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{{trope}}
* The main character of ''[[
** Don't underestimate the part where Lucy is captured shortly after her childhood breakage {{spoiler|after her only friend is shot by government agents who are after Lucy and are terrible shots (Then again, their target WAS just a 'little girl'). And she agrees to go with the director of the program peacefully instead of murdering everyone there because he says he'll save her friend. He doesn't/can't}} and so she spends ''the rest of her childhood and most of her teen years'' [[And I Must Scream|incapacitated in a mega-straitjacket and stored in a high security vault, with strict orders for nobody and nothing to approach within 6 feet of her on threat of being viciously murdered, and finally being treated as an experimental lab animal given absolutely no compassion, emotional or physical contact. As if she wasn't already broken]]...
** There's a fair few characters in Elfen Lied that are this {{spoiler|"fair few" meaning every single protagonist, without exception}}. Nana gets [http://manga.clone-army.org/nana.php a special mention.]
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* The Golden Dragon [[Holier Than Thou|Filia]] from the third season of ''[[Slayers]]'' is a competent mage who, at a first glance, is [[Jerk Sue|haughty and arrogant]], but in reality is [[Naive Newcomer|naive and sheltered about the gray morality of the human world]] (which she has never travelled upon), and simply doesn't know that {{spoiler|her own race slaughtered the Ancient Dragons}}; the season's [[Big Bad]], Valgaav, belonged to that race before [[Half-Human Hybrid|he was turned into a half-Mazoku.]] When the girl finds out about ''that'', [[Heroic BSOD|she splinters]] ''[[Heroic BSOD|massively]]''. Only in the finale does she fully get better, return from the [[Despair Event Horizon]] and find a new purpose.
** [[Royals Who Actually Do Something|Amelia]], princess of Seyruun, reaches this trope several times, but she manages to [[Genki Girl|snap back without breaking]]. It's kind of strange, granted that her mother was killed by an assassin when she was young, {{spoiler|and her older sister left her because of it.}} The closest that she was to it was in NEXT, when {{spoiler|she thought her father was dead too, and she collapsed in tears over that.}}
** [[Jerkass Woobie|Zelgadis]] was a [[Wide
** And don't forget Sylphiel, a [[Proper Lady|sweet and discreet]] [[White Magician Girl]] who breaks ''badly'' when {{spoiler|she becomes the [[Sole Survivor]] of her beloved [[Doomed Hometown|Sairaag]].}}
** Arguably, {{spoiler|Naga}} was broken in the past. After all {{spoiler|she IS Amelia's older sister Gracia, and the circumstances in which she left Seyroon were simply horrible. She walked on her mom's assassination, killed the culprit [[Bloody Murder|in a really gory fashion]], and ''then'' she set off home.}}
* Chise from ''[[Saikano]]''. She asks for death before the series is even half over. But she's not that lucky.
* Dawn/Hikari from ''[[Pokémon (
** Not too long after Dawn got broken, the group learned [[Badass Adorable|Maylene]] was in a similar situation -- [[The Rival|Paul]] had recently kicked her ass and called her a weakling after getting his badge. The girls end up in a Pokémon battle to get each other back in fighting spirit.
** Ash, while not a "cutie" per se, went through this after being beaten in a [[Curb Stomp Battle]] against Paul, where he got beaten 6-2. He spent almost an entire episode moping until he finally managed to pull himself together, but though his attitude improved, his battle skills have suffered tremendously, in the form of him not winning a single non-gym battle for quite a while.
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** After {{spoiler|having to develop her training abilities from scratch, pulverizing a Drilbur in lieu of a Pokemon battle so it can serve as her starter, and wiping 99 trainers in a row}}, Iris had every right to brag. Then {{spoiler|Drayden came along and stomped her so hard she lost her composure and Excadrill stopped obeying her out of despair. It takes losing to Langley for Iris to begin rediscovering herself and helping Excadrill out of his funk. It seems to have paid off, as the rematch ended in a draw between Excadrill and Beartic. [[Tempting Fate|We'll see how long that lasts.]]}}
* In ''[[Pokémon Diamond and Pearl Adventure]]'' this happened retroactively to {{spoiler|Koya}} and his Growlithe. After battling a trainer that was way above their level, Growlithe was so traumatized that it didn't even want to be touched by its trainer. {{spoiler|Koya}} became more aggressive and [["Stop Having Fun!" Guys|serious]].
* In [[Fullmetal Alchemist (
** Let's not forget ''how'' she got {{spoiler|that secret: by having it ''forcibly tattooed on her back''}}. And Roy later had to {{spoiler|add more scars by burning said back so no one would be able to discover it.}}
** Also Winry. She grows up fine into a [[Genki Girl|strong and cheerful girl]], despite her parents' death in Ishval while helping the wounded Ishvalans. [[Right Behind Me|Then she found out]] who [[Freak-Out|killed]] [[Innocent Bystander|her parents]]. [[Tear Jerker|All emotion break loose]].
*** The identity of the Rockbells' killer differs between [[Fullmetal Alchemist (
** Also Ed and Al, in all cotinuities. They started out with a happy family, but then Daddy left {{spoiler|for very good reasons}}, Mommy died, they attempted to bring back Mommy only to fail and mutilate themselves in the process. And THAT'S all before the story even begins. [[It Got Worse|Whoa boy]]!
** In [[Fullmetal Alchemist (
* ''[[
** There's poor Sayu Yagami, Light's sweet, adorable little sister in: During the second arc she gets {{spoiler|kidnapped by Mello and ends up so traumatized that she goes catatonic and her mother has to use a wheelchair to move her around (!)}} She appears in a brief scene later in the manga. {{spoiler|[[Word of God]] says she hasn't fully recovered, but she's improving. Thank the Gods.}}
** There's also poor Touta Matsuda, who is a genuinely good (if a little dumb) person who hero-worships Soichiro, L, and Light and always gives his all to the investigation, even if he ends up hindering it more than helping it. Everyone makes it [[Butt Monkey|very clear]] that they don't think Matsuda is very important to the investigation despite that he's as committed as everyone else, and he ends up developing a pretty big inferiority complex. {{spoiler|Then two of his heroes (Soichiro and L) die, and in the Yellow Box Warehouse he finds out that Light was responsible for both deaths and that he is the killer that they've been hunting this entire time. When Matsuda tries to take him down before he can kill Near, Light starts screaming that [[Berserk Button|he's an idiot.]].}} The poor guy has his idealism, mentors, and self-esteem slowly demolished throughout the series... {{spoiler|No wonder he completely snaps and almost kills Light in the spot, screaming his head off and with [[Berserker Tears]] running down his face. He's back to normal in the epilogue of the manga, but a little bit less trusting.}}
* In ''[[Silent Möbius]]'', not long after Katsumi's [[Face Heel Turn]], Yuki Saikou starts seeing disturbing visions of the future. Needless to say, she doesn't take this well at all. {{spoiler|And we're not counting Yuki's own past as well...}}
* ''[[Code Geass]]'' has C.C. who was apparently once [[The Cutie]] before the harsh realities of living in a [[Crapsack World]] turned her into a cynical person who gives people (including an orphaned child) [[Blessed
** I'd say the first time around Shirley Fennette got kinda [[Mind Rape|broken]], before {{spoiler|Lelouch fixed everything by causing [[Laser-Guided Amnesia]] (and managing to screw himself over at the same time). [[Sarcasm Mode|Thank you, Mao]]. }}. But in ''R2'', {{spoiler|Gottwald brings her memories back after testing out his Geass canceller on her, which lead to her eventual death at Rolo's hands}}.
*** No, Lelouch didn't fix
** What about Nunnally? She's blind and crippled as a result of her mother being murdered in front of her. She maintains a happy smile and only wants to be with her brother. Although many things happen over the course of the show to separate them, she never lets herself look down. And by the second season she ''does'' manage to pull herself together and come into her own. {{spoiler|However, at the end of the show, she's trying to stop Lelouch from getting the key to a WMD. Lelouch Geasses her and steals it, and she pitifully tries to stop him from getting away. [[It Got Worse|It gets worse]] when she's chained up as a prisoner in a parade. Then, she watches her brother get murdered at his own orders to unite the world in hating him. All this gets to her and she wails over his dead body.}}
*** {{spoiler|Knowing it's done for the good of the whole FLIPPIN' WORLD makes it a lot better. Nunnally is a unique example in that her image as [[The Cutie]] is broken, to the audience. Until she died, she kept an optimistic personality, because Lelouch unintentionally Geass'd her into it.}}
**** No... he {{spoiler|geassed her into handing over the Damocles controller. Besides, does ''this'' sound optimistic to you? : ''"It's not fair... All I wanted and needed to be happy was to be with you! How can I ever look forward to the future without you?!"''}} You were thinking of {{spoiler|the Euphinator}}, I'm afraid.
** How have we gone without mention of Euphemia, who {{spoiler|was accidentally forced to slaughter hundreds of people against her will, and, just to add insult to injury, was forever known as the "massacre princess" or even "[[Fan Nickname|The Euphinator]]"?}}
** Mao, {{spoiler|the orphan whom C.C. gave Geass to,}} went through this as well. He [[Used to Be
** Suzaku fits to an extent as well, since he starts off at the beginning of the series as a [[Knight in Shining Armor|chivalrous and gentle person]] before the series [[Serial Escalation|embarks on the path]] of [[It Got Worse]]. As it runs its course, he suffers a [[Heroic BSOD]] when it's revealed that {{spoiler|he killed his father}}, and then later {{spoiler|he's given a "Live" Geass order from Lelouch which means that he has to stay alive at all costs,}} after which {{spoiler|his girlfriend gets killed off in a very ugly fashion}} and then later {{spoiler|he ends up deploying nuclear weapons while under the effect of his Geass}}, and ultimately gets pushed across the [[Despair Event Horizon]]. And then finally {{spoiler|he's left to a potential [[Fate Worse Than Death]] by killing Lelouch as Zero as soon as he manages to hook back up with him, and has to spend the rest of his life as Zero all [[Lonely
** Lelouch also fits to an extent, dating back to his failed attempt at [[Calling the Old Man Out]] for apparently [[Somebody Else's Problem|not doing anything in response to Marianne's murder and Nunnally's crippling]] that led the expulsion of him and Nunnally to Japan. Then [[It Got Worse]]. [[Byronic Hero|And thanks to himself, in a way]].
