Alas, Poor Scrappy

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.

"She's going to pull through this. We need her to pull through. Each weekly sadistic mishap helped me through some tough times, and this is just another one of those sadistic mishaps. Right? The monitor on her life support system will sound an alarm, and some nurse or other will rush in and save her. Right? Wrong. No one saves PMMS. Alleged York manages to kill her with this completely expressionless look on his face. Damn you, cheesy Fox suspense show, for making me laugh so hard one minute and cry so hard the next! PMMS is dead. She's dead. I can't believe it."

—Gustave, Television Without Pity

The Real Life, TV-applied version of We Want Our Jerk Back.

So, that character that nobody likes is finally going to be killed off! This is the moment you thought you'd be rejoicing. Yet... the death scene is so well done that you actually find yourself feeling sad! Expect to read a lot of messageboard posts saying "I never thought I'd cry at X's death, but I was bawling so loud I woke the neighbors."

Keep in mind that this is obviously Truth in Television. No matter how many times that Jerkass Jerk Jock stuffed you in a locker and gave you a wedgie, if he is hit by a drunk driver on the way to prom, your remembrances will almost certainly be favorably tinged. Unless you're just that evil or mentally/emotionally unsound.[1] Or he was...

Contrast And There Was Much Rejoicing. See Also: Never Speak Ill of the Dead; A Death in the Limelight:.

Compare Death Equals Redemption.

No real life examples, please; Calling real-life people "unlikable" is a bad idea.

As a Death Trope, Spoilers ahead may be unmarked. Beware.

Examples of Alas, Poor Scrappy include:

Anime and Manga


Comic Books

  • Doug Ramsey, a.k.a. Cypher, from the X-Men family comic New Mutants was considered to be The Scrappy (due to his fact that his mutant power was the ability to speak every language, which sort of paled next to eye-beams and weather-control and the like), and fans repeatedly demanded he be killed off. Once he died, everyone missed him and wanted him back.
    • There's some question, however, whether or not the writers themselves over-exaggerated the sympathetic response while downplaying the hate, as a sort of manufactured Take That towards the fans. It's been suggested that the actual fan response was much more mixed, and the negative responses were simply ignored and brushed under the carpet. In a time before the Internet gave people the opportunity to publicly voice their opinions of such things, it's hard to say.
      • Cypher was also a perfect example of Idiot Ball . Not him - everyone else in the X-Men and New Mutants. Because he had a non-combat power, he wasn't given nearly as much training as the rest of the New Mutants in combat skills. If he was going to be going along with his teammates into dangerous situations, two things should have been factored in: 1 ) Give him more combat training, probably from Wolverine himself, to turn him into a Badass Normal , and 2 ) armor, not spandex. Those few of us who actually liked the character were utterly enraged at his death.
  • Vibe's death in the '80s Justice League of America comics: Reviled in life, a hero in death. He asphyxiated so graphically you couldn't help but feel bad for the guy just that one time.
    • Steel, who died at the same time, is less remembered, probably because he was less annoying in the first place.
      • Perhaps what made Vibe's death stand out more was the fact that the skinny jerk, for the first time in thirty issues suddenly showed a glimmer of true heroism. A desire to help others because it's the right thing to do. A sudden desire to be a better man. Even the dullest stone sparkles a little, if polished right. It's something J.M. De Matteis is very good at...finding the inner light in any character, no matter how rotten. Then, just to twist the knife, Vibe's murdered within moments of his epiphany! He learned his lesson...but died anyway, alone. The end! Powerful, powerful stuff. On the other hand, the only thing most people can remember about Steel's issue is the nightmarish panel where he cries out "Help-Me-Help-Me-Help-Me-Help-Me" after being shattered.
  • Runaways: Xavin's Heroic Sacrifice to save Karolina from the rest of her race seeking revenge against her for her parents actions. Got this reader who always hated that smug asshat.
  • Jason Todd, of Batman fame, was so hated, in issue 428 fans (by a slim margin) voted to have him killed off by the Joker. The Joker's murder of Jason was so brutal and cruel, not only did fans immediately stop hating him, the Joker was seen by many as crossing the Moral Event Horizon.
  • The fate of Marvin and Wendy from Superfriends in Teen Titans #62. Yes, they were annoying. No, they did not deserve to be brutalized by Wonder Dog, who kills Marvin and leaves Wendy comatose.
  • In Archie Comics' Sonic the Hedgehog, occasional character Tommy Turtle was finally put out of his misery (for the second and final time) in issue #169, when he was blasted to dust by Dr. Eggman's latest weapon. They ended up erecting a tombstone (even though there was nothing left to bury; his ashes got lost in the wind), and even naming a hospital after him.
    • This is also a Heroic Sacrifice: he was infected by nanites from the evil AI A.D.A.M. He was able to resist the mind control just enough to fly to his death.


