Deus Angst Machina: Difference between revisions

* The life of [[Cosmic Plaything|Guts]] from ''[[Berserk]]'' sucks to such a major degree that it puts the [[Trauma Conga Line]]s of Griffith and Casca to shame, especially since [[Go Mad Fromfrom the Revelation|the trauma factor of the latter]] coincides with [[My Greatest Failure|the trauma of the former.]] His life sucks so much that the universe was literally out to get him ''before the dude was born.'' He refuses to let [[Screw Destiny|the universe control his destiny]], but even Guts has his [[Freak-Out|breaking point.]]

* Since [[Robin Series|Tim Drake]] became [[Robin]]: His mother was poisoned to death, his friend Darla was killed {{spoiler|(but later came back to life (Of course))}}, his dad was killed by a Captain Boomerang, his girlfriend Stephanie Brown, tortured and 'murdered', his stepmother was most likely killed via a nuke in Bludhaven, his best friends [[Superboy]] and [[The Flash|Bart Allen]] were killed {{spoiler|(but, as expected, later came back to life)}}, his adopted sister [[Batgirl (2000 comic book)|Cassandra Cain]] went insane, {{spoiler|(But eventually returned to the side of good}}, his civilian best friend, Ives, has cancer {{spoiler|now in remission}}, {{spoiler|and Batman just supposedly died. But his girlfriend did come back only to start helping one of Tim's enemies in order to push him to become more efficient, on Batman's orders.}} The writers joke about giving him a puppy so they can kill it too. Tim's response to all this? To emotionally deaden himself and go the [[Jerkass]] route.

* The backstories of the [[Stationery Voyagers]] and their allies take the [[Humans Are Bastardsthe Real Monsters]] concept to extremes.

* Anyone in ''[[Battlestar Galactica Reimagined(2004 TV series)|Battlestar Galactica]]''. Anyone. Cylons included. Heck, they exterminated 99.99% of the human race - and ''it was just the beginning''!

** Just to demonstrate, here's a list of some of the crap they go through (deep breath):<br />Let's see... Dead mother, emotionally abusive father, fucked up childhood; Sam's attempt at a normal life ends with his girlfriend's death; their father makes a [[Deal with the Devil]] for Dean's life, leaving Dean to deal with the guilt and anger of knowing his dad's in Hell because of him; he also tells Dean he'll have to either save Sam or kill him, leaving Sam terrified he'll go [[The Dark Side|Dark Side]]. Sam dies, prompting Dean to make his own deal. Dean goes to Hell for forty years; Sam allies himself with a demon; Dean gets raised from Hell by Castiel, an angel... Only to find out that the angels ''want to start the Apocalypse''. And Dean inadvertently broke the first seal and kick-started the whole thing. Dean persuades Castiel to help him, only to get there too late to stop Sam from accidentally freeing Lucifer and ''[[Nice Job Breaking It, Hero|starting the Apocalypse]]''. Dean and Sam find out they're vessels for Michael and Lucifer, and if Dean says yes Michael will torch half the planet in 'saving the world'; they try to kill Lucifer themselves, but fail (and lose two close friends in the process); Castiel tries to find God, only to be told that God doesn't give a damn. Dean comes very close to saying yes to Michael out of sheer despair. They eventually manage to find a way of beating Lucifer that involves ''Sam'' going to Hell, and Cas pisses off back to Heaven, leaving Dean pretty much broken. At least he has love interest Lisa and her kid Ben to comfort him, though... Then Sam comes back - except {{spoiler|without a soul}}. He {{spoiler|gets his soul back}}, they get sold out by {{spoiler|their grandfather}}, and then the [[Big Bad]] turns out to be {{spoiler|Castiel, who they regard as family}}. Dean's relationship with Lisa and Ben also deteriorates to the point where he gets Cas to ''erase their memories of him''. And Sam gets back his memories of his time in Hell, which had been blocked to stop them from driving him insane causing him to have hallucinations of Lucifer, so now he's not sure what's real and what's not. Cas absorbs all the souls from Purgatory ''and'' Leviathans which eventually take control of his body and kill him,<ref>Though Misha Collins is coming back, he might not play Cas</ref> Dean's ready to quit hunting, and Bobby, the character who {{spoiler|has survived for an incredibly long time considering the show's track record, get's a bullet to the brain and dies, leaving Sam and Dean alone in their fight.}}