* Mai Tokiha from '' [[
* ''[[Yu-Gi-Oh! GX]]'': Judai Yuuki's experiences in Season 3, including being pursued by a supernatural [[Stalker
** In the original series of ''[[Yu-Gi-Oh!]]'', Mai Valentine experienced this between the end of Battle City and the Doma arc.
*** And sometimes it seems [[The Woobie|everything in the universe]] is trying to break Yugi, but he [[The Pollyanna|refuses to let it break him.]] Ryou Bakura just [[Stepford Smiler|pretends not to be broken]].
*** Seto Kaiba was {{spoiler|subjected to years of abuse by his [[Knight Templar Parent|adoptive father.]] It worked: he was successfully broken and remade into said adoptive father's image.}} Who could do that to such a cute little child genius??
** In ''[[Yu-Gi-Oh!]] 5D's'' we have {{spoiler|Carly Nagisa, in a combination with [[Kill the Cutie]].}} Results in a [[Tear Jerker]] at the end of Episode 39. It even doubles as a [[Break the Haughty]] moment considering who it is that kills said cutie {{spoiler|and promptly finds himself on the receiving end of a [[Super-Powered Evil Side]]}}.
*** Also from ''5D's'': [[Dark Magical Girl]] Aki Izayoi. We're first introduced to her as the [[Emotionless Girl]] and a closet sadist, as well as someone who refuses to think for herself and is a generally unsympathetic character, to both the audience and pretty much the entire world. Come Episode 40, where Aki is {{spoiler|comatose after dueling [[Evil Counterpart]] Misty (who pretty much breaks her brain by telling Aki that she killed her brother, and, indirectly, Misty herself) and witnessing the only person she really cares about fall to his death ([[Back
* Subaru Sumeragi in [[
* Kamui from ''[[X 1999]]''. Probably the only [[
* Rena and Satoko from ''[[Higurashi no Naku Koro
** Shion, however, outperforms all other cuties in the fine art of breaking and snapping. Don't ask. Rather, instead of breaking/snapping, she [[Ax Crazy|explodes violently with the force of an anti-personnel mine, ripping everyone else apart with the shrapnel]].
* Seems to be the entire point of ''[[Bokurano]]'', featuring a large cast of cuties all broken, [[Cold-Blooded Torture|tortured]], and killed one by one.
** Or any story Mohiro Kitoh writes, really. Just look at Hiroko, Akira, Norio, and pretty much ''everyone'' in the side of good from ''[[
* Gohan in ''[[Dragonball Z]]''. He starts out as something of a nerdy crybaby, but then he's kidnapped (twice in the same day!), abandoned in the wilderness, watches his father get beaten and killed, watches his kidnapper-turned-father-figure get beaten and killed, watches a bunch of his father's friends get beaten and killed, and watches his father's best friend get beaten and almost killed, all in the first story arc! This is repeated in the following story arc, with the deaths of Krillin and Dende, and more beatings for Goku and Piccolo. It finally culminates in the Cell arc, when Cell deliberately goes out of his way to piss Gohan the hell off and he dutifully shows us why we should [[Beware the Nice Ones]] by reaching the first level beyond Super Saiyan, by shifting from [[The Messiah]] Jr. into a brutal, sadistic, homicidal maniac that would make Frieza proud. Then his father dies. Post-[[Time Skip]], aside from the [[Superhero]] gig, Gohan's retired from fighting in order to attend high school and take a shot at just being a normal kid, but once he re-[[Took a Level
** Gohan actually got an episode seemingly ''centered'' around this. Early on, Gohan had apparently been watching too many Disney movies, as he's constantly trying to make friends with butterflies and squirrels, asking them their names, etc. Then an early ''Z'' episode shatters any illusions he may have had about nature being cuddly and cute. He meets a wounded dinosaur and attempts to nurse it back to health, applying a poultice to its injuries and gathering food for it. There's a short scene where he imagines how cool it will be to keep it for a pet and have adventures with it, illustrated in a cute super-deformed style. Then a short while later, another dinosaur attacks it, and Gohan fails in fighting it off and gets knocked senseless, awakening to find his new friend's ''bones'' scattered on the ground. The lesson: stop baby-talking at nature, little five-year-old, it doesn't like you.
*** He spends pretty much the latter half of his training ''eating'' that other dinosaur's tail, bit by bit, for breakfast. Payback is not only a bitch, but apparently delicious.
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** Vegeta is implied to have suffered similar things throughout his childhood: According to his death speech, he was kidnapped by Frieza, and then ordered to do whatever Frieza demanded if he wants to see his father live. Unfortunately for him, Frieza isn't one who keeps his word, as his dad ended up murdered by him, as well as virtually all of his race.
*** Broly, since his birth, had to endure several life-threatening situations. For one thing, King Vegeta attempted to have Broly executed just because he felt he would have been a threat to the royal family due to his power level of 10,000. Shortly after that, as well as being tossed into a dump along with his father (who was also nearly executed because he attempted to stop Vegeta from executing his son), he also narrowly escaped with his dad from Planet Vegeta's destruction by Frieza, and was also implied to have spent most of his childhood constantly in hiding and also in constant pain and fear, and eventually started developing [[Ax Crazy]] tendencies. Later, his dad also forced him to wear a [[Hypno Trinket]] / [[Power Limiter]] due to fearing his power, and was later used to destroy the South Galaxy as part of a revenge scheme against Vegeta.
* Oddly enough, though ''comparatively'' little happened to her in the story compared to other examples (at least physically anyway), Kotonoha Katsura from ''[[
** "Comparatively little"!? She {{spoiler|was raped by her boyfriend's best friend}} for goodness' sake!
*** Well... Yes. ''Comparatively'' little. Have you read these OTHER examples?
*** Don't forget {{spoiler|she was bullied by Otome and her friends for ''at least'' several months ''just'' for being [[The Ojou|rich and pretty]], and the bullying got ''much'' worse after she went out to Makoto. And then we have Setsuna treating her like shit so Makoto hooks up with Sekai.}} And people in [[Real Life]] have reacted worse for ''much'' lighter stuff.
* ''[[Last Exile]]'': {{spoiler|The character Dio}}. To clarify: {{spoiler|his [[The Caligula|sister Delphine]] basically kidnaps him while his [[Battle Butler|friend]] [[Extreme Doormat|Luciola]] stands by and does nothing (although, to be fair, they were outnumbered by Delphine's elite guards). Then, while he screams for Luciola to save him, he is brutally [[Mind Rape
*** Though it should be noted {{spoiler|that he got better.}}
*** {{spoiler|How exactly did he get better? He snaps out of his [[Mind Rape]] in a vanship, alone, just after having hallucinated being in a race and telling Luciora (who was already dead at that point) to jump out to reduce weight. Hard to imagine anything more [[Tear Jerker|heart-breaking]].}}
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* The titular heroines of ''[[Gunslinger Girl]]'' get broken from the inside by their own cybernetic implants and by the brutal mental conditioning they receive to function as cold-blooded assassins. And that's not even mentioning the singularly horrible things that happened to them in order to necessitate them becoming cyborgs to survive.
* The ''[[Berserk]]'' storyline specializes in taking sympathetic characters and putting them through horrible shit.
** When we first meet Casca, she's an intelligent and capable [[Action Girl]] who at one point leads the Band of the Hawks to rescue Griffith from {{spoiler|his horrific year-long torture ordered by the King for having sex with his daughter}}. But when Griffith later does his infamous [[Face Heel Turn]], {{spoiler|she loses everyone in the Hawks to a whole mess of demons summoned by the evil Godhand, and then gets stripped naked by demons who have naughty tentacles in mind for her before being raped by the newly-transformed Griffith, who has joined the Godhand as their fifth member Femto, right in front of Guts, the man she loves, who is [[Forced to Watch]]}}. The horror of the experience [[Go Mad
** The universe hasn't been kind to Guts either. A poor innocent baby who is {{spoiler|rescued from under the tree where his mother was hanged while she was pregnant}}, [[Used to Be
** Many Apostles have had their lives go completely to shit as part of the process of causality leading them to their [[Despair Event Horizon]], their sacrifice and their transformation, but none more tragically than Rosine. An imaginative and clever little girl from an abusive household, strongly hinted {{spoiler|to have been a [[Child
** Theresia, a twelve-year-old girl and the daughter of The Count, one of the early Apostles that Guts kills in the series, is a classic case of an innocent daughter sheltered from the world and wanting more than anything to be free of her "cage," as she explains to Puck, who the Count has captured and brought to her as a "pet." She tells Puck that her mother was killed by pagans, and her father became different ever since, almost like he wasn't even human anymore. When Guts's battle with the Count makes a wreck of the castle, the door to Theresia's room becomes undone, and Theresia can finally escape. {{spoiler|But when she arrives at her father's chamber, she is horrified upon seeing the monstrous Apostle form of her father, is taken hostage by Guts in a [[What the Hell, Hero?]] moment, and then is forced to watch as Guts puts him through the same torture that he puts other Apostles through. And then the Count's Behelit activates and the Godhand arrive. After a brief battle with Guts, Femto, the newest member of the Godhand, establishes his [[Complete Monster]] credentials in a big way by demanding that Theresia be sacrificed so that the Count can continue to live. And then, as Theresia watches in terror and horror, the other Godhands reveal to her the truth about her mother's fate -- that she had joined the pagans and was conducting an orgy in the Count's own castle when he arrived, that he found himself unable to kill her despite her utter betrayal, which drove him over the [[Despair Event Horizon]] and allowed the Godhand to show up, and that the Count himself sacrificed her in order to become a demon. This ordeal, along with having to watch her father get [[Dragged Off to Hell]] after refusing to sacrifice her, is enough to drive Theresia to attempt suicide, but she finds the will to live again when the ground below her gives way and she grabs Guts's outstretched [[BFS|Dragon Slayer]]. Poor little Theresia is left with an utter hatred for Guts, manifested in one of the scariest [[Death Glare
* Louise Halevy from ''[[Gundam]] 00'' falls into this trope {{spoiler|1=after Nena Trinity [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=um8JE7ZHHCo obliterates her family at a wedding], leaving the girl without her left hand and completely distraught.}} Starting with the second season, {{spoiler|1=she joins the A-Laws, the secret police of the Federation, as she tries to get revenge on Celestial Being for the murders of her family. She finally finds the said murderer and gets her revenge, but it only serves to BREAK her further ([http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gh5suv5oZlo here] at 20:27). She didn't find any satisfaction, she didn't find any praises from her dead parents from avenging them, and [[And Then John Was a Zombie|she has become a murderer, just like the murdered]]. She got better, eventually.}}
** {{spoiler|Arguably Nena Trinity fulfills this category herself [[Dark and Troubled Past|once we learn her and her brothers's backstories.]] The Trinity siblings are [[Artificial Human
* And don't forget that the other Gundam pilots also get quite broken. Examples?
