Apology Not Accepted

• Main
• Laconic
• All Subpages
• Create New

"Okay. I don't forgive you."

Herb Kazzazz, BoJack Horseman.

Fiction loves to advocate for Forgiveness and Turn the Other Cheek. A person has done a terrible thing. They are truly remorseful and are willing to make amends. Will a simple apology do the trick?

Except real life isn't all about that; in addition to some people holding grudges, some actions are too heinous to earn Easily Forgiven. Apology Not Accepted happens when the injured party refuses a verbal, written or otherwise communicated apology. Most cases portray the person rejecting the apology as a grudgeholder and unsympathetic. There is the rare case where the media acknowledges that some things cannot be forgiven.

You will more likely see this trope into a drama, though there are comedic examples.

Note: On TV tropes, this is referred to as the Rejected Apology. Changing it proactively.

Examples of Apology Not Accepted include:

Anime and Manga

• Sailor Moon
  • An early episode has Shingo accidentally break his best friend Mika's handmade prizewinning doll by accident at school, after hearing teasing that she's his girlfriend. He then clams up rather than apologize, and their classmates tell Usagi about this when she's getting out of detention that day. Usagi confronts Shingo, as he's crumpling up apology notes, and tells him to go to Mika's house and say he's sorry now, or she's telling their mom. Shingo tries, but by then Nephrite beat him to the punch and has compelled Mika to make dolls while not talking to anyone, under possession of a youma. She won't even hear him out; when Shingo asks Usagi for advice, she suggests maybe a present would do the trick. He makes a clay Sailor Moon doll, and brings it to Mika at her next doll exhibition. It's only then that he and Usagi realize a youma had possessed Mika, and drains her; Shingo's attempts to rescue her lead to the youma knocking him out in turn and smashing the clay doll. With that said, Mika revives, sees the clay shards as well as Shingo's apologetic look, and finally forgives him.
  • The S finale has Sailor Uranus and Neptune call out Usagi for the fact that she gave the Grail to Mistress 9 in an attempt to help Hotaru fight from the inside and repel her body. That it ended up working doesn't negate the fact that Mistress 9 and Pharaoh 90 nearly brought about the Silence, and it was only Hotaru awakening as Sailor Saturn which allowed the Senshi to turn the side, as Sailor Saturn sacrificed her life to stop the Silence and Super Sailor Moon barely rescued her baby form. Usagi apologizes as her friends defend her from the Outer Senshi, saying she doesn't want them to fight. Uranus and Neptune assert that if she fights them, without her friends, they'll consider her apology. Ended up being a Secret Test of Character; when Usagi is pinned and faces a fatal attack, her Messiah powers awaken and knock down Uranus and Neptune. They then apologize to her for the insubordination to the real Messiah, something she accepts.

Comic Books

• The Sandman has Dream apologetically and solemnly tell Rose this multiple times as he prepares to kill her to save the Dreaming, as she is an Apocalypse Maiden. Rose eventually shouts at him to stop apologizing, and get it over with already. Fortunately, her grandmother Unity appears and takes Rose's place.

Film

• In Lilo & Stitch, Mertle says this word-for-word when Lilo apologizes for attacking her in dance class and biting her. Lilo's apology is sincere, but from her expression she knows that even if Mertle weren't The Bully and Alpha Bitch, she wasn't expecting any forgiveness.
• One heartbreaking version in the sequel Lilo & Stitch: Stitch Has A Glitch. The climax has Stitch realizing that his DNA is coming apart, compelling him to attack everyone around him including Lilo, and he runs off after scratching her before her big recital. Lilo abandons the recital to rescue Stitch as he prepares to fly away and keep from harming her. She says that she's sorry for yelling at him earlier after Jumba finally tells her what the problem is, but please come back. Stitch says that he can't come back, to keep her safe, before glitching again and crashing into the mountainside. The other main characters fortunately find and save him, though it takes The Power of Love from Lilo to revive Stitch, something that Jumba says is scientifically impossible.
• The Little Mermaid has Sebastian attempt to apologize to a sobbing Ariel for accidentally revealing her crush on a human to Triton as well as her grotto of human trinkets, which led to Triton destroying it all to "teach her a lesson". Sebastian only gets as far as her name before she tells him to go away. All he and Flounder can do is leave heartbroken, with Flounder also sniffling. Unfortunately, this leaves her vulnerable enough for Flotsam and Jetsam to convince her to visit Ursula. The pair does make up when Sebastian helps Flounder get Ariel's human form to the surface after Ursula transforms her, and he agrees that rather than tell Triton about this development, he'll help her win Eric's heart so she has a chance at happiness.