Film

Joker: When I say that you and your girlfriend was Nothing Personal, you know that I'm telling the truth.

  • The death of Snails in Dungeons and Dragons largely averts this trope. Many viewers love it that he finally gets offed.
  • Despite the crazy amount of hate leveled his way back when Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull was new, news of Mutt's death during the Vietnam War in The Dial of Destiny was met with this kind of response. Part of it comes from people beginning to warm up to him as the years went by, but the main sticking point is that it's viewed as a cheap way of heaping tragedy onto Indy so he can be shown as an old sadsack.

Literature

  • The death of Balthamos at the end of The Amber Spyglass by Philip Pullman. So well done, it made the former Scrappy awesome upon further readings.
    • Not to mention Lord Asriel (and maybe, just maybe, Mrs. Coulter).
  • Tom and Ty, Michael Point's disposable backup in Contract by Simon Spurrier:

"I'd say the two of them killed the fuck out of this room before someone took a lucky shot."
"Let's hear it for the Disposables."
"I've got to say, I'm sort of proud."
"I've got to say, I'm sort of sad."
"Is this how farmers feel when they eat their prize-winning cattle?"

  • Christopher Drawlight, the obnoxious, lying, mooching gentleman idiot, gets a sad death in Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell
  • Quite a bit of the Harry Potter fandom was indifferent to Dobby, if they didn't find him extremely annoying. He was considered to have a low probability of dying, and nobody was expecting to be heartbroken if he did. Then Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows came out...and it was a Tearjerker if there ever was one.
    • Colin Creevy and Lavender Brown (in the film) are two other characters that most fans either found annoying or didn't care either way for, but their deaths were still pretty sad.
    • Also Severus Snape, for fans that didn't like him much. Made even worse with The Prince's Tale.
  • Some fans never liked Ozzie from Avalon: Web of Magic, because he was just the useless cute mascot comic relief. And then in Dark Mage, he acknowledges his uselessness, becomes less useless, and is the Only Sane Man. And then he's killed by his best friend while trying to save her.
  • Inverse example from Jane Austen's Emma after Frank Churchill's manipulative, hypochondriac Aunt dies of a stoke Austen says this:

Goldsmith tells us, that when lovely woman stoops to folly, she has nothing to do but to die; and when she stoops to be disagreeable, it is equally to be recommended as a clearer of ill-fame. Mrs. Churchill, after being disliked at least twenty-five years, was now spoken of with compassionate allowances.

  • In Iron Fist, Castin Donn is the least sympathetic Wraith. He's kind of annoying, doesn't respect Wedge's judgments enough, and suffers from a kind of Fantastic Racism which we don't see very often - he's had so little contact with nonhumans that he's awkward and uneasy around the aliens in the squadron, and never makes the effort to desensitize himself to them. When Wedge vetos his plan he goes ahead with it anyway, sneaking into enemy territory on his own. He might have gotten away after being seen if he hadn't been distracted by the sight of a lab where really rather gruesome experiments were being performed on nonhuman species - he went in and freed a subject, and was killed. No one on his side ever knew that his speciesist views were changing at the end.
  • In the Mistborn books, Elend was one of the least liked characters. He was not just a Scrappy but a terrible Wesley, not to mention an Author Avatar Mary Sue. However, his death was incredibly tragic, and people ended up mourning for him even though they had been wanting him to die ever since he showed up.


Live-Action TV

  • The True Blood fandom had a massive load of hate for Sam Merlotte's troubled younger brother Tommy, an illiterate, dumb, well-intended Designated Villain who was generally thought of as annoying, a nuisance and a filler character. In the end, though, he sacrificed himself, transforming into Sam and settling a debt with the ex-husband of Sam's girlfriend, which ended up with him being bludgeoned to death. Not before he could deliver the following line, which had tons of fans that hated him crying desperately:

Tommy: (to Sam) There ain't no heaven, and hell's a dog fight. I’m gonna disappear like I never was, that's what I want.