*** ''[[Gundam Wing]]'': {{spoiler|Quatre.}} Although, his is an odd example, since it's the system he was hooked into to that psychically broke him. And then he bounced back.
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**** {{spoiler|The second Lockon (and said twin brother) didn't have it much better. He tried to get over his own revenge desire, but had to deal with his teammates distrusting him at first and comparing him to the first one for a while. And then his girlfriend turned out to be a [[Manchurian Agent]], and when he was THIS close to subvert her brainwashing... she got brainwashed AGAIN, and Setsuna has to [[Shoot the Dog]]. [[Heroic BSOD|He almost breaks]].}}
*** As long as we're talking Gundam pilots, most of the non-Char non-Bright cast in Zeta Gundam. Four comes prebroken, but Rosamia, who seems like a Cloudcuckoolander (if perhaps mildly mentally challenged) completely breaks during the series. And, of course, {{spoiler|Kamille himself in the finale.}} Of course, what can you expect from a series with a mobile suit named the [[Names to Run Away From Really Fast|Psycho Gundam?]]
** While not the main Gundam pilot, ''[[
*** And while not shown openly, his adoptive daughter and fellow Newtype Tiffa Addil is strongly implied to have been treated as a little more than a lab rat for most of her 15 years of life, which left her [[Shrinking Violet|with a strong phobia of people]] aside of Jamil and the ''Freeden'' crew. A good part of her [[Character Development]] consists on this particular broken cutie managing to put her own pieces together and remaining quiet, yet not as fearful as she used to be.
** Flit Asuno in [[Gundam AGE]], when {{spoiler|Yurin dies}}. From then on, he goes the {{spoiler|[[Dark Messiah]]}} route.
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* In ''[[Deadman Wonderland]]'', [[Only Sane Man|main character]] Ganta is imprisoned in a maximum security prison/theme park after emerging from a [[Heroic BSOD]] after {{spoiler|his entire class gets slaughtered by a mysterious "Red Man" right before a field trip to said prison/theme park.}} In short order he's sentenced to death, befriended by [[Ax Crazy]] Shiro, discovers that a piece of candy he lost was actually {{spoiler|antidote for the poison that's being constantly injected into his body}}, that {{spoiler|he actually ''does'' have the power that killed his classmates, courtesy of a red diamond implanted into his body by the Red Man}}, and {{spoiler|discovers other "Deadmen" and is forced to learn how to use his power to fight them in a tournament}}. And that's not even half of this manga's current chapters.
** This also happens to Nagi after Genkaku reminds him that he has no hope of seeing his child by escaping out of Deadman Wonderland. {{spoiler|He later kills himself and takes Genkaku with him}}. And then there's Genkaku himself, who was shown in the past to have been a timid, cute monk that got repeatedly beaten and raped by bullies, with the elder monk in charge being unsympathetic and uncaring, and seeing the little wounded kitten he was taking care of die - all of this causing him to go insane.
* In ''[[Monster (
** And Anna! Poor, poor Anna... Johan crushes her so many times in so many ways that she {{spoiler|comes ''this'' close to suicide}}.
* [[Genki Girl|Momo]] [[Yamato Nadeshiko|Hinamori]] from ''[[Bleach]]''. She's pretty much manipulated for decades by someone she dearly loved, who knew all of her strengths ''and'' weaknesses and played them ''frighteningly'' well to get his plans done. {{spoiler|And when it's all said and done, [[Complete Monster|he]] almost kills the already messed-up girl, leaving her deeply traumatized, brokenhearted and in denial too}}. [[The Scrappy|And people think she's stupid and has no chance for recovery after that]].
** {{spoiler|She partially gets over it and joins her colleagues in fighting her betraying captain.}} However, her friend Matsumoto still seems to be worried about her state of mind. {{spoiler|These worries likely escalated, since Aizen's last ploy made Histugaya stab the poor girl through her vitals. Now she's got betrayal from Aizen ''and'' her little brother figure}}. *** {{spoiler|She lived through that, however. Kubo also mentions in some notes that, now that Shinji Hirako has become her new Captain, he's helping her to put herself back on her feet. There's a whole last arc left, though -- who knows what will happen to her AND others from now on.}}
** Hinamori's best friend Hitsugaya has had it hard as well, even if not in her level. As a child, people used to fear him because of his powers, with Hinamori and his grandma as the only ones who didn't run from him. Later he decides to become a shinigami to protect Hinamori, but couldn't save her from herself {{spoiler|and Aizen, getting to witness Hinamori's breaking and then being stabbed to near death for confronting Aizen about it.}} And ''then'' {{spoiler|there's the certain incident described above, which finishes with poor Hitsugaya screaming in horror at what he was made to do and completely breaking down in grief and fury. And when when he and Hinamori get sorta better from ''that'', he still feels guilty and worthless about it for a long time.}}
** And then there's Momo's close friend and Hitsugaya's [[Number Two]], Rangiku Matsumoto. We know her as a [[Bottle Fairy|slightly inebriated]] (when off-work) buxom babe who flirts with everyone and is a [[Cool Big Sis]] to Hinamori and Orihime and even to her own captain. The only real hints of a darker past is her relationship with [[Affably Evil|Gin]] [[Stepford Smiler|Ichimaru]], {{spoiler|who saved her from starving to death when they were children}} and to whom she's the [[Morality Pet]] (of sorts). And MUCH later, we see that {{spoiler|not only she and Gin were street urchins, but that she was beaten up by a bunch of thugs. Gin rescued her, and since then he became obsessed with both protecting her ''and'' getting revenge on the boss of those thugs, Aizen, for what was done to her ''without her consent and knowledge''. This put a huge damper in their friendship and lots of pressure on Matsumoto, who would've likely been much happier if Gin just stayed by her side in Soul Society. And she only learned about Gin's real thoughts when he, having failed to kill Aizen, was about to die.}}
** [[Failure Knight|Rukia Kuchiki]] seems to have stretched her breaking out over several decades, after her childhood as a [[Street Urchin]] and {{spoiler|having to kill her [[Big Brother Mentor]] and first love}}. She largely managed to hold herself together, right up until the aforementioned [[Affably Evil|Gin]] managed to [[Kick the Dog|shatter her composure]] prior to her execution with just a few words, leaving her a screaming wreck. Thankfully, she manages to slowly put herself back together with the help of Ichigo and her other friends.
** The Hueco Mundo and Arrancar arcs are pretty much designed to break a certain [[Barrier Warrior|Orihime]] [[Stepford Smiler|Inoue]]. ''Repeatedly''.
*** Orihime sorta came pre-broken, though. Her parents were abusive drunkards, so her older brother Sora ran away with a toddler Orihime when he turned 18 and then went the [[Promotion to Parent]] way. He then was seriosuly injured right after their first and only fight, and Orihime took him to the Kurosaki clinic but Isshin couldn't do anything to save
**** Shall we elaborate on the Hueco Mundo arc? She's emotionally blackmailed into going to Aizen's palace, psychologically tortured by Ulquiorra, physically tortured by Aizen's two jealous aides/fangirls, [[Forced to Watch]] Ichigo get the crap kicked out of him no less by four times and come back as a monster after the last one, and with the exception of her kidnapping, '''all of this happens on the same day.'''
** And later? '''ICHIGO''' is the cutie being actively broken. He did get a huge taste of it when {{spoiler|his beloved mother Masaki died to save him when he was only nine years old, and he spent years blaming himself for it.}} Then the Soul Society and Arrancar/Hueco Mundo/Fake Karakura/Deicide arcs came (not to mention the fillers), and while he was broken more than once he always bounced back somehow. And ''then'', {{spoiler|in the X-Cution arc, his beloved family and friends (including the aforementioned Orihime) are not only attacked, but ''brainwashed'' by current [[Big Bad]] Tsukishima}}, and the kid starts splintering. '''Badly'''. It takes a LOT for him to become more or less stable.
