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Break the Cutie/Anime: Difference between revisions
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*** The identity of the Rockbells' killer differs between [[Fullmetal Alchemist (anime)|the 2003 anime version]] and the manga/Brotherhood anime. A young and traumatized {{spoiler|Roy}} in the first series, {{spoiler|Scar}} in the manga/Brotherhood. But it's played amazingly both times.
** 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 (anime)|the 2003 anime version]], Rose, who just wanted to help people, felt the full swing of the show's gradual slide away from the [[Sliding Scale of Idealism Versus Cynicism|idealistic end of the scale]] when she was protecting some children during an invasion of her home town. She was {{spoiler|gangraped by soldiers and left pregnant and mute (due to trauma)}}, and ended up so empty that she was used as {{spoiler|a figurehead of a religious movement}}, and then just {{spoiler|as an empty shell for the [[Big Bad]] to possess}}.
* ''[[Death Note]]'':
** 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 with Suck]] {{spoiler|in an attempt to die.}} There are two other, cuties in the series {{spoiler|(Shirley and Euphemia)}} but neither are broken, and remain as [[The Cutie]] even {{spoiler|as they die}}.
** 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}}.
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*** 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 From the Dead|or so they think!]])}}, and we meet her father. Who reveals that, aside from having serious [[Parental Abandonment|abandonment]] issues due to the fact that she adored him and he was never home, she suffered serious mental abuse and even a bit of physical abuse when she was a child, due to the fact that he couldn't come to terms with the fact that she had powers. When she grows up, she's ostracized by nearly every single person she meets for the same reason, and she can't get rid of it without turning into what is implied to be an even bigger social pariah in the ''Yu-Gi-Oh!'' universe, since ''everyone'' you meet plays cards. And I mean ''everyone.'' Yuusei forgives her for being a little psychopathic.
* Subaru Sumeragi in [[CLAMP]]'s ''[[Tokyo Babylon]]'' and ''[[X 1999]]'' was very carefully broken, and then some more, by his love interest Seishirou.
* Kamui from ''[[X 1999]]''. Probably the only [[CLAMP]] character able to give [[Tokyo Babylon|Subaru]] (above) a run for his money, and CLAMP [[xxxHolic|love]] [[Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle|their]] [[RG Veda|woobies]]. No wonder Subaru becomes Kamui's [[Big Brother Mentor]].
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** 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 (manga)|Monster]]'', [[Complete Monster|Johan]] is -- [[Manipulative Bastard|as noted]] -- especially prone to doing this to his victims, even simply to screw with them. For example, in volume 12, sending an abandoned small boy to look for his mother, basically telling him that if he sees her, and she sees him, if she truly loves him and wants him she'll take him back {{spoiler|(naturally, Johan is crossdressing as the much more wholesome Anna at the time, making it that much creepier)}}. He sends him to look for his mother in ''the red light district of Prague'' -- where the boy witnesses rape, depravity, a drug addicted prostitute dying from withdrawal begging him for money and even the prostitutes themselves taunting him. {{spoiler|Tenma and Grimmer have to talk him out of jumping off a bridge after this. This still doesn't quite break the cutie. But it comes damn close. Mind you, this boy is perhaps 7 or 8}}.
** 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 him -- and ''that'' is when she met Ichigo. Later she was had [[Traumatic Haircut|her hair forcibly cut]] by other girls, and Tatsuki stepped to help her. And after being more or less stable but still questioning her own worth and her growing feelings for Ichigo through the first arcs... well, the Hueco Mundo and Arrancar arcs came. She's more or less getting better, if the X-Cution arc is a lead.
**** 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 ''[[Digimon Tamers]]'' started out as a [[Genki Girl]] with a hand puppet to emphasize her childlike nature. She is the penultimate innocent of the cast, as well as the shy, sweet girl that main character Takato has a crush on. Then, once on the adventure, after a promising start as a potentially excellent Tamer, {{spoiler|she loses her Digimon partner and gets kidnapped and possessed by the [[Big Bad]]. The [[Big Bad]] then proceeds to conjure up monsters ''based on her worst memories'' (revealing in the process that she was a [[Stepford Smiler]] all along, completely broken after her beloved mother dies of illness and her father tries to raise her alone [[Parents as People|but can't do a lot for her]]) in order to feed on her sadness.}} This is one instance of [[Mind Rape]] that would give even [[Neon Genesis Evangelion|NGE]] a run for its money...