  • Ugly Betty may have problems with annoying characters taking over the plotlines, but it has a knack for a good Montage Out, thus giving us the following examples:
    • It's been said that nobody cared about Bradford Meade until he was killed off.
    • Even the infamous Walter, though he didn't die, got a respectful and melancholy send off when he was Put on a Bus. The fact that viewers were able to feel anything but joy at that moment is a testament to this trope.
    • Daniel's love interest of the 3rd season, Molly, was generally considered pretty boring even when we knew she was terminally ill but the actual moment of her death was beautiful.
  • Tracey from the Firefly episode "The Message" qualifies because he basically tries to trick the crew into smuggling him across the solar system while he's carrying (and biologically supporting) genetically enhanced organs inside his body. Of course, Tracey gets shot by Mal while trying to kidnap Kaylee and escape in one of Serenity‍'‍s shuttles, which Tracey only did because he panicked when Shepherd Book talked about handing Tracey over to the corrupt cop who was chasing them for the organs, which was only a ruse to get everyone to safety, including Tracey.
  • The extremely despised Nora went out with a bang on Desperate Housewives. Even though it was expected and hoped for, the episode managed to make it a tragic and shocking.
    • Throughout the series, Edie Britt was a Love Her Or Hate Her character—you either thought she was witty and not used enough, or catty and hung around the show for way too long. Yet when she actually was Killed Off for Real in season five, the people who despised her ended up mourning her death just as much as the people who loved her, especially after her tribute episode.
  • In 24, Season 3, Ryan Chapelle. He shows up in 23 episodes across the first three seasons, and in 20 of them he's a Smug Snake and an Obstructive Bureaucrat. He softens up in the 21st, just in time to find out he has to die: the villain made a deal that the heroes needed, and one of the conditions was that Chapelle be executed. Suddenly he becomes incredibly sympathetic and human (The 23rd is just his body being recovered by said villains).
    • Chapelle is a particularly great case because Jack asks if there's anyone he wants to contact before he dies. Chapelle says no, his only friends are at work. Considering that we've only seen him at work where he seems to be something of an in-universe Scrappy... ouch.
    • Lynn McGill in Season 5. Starts out as a douche, but after his sister is killed, he has a change of heart, and you can't help but feel sad for his Heroic Sacrifice (the fact that he's played by Samwise Gamgee doesn't hurt).
    • The page quote is about an example from Season 1, when Janet York is killed by a man pretending to be her father. That episode is when 24, a show that had been somewhat motoring along to that point, became seriously good.
    • The evil, vain, manipulative Sherry Palmer, who died in Season 3.
    • George Mason in Season 2. If not to viewers, certainly to the characters on the show.
  • Believe it or not, there is a portion of Doctor Who fandom that cried over Adric getting blown to bits.
    • It wasn't so much the actual death scene in that case, but the Silent Credits over a picture of his broken star. Beautifully touching.
      • And don't forget his tearjerking last words: "Now I'll never know if I was right..."
    • Donna Noble. She was deliberately written as a Scrappy in her first appearance, but she developed, some of the fandom grew to like her and got really annoyed after she got a bridge dropped on her (death is relative).
      • Annoyed? Grew to like her? I loved Donna! She's probably my favorite companion yet. I would not call her a Scrappy.
    • It seems that few readers of the Doctor Who Expanded Universe Eighth Doctor Adventures like Sam Jones. But when it was revealed she'd died... well. It didn't hurt that a more likable character had been legitimately fond of her and was grief-stricken over it.
    • An in-universe example: Miss Evangelista in "Silence in the Library." After establishing that no one else on the expedition likes her, she winds up being the first to get chewed up by the Vashta Nerada. In her final "ghosting" moments, she asks to talk to Donna, the only person who was nice to her, instead of any of her teammates and their remorse shows on all of their faces.
  • Agent Jeffrey Spender from The X-Files, shot at point-blank range at the end of the first episode in which he developed any character beyond that of being an annoying, weasely foil to Mulder and Scully. He was eventually revealed to be Not Quite Dead, but at the time, some people were stunned he'd gone into a two-parter practically chanting "Kill the Twerp" and came out of it really upset that they'd killed the noble Spender.