Literature

• Divergent has Al bawling when he apologizes to Tris for assisting in an attempt on her life, after she ranked first in the Divergent faction. Her response is that if he touches her again, she will kill him.
• Harry Potter has this happen a few times in the past and the present:
  • Zigzagged with Percy in the last two books, because he doesn't apologize at first for turning his back on the family and making his mother cry. In fact, he doesn't talk to them period after the Wizarding World learns that Fudge was lying about Voldemort's return, meaning his father was right all along not to trust Fudge. The new Minister, Rufus Scrimgoeur, tries to use Percy to gain audience to the Burrow, where Harry is spending the winter holidays. Percy is given a few moments with his family, where he could apologize for being an ambitious ass, while the Minister talks to Harry. Harry refuses to spy on Dumbledore and tells off Scrimgoeur for imprisoning people based on what they say rather than if they're guilty, and Percy acted like the previous year didn't happen so his younger siblings tossed mashed parsnips at him, including Ginny. It took the year after, while being held hostage in the Death Eater-run Ministry, for Percy to realize how badly he had fucked up; even if he did apologize, the Burrow was under the Fidelius Charm after the coup and the Death Eaters would harm Ginny at Hogwarts if he did anything. Percy ends up apologizing before the Battle at Hogwarts, and fully admitting he was a "power-hungry Ministry loving moron" in Fred's words, which allows his family to forgive him.
  • Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows showed in a flashback that Severus Snape made his worst mistake by calling her a "Mudblood" when she was defending him from James and his friends. It was the last straw, and she ended their friendship. When he camped out by the Fat Lady to offer an apology, she wouldn't accept it. Lily reveals that she spent years defending him to her other friends, but realized that she can't stop Snape from becoming a Death Eater and Voldemort worshipper.

Live-Action TV

• Like in the comic, The Sandman has these moments:
  • Death yells at Dream for worrying her and not calling for help when Burgess held him captive. She calls him so self-tempered and proud while confiscating the bread loaf he was using to feed pigeons. He gives a meek apology; in response she tosses the bread at him. With that said, Death does forgive him, and takes her with him on his rounds.
  • Dream say he's sorry to Rose in the first season finale because they realize that he needs to kill her to stop the damage to the Dreaming that she's causing as an uncontrollable Vortex. Dream was hesitating because he does not kill, he's come to genuinely like Rose when working with her to find the errant Dreams as well as her brother Jed, and she chose to save him from the Corinthian. Rose tells him gently, to stop. It's okay. She's fine with her death if it means her friends and little brother are safe. Like in the comics, Unity ends up taking Rose's place as the Vortex and dies in her place.

Theatre

• The Little Mermaid goes further in the stage show with Sebastian being able to apologize to Ariel after accidentally outing her love for Eric and grotto to Triton. Ariel rejects the apology and says she's running away to find Eric on the surface. Sebastian doesn't help his case by starting "Under the Sea" to convince her to stay in the ocean, as she swims off in frustration.

Video Games

• In Undertale, you can choose to not forgive Asriel when he says that he is sorry. He understands why, all things considered.

Western Animation

• Avatar: The Last Airbender has this happen in season 3:
  • A horrifying example in flashback: Zuko spoke out of turn during a war meeting about a general who wanted to use recruits as canon fodder, against Iroh's warnings, and had to settle the argument through an Agni Kai, a fire duel that can be lethal. He thought he would fight the general who brought up the plan he hated, but instead would have to fight his father, Emperor Ozai. Out of filial piety and fear, Zuko apologizes to Ozai for his breach of etiquette and says that he won't fight his own father. In response, Ozai burns off part of his face to "teach" a bit of respect, Iroh couldn't watch while Zhao and a young Azula cheered Ozai on with glee. Season 3 had Zuko realize this was super messed up of a father to do to their own child, over an interruption, and called out Ozai for this during the eclipse.
  • Zuko sincerely apologizes to the Gaang when trying to convince them to hire him as Aang's firebending teacher, after the Day of the Black Sun invasion failed and last time they saw him, he helped his sister Azula take over Ba Sing Se. Sokka and Katara aren't into it, and Aang is unusually hostile towards Zuko out of guilt towards the soldiers he had to leave behind. While they do later agree to take him under probation since he fought the assassin he hired, Katara makes it clear that any funny business, and she will "end" his destiny.
• BoJack Horseman uses this to denote when BoJack has irreparably screwed up or damaged a relationship. He's not the only character to undergo these screw-ups, but he is the main one:
  • "The Telescope" has BoJack give an "I feel bad, I'm sorry" apology to his mentor Herb Kazzaz when the latter has terminal cancer. He had refused to stand up for Herb when the latter was outed as a gay man, fired from Horsin' Around, and blacklisted, and hadn't talked to him in twenty years. Herb delivers the first Wham! Line of the series: "I don't forgive you." He says that it wasn't getting fired that hurt; it was that he needed a friend, and BoJack wasn't there for him before or after the firing. Herb will never forget that his best friend abandoned him in his time of need.
  • Princess Carolyn ends up on the receiving end of this in "Best Thing That Ever Happened" from BoJack of all people. The reason is that she screwed up his chance to be in two movies, one that would have mended his friendship with Kelsey since he got her fired from Secretariat. BoJack prepares to fire Princess Carolyn for her screwup, and much of the episode is about Princess Carolyn trying to apologize, beg, negotiate, and point out that she's had to clean up many of BoJack's screw-ups over twenty three years' worth of representation and one mistake shouldn't mar their relationship. It doesn't work, and it takes two more seasons for them to properly reconcile when BoJack gets enough Character Development to do a favor for Princess Carolyn and star in Philbert.