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*** 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 child -- in stark contrast to his [[Ineffectual Loner]] personality in the main part of the story. It's revealed that a mixture of his parent's deaths {{spoiler|because of his powers}} and stress over feeling responsible for Mytho's safety slowly wore on him until he became the [[Jerkass]] we see at the beginning of the story. Rue, herself, is shown as being sweet and caring as a child, but [[The Ojou|snobby and harsh]] when she's older (to the point where she insists on being called Rue-sama/Lady Rue). ''Her'' personality change is revealed to be the result of {{spoiler|constant emotional abuse from her father, the Raven.}} It only gets worse in the second season, when {{spoiler|Mytho}} begins to physically abuse her and manipulate her.
** {{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.}}
* ''[[Baccano!]]'' does this to Czeslaw Meyer, a [[Really Seven Hundred Years Old|seemingly]] [[Adorably Precocious Child]] who ends up getting his limbs torn off, shot in the face, and having all sorts of other unpleasant things happen to him. [[Good Thing You Can Heal|Good thing he can heal]]... [[A Fate Worse Than Death|or not]].
** 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.
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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.}}
* ''[[One Piece]]'': Almost every time a Strawhat Pirate member has a flashback. The combination of Oda's skill at drawing cute kids and writing cruel back stories is just plain lethal.
** 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.
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*** 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.
* ''[[Black Lagoon]]'' is either in love with this trope or owes it money.
** [[Creepy Twins|Hansel and Gretel]] were [[Harmful to Minors|created by an]] [[Orphanage of Fear|entire]] [[Mind Rape|upbringing]] [[Rape as Backstory|of]] [[Snuff Film|this]].
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* ''[[D.Gray-man]]'' has a really ''nasty'' example of this in a flashback: {{spoiler|Kanda's childhood friend Alma Karma}}. Despite a horrible life {{spoiler|as a test subject for the Black Order, Alma}} was a [[Cheerful Child]] and the optimist to Kanda's cynical [[Jerkass]]. But after he {{spoiler|got fried by the Crow while trying to save Kanda and only lived because he managed to synchronize with [[Empathic Weapon|Innocence]],}} he decided that the world was such a horrible place that it was doing everyone a favor to kill them. Which he attempted. Enthusiastically. When Kanda finally found him, he was standing in the midst of ''dozens'' of corpses, drenched in blood and [[Dissonant Serenity|smiling serenely]], {{spoiler|with another corpse still impaled on his "razor wing" Innocence. And he'd been trying to kill himself, too; his [[Healing Factor]] just kept closing it up.}}
** 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 with Extreme Prejudice|He might have very questionable hobbies]], [[Knight Templar|but was very much]] [[Well-Intentioned Extremist|a warrior of Christ]]. And the manga makes his position very, very clear in the scene of his human form's death, with him kneeling to lap at the blood of his homeland. The man, the most devout of the knights of God, stripped of literally ''everything'' that ever meant anything to him and left to see as the enemies of his faith are left to ravage his beloved homeland. And today, readers would bet ''every single one of you, reading this article, has only known Vlad III of Wallachia as '''Dracula'''.'' A ''monster''. [[Humans Are Bastards]].
* 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}}.