  • Television Without Pity frequenters are often split on the death of Lucy Knight on ER, who, though annoying, got an incredibly good sendoff. Some were ecstatic that she was gone, under any circumstances. This story arc also had John Carter almost killed, and, since many fans were on the fence with him at that point, he garnered huge sympathy points.
  • Owen's death (deaths?) in Torchwood. That was largely helped by Tosh's own exit - well-acted and really quite heartbreaking.
  • Cally's death on new Battlestar Galactica. She had her fans, but more than her share of detractors, as well. It was so affecting that Jacob, the Television Without Pity recapper who made a regular running gag of her, devoted most of his recap of that episode to a deep psychological analysis of her (then again, Jacob writes deep psychological treatises about his breakfast muffin, so take this with a grain of salt). A good summary of the fan reaction would be this.
    • A lot of this has to do with the way she was offed. She was nearly Driven to Suicide, talked down from it, immediately knocked unconscious by the same person who talked her down, and woke up in time to see said person holding Cally's own infant son in a maternal-looking manner. She then met Cally's gaze and gave a tiny smile before pushing the button that threw Cally out the airlock. Even for the haters, that was a bit much.
    • Another example is Anastasia Dualla, who started off well, but after her "relationship" with Apollo (dubbed "The Love That All of a Sudden", or - factoring in Starbuck and Anders - "The Quadrangle of Dooooom") was not very liked by the fandom. Then, in "Sometimes A Great Notion," after a nuclear war-ravaged Earth is found she, quite unexpectedly, blows her brains out after a long romantic date that gives her ex-husband (Apollo) hope that their relationship might be rekindled. It was probably a good writing decision, given that if she hadn't, what happened immediately after that series probably would have broken her spirit further.
    • Kat's death could be taken as a candidate with much greater demographic appeal from the same show, particularly considering what was revealed about her past in the same episode. Though some viewers liked Kat; she was the only character who would consistently and unapologetically call Starbuck on her bullshit.
    • Ellen Tigh, who was previously unsympathetic and disliked by much of the fanbase, got a heartwrenching death scene when her husband executes her for collaborating with the Cylons - something she did for him. The ironic thing is, both of them are Cylons, so of course, she gets better.
    • And then there's the death of the entire Quorum of Twelve - the very moment they finally do something not stupid, they all get killed for it.
  • Happens in Season 2 of Dexter with the immolation and framing of James Doakes, especially given a few little touches to the character that fans were quite fond of (such as the voice mail message).
    • And as of the Season 4 finale, Rita.
      • Though for many, she wasn't a scrappy until the very season they killed her off. Makes you wonder if her shift in personality was done in order to annoy the audience on purpose.
  • Isaac of Heroes had been stagnating as a character for quite a while before Sylar killed him, but his death and the scenes leading up to it were handled well enough that many viewers who had been complaining about Isaac were touched by his exit.
    • This likely applies to Tracy now as well. Unless she's not really dead...
    • This very much applied to Elle. With all the stupid writing going on in that time, she got the brunt of the blows. However, many were displeased when she was killed by Sylar. The fact that her death was rather pointless and she died as a shell of her former self might've had something to do with it though.
      • Elle was never hated and still remains part of the big 4 of Heroes Fanfiction (Along with Sylar, Claire, and Peter). Sure the writing was bad but she couldn't be classified as The Scrappy especially considering the high number Fix Fics for her
  • A lot of Supernatural fans who couldn't stand Bela. Many of them felt a staggering amount of sympathy for her in the episode where the hellhounds come to get her. It might have helped that the actress got better and less annoying in her absence.
    • And then there's Jo and Ellen Harvelle, the former of whom was positively reviled during her S2 days and the latter of whom was perceived to overstep her boundaries with the boys later on, and they were given one of the saddest send-offs in the show.
  • Amber, aka "Cutthroat Bitch," in House. Most of the pathos comes from Wilson's reaction, though. Really, considering his Woobie quotient, it was to be expected eventually.
    • Lampshaded by the team.