** And in the
* ''Everything'' that happens to Princess Oboro in ''[[Basilisk]]''. {{spoiler|Her fiancé is the leader of an enemy faction despite both being really in love, the peace treaty that would allow them to marry was messily broken behind her back, [[Evil Chancellor|her lieutenant]] steals the command from her and attempts to rape her '''twice''' in the course of the story, ''very'' powerful people meddle in the clans' feud to make it worse, and all of her servants/warriors/friends/enemies die, all of them VERY messily. No wonder she [[Driven to Suicide|ultimately decides to kill herself and die with honor]] rather than fighting her injured, blinded, almost dead True Love in the end. Who, having become broken as well, promptly commits suicide as well.}}
* Juri Katou of ''[[
** It's not quite the same as Jeri,but Keenan in ''[[
** Seems tame in comparison to poor Juri but Ken Ichijoji also fits the bill, too. He goes from the [[Big Bad]] and Evil Genius in the first season of ''[[
*** And then there's Takeru/TK in the [[Digimon Adventure
**** Speaking of the original series, Tailmon/Gatomon may be a [[Badass]], but that's partly because she went through this a long time ago. She was accidentally dropped in the forest as an egg when the Chosen Digimon were being transported to where they'd meet their partners, hatched and spent her entire early childhood isolated and lonely but still with a desire to be with her partner that she couldn't place, when she reached her Child/Rookie stage set off looking for her only to be captured by Vamdemon/Myotismon as a recruit for his army. She resisted for a while and ended up regularly beaten for it to the point that she gave in just to stay alive and eventually forgot the whole thing and got to be noted as one of his more valuable servants. When she ''does'' finally find Hikari and remember her past, nothing gets easier, seeing as she gets kidnapped and used to lure out her own partner and Wizarmon, her only real friend during her time under Vamdemon's service, is [[Kick the Dog|killed right in front of her]](twice), and even after Vamdemon seems to be defeated, her experiences don't entirely leave her.
* ''[[Blood
** Aside from this, averted with Lulu, who {{spoiler|sees all of the other Schiff die off in ones and twos, and faces her own premature death from the Thorn.}} Despite this, she remains [[Genki Girl|happy and chipper]], and {{spoiler|eventually they find her a cure.}}
*** Pulled yet again in regards to Haji. Through a flashback, it is shown that the reason he went from being somewhat stoic to made of stone was because {{spoiler|his blood turned his One True Love and reason for living into a murdering psychopath who forgot who he was and ''cut his arm off'' during her rampage.}}
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* ''[[Fushigi Yuugi]]'' revolves around this trope. Yui is raped basically within 5 minutes of her second trip there, and becomes a vengeful, hateful villainess, primarily because of her {{spoiler|bishonen bodyguard Nakago, who warped her mind to the point where she blames her best friend Miaka for the rape, since she wasn't there to help her. Eventually, it turns out that Yui was never actually raped, but the entire thing was a [[Gambit Roulette|ridiculously complicated plan]] by Nakago to pit them against each other as a part of a larger plan to stage a coup in Genbu. Later he tries to rape Miaka as well but fails, though he ''does'' get her to believe that it happened until someone else explains the mess.}}
** Also, that whole arc where {{spoiler|Yui drugs Tamahome to make him betray Miaka, who was temporarily broken until she breaks the spell with [[The Power of Love]]. Then, Miaka's own mistakes make everything ''worse'' for her, Tamahome, and their friends}}
** Chiriko, Chiriko, Chiriko. This is a ten-year-old boy who initially [[Refusal of the Call|Refused the Call]] when he realized he was a designated Suzaku warrior, because he was terrified of going to war (like any normal child would be). His final fate, in which {{spoiler|HE STABS HIMSELF IN THE CHEST as a [[Taking You
** Suboshi and Amiboshi, impoverished twin orphans who have the misfortune of being recruited by [[Manipulative Bastard]] Nakago. Suboshi deals by becoming a [[Hot-Blooded]] [[Jerkass]], later crossing the [[Moral Event Horizon]] and thereby losing his "cutie" status ([[Draco in Leather Pants|for most fans, anyway]]); Amiboshi fares much better, but even he still has {{spoiler|a [[Driven to Suicide|suicide attempt to his name]], and only reaches happiness when [[Tear Jerker|his memory of the preceding 15 years is completely erased]]... thanks by Suboshi, [[Pet the Dog|as his last act of kindness ever]].}}
* Misuzu from ''[[
* ''[[Neon Genesis Evangelion]]'''s plot [[Deus Angst Machina|tortures]] its already troubled protagonist Shinji to the point of snapping into a psychological breakdown for two whole episodes and/[[Gainax Ending|or]] {{spoiler|destroying humanity}}. Not to mention doing something similar to [[Dysfunction Junction|almost every single other character]]. Let's just face it, at some point the writers sat down and said 'okay, we need to break every single character by the end of this series. Any ideas?' It's particularly heartbreaking when we're shown a flashback of a toddler Shinji right before witnessing the death of his mother: a young child who's smiling and constantly laughing, without a hint of bitterness and actually seeming outgoing. His 'break the cutie' process started at 4 years old and just kept going downhill... [[It Gets Worse|really downhill...]]
** Asuka Langlay Sohryu is a [[Jerkass]] [[Tsundere]]. Then we learn, in episode 22, that a full-blown [[Break the Cutie]] process made her [[Broken Bird|the bitch we know]]: {{spoiler|her mother Kyouko went crazy after having half her soul sucked in by the EVA 02, completely ignored Asuka and started seeing a [[Creepy Doll]] as a replacement for her (and may have tried to strangle little Asuka at least once), then hanged herself in her room with said doll ''in the same day Asuka was chosen as the EVA 02 pilot''. And the poor little girl was the one who found the body.}} And how do we find that out? When she's under a horrendous [[Mind Rape]] that forces her to relive those memories. [[Jerkass Woobie|OUCH]]!
*** At least we get the hints that Shinji and Asuka (and most EVA characters) are messed up right away. But poor Maya Ibuki is probably the only character that manages to remain cheerful and well adjusted throughout the series. Which all falls apart in End of Evangelion when all their hard work was seemingly for naught and the JSDF (their supposed allies and fellow humans) start breaking into their base and slaughtering people. Upon being given a gun and told to fight off fellow humans Maya proceeds to hide under her desk and hug her stuffed rabbit pillow for dear life while everyone else fights. She later graduates from this to completely snapping and turning into a bubbering shrieking mess as {{spoiler|she watches Asuka get torn apart, and Lillith Rei appears literally moving right through her, and she watches her fellow staff melt into orange liquid all around her. She finally only clams down when Ritsuko appears, except it's just Lillith Rei messing with her head, who promptly melts her as well.}}
* Both Rue and Fakir have this as part of their backstories in ''[[Princess Tutu]]''. In a flashback, we see Fakir as a cheerful, imaginative
** {{spoiler|Mytho himself! He was first just an adorable [[Cloudcuckoolander]], later after having a piece of his heart soaked in raven's blood he becomes quite... well, bat shit insane. Not so cute anymore. It takes Rue's [[Heroic Sacrifice]] to fix him.}}
* ''[[
** After gaining immortality, Czeslaw was brutally tortured for several hundred years. When he finally snapped and killed his torturer, he gained his memories - [[Mind Rape|meaning that he now has hundreds years of memories of being tortured and torturing himself]].
* Chiko from ''[[The Daughter of Twenty Faces]]'' has a rare double [[Break the Cutie]]. In the two-part [[Wham! Episode]] early on, Chiko makes friends with a local girl whose dad is head of security at the local museum. The girl has a major crush on Chiko's disguise as a member of a circus, and invites her over, allowing Chiko to discover many weaknesses in the security. And turns them over to her thief comrades, who steal the major artifact from the museum... breaking the girl in the process. In part 2, the girl falls in line with some thieves gunning for Chiko's comrades, and the resulting carnage and death of the girl fighting Chiko breaks her as well.
* Cream gets one of these in ''[[Sonic X]]'' after the {{spoiler|robot Emerl whom she rescued and made friends with goes crazy}} under the power of [[Green Rocks]], tries to attack her mother and then beats the living heck out of Sonic, who [[Taking the Bullet|got in the way]] while Cream was trying to reason with him and he went for her instead. A distraught Cream then {{spoiler|has to destroy Emerl herself}}. Being who she is, however, she gets over it, to an extent.
** Cosmo can be considered this as well, except that she was damn well broken to begin with, what with having her entire home and family destroyed right in front of her, crash landing on another planet being {{spoiler|used as an unwitting spy by the enemy she was trying to fight against and ending up stuck in a situation which meant she either lost her sight and hearing or the bad guys kept watching... Not to mention the fact that the bad guys turned out to actually ''be'' her species with their leader quite possibly [[I Am Your Father|being her father]],}} and having the worst case of survivor's guilt ''ever'' encountered in a series aimed at an under-teen demographic. {{spoiler|And has to force her boyfriend to kill her, which counts as a ''double'' [[Break the Cutie]] between them.}}
* Pretty much every likable character from ''[[
* When we first meet ''[[Bitter Virgin]]'''s sixteen-year-old Hinako Aikawa, she had already endured serious [[Abusive Parents|sexual abuse]] from her stepfather. Abuse which [[Adults Are Useless|her mother refused to acknowledge was happening]] until it got Hinako pregnant for the ''second time''. Readers saw these events transpire in a flashback that occurred while Hinako was in the process of being raped ''again'' by a random molester. Fortunately, ''that'' time she was rescued, and the series as a whole focuses on Hinako's recovery from these traumas.
* In ''[[Vampire Princess Miyu]]'', not only [[Dark Magical Girl|Miyu]] is an already broken cutie who {{spoiler|had her powers awaken when someone came to kill her and she had to bite him to survive, then saw her parents be captured and put in suspended animation when her mom tried to [[Screw Destiny]] and not have Miyu become the Shinma Guardian}}, but she actively seeks out pretty people who have been through extreme suffering and pain in their pasts, so she can offer them [[Kiss of the Vampire|a blood contract]]: they give her their blood, she eases their pain through placing them in a [[Lotus Eater Machine|dream-like trance]]. {{spoiler|Unless they ''still'' have things to do and people are suffering because of them, like the third OAV shows}}.
