Honor Before Reason/Anime and Manga: Difference between revisions

== ''[[Bleach]]'' ==

* [[The Hero|Ichigo]] believes in fighting his way. He won't let his hollow get in the way of that, even if disadvantages him to do so. His hollow taking over allowed him to not only survive Byakuya's killing blow, but to gain the upper hand and badly wound Byakuya. Upon regaining control, Ichigo apologised to Byakuya and asked if they could start the fight over. It was the first time Byakuya realised Ichigo had a lot more honour to him than he'd realised and, fortunately for Ichigo, he agreed.

* Ichigo displayed this trait again against Ulquiorra. Ichigo, at the verge of death, was so completely taken over by his [[Super-Powered Evil Side|hollow]] that he lost all reason and not only overwhelmed Ulquiorra with raw power, but even stabbed Uryuu for trying to calm him down. When Ichigo regains control, and sees what he's done to both Ulquiorra and Uryuu, he insists that the only way he'll continue fighting Ulquiorra is if he's given the same injuries in compensation. ''This means chopping off an arm and a leg''. {{spoiler|Ulquiorra's too far gone, however, and dies before Ichigo can carry through his vow.}}

* Kenpachi deliberately weakens himself in battle simply to ensure he can carry out his battle philosophy: to have as much fun in a fight as possible. He used to add bells to his hair so his opponent could hear him coming. He wears an eyepatch that not only limits his vision but which also sucks up his reiatsu, forcing him to fight with limited power. He'll even let his opponent take a free strike against him just to see if his opponent is strong enough to injure him.

* Ikkaku has vowed to fight and die under Kenpachi's command. To this end he'll even throw a fight to avoid revealing how powerful he really is, just in case the truth puts him under pressure to work towards becoming a captain of another squad. Called out on this by Iba who told him he's not as expendable as he thinks he is, he should be working to get stronger, and he should never put personal pride before his shinigami duty.

* Yumichika is so determined to remain a subordinate of both Kenpachi and Ikkaku, and so determined to uphold the squad's kidou-hating, direct combat-loving philosophy, that he hides his power and would prefer to die than reveal the truth in public. Ikkaku may only be hiding bankai, but Yumichika's even hiding his ''shikai'' thanks to his power being kidou-based.

* Ukitake placed so much value on honour that he ignored his own misgivings and allowed Kaien to avenge his murdered wife. When Kaien requested Ukitake and Rukia stay out of the fight no matter way, Ukitake agreed and explained to Rukia that there was a difference between a fight for life and a fight for pride. Unfortunately, the culprit wasn't a normal hollow and had a special ability that proved Kaien's undoing.

* Subverted with Kyouraku. He's a devoted [[Combat Pragmatist]] and lectures other captains that idealistic fighting is a distraction captains can't afford when in battle. Kyouraku and Ukitake are acknowledged as the greatest partnership in the Gotei 13, and it's made clear that while one side of the partnership plays this trope painfully straight, the other blows it to hell.

== ''[[Fullmetal Alchemist]]'' ==

* Edward turns down the opportunity to take the Philosopher's Stone and run, despite it being the one thing he's been searching for for three years. He leaves it, because the doctor who has the stone used it to heal injuries and sicknesses in his town. Edward says that he didn't want to take away the town's life support, and if he achieved his objective at the cost of others, then it would leave a bitter aftertaste. His brother agrees.

** Also, even to save his friends, Edward finds himself unable to shoot at anybody, even his {{spoiler|virtually immortal}} enemies.

** Al (the manga version) on the other hand? Not so much.

*** Al only concedes to use the Stone because he's helping to save humanity, not himself. Ed did try to shoot Envy, but the gun was clogged by blood. Also, these examples are fairly reasonable. What really doesn't make sense is the finale, where he actually is offered a chance to fix anything that really won't cost anyone anything in the long run, because {{spoiler|Hohenheim was dying anyway}} and he turns it down. Probably a good thing, though, because there's a chance that Hohenheim would have ended up [[And I Must Scream|stuck in the Gate.]] However, this is because Ed and Al believe that it's their own fault for losing their bodies, and won't have anyone pay for their mistake, even their own father, so that's still an example of this trope.