Thirteen: She didn't even like us.
Kutner: Well, we liked her.
Taub: Did we?
Foreman: We do now.

    • Actually, while the other characters may not have liked her, many fans did. Not surprising given that she was in many ways a female version of the show's eponymous protagonist.
    • As an example of when this doesn't work, Thirteen is considered the Creator's Pet by most of the fandom. She also has Huntington's Disease. This means that in addition to the time she spends on-screen as a doctor, she's also appearing as a patient, slowly dying with nothing that can be done about it. This has so far failed to gain her much sympathy.
  • Kendra in Season 2 of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Sure she was an annoying character with more than a little shade of the Ethnic Scrappy, but it was still a bit of a shock to see Drusilla take her out so easily.
  • Just when it looked like she was about to be Rescued from the Scrappy Heap, Ana-Lucia went out rather shockingly with a bang on Lost.
    • While we're on the subject of Lost, how about Shannon, Shannon, and more Shannon. Just when she starts becoming a compelling character and not the vapid Rich Bitch, as well as we get to learn how much her Evil Matriarch stepmother crashed her dreams... boom, shot in the stomach.
    • Also, Charlie, while not necessarily a Scrappy, had strong dislike from many fans, especially after his bizarre actions in the episode "Fire and Water". However, he was highly redeemed in the episode "Greatest Hits", and died very heroically in the next episode.
      • Are you kidding me? Charlie was everyone's favorite character!
        • YMMV. For me Charlie's death fits this trope perfectly. I was SICK of him and couldn't understand why Claire continued to put up with his needy, neurotic whininess- and then cried like a baby when he died.
  • Judith Montgomery on Joan of Arcadia. Everybody hates this Cousin Oliver who pretty much broke up the already established group dynamic, but her death was done in such a powerfully dramatic way that some fans began to wonder why they hated her in the first place.
  • Joxer from Xena: Warrior Princess made a Heroic Sacrifice for the woman he loved, which made many fans rethink their hatred of him. However, his sacrifice was in vain and achieved nothing. And Gabrielle, the woman he died for, didn't even seem that upset!
  • Jessica Wallace on Neighbours, hated by many viewers and most of the other characters for breaking up Ringo and Rachel, had such a realistic and tragic death scene that producers deemed it "too convincing" and had to edit some of the most upsetting parts out.
    • Moody rich girl Serena Bishop suffered through attempted-rape, finding out her boyfriend was really her half-brother and a plane crash. She was eventually lost at sea.
    • Bridget Parker received much negative backlash from both the public and the media when she first joined the show, and many viewers called for her death. Ironically, just as fans had warmed up to her character, she was killed off in a freak car accident.
  • Riley from The Sarah Connor Chronicles went from becoming The Scrappy in record time to getting Rescued from the Scrappy Heap when we found out she was from the future (and thus actually served a purpose on the show besides giving John someone to suck face with); much of the fanbase mourned her death after discovering just how much her supposed savior screwed her over. Going out in a brutal fight to finally take control of her life, all in less than one season, probably helped.
  • Alexandra Borgia of Law and Order, due mostly to the extremely brutal bridge dropping she received.
  • Fat guy Malcom Ross of Harper's Island. Buried his best friend's, nice-guy nerd Booth, body in the woods after he accidentally shot himself, taking the bag of money into his room and not telling anyone about it. His panicky nothings wrong attitude and sobbing when the truth comes out made him a hated character in many circles. But everyone cried when, with Roy Orbison's Running Scared playing in the background, he burns the money and is subsequently chopped, beaten and thrown in a furnace.
    • From the same show, violent townie Shane was probably the least likable character on the entire series. So how does he go out? Mortally wounded, single-handedly taking on the serial killer to give the heroes enough time to escape.
  • The ending scene of Blackadder, "Goodbyeee!", where Captain Darling, supercilious little toad that he has been, suddenly becomes very human and even likable. And he dies five minutes later.
  • The October 17, 2007 episode of The Chaser's War on Everything featured "The Eulogy Song" sung by Andrew Hansen. It controversially cataloged a list of dead celebrities renown as "top blokes after death", embodying this trope perfectly.
  • Jool on Farscape- Intensely haughty and annoying for most of her first season, she even had a literally ear-splitting voice at times. But by the time she decided to stay on Arnessk in Season 4, she had grown to be at least tolerable. And by the time she gets exploded with the rest of the Eidolons near the end of "Peacekeeper Wars", the writers and Tammy Mackintosh managed to make this convinced Jool-hater cry for her.
  • Bosco of The Mentalist was not popular, mainly because he kept calling Jane out on his crap and was in love with Lisbon, which pissed off the Jisbon shippers. His death, though? Genuinely moving. Made so by Lisbon.
  • The death of Norton Drake during the second season of War of the Worlds. For the first season, Norton was a near-insufferable genius whose main job was to roll around a lab in his wheelchair and provide scientific technobabble to the main characters - and this was after the actor who played him stopped using a ridiculous Jamaican accent for the first few episodes of the series (the character did get one episode of much-needed character development in the latter half of the first season, though). In the second-season premiere, however, just as it looked like he might take on more of an active role with the Blackwood Project, Norton gets shot by a clone version of one of the main characters, gets enough strength to crawl over to a panic button and press it, then gets shot again off-screen...and then his body is blown to smithereens when the house he worked in explodes, and almost all of the characters promptly forgot about him. Norton's death is one of the main reasons why the second season is Fanon Discontinuity in the eyes of many fans.