* Ken Hidaka from ''[[Weiss Kreuz]]''. He starts out as a cheerful, optimistic, naive boy-next-door who, when he's not [[Hitman
** Despite this, he gets better; {{spoiler|breaking ties with Kritiker and using Omi's connections to have himself [[Self-Restraint|voluntarily incarcerated]] for a while}} restores him to something like his old self in time to follow Aya west and join Kryptonbrand in ''Side B''.
** Gluhen claims another one in short order. Sena Izumi, the idealistic, hotheaded, optimistic addition to Weiss {{spoiler|is revealed to have found his sister's dead body, heard the gunshot that killed his father, and then while cowering in a closet had the gun turned on him by their murderer--his mother, who then goes missing. During the Koua mission, he proceeds to get broken even more by losing Nozomi, a friend he'd sworn to protect, to brainwashing-induced suicide--right in front of him, even; Kyou, another member of Weiss whom he had begun to think of as an older brother; be manipulated into killing his uncle; finally find his mother...and then is promptly shot in the chest by her. He dies in Aya's arms after apologizing for being unable to kill her first.}}
* ''[[Barefoot Gen]]'' seems to be leading towards this for Gen and all of his family, given that they're a family of war protestors in World War II era Japan... specifically, Hiroshima. They're mocked for being traitors, refused food, Gen's father is arrested and beaten, have their field of wheat which is the only hope they had of not starving destroyed, Gen's sister is accused of stealing money and stripped naked, the sweet potatoes they get from some friends in the countryside are taken away when a policeman accuses them of buying them on the black market, and plenty of other constant insults by their neighbors and times when they almost starve to death. Then the atomic bomb goes off. This finally breaks Gen's mother, {{spoiler|who has to watch her husband, son, and daughter burn to death in the remains of her house. She does get better, though.}}
* Yukiteru from ''[[Mirai Nikki]]'' had this happen to him. Originally a more naive pacifist who just wants to get along and save anyone he can, he eventually breaks after {{spoiler|his father is revealed to have only come back so he can kill Yukiteru to get money, kills Yukiteru's beloved mother, then buys a telescope and tries to "start over" with Yukiteru only to end up getting stabbed to death by men working with the Eleventh}}. It probably didn't help that Yukiteru had a psycho [[Stalker
** {{spoiler|Whoa, Yukiteru's father was only told that he had to destroy his sons phone, how would he know that it would kill Yukiteru}}
*** {{spoiler|True, but that still doesn't excuse the betrayal, especially after his father had built up his hopes that he and Yukiteru's mother would get back together. Then when he fails, he jumps out of a collapsing building by ''stealing his sons parachute'' leaving him to die.}}
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** An even stronger Usagi example is during the third season. {{spoiler|It's Usagi's birthday, but her boyfriend doesn't remember, so she slaps him and spends a few hours feeling extremely guilty, then realizes she never told him her birthday in the first place. He makes up for it by buying her the glass shoes she wanted... which turn out to be possessed by a [[Monster of the Week|Daimohn]] after her [[Anatomy of the Soul|Pure Heart]]. Worse, judging by the sheer shininess of her Pure Heart, which is pretty damn bright, she might just be the possessor of a talisman. Tuxedo Mask comes to her rescue, but her broach is stolen by Kaolinite so she can't transform, and it's only a matter of time before the Daimon tracks her down. Usagi, Tuxedo Mask, Kaolinite, and the Daimon end up facing off in an under ground parking garage, where Tuxedo Mask is turned into a glass sculpture and Kaolinite gets away with him and her broach. Kaolinite uses the two of them for ransom, and Usagi ends up going to Tokyo Tower and offering her Pure Heart up. It turns out it isn't a talisman and everything's okay in the end - heck, Uranus and Neptune even managed to kill off Kaolinite - but it was sure a hellish day for Usagi. Oh, and to top it off, the glass shoes Mamoru bought her broke.}}
** [[It Got Worse|It gets worse]] in the manga version of ''Sailor Moon Sailor Stars''. {{spoiler|First, Mamoru is killed off by [[Big Bad|Galaxia]] in front of Usagi, and Usagi [[Trauma-Induced Amnesia|blocks the incident out of her memory]]. Then the Inner Senshi are murdered in front of her, and the Starlights trigger her memories of Mamoru's death, sending her into a near breakdown.}} Next, {{spoiler|the outer scouts are killed one by one after they return to their bases, Usagi again loses her memory, and the cats and the Starlights are killed. She nearly gets burned to death by one of Galaxia's minions and is forced to watch Princess Kakyuu get impaled by another minion.}} If poor Usagi hasn't had enough to deal with, it gets even worse when {{spoiler|she turns up at Galaxia's base and ''is forced to fight the reanimated sailor scouts'' and ''Mamoru''. After having the crap beaten out of her, she manages to get her strength back and kill the evil scouts, only for Galaxia to toss Mamoru off a cliff, which in turn kills Chibiusa as she can't exist if Mamoru is dead.}} It's a wonder Usagi isn't driven completely insane. Luckily, everyone gets better.
** The anime may remove one or two things, but it's still '''not''' easy to deal with. First, {{spoiler|Galaxia releases Nehelenia, who then sets up a whole world takeover that has her transforming people into [[Empty Shell|empty shells]], which includes Mamoru too. Then the scouts are captured one by one and sealed away in mirrors, while Usagi sets out to release Mamoru and face Nehelenia despite having lost a good part of her powers. She then almost is mindwiped, and how she gets released? By seeing Jupiter's rose earring fall to the ground ''after Jupiter is tortured to near death by Nehelenia'' and then is captured. When Usagi gets better, she reaches Nehelenia's lair...and since Mamoru is brainwashed and has forgotten abut her and Chibiusa, poor Chibiusa is killed/written out of existence in Usagi's arms. It takes Usagi ''all'' of her willpower and then ''redeeming'' Nehelenia (another broken cutie in this particular continuity) to fix all of this shit.}} And ''then'' {{spoiler|the incident that kills Mamoru happens, but Usagi wasn't there to witness it, thus the poor kid believes that Mamoru is way too busy to contact her in the States. She lives her life as much as she can, [[Stepford Smiler|hiding her bad feelings]] as she fights alongside her Seishi and the Starlights, but the truth starts to surface slowly.}} And soon afterwards, {{spoiler|Princess Kakyuu reappears only to die protecting Usagi and the Starlights, then Galaxia invades and kills the Inner Seishi in front of Usagi and the Starlights...only to drop a huge bomb by showing Usagi Mamoru's starseed, the proof that she killed him. And then comes Haruka and Michiru's [[Fake Defector]] act where they kill Hotaru and Setsuna in front of Usagi again, then die as they fail to bring down Galaxia. Again, it's a wonder that Usagi isn't driven insane, and that she manages to ultimately get better.}}
* ''[[
** While the Strawhats do tend to have traumatizing backstories, the only ones who have Break The Cutie moments are Nami, Robin, Zoro, Chopper and Franky. Luffy's trauma just makes him more obstinate than he was, Usopp's backstory has a [[Break the Cutie]] moment for his best friend/possible love intrest and not for him, Sanji's back story was more encouragement to his dream than trying to break him, and Brook is more of a [[The Pollyana]] than a Cutie.
** Nami has the added bonus of being broken by Arlong ''again'' when all her effort to buy back her village is destroyed when the Marines confiscate all her collected money. Her obviously forced smile when she tries to tell the Kokoyashi villagers that she can just get more money just makes it all the more heartbreaking, especially so when she breaks down after they've resolved to take down Arlong, no matter what the end result.
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** From the (canonical) Monsters story in [[One Piece Wanted]], Flare breaks down when {{spoiler|[[Bitch in Sheep's Clothing|Cyrano]], the guy she viewed as her hero for years, was actually the one who destroyed her hometown and killed her father (And everyone else in the village, directly or not). What made it even worse is that Cyrano was laughing about the whole thing}}. She tried to hold her tears, but eventually broke down and cried. [[Tear Jerker|Really hard]].
** And a full-blown [[Break the Cutie]] process is what made {{spoiler|Boa Hancock}} the huge bitch that we meet. More exactly, {{spoiler|she and her sisters Sandersonia and Marigold start out as normal little girls in the Kuja Pirates, then are kidnapped by slave drivers and fall in the hands of the World Nobles. They branded them like cattle, force them to eat Devil Fruits for their own amusement, and torture them and many others nonstop '''four''' hellish years. When the Boa girls manage to escape thanks to a really badass fish man, the damage is already done, and Hancock has specially become a total bitch.}}
* In ''[[Chirin no Suzu]]'' a lamb named Chirin starts out as cute, friendly, and happy go lucky until his mother is killed by a wolf, so he seeks revenge but realizes that he's too small and weak to do any damage so he convinces the wolf to become his apprentice and he goes through [[Training
* In ''[[Full Metal Panic!]]'''s backstory between Sōsuke and Kalinin, you can get a taste of young Sōsuke's [[Break the Cutie]] (though most of what you see is the huge contrast and aftermath). Especially noticeable from [http://pics.livejournal.com/fmp_misha/pic/0003a17w this] to [http://pics.livejournal.com/fmp_misha/pic/0003eq61 this].
* As mentioned in passing above, Kimihiro Watanuki from ''[[
* Ditto for ''[[Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle]]''. All 4 main characters have tragic angsty backstory.
* [[Break the Cutie|This]] [[Kill'Em All|happens]] to main character Sara Werec of ''[[Soukou no Strain]]''. In the ''first episode'' no less!