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* ''[[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!]]'' Yuri had {{spoiler|her siblings killed in front of her by robbers when she was a kid.}} The worst part is that {{spoiler|it was Yuri's "fault" that they died because she couldn't find money in the house to give to the robbers. They probably would've killed them all regardless, but that doesn't really help Yuri's feelings of guilt.}}
** 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.}}
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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!!]] goes through hell and back through the third arc of the series. Seemingly happy and go lucky, {{spoiler|he was broken before the series started. Let's start that he had [[Abusive Parents|uncaring parents]] (or at least hinted), so he started a gang known as Yellow Scarves because of his insecurities of wanting to be [[I Just Want to Be Special|someone in life]] Then his life went to hell when he met both his girlfriend [[Honey Trap|Saki Mikajima]] and the informant [[Manipulative Bastard|Izaya Orihara]]. While he got to know them both, fights were breaking out more with the rival gang Blue Squares. It got to the point where Masomi needed to ask Izaya for help in order to defeat the rival gang. And then hell strikes and Saki is kidnapped by their leader and have her legs broken. The person that he started to trust ends up not responding to the phone calls and in a panic, Masomi tries to save Saki...only to freeze up. While Saki is saved by Kadota and his gang after they quit Blue Squares, Izaya then accuses Masomi for letting Saki get hurt. He then tells him that he'll have to live with the guilt forever.}} Cue the series starts and he invites his friend [[Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass|Mikado]] over to Ikebukuro {{spoiler|so he could save him}} but by the time that his other friend [[Yamato Nadeshiko|Anri]] is injured by the Slashers who is hinted to be part of the Dollars, he's forced to {{spoiler|rejoin his gang and then is thrown back into the hell by relying on Izaya again and having him reveal that the leader of Dollars is his best friend and then later getting bitchslapped by Anri after he accuses her of "sucking up" to Mikado. [[Death Seeker|What finally sends him over the edge]] is [[Jerkass]] Horoda telling him he's out of the group because he was hiding information from them about Dollars and declared that they would kill his best friend. Finally, he tries to kill Horoda to make up for what happened to Saki but almost dies in the process. Luckily, [[Big Damn Heroes|Mikado and Anri appear to save his ass.]]}} By the end of the anime series, he seems recovered... {{spoiler|but in recent novel chapters, he's going back to hell after finding out that ''Mikado'' is [[Break the Cutie|going through]] [[Jumping Off the Slippery Slope|the same thing]] [[Yandere|but is taking it a different way.]]}} This kid needs a hug and therapy.
** 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 [[wangst]]. Being kidnapped by a frickin' giant flaming bird at the age of five will ''do'' things to you. She managed to stay reasonably upbeat as she spent a lot of time carefully planning to take down the [[Big Bad]] responsible for all her misery. (Admittedly, there ''are'' a few cracks now and then, especially when confronted with the [[Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?|crippling fear of birds]] that he had instilled in her.) After spending most of her time getting over ''everything'' (doing so in almost complete solitude), she finally found her parents and headed off for a joyous reunion... {{spoiler|[[Yank the Dog's Chain|only for them to vanish right before her eyes]]}}. ''Ouch.'' [[Angst Coma]] was immediate, though she did wake up quickly enough to keep fighting.
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* 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 ''[[Ai Yori Aoshi]]'', we're introduced to Kaoru Hanabishi post-breaking. In the period of the first chapters / episodes, he's partly recovered, but distant and lonely. Then his [[Love Interest]] [[Yamato Nadeshiko|Aoi]] shows up, and the process of reconstruction begins. As for the breaking part, we see through flashbacks that he was basically subjected to [[Torture Technician]]-as-guardian: he lost both his parents, had most of the few keepsakes he had left destroyed, was [[Abusive Parents|beaten to the point]] of [[Good Scars, Evil Scars|horrible scarring]] by said guardian, and never again saw the [[Childhood Marriage Promise|cute girl he used to play with]]. Then he struck out on his own to work as a menial and go to school, in the hopes of making it on his own. Only the efforts of [[Genki Girl|Tina]], and later Aoi and the rest of the [[True Companions]], were able to help him be a whole person.
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* 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...}}
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* ''[[The Idolmaster (anime)|THE iDOLM@STER]]'' - Haruka
* 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 [[Tekkaman Blade]], if you pay an attention to his Flashbacks, you will wonder how much the universe has tortured such a cheerful child into such a [[Jerk with a Heart of Gold]]. Heck it is implied that D-Boy is a really [[Nice Guy]] before the plot starts, which is to say really surprising(the D stands for DANGEROUS)
** 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.
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