Video Games

  • Oswald from Odin Sphere. He wasn't universally considered The Scrappy, but got this reaction from a fair chunk of the fanbase (Mind you, he turns out to be Only Mostly Dead).
  • Subverted Trope in Final Fantasy VII when Cait Sith dies. A somewhat touching death for who most people consider The Scrappy. Until Cait Sith #2 comes in to replace #1.
  • Raiden in Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots, as his death scene is played very well, with the noble Heroic Sacrifice and the revelation that he's not lost his humanity as he claims. And then he comes back anyway. Nuh?
  • Liane's death in Jeanne D'Arc. She was whiny, annoying, and undeveloped, and you are forced to use her in a certain point of the game when she replaces Jeanne, which is, by the way, when she becomes an incredibly crazy (and whiny) general... but still, when she is executed by burning for crimes of 'heresy' she had nothing to do with, screaming that it wasn't her fault and thinking she was hated by her friends, you can't help but feel sorry for her.
  • In-Universe example: Kinshiro Morooka was never very well-liked among the cast of Persona 4, but he does get some amount of respect after his murder.
    • ... Or more cursing. "Damn it, King Moron! Why must you torture us beyond your grave!?"
  • Duke Nukem Forever used to be the butt of every joke out there. After it was officially canceled and gameplay footage was released, most people commenting on the video claimed it looked fun.
  • Xion from Kingdom Hearts can fit this. Not only is she The Scrappy second to even the likes of Kairi (or maybe even MORE hated), but her actual Alas, Poor Scrappy death moved some successfully.
  • In Xenogears, Hammer the Supplier was reviled by many a fan as annoying and backstabbing, but most of that could be forgiven not only because he's gone, but because it's so obvious just how much other characters miss him, especially Rico and Elly.
  • In Super Paper Mario, it's revealed that Luvbi is the last Pure Heart. Nobody was really fond of her before this, but the scene is still very moving and the characters are sorry to see her go.
    • Oddly enough, you can still visit her in the same area. Apparently, she didn't die.
      • Even stranger is not even Luvbi herself knows why she is still alive
  • Resident Evil: Code Veronica fans are divided into two camps; those who found Steve Burnside obnoxious but sympathetic, and those who found Steve Burnside obnoxious and grating. Even so, the scene in which he painfully mutates into a Tyrant, attacks Claire, resists the virus to save her and then dies in her arms is surprisingly sad. For a Resident Evil game, I mean.
  • Adi and Cort in The Reconstruction, who are minor members of the Goldfish Poop Gang that most players probably wouldn't bat an eye at...up until the final battle, anyway, where they defend the Big Bad to the death. Made worse by the fact that you have to kill them yourself.
  • Chatot from Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Time/Darkness/Sky initially comes off as a Know-Nothing Know-It-All whose outright refusal to listen to you repeatedly annoys the player. Then a moment on his part robs the player of the chance to fight The Unfought—and his next awesome moment involves taking an attack meant for the hero and being seriously wounded, to the point where the cheery Guildmaster turns serious and mournful, worrying that he might not pull through this time. It's a bit... jarring.
  • A huge portion of the Splinter Cell fanbase has an extreme love-hate relationship with Colonel Irving Lambert, known for his banter and his frequent decisions on when to end the mission. So when Double Agent came along and included the dilemma of whether or not to shoot Lambert as one of its selling points, And the Fandom Rejoiced broke out, with more than a few stating their over-the-top-desire to finally do him in. THEN Ubisoft made Essentials, which makes shooting him necessary to complete the game, and the enthusiasm dropped like a rock. THEN Conviction came out which CONFIRMED it. God help whoever decided THAT.
  • The King of Fighters XIII: Ash Crimson deletes himself from reality via Heroic Sacrifice, and Elizabeth surely wasn't the only one who was truly sad after his death.
  • Erika in Umineko no Naku Koro ni. While she was nothing but a Canon Sue in EP5, in EP6, a bit more is revealed about her. At one point, she's thinking about an ex-boyfriend she had, and asks Dlanor to help her re-enact their final fight using the Blue and Red Truths. Erika had found some circumstantial, rather weak evidence that he had been cheating on her. Dlanor(acting in the ex's place) cannot refute the evidence, but can give a different interpretation of it, where he wasn't cheating. Because only "one truth" can exist for Erika, she denied that Blue Truth theory. Dlanor came up with one Blue Truth response Erika couldn't deny: "I still love you." Later on, Erika sees through one of Beato's logic tricks, and realizes that either way she played, she was doomed. It was a double-check. She realized how unfair... and yet beautiful the game layout was, and came to the realization that two truths CAN exist simultaneously. She tells Beato, "I never thought it would be a witch who shows me the true nature of this world." She wonders how many things in her life were messed up because she couldn't see that. However, she doesn't back down on her arguement, and loses the ensuing argument against Beato. She's mortally wounded, about to be erased, and Dlanor's trying to find Bernkastel to authorize a resurrection. Erika refuses, thankful that she won't have to be admonished by her master in her final moments. Instead, she chooses to take one last stand against Beato, with her final Red Truth, and her self-introduction. "Nice to meet you! I'm Furudo Erika, the detective! I may be an uninvited guest, but please, welcome me! I am the 18th person on Rokkenjima!" Even this bit of Red Truth that establishes her gets denied as Beato and Battler reply in Red together, "Sorry, but, even if you join us, there are 17 people."
  • Grobnar of Neverwinter Nights 2. He is mostly the annoying comic relief, but Mask of The Betrayer reveals that he had a stupidly awesome death: Attempting to save a 7 foot tall construct of solid metal by putting his squishy gnome body between it and a falling pillar.
  • In Mass Effect 1, Kaidan and Ashley, your two party members, are both Scrappies for various reasons; Kaidan for his Master of None tendencies, and Ashley for her bitchy tendencies. But, Virmire, damn...
    • The survivor, gets even more hate from some people for refusing to work with Shepard for being affiliated with Cerberus. In Mass Effect 3, it's possible (and depending on your choices) necessary to kill the survivor, and his/her last words are quite sad.
    • As much as people disliked Miranda in Mass Effect 2, a lot of people were upset about her possible death in Mass Effect 3 provided you didn't take steps to prevent it.
    • Udina, of all people, in Mass Effect 3. Sure, he was an obnoxious ass in the first two, but here he becomes quite a bit more sympathetic in his desperation to get aid for his homeworld. Even the attempted coup seems more sad than anything. He did it for Earth.
  • The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword has Fi, who, while not universally hated, is still something of a Base Breaker due to her tendency towards being Captain Obvious. Even if you hate her, her "death", which is basically a heroic sacrifice that will take centuries, and which she prefaces by admitting feelings for Link that she was incapable of admitting until the end due to programming, is still a tear-jerker.
  • Alister in Tomb Raider: Legend was considered to be extremely whiny and annoying while always quipping in at the most inappropriate times (lampshaded by Lara when she tells him to shut up as she tries to make some tricky acrobatics). In Underworld, Alister gets shot and killed by Lara's doppelganger, dying in Lara's arms. For an annoying sidekick, it's still damn sad to see him get killed when he isn't a fighter like Lara.