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*** To be more specific, the first mind rape and the actual massacre occur when he's about ''seven'', and the second time, aged twelve-thirteen, had him forced to watch everyone being slaughtered ''hundreds of times, over and over'', leaving him in a coma that only Tsunade is able to bring him out of. No wonder he [[Freak-Out|freaks out]], and then he [[Jumping Off the Slippery Slope|gets worse and worse]].
** Another possible candidate is Gaara (hear me out). He was initially a kind-hearted child who just wanted some friends. Then he killed the one person he cared for because they were trying to kill him (on Gaara's dad's orders, no less,) due to the beast within him was something the village would rather forget. we've seen how this turns out...
*** Possible? Gaara was six years old when he realized that no one loved him. His father hated him for his inability to control Shukaku, his uncle hated him because Gaara's mother, his sister, died in childbirth, everyone else hates him because he's a "monster" ... he himself tries to hurt himself (in the flashback, he's trying to stab himself, and is disappointed when it doesn't work; later, he cries after being called a freak). His uncle tries to murder him {{spoiler|-- on his father's orders, which he actually questioned --}} and Gaara kills him in self-defense. He is effectively abandoned by everyone who should have cared. And the result? Sociopath at six, after he realigns his life's philosophy to fit with what he's learned; and serial killer by twelve, after he puts that philosophy into effect. No wonder he latched on to the idea of Shukaku as a "Mother"
** One other example is Nagato/{{spoiler|Pain}}. He was a cute kid that {{spoiler|Jiraiya trained}} and was so cute that he cried {{spoiler|when he had to kill someone to save his friend's life}}. Then we found out about his childhood. He watched his parents get killed {{spoiler|because they were trying to protect him from ninjas from Konoha}} (though it was mainly a case of mistaken identity), bonds with a dog and makes friends. He subsequently loses the dog when an explosive kunai blows it up as collateral damage from Konoha ninjas fighting some guy. Years later he loses his best friend because a Konoha ninja {{spoiler|Danzo}} set him up to die. Not surpisingly, Nagato isn't too fond of Konoha.
*** Okay, now analyze Nagato, Sasuke and Naruto's situations: {{spoiler|All of them had their lives destroyed for/by the Leaf Village one way or the other. So why the hell is Konoha the heroes, since they're TRAINED to Break Cuties!}}
**** Because it's {{spoiler|Madara's}} Fault
***** and {{spoiler|The Uchiha}} wouldn't negotiate
**** Killing {{spoiler|Nagato's parents}} was an accident, they even apologized too]]
***** [[Sarcasm Mode|And we all know apologizing to a kid after killing his parents in front of him makes it all better!]]
** Sakura now fits this trope. It went like this:
*** Sasuke's defection, then Naruto failed to bring him back.
*** Then Naruto went 4 tails against Orochimaru and Kabuto makes her realize it's at least partially because she made him promise to get Sasuke back and he agreed that he would, and he's still trying to do that no matter what
*** They find Sasuke but he leaves with Orochimaru and Kabuto
*** Danzou gives permission to have Sasuke whacked
*** Sai (of all people) get her to realize Naruto's feelings for her, and everything Naruto is going through: the burden of expectations she and the village pile on Naruto, and especially the suffering he's going through because of ''both'' her and Sasuke. Then Naruto also calls her out in her "love confession"
*** And ''then'', she tries to kill Sasuke herself and fails, since she just can't go and kill one of her dearest friends no matter how far gone he is.
*** And then Sasuke tries to kill her. If the girl doesn't end up as a [[Broken Bird]], it'll be a '''miracle'''.
** You also can't forget Haku. He watches his Mother get killed by his Father and then kills his Father. Now an orphan he's forced to live on the streets fighting off wild dogs for food. Ends his life as Zabuza's weapon.
* ''[[
** [[Creepy Twins|Hansel and Gretel]] were [[Harmful to Minors|created by an]] [[Orphanage of Fear|entire]] [[Mind Rape|upbringing]] [[Rape
** [[Dark Action Girl|Revy]] is heavily implied to have been broken at some point in her past. {{spoiler|Confirmed when we learn that THE breaking event was being tortured and raped by a policeman when she was a [[Street Urchin]].}}
** The entire Fujiyama Gangsta Paradise arc is this for {{spoiler|Yukio AND Ginji}}.
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* One has to suspect that the writers of ''[[Vision of Escaflowne]]'' had some sort of "Torturing your main character, in body and soul" checklist, given the sheer amount of abuse Van goes through in the series. [[Parental Abandonment|Kill off his family in his bactstory]]? Check. [[Doomed Hometown|Have his country burned to the ground]] and [[Noble Fugitive|force him to go on the run?]] Of course! {{spoiler|Reveal to him that his brother is alive, but [[Cain and Abel|on the bad guy's side]]}}? Would never think of leaving it out. [[Synchronization|Synch him up with his mech]] just before the one battle where he totally ''trashes'' it, leaving him an oozing, bloody mess? Oh, most definitely. {{spoiler|Having said older brother actually ''pull'' a [[Heel Face Turn]] and return to his side (which in turn reveals that [[Knight Templar Big Brother|he did it to ensure Van wouldn't have to be broken as he grew up]]), only for him to perish through [[Karmic Death]] right before the final battle}}? [[Check, Please!]], Make the only means of saving him (repairing the Escaflowne) the most unimaginably painful method you can think of? Not actually on the list, but sure!... Really, the list goes on.
** Don't even get us started on Hitomi, and for that matter, most of the ''whole damn cast''.
* Tomoya Okazaki from ''[[Clannad (
** HELL ''EVERY NAMED PERSON''.
* In ''[[
* ''[[
* Mikuru Asahina from the ''[[
** Haruhi and Yuki gets the treatment too. Let's start with Yuki.
*** Yuki lives through over 15,000 (15,498 in the novels, 15,513 in the anime) repetitions of the same 2 weeks without aging, remembering everything to do with it. And she can't do a single thing because her job is to observe. By the end of it, Kyon notices that [[The Stoic]], turned [[Up to Eleven]] is now openly showing her sadness. No wonder. She lived for nearly 600 years without aging a single bit.
*** Haruhi is closer to a [[Broken Bird]] than a Broken Cutie. She learns, rather painfully, that she isn't all that special, and in her quest to make her life special, goes on the hunt for aliens, time travellers and ESPers after some inspiration from Kyon. This leads to her general sociopathy, and her obsession with cosplaying Mikuru. A good part of the plot is her ''learning how to be a good person again'', as noted by Kyon.
* [[Adorably Precocious Child|Negi]] of ''[[Mahou Sensei Negima]]'': his [[Doomed Hometown|hometown]] gets destroyed by demons at age four or so, and at age ten he ends not only with the responsibility of protecting his students after they get [[Trapped in Another World]] (and sold into slavery, get amnesia, and [[Clear My Name|framed for terrorism]]), but he discovers that {{spoiler|his mother was framed for ''genocide'', and the people who did it are trying to kill him. And then there's the whole "having to prevent the magic world from collapsing" thing...}} Fortunately, all the crap that happens to him only [[Took a Level
** Also [[The Woobie|Ako]]. She starts as a [[Extreme Doormat|doormat]] with major self-esteem issues, then accidentally gets trapped in the magic world, where she gets a disease, forcing her and two of her friends to sell themselves into slavery to pay for the cure. To top it off, she then falls in love with someone who [[Loving a Shadow|turns out to not even really exist]].
** And Asuna as well {{spoiler|who gets so broken, her memory is wiped so she can have a chance at a normal life.}}
** [[Our Vampires Are Different|And Evangeline]], who was turned into a vampire and unwittingly killed her vampire immediately afterwards. She then spent [[Really Seven Hundred Years Old|centuries]] with everyone hating her, before her crush cursed her to stay in a school... [[Sealed Evil in
* In ''[[Pluto]]'', the titular villain may be a seething mass of hatred, but after what he goes through {{spoiler|Tetsuwan Atom/Astro Boy's}} hatred is greater by far.
* Played in reverse in [[Cyber Team in Akihabara]], Tsubame Utorii is introduced as a [[Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds]] who viciously attacks and defeats the main cast every chance she gets. {{spoiler|It's eventually shown just how badly broken she is. In a late episode, Hibari Hanakogane goes to great lengths to try and befriend Tsubame. After an [[Villainous BSOD|emotional breakdown]] in which she [[Tear Jerker|compares her life to Hibari's]], Tsubame [[Heel Face Turn|joins the Cyberteam]], and spends the remainder of the series trying to repair her broken childhood with good memories as an adopted child in the Hanakogane household.}}
* For a [[Hentai]] series, ''Bondage Fairies'' can sure put its two main characters through the wringer. The original manga sees {{spoiler|Pfil being physically and psychologically tortured by the sisters Oliga and Marcia (Ilina sat it out since she kinda liked Pfil), briefly becoming convinced that she's a helpless failure. [[Plucky Girl|She overcomes it]]. The fourth manga, ''Extreme'', sees normally-unflappable Pamila get it even worse. Seeing the strength of the brainwashing [[Yandere|Urushira]] has over Pfil, while being [[Rape
* ''Moonlight Lady'', an [[Hentai|ero-OVA series]], demonstrates this trope with the character Sayaka Kurihara. Originally a [[Shrinking Violet|shy]] actress by the name of Ruri Yamato, she was preparing for a movie when she wandered into the Kuraki estate, and was summarily kidnapped and [[Rape
* ''[[D
** Which is just the worst example of them. It seems you have to be really fucked up so Innocence accepts you. And if you aren't - you'll be. Examples?
