, rather than shoving what's GOOD and what's BAD down my throat.

Kenshin from Rurouni Kenshin is probably still my favorite use of this trope, at least in the first couple of arcs. Though, to be fair, it's been years since I read or watched the series, so I might not feel as compelled by it as I did when I was younger. For example, it's shounen and I know it doesn't get quite as dark with his struggle as I might prefer it now. But I remember honestly feeling his struggle as someone who had killed extensively in a war at a young age and who never wanted to let himself return to that state of mind. And I also felt it was honestly HIS struggle for HIS reasons, rather than the narrative defining what's righteous and pushing him in a certain direction. So I think it was handled well considering the target demographic.

There's also Xena, who I think worked the trope pretty well for awhile, but only for the first couple of seasons, really. Once the writers started bringing in Christian mythology and themes into the series I very quickly got fed up. Which is unfortunate, in retrospect, because like you said it's usually a male dominated trope and it was nice to see it used with a female character.

[sharkflip.livejournal.com]

I'm currently watching Angel. 'Nuff said.



Also, I am so embarrassingly late to this party.

[chomiji]

Cho Hakkai.

[meitah.livejournal.com]

Katniss. Especially as she sees Gale not even try to be better than the Capitol. And Katara, after she learns bloodbending. Willow Rosenberg, too, after season six. Faith starts to fall into this in the comics, but she's put on "clean up" duty, and kind of gave up bothering, since no one else did with her. And Eff Rothmer from Patricia Wrede's Thirteenth Child (which I seriously rec to you) plays with this one every which way.

There are probably a few more dangerous ladies that I can think of, but my brain's kind of dead atm.

[natural-blue-26.livejournal.com]

I think I remember *way back* you mentioned in passing that you had read the Animorphs series as a kid?

Because WOW did Rachel *ever* represent this trope- I don't know any other "kid" series at that point that actually takes the reader though a main character's (especially a girl's!) head as they slowly lose their grip of right and wrong because they start out willingly taking the morally ambiguous missions to keep everyone the fight with hands "clean"-- and then most distressingly to themselves, in Rachel's case, start *enjoying* being the one who deals the most damage to the enemy.

And then there's when she goes up against Taylor- who is essentially a Rachel lookalike who sold her family/brain/essentially her soul to regain her pretty face/social position (Seriously, Rachel's boyfriend who has just been tortured by Taylor actually calls Rachel the 'twilight' to Taylor's 'night' at the end of the first book Taylor is in)-- and David- who has all of her darker character flaws with none of her overwhelming sense of loyalty to those she loves. REALLY DARK ARCS IN THE SERIES.

Seriously, her ending is still one of the best done young-lit character deaths *ever* IMO.

[despairinbeauty.livejournal.com]

Whoa. This. THIS. Loving this troupe, even though...yeah, it is a male-dominated trope. :/

So far...my favorite character that may embody this trait is Andrew "Ender" Wiggins (main character from Ender's Game). He knew that he understood how to fight in war well, but at the same time he hated himself for the ability. Unfortunately, he got sent into Battle School, even though it is the less of the two evils (the other choice was staying under his power-hungry brothers' control, which could lead to him having to fight his psychopathic brother's manipulations all the time). However, he got manipulated into having to fight from a corner at Battle School all the time, and even had to kill someone in order to survive, even though he felt that he could have not had to go to such dire measures. In the end, the government officials manipulated him into wiping out a major part of the alien society that he was trained to wage war against, and Ender pretty much had to escape and run away with his subordinates because of his ability to fight in war, as well as find ways to protect the last of the alien species he was once fighting against.

I admit, Ender's ability is probably more well-controlled than the other examples listed by everyone else here, so...yeah, he probably might not count. ^^;

[spankulert.livejournal.com]

(Snooping around since you seem to have friended me. Hi, btw)
Luther is a show I've just recently gotten into in a huge way. Brit show, so naturally they tease me with a six episode season. The main character Luther, played by Idris Elba, fits this trope nicely, me thinks. He's a detective that deals with the more grisly murders, and has been dipping in to that for too long now it seems.