Webcomics

    1. She deserved to die because she capped off her role as The Scrappy by Jumping Off the Slippery Slope, killing the Cool Old Guy, weakening the fabric of the universe, and ensuring that the villains won the battle for Azure City, all while thinking she was still doing the right thing.
    2. She becomes sympathetic in the eyes of the audience because her last actions were made under the belief that she was saving everyone instead of dooming her side to exile, and then after being mortally wounded as a result, the spirit of the founder of her order explains to her just how she screwed up and tells her that she won't get a chance at true redemption, but that her celestial horse will still get to visit her in the afterlife. * Sniff* And in a 'verse where it has been proven that Death Is Cheap, she was decided by the author to be so unworthy of resurrection and redemption that any chance of it happening is rendered moot in a throwaway gag.
    • Not to drive the point home, but another aspect of the death that turns it into a touching moment is her last words. Miko was, above all else, uncompromising. She would never accept anything but the most pristine of Lawful Good, would go over the top with her expectations and would scream and cry whenever she did not get her way. Yet here, in her last moments, she was denied the thing she wanted the most, being a paladin. When that happens, she shows a final bit of character development when instead of crying about it, she instead just asks if she will see her only real companion again. And when given just that small favor, instead of screaming about what she really wanted, showed maturity in compromising for that one little bit, by saying "I can live with that." In her last moments she learns to compromise what she wants.
      • Of course some think she might just have been driven a tiny bit insane by the revelation that said cool old guy mentor and father figure who personally recruited her into the order of paladins had been lying and manipulating her (for the great good but still that has to be like finding out your prudish judgmental grand mother has a hot 18 year old boy toy.) resulting in her paranoid delusions but this party is just less vocal about their opinion.
        • Also the fact that the party magnificent bastard (Belkar) was deliberately pushing all her buttons the moment she arrested the entire party.
  • Terry's death in Blip. Up until then, most of the fans had hated her for breaking up K and Bishop, but when she died, they lost it. It helps that her death scene was a straight-up Tear Jerker.
  • CRFH had this coming from Dave. It failed spectacularly, because no one realised that Dave was meant to be The Scrappy. Quite the contrary, he became one of the most popular characters, so the author had no choice but to bring him back and actually make him a protagonist.