*** Lenalee Lee. Parents killed by akuma. Abducted from the home she shared with her older brother after she was found out being a innocence host. Tortured, losing mind, possibly even driven to attempted suicide (specuialted by fandom, but still) - and all this before she was 13. She got better after her aforementioned older brother joined the Order itself to live with her. Just to have serious breakdowns whenever one of her [[True Companions]] dies (which for her is like her world falling apart). Good for her she's also a [[Plucky Girl]], leading to her being one hell of an [[Action Girl]]. Then again this habit, altogether with her [[True Companions]] thing leads her to be pretty much of a [[Stepford Smiler]] who has to admit how broken she is to become a better person. Not to mention she still suffers trauma from her early years in the Order.
*** Miranda Lotto. Especially when she is forced to release the activation of her innocence, knowing that the people she kept alive with this and who protected her {{spoiler|will ultimately die.}}. And her backstory was not nice either, conidering how she was shunned all of her life in her home due to her clumsiness and bad luck, to the point that she took broken dolls and fixed them in an attempt to not feel lonely.
*** The plot tries to do this on Allen Walker frequently. Up til now it did not succeed completely. He has some serious cracks now but is not completely broken, due to his status as [[Iron Woobie]]. (think of it. Parents abandoned him. Lived as an orphan til someone adopted him. That man got killed. Resurrection (triggered by a fat guy with silly top hat) utterly failed. Next person who took care of him... left a trauma that's usually played for laughs but still leaves a bad taste in your mouth if you think of it... He wants to save the souls of people who got tricked by the same fat guy that tricked him. Just to realize that somewhere along the way he probably is going to kill some humans too. No matter how bad they are. And THEN, just to sweeten the pot he learns that he's {{spoiler|obsessed with one of those [[Big Bad]] guys, that this guy will eventually erase him, that same guy was the brother of his foster father, said one was nuts already when he adopted Allen and probably never loved Allen but his brother (not that it influenced him being a good caretaker, as it seemed... or Allen's love for said foster father. [[Woobie]] indeed.) - and just now he's in prison, damocles' sword of execution or some other [[Fate Worse Than Death]] above his head...}} and as it seems this is not the end of it. Really now, if things continue this will he'll efinitely fall into the trope.
* Chapter's 304 and 305 in ''[[Hunter X Hunter]]''. Poor, poor, {{spoiler|Gon}}.
* ''[[Hellsing]]'': Seras, who seems a cheerful and upbeat girl for most of the manga, has a rather dark and disturbing backstory, which seems to have happened when she was very young. It consists of her father being murdered by burglars, her mother hiding her in a cupboard to protect her, and her mother's subsequent murder by the same burglars. Seras tries to exact revenge by stabbing one of the guys in the eye with a fork. She gets shot for her trouble and one of the perpetrators proceed to rape her mother's corpse, due to it being "still warm". In full view of Seras who lies on the ground bleeding profusely watching it happen and unable to do anything to stop it.
** The seventh OVA is specifically dedicated to having Zorin Blitz do this to Seras as well. She delves deep into Seras' memories, forcing her to relive her painful childhood. While Seras is trapped in the illusion and crying profusely, Zorin hacks off her arm, stabs her through the back, and slices her eyes. Pip and his two remaining squad members arrive and manage to temporarily disable Zorin before she can kill Seras by shooting her multiple times. Pip tries to escape with the badly wounded Seras, but Zorin stabs him through the back. He kisses Seras in his agony, then tells her to bite him before he dies. Tearfully, she does so, healing most of her wounds. Seras then goes into [[Roaring Rampage of Revenge]] mode and utterly destroys Zorin's forces and Zorin herself.
** Integra didn’t have it easy, either. She used to be a shy girl; then, her father died when she was twelve, leaving her the leader of Hellsing and a member of the Royal Order of Protestant Knights. Almost immediately after his death, her remaining blood relative, [[Evil Uncle|Richard]], tried to murder her. Escaping through the air vent and fleeing for her life, she stumbled upon Alucard out of pure luck. If Richard hadn't shot her in the shoulder first, Alucard would not have awakened in time to slaughter the two henchmen and block the bullet for Integra. She then shot and killed Richard, effectively losing the last of her family on the same day.
*** Further attempts of breakdowns consist of the attack to her mansion by the Valentine brothers that forced her to shoot down all her troops that had been turned into ghouls, what happened later on in London (she witnessed how it was destroyed to the ground and was the only real survivor of the attack), the deaths of Penwood and Walter (coupled with his betrayal), and Alucard’s disappearance.
*** Of course, neither had it as bad as Alucard himself… {{spoiler|with his captivity and rape as a child}}. Quite honestly, he was a goddamn saint for Christendom throughout his entire life and was ''very'' repeteadly screwed over. [[Impaled
* The entire ''[[Texhnolyze]]'' anime seems to be designed to do just this to main character Ichise up until he {{spoiler|dies in the last episode}}.
* Edmond and Albert in ''[[Gankutsuou]]''. Big time.
* ''[[Ashita no Nadja]]'': Colette was very broken at some point. {{spoiler|As a rich noblewoman who fell for her piano teacher, they eloped and lived a simple but happy life together in Paris. Then her hubby died in an accident. ''Then'' she had to support herself and her baby daughter alone as a seamstress, which was harsh but not unlivable until they both fell ''very'' sick. And ''then'' she was tricked by the envoys of her rich family into believing that he daughter perished of said illness, thus making her return to her clan. She gets somewhat better, but never forgets her former life.}}
** And later? {{spoiler|Said daughter, the main character Nadja, also lives a simple but happy life as an orphan girl and then a dancer. Then finds herself in a love triangle with two very troubled young men who are also twins - one is a cynical but goodhearted [[Gentleman Thief]], the other is a softspoken but very troubled [[White Prince]]. And ''then'' she puts pieces of her past together and gets closer to her mother... but ''then'', her former best friend who has snapped on her due to a huge misunderstanding and her [[Evil Uncle]] plot against her. And holy shit, Nadja gets ''more and more'' broken since then.}}
* In ''[[Angel Beats
** Iwasawa {{spoiler|had an abusive Dad and generally a broken household. She found her savior in music, but that was taken away from her when her Dad hit her causing her to lose her voice first, then die.}}
** Angel has a lesser example but {{spoiler|Her rank as Student Council President was taken away, the teachers and students have lost all respect for her, and her comfort food was taken away from her all because of the SSS's actions.}}
*** It's also sad when you realize that {{spoiler|Angel probably is a human like the rest of SSS and was just trying to fulfill her duties as Student Council President. Her reputation and life in the after world is ruined because she was trying to play by the rules.}}
**** {{spoiler|Otonashi has a bit of one when Angel at the near the end of the series, her desire to thank him for the gift of his heart during her life (which was the only thing keeping her there) fulfilled.}}
* ''[[
* ''[[Peacemaker Kurogane]]'': Suzu goes insane after he thinks that Tetsunosuke (his only friend) killed his master Yoshida (whom he admired and was the only person who cared for him). Not to mention that he was taken in by a [[Depraved Homosexual]] old man from off the streets when he was alone and starving and subsequently raped.
* ''[[Count Cain]]'': Jizabel's backstory.
* ''[[
** The anime's second season did something of the sort to Alois Trancy. In episodes 7 and 8, {{spoiler|Alois, who before seemed like a complete jackass, is stabbed and ignored by Claude for a bit who's busy practically orgasming over the taste of Ciel's blood. Alois's tearful response "Oh, you look like you've seen a bunch of maggots squirming in a dung pile," to Claude's indifference towards him is heartbreaking; then we learn his backstory, where his little brother died and left him alone and he was made to become a sex slave to a perverted old man, and he later practically confesses his love for Claude, telling him he's the only one he has left in the world, before Claude tenderly holds his face and then crushes his head in.}}
** There's a few other characters too, such as Freckles/Doll from the circus arc.
** Elizabeth in chapter 57.
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20120731043116/http://courtintrigue.proboards.com/index.cgi Court Intrigue], a ''[[Sailor Moon]]'' RPG set in the 30th Century, has a race of aliens called the Argenians who have their planet destroyed. Among the survivors are 8-year-old [[Cute Mute|Mirek]] and 9-year-old [[Bratty Half-Pint|Keiki]]. The former becomes a [[Dumb Struck|mute]] and latter starts to act out because the events are so upsetting.
** Oh yes, did I mention that Neo Queen Serenity, King Endymion, Sailor Venus, Sailor Mars, and Artemis all get killed and they don't get better? You can imagine what this does to (Chibi) Usagi and Diana.
* [[Rozen Maiden]]: Suigintou. In Overature, she starts out a very friendly doll {{spoiler|despite the fact that her father abandoned her (incomplete) and she's been literally crawling through N-Fields to find him. She happens to find Shinku, who takes her in and acts as if she cares. However, once Sugintou is killed the first time by Souseseki, Shinku reveals that Sugintou is not a complete doll, and looks on coldly as Sugintou begs Shinku to save her. Shinku refers to her as junk several times. Sugintou comes back, because Rozen decided to quit being a Jerkass, and tries to grab Shinku's Roza Mystica.}}
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* ''[[Macross Frontier]]'' smacks [[Idol Singer|Sheryl]] [[Ms. Fanservice|Nome]] with this one. ''Hard''. ''Along with'' [[Break the Haughty]]. {{spoiler|She ends up getting most of the example bad things: Her manager/best friend/practical foster mother turns out to be the [[Big Bad]] and takes an openly sadistic pleasure in verbally beating Sheryl down and telling her that [[Your Days Are Numbered|she is going to die]], because Grace infected her with a V-type infection ten years ago in an extremely painful medical procedure that was supposed to help her, which turns out to now be in the very late stages, making it incurably terminal with Sheryl's remaining lifespan measured in weeks. Faced with all this, she is finally confronted with the notion that she may not even be remembered, as her former interstellar stardom is suddenly forgotten in favor of Ranka's, and she roams the streets without disguise completely ignored. And it's raining at the time. Of course. She finally breaks down into a sobbing wreck when she finds one of her concert posters discarded on the sidewalk and left in the rain like common trash. When she recovers, she becomes a better person overall}}.