* A rare villain example in the form of Kimblee. As despicable as he seems, he still has his code of honor which he never breaks {{spoiler|even to save his own life, or at least keep his soul from fading away.}} Had Kimblee simply stood by as Pride {{spoiler|attempted to [[Grand Theft Me|steal Ed's body]] when his own was disentegrating}}, he might have even been able to reassert his own consciousness over Pride's at a later point.

== ''[[Gundam]]'' ==

* Played straight with Kira Yamato, the protagonist of ''[[Mobile Suit Gundam SEED|Gundam SEED]]''. He realizes that although stopping one's enemies without murdering them may be difficult, but doing otherwise would breed more hatred and thus not bring an end to war. [[Justified Trope|Of course,]] [[Improbable Aiming Skills|his aim is so good]] [[Beam Spam|and his arsenal so large]] [[The Ace|that against anything other than a top ace]] [[Martial Pacifist|the fact that he shoots to disable rather than destroy]] [[One-Man Army|really makes no difference at all.]]

** In the sequel series he takes this to ridiculous levels, allowing himself to be defeated losing his mecha and seriously risking his own death rather than allow his side to wipe out an enemy force instead they try to outrun and only disable and shoot near misses. He also refuses to hold a grudge and kill enemy pilot Shinn Asuka when the guy has nearly killed him and killed countless pilots on his side and it's clear the man as a very nasty vendetta against him.

* Played equally straight, previously, with Shiro Amada of ''[[Mobile Suit Gundam: The 08th MS Team]]'', who believed in killing only as an absolute last resort, despite being the commander of a mobile suit unit.

** And the fact that Zeon ''gassed his home colony in front of him during the first week of the gas'' doesn't change his mind about this. They're a reason why people laughed in his face when talking about this.

* Both these instances can be traced back to Judau Ashta from ''[[Mobile Suit Gundam ZZ|Gundam ZZ]]'' who began acting like this about the same time they touched down on Earth and the show started [[Growing the Beard]], simply because he couldn't handle any more death. Sometimes it actually worked, such as with Masai and Puru 2. However, it usually failed miserably (the death of the entire Blue Team, Rommel, {{spoiler|Chara Soon}}, and Haman). At the end of the series, having born witness to the Federation dragging its heels before mobilizing a fleet to defeat Neo Zeon and showing up after the battle was over, he was at the breaking point. To let him blow off steam, Bright let Judau deck him in the face... [[Crowning Moment of Awesome|something awesome for both of them.]]

* Then there's Char Aznable in ''[[Chars Counterattack]]'', who purposefully leaked the specs for the cutting-edge Psycoframe system, knowing that Amuro would get it and have it built into his next Gundam. The reason he did this was because he thought there would be no point in defeating Amuro if he and Amuro weren't evenly-matched in the battle.

* In ''[[Mobile Suit Gundam Wing|Gundam Wing]]'', Wufei tracks down Treize Khushrenada in an attempt to kill him to prevent him from taking control of the Earth Sphere Alliance. However, instead of blowing Treize to smithereens with his Gundam, Wufei accepts a challenge to a sword duel from Treize which he loses. Treize reciprocates Wufei's earlier gesture of honor and allows him to leave in his Gundam rather than seizing the state-of-the-art machine for study or reverse-engineering. Wufei departs--again passing up the perfectly good chance to eliminate the would-be dictator with superior firepower.

* In ''Endless Waltz'', Zechs, Noin, and the Wing boys also do this. After they defeat hundreds of enemy mobile suits without killing a single soldier, Quatre comments that if they were fighting to kill, they could have blown through the Mariemeia Army far more easily, but then there would have been no point to their intervention.

* In ''[[Mobile Suit Gundam 00|Gundam 00]]'', Graham Aker is the embodiment of this trope. "Sounds reasonable! Too bad I'm an unreasonable man!!!".

** Especially pronounced in the second season where he and Setsuna are duelling over an ocean. Setsuna's Gundam malfunctions in the middle of the fight and Graham leaves him be because he can't see any value in defeating a disabled opponent.

== ''[[One Piece]]'' ==

* [[Lovable Sex Maniac]] Sanji is completely [[Wouldn't Hit a Girl|unwilling to hit a female]] for any reason whatsoever. This has very nearly cost him his life on more than one occasion, and he's been called out on it as well. Sanji is fully aware of this, but this rule is so ingrained in him that he can not and will not break it for anything.