Web Original

  • The outpouring of grief that followed the sudden death of Wrestlecrap Radio's robot sidekick Johnny 6 during the April 25th. Podcast, after Crappers had been clamouring for his destruction for weeks.
  • The death of Liam Black in Survival of the Fittest version 3 was considered by some members to be well-written, and genuinely saddening, in spite of the fact that the character was extremely unpopular whilst alive.
  • Red in There Will Be Brawl was disliked by some fans due to his naive and cheerful personality in a World Half Empty, and suspected by many to be the butcher (especially in regards to that Jigglypuff he was subtly hiding from Luigi). Then... "So, uh... was I any good?" Turns out he was training the Jigglypuff to sing for Luigi. Thankfully, Leaf uses it to finish off Wario, who killed him.
  • Spencer D. Bum in The Spoony Experiment was considered a Scrappy by some of the fans, even though he only appeared a grand total of two times. Then his heart was ripped out of his chest onscreen by Black Lantern Spoony.
  • In The Flash Tub cartoon Platform Hero, Green Dinosaur, hitherto The Load, has a tearful death scene in Dark Dragon's castle Taking the Bullet...er, sword for The Hero.


Western Animation

  • Rare in-universe example: In Daria, when an old high school football hero returned to be worshipped. After alienating the whole cast, he was killed before the second commercial break, shocking everyone.
    • Subverted, though, by the fact that Daria herself was completely unaffected by his death, instead having to deal with the fact that half of the cast opted to talk to her about it due to the misconception that she's perennially depressed and morbid (as opposed to just being overly sardonic).
    • In her own words: "People aren't upset because Tommy Sherman died. They're upset because they're going to die."
  • The Magus in the Gargoyles three-parter "Avalon". It helps that he just Took a Level in Badass.
    • And he finally overcame his Fantastic Racism long enough to pull a Heroic Sacrifice.
      • He overcame his racism years ago since he spent his life raising the gargoyle children.
  • In Total Drama Island, Owen who is hated by almost all of the shows more mature fanbase, gets sympathy from some viewers when he sings "Oh My Izzy."
    • Sierra too to a degree, she got caught in a plane explosion (which was kinda her fault), lost her hair, all because she made a cake for Cody's birthday
  • Played with in an episode of Project G.e.e.K.e.R. . When Geeker sacrifices himself to avert the destruction of a sizable chunk of the planet, his ever-begrudging caretaker Lady Macbeth (who had treated him more as stolen goods than a...er, sort-of-humanoid companion) actually breaks down and cries at his obvious and horrible destruction...only to have Geeker pop up behind her and ask why she's crying.
  • Invoked, but ultimately subverted in-universe in The Spectacular Spider-Man. Peter had previously been humiliated, picked on, and insulted by Sally Avril for her percieved belief he's "messing with the social system", in that he was a nerd who tried to ask her out, caused Liz Allen to develop a crush on him an later date her, took Mary Jane to the prom (Sally even shouts that 'guys like Peter' don't get to take 'girls like that' to the prom), tried out for the football team and actually did better then Flash and Kenny, and while everyone was cheering for him, she was pouting about his success. When they get partnered up in a police ride-along, she insults Peter more then usual, until he had to go off to "take pictures" of The New and Improved Enforcers (which was an excuse so he could turn into Spider-Man) by hiding behind a truck. When the truck is caught as colateral damage in the fight and blows up, apparently killing Peter, Sally screams and cries, realizing how horrible she was (and that Liz looks terrible in black). But when Peter pops up and claim he left his camera on auto so he could 'go to the little boys room', she promptly turns back into Alpha Bitch.
  1. ↑ Or you didn't witness his death firsthand
  2. ↑ The main difference being that in the novel, Hathaway kills Quess; in the movie, Hathaway goes nuts and kills Chein after she kills Quess
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