* Mima Kirigoe from [[Perfect Blue]] starts off as a typical [[Idol Singer]], with the usual cherry personality and cheesy themes, but in real life she comes across as a genuinely sweet, sympathetic, attractive woman. Then [[It Got Worse|it gets worse]]. {{spoiler|By the end of the movie she's deranged, a murderer (depending on your interpretation), and suffering from severe identity crisis.}}
* [[Keet|Masomi Kida]] from [[Durarara
** What no mention of Anri? {{spoiler|The fact that she was abused by her own father, and seeing her own mother Sayaka kill him and committing suicide at the same time using Saika, resulting in her without a heart and being Saika's new owner, must've been hard for her.}} It's hard not to feel sympathy for her.
** Mikado as well. He starts off as this adorably idealistic boy, just moved to a new city, all excited about making new friends {{spoiler|and watching the growth of his ideal group, the Dollars.}} But then {{spoiler|his best friend leaves, the girl he likes might be a psycho but they don't talk about it, and the Dollars starts filling up with low-level gangsters who just use the name.}} Not to mention {{spoiler|the fact that he's manipulated and used by Izaya and Aoba, to the point that his dark side pops up and he stabs his kouhai with a pen.}}
*** However, this might be a subversion {{spoiler|as Aoba points out that Mikado had this dark personality from the very beginning and if that's the case, his whole idealistic nature might as well be a facade for hiding the darkness in his heart.}} Though in a sense, it could potentially be worse: how ''broken'' you have to be to do that, huh?
* Blue from ''[[Pokémon Special]]'' just ''barely'' averts this, which is a refreshing change, given that she has [[Dark and Troubled Past|every right]] to [[
** White gets hit ''hard'' as {{spoiler|N reveals to her that her star Tepig actress may have never shared her dreams alongside of her. When White tries to jump out of the Ferris Wheel car that she is currently stuck inside, Gigi decides to stay with N. The shock makes her slip out and fall, and she ends up on the ground, barely conscious, with her eyes full of tears}}.
* The title character from ''[[Kimba the White Lion]]'' also had it pretty rough. Before he even was born, his father was shot by hunters, while his still pregnant mother was put on a boat to become a zoo animal. After several weeks Kimba was born, a storm was coming right towards the boat, so his mother forced him to leave her behind while she drowns in her cage. [[Downer Beginning|Not the smoothest way to start out a series]].
* Kohaku from ''[[Inuyasha]]''. [[Doomed Hometown|His village was destroyed]], he was possessed and forced to attack his companions, wounding his sister Sango almost fatally and [[Self-Made Orphan|murdering his father]] and friends, and then got killed. He was revived and [[Brainwashed and Crazy|brainwashed]] by [[Big Bad|Naraku]] (the one responsible of all of the above) to be used against his sister and her new friends and to help in his plots by slaughtering a lot of innocent people. When he finally regained his memories, two of his "protectors" were killed {{spoiler|(Kagura and Kikyo)}}, he can't stand being near his sister because of the guilt and he thinks the only way to atone is [[Redemption Equals Death|to die killing Naraku]]. If that wasn't enough, he was later forced to relive the day he killed his father and friends over and over again for days. He used to be a shy, gentle and happy 11 year-old boy.
** Also said older sister Sango. The poor girl is as plucky as she can be after witnessing how poor Kohaku was [[Brainwashed and Crazy]] into killing their dad and almost killing her, but seeing Kohaku lose his memories upon all of this shit and not being able to remember her ''because it'd mean he'd also remember killing their dad and friends''... it often ends up breaking her into tears. It's not helped by how her [[Chivalrous Pervert]] love interest, Miroku, is getting closer and closer to fall victim to [[Power Incontinence]].
** Kagome doesn't have it easy either. She witnesses a good part of Sango's breaking process, is confronted by her [[Dark Magical Girl]] past self [[Always Someone Better|who is more expert and skilled that she is]], doesn't know what her real place in the world is as she goes back and forth in past and present, and Naraku often '''directly''' seeks to break her mind. [[The Scrappy|But her haters refuse to see it and cal her "whiny", "bitch", "whore", and "jerk".]]
* In ''[[
* In ''[[
* [[Abusive Parents|Lucy]] and [[Made a Slave|Erza's]] pasts in ''[[Fairy Tail]]''.
** [[Adult Fear|Ur]], despite being older than most exmaples.
* ''[[
** As much as every magical girl here (save Madoka to a degree, she has [[Desperately Looking for
** Similarly there is Homura Akemi. {{spoiler|Whom is caught in a brutal and [[Tear Jerker|depressing]] [[Groundhog Day Loop]] of her own making. With no means of escaping, so far.}} In fact, [[Moe|compare]] [[Meganekko|Past]] [[Shrinking Violet|Ho]][[Adorkable|mu]][[Ill Girl|ra]] with [[Took a Level
* ''Kodomo no Jikan'' gives us two examples before the series even starts: Rin and Reiji. Reiji was broken first by his abusive, drunken father and indifferent mother, then was repaired a bit by his relationship with Rin's mother ([[Kissing Cousins|his]] [[Values Dissonance|cousin]]), but then she died from lung cancer. That, combined [[Wife Husbandry|with]] [[Replacement Goldfish|his]] [[Love Father, Love Son|actions]], broke ''Rin'' herself.
* Reika Kitami, the main villain of the ''Bible Black'' series experiences this in the Prequel. When she first arrives in high school, she's a sweet, [[Wide
** And if that wasn't bad enough, the process is repeated on Imari in the original series. Imari starts out exactly as Reika did. Cute, sweet, innocent high school girl, with an apparently reciprocated crush on the primary male protagonist, Minase. As soon as Minase finds the Black Bible used by the original Rose Cross Coven, it all just goes badly for Imari. It begins with her walking in on Minase having sex with another female student (after he invited her to come over and cook diner for him in the first place), she gets kidnapped by the new coven (Now taken over by Reika) thanks to Minase (who has become the 2nd under Reika after his own magical mind break), is drugged and subsequently forcibly sodomized by a [[Charm Person|magically]] [[Playing
* In ''[[
** Also, in the fanmade game ''[[Heta Oni]]'', {{spoiler|Italy}} is broken quite a few times, {{spoiler|because everyone continues to die while trying to protect him, and he has to watch it all. [[And I Must Scream|Again, and again, and again, and again...]]}}
* ''[[
* Nanako from ''[[Oniisama
* The whole world of [[
* Practically the whole cast of [[Fruits Basket]]. Let's see...
** Tohru, whose father died when she was three and whose mother died when she was sixteen. Not to mention her whole family hates her except for her grandfather.
** Kyo, who's rejected by everyone for being the cat of the zodiac.
** Yuki, who was psychologically abused by Akito ({{spoiler|in addition to everybody else}}).
** Momiji, whose mother rejected him for being a member of the zodiac and now doesn't remember him.
** Hatori, who had to erase the memories of the woman he loved and break off all contact with her.
** Hanajima, whose sixth sense resulted in her {{spoiler|almost killing a boy when she was six and hearing everybody's thoughts until well into her teens, when she finally learned to control it}}.
** Kisa, who was bullied so much she stopped speaking.
** Isuzu, {{spoiler|whose parents pretended to love her and then started abusing her when she found out. And that's not counting what Akito did to her...}}
** {{spoiler|'''Akito''' [[Unsettling Gender Reveal|herself]], since her [[Complete Monster]] mother hated her ever from '''before''' she was born for utterly petty reasons, and ever since her kind father died was driven by her mother to hate, abuse, and break everyone in her surroundings.}}
{{quote|
* ''[[Afterschool Charisma]]'' is not kind to its main character, Shiro. Not only does he have to deal with [[Stranger in
* ''[[The Idolmaster (
* The entire main cast of ''[[Cyborg 009]]'', to one or another degree... those poor souls.
** And not only the main cast is broken. Cases in point: Cynthia Finder, {{spoiler|Cyborg 0012}}, {{spoiler|Cyborg 0013}}, {{spoiler|Lina and Phil from the Psychic Assassins}}, and specially {{spoiler|the Pu'Awak sisters}}
* Takaya "D-Boy" Aiba from [[
** Also, his sister Miyuki. {{spoiler|So broken that she ends up ''dead''.}}
** And rather surprisingly, some alternate materials show that {{spoiler|Shinya Aiba aka ''Tekkaman Evil''}} was this in the past.
* Happens to Youji in [[Loveless]] during his confrontation with Seimei (though Natsuo helps him through it), and Soubi almost directy after (though he was pretty broken to begin with). Also Ritsuka, when he realizes quite how far Seimei is from the person he Ritsuka thought he was. Nana has a relatively minor one when she realizes it was the flaws in her security system that let Nisei and Seimei into the academy. Pretty much everyone in Loveless was either already broken, gets broken during the series, or will eventually; it is a [[Crapsack World]] afterall.
* Chirin from ''[[Chirin no Suzu]]'' is a [[Cheerful Child|spunky young lamb]] for the first few minutes of the film. He eventually loses his happy-go-lucky spirit after his mother is killed by a wolf, and goes on a revenge quest.
* Episode 9 of ''[[Kore wa Zombie Desu
* Mii from ''[[
* Happens to Tsuna of ''[[Katekyo Hitman Reborn]]'' every arc. Usually as a result of trusting people too easily.
* Please don't be a female lead in a [[Mayu Shinjo]] manga. And ''specially'', don't name yourself [[Haou Airen|Kurumi Akino]] or [[Sensual Phrase|Aine Yukimura]]. Because you'll end up horribly broken not just by your boyfriend's rivals/enemies/scorned women, but [[Bastard Boyfriend|by your own boyfriend]].
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