* To say that ''[[House (TV series)|House]]'''s life has been unbelievably crappy so far would be a huge understatement. This is a ''long'' list, so bear with us.<br /><br />:He was abused as a child by a man who turned out to be his non-biological father and the events leading up to how he got his limp were horribly unfair (as if having a blood-clot in your leg wasn't painful enough). But, in the show itself, it's Stacy who starts the real downward spiral; after a long bout of [[The Masochism Tango]], he gets her to leave because her crippled husband is willing to do anything to keep her around and he isn't, her leaving brings him more psychosomatic pain and a [[Tear Jerker|heartbreaking]], [[Fan Disservice|disturbing]] scene involves him being reduced to begging Cuddy for some morphine and in the [[Season Finale]], he gets shot twice and [[Hannibal Lecture]]d by his shooter/conscience throughout the whole episode. When he gets the ketamine which magically regenerates his thigh muscle, he seems to be changing for the better (no drugs, running everywhere, getting upset when a patient's wife thanks him and he can't even feel pleased) but this obviously cannot last so the pain comes back in full force, he's back on the drugs and Wilson and Cuddy have just decided that this would be a brilliant time to teach the poor bastard some humility. Then there's the legally and ethically insane Tritter arc, the depression of trying to find ways to relieve the pain, and the Ducklings leaving (and Wilson mindfucking him into thinking he's hallucinating them). This is followed by House's guilt over his involvement in the events that led to Amber's death at the end of the fourth season. He nearly got brain damage in trying to save her too. Wilson subsequently dumped him even though he didn't blame House for what happened to his late girlfriend, and it wouldn't help anything in any case. He followed Wilson around for months, trying to get him back. Then again, Season Five too is one big angst fest. Not long after Kutner did himself in for no particular reason<ref>[[Real Life Writes the Plot|In real life]], because the actor took up a job in the White House and thus his character had to be written off the show</ref> he started having hallucinations and went through rehab, only to find that the woman he's in love with, Cuddy, won't date him. Ever so briefly averted at the end of season six, when House went an entire season without Vicodin, started acting like kind of a human being, and even magically got Cuddy to dump her fiance for him. Then Season 7 has it ''all'' go downhill again. He's together with Cuddy but they secretly make each other miserable, Cuddy later dumps him, he's back on Vicodin, and to top it all off he's a wanted criminal when he flees the country for months after ramming a car into her home out of revenge. In season 8 he has to serve jailtime although he has no priors, simply because he ended up with a lousy lawyer. Cuddy quits, but House gets out on parole because Foreman (the new Dean of Medicine) needs his expertise, and because with the hospital's resources stretched thin re-employing House is a good bargain given his situation. After that things started to look slightly up as he eventually refunds his department, gets his staff back, and amends things with Wilson. Except then Dominica (the Russian immigrant he married to get her a green card) dumps him once she gets her citizenship. House had withheld the news from her that she'd gotten her citizenship because he realized he actually did like her, and wanted her to stick around. The irony being she also had feelings for him and probably would have stayed with him if he hadn't lied to her. And right after that happens, Wilson tells House that he (Wilson) has stage 2 thymoma. With three episodes left to go, Wilson is still alive so there's still hope.

* A bizarre mix of real life and storyline trauma afflicted [[Jeff Hardy]] during the end of his latest run in the [[World Wrestling Entertainment|WWE]]. First, his beloved older brother Matt's appendix bursts and he nearly dies from an infection. Then for several months he can't quite manage to get over the hump and win the WWE title, though he's coming closer than he ever has. Then he fails a Wellness test and gets suspended for two months, including [[Wrestlemania]], at which he had been rumored to win a high-profile match. While he's suspended, his house and everything he owns burns to the ground, and his cherished dog is killed in the fire as well. Then once he returns, he's set upon by a malevolent GM and still can't quite make it to winning the title. Finally, finally he wins it, but his brief run is marred by a mysterious person making repeated attempts on his life. His title run ends when his own brother turns on him in favor of Edge, who at the time was the mortal enemy of both. Matt then reveals that not only did he do that, he was the one repeatedly trying to kill Jeff, he was the one who burned his house to the ground, and he was the one who killed Jeff's dog, and he then goes on to soundly trounce Jeff in all but the very last match of their feud. After all this, he wins the title again but loses it within a few minutes to [[CM Punk]], who then goes on to rail at Jeff about his drug issues and keeps the title from him through many underhanded tactics. And when things are finally looking up for Jeff...he's made peace with his brother, he'd won the championship again, all was just starting to look up, bam, he loses it and his job thanks to CM Punk. The sad thing is, there's probably some more things that got missed in all of this. Can't blame the guy for wanting to go home and lick his wounds for a while now, can you?

* ''[[Dragon Age II]]'' - Arguably an example the maincharacter(and again, arguably his/her entire party to an extent) suffers this in that over a ten year span you lose your father, your home, [[SchrodingerSchrödinger's Gun|'one' of your siblings]] is killed brutally on screen, you're forced into a year of servitude, your other sibling can [[SchrodingerSchrödinger's Gun|die or otherwise be forced, or by their own choice, into ditching you]], your mother dies after finally getting back her childhood home and in a particularly heartwrenching fashion too and finally at the end of it all a partymember and possible love interest sets off a series of events where you are forced to make a gristly decision involving either massacring a series of mostly innocent mages and supporting the [[Knights Templar]] or becoming an outlaw and possibly losing friends because they just weren't quite loyal enough. Damnit, Hawke just cannot catch a bloody break...or maybe that's the issue, [[Incredibly Lame Pun|he can.]]

* The [[Ciem Webcomic Series]] began as one very long string of this, with the goal being a [[Break the Cutie]] moment [[Took a Level Inin Badass|to force the protagonist from being a humble teenage girl to being a superpowered spy/vigilante]] - one who's not above tricking her enemies into killing themselves.