* Sanji also straight up used this trope when, against the advice from his crewmates, gave food to starving and obviously evil pirates who then immediately attacked him. Sanji then said that he stood by his decision.

** Because he {{spoiler|starved almost to death as a kid}} starving is something he literally does not wish on his worst enemy. No exceptions.

* Another Sanji example is his fight against Wanze; Despite being the strongest of the three (Franky, Usopp, and him), he opts to fight the relatively-weak Wanze due to his honor as a cook even though there are stronger agents ahead.

* Also Whitebeard, who'd do truly outrageous and insane things to protect his sons. He is however opposed to rushing in half-cocked, and makes sure to use strategy and not just brute force.

* Nami's adoptive mom, Bellemere, essentially chose to be executed rather than disavow being Nami's mother. On the other hand, the doctor and Genzo point out afterward that their plan to send Nojiko and Nami out to sea to spare them from being discovered wouldn't have worked, as the fishmen had sunk all the boats, and Bellemere, having been a former Marine, ''knew'' it would have been impossible to resist the Fishmen, so it's likely Bellemere thought things through more than it seemed.

* Interestingly, despite being the main character, Luffy doesn't usually follow this trope to arbitrary levels. You couldn't ask for a truer friend, but he's made it clear that he does what ''he'' wants to do, and doesn't care if other people disapprove. He's also willing to break a promise if he gets angry enough.

* Although, in one story, Luffy refused to fight Smoker during the Punk Hazard arc after discovering that Smoker and Tashigi were victims of a [[Freaky Friday Flip]], a situation clearly detrimental to their ability to fight; Luffy didn't hesitate to laugh a little though, even though Smoker ''seriously'' [[Dude, Not Funny| didn't find it funny.]]

* The mayor of the town Buggy is attacking in the Buggy arc tries to stand up to the pirates, prompting Luffy to punch him out. He later realizes that he was wrong and is grateful to Luffy for stopping him from throwing his life away.

== ''[[Ranma ½]]'' ==

* ''[[Ranma ½]]'' would be considerably less funny [[Pillars of Moral Character|without this]]. It also would've been much much shorter.

* This can actually be considered an element of Ranma's fighting style; whenever challenged to one of the various [[Martial Arts and Crafts]], he always has to [[Beat Them At Their Own Game]], even if he has only a minimum amount of time to pick up the rules and despite the fact he's usually going against a champion of that style. During the Martial Arts Dining arc; despite the fact Ranma is clearly starving, s/he insists that s/he will only eat what s/he ''earns'' from the table/arena. In the anime, at least, s/he even goes so far as to turn down Akane when she offers her fiancé some smuggled food. This almost results in Ranma losing the contest when his/her frantic efforts at both fighting and thinking up counters burn out what little energy s/he has left.

* Nodoka Saotome and her [[Seppuku]] pledge is a rather darkly humorous take on this, seeing as how the so-called "pledge" is ambiguous as all hell (It was that Ranma would grow up to be 'manly'). While the series' heavy reliance on [[Rule of Funny]] ultimately leaves the audience [[Like You Would Really Do It|too skeptical to believe the threat would ever REALLY be carried out,]] all the evidence in the series is that, if Ranma thought he had sufficiently disappointed his mother, ''he would go through with it''. This is despite the fact that Ranma was about a year old when he 'agreed' to it.

* One thing that often gets over looked is that Ranma's father Genma, despite being [[Dirty Coward]], has come up with two super-powered techniques which he ''never'' uses simply because he vowed not to. He holds to this even when he's getting beaten senseless and could easily wipe the floor with his attacker if he broke them out. He'd also submit to the Seppuku thing if he was called on it (of course, in typical Genma fashion, the trick is arranging matters so that he ver does actually get called on it). Honour is a finely tuned thing.

== Other works ==

* Kamina in episode 1 of ''[[Gurren Lagann]]'' does this by deliberately attracting his opponent's attention, ruining Yoko's fight-ending shot in the process.

** Essential to the [[Twist Ending]] of "Endless Odyssesy": {{spoiler|Harlock promises early into the series that he will help Tadashi Daiba succeed in his vow to kill the man who murdered his father, commenting on his belief that a man cannot break a promise and anyone who would break a promise or an oath is not a man. After Nu is defeated, he then reveals that ''he'' was the one who killed Daiba's father, as he had promised to do so if Tsuyoshi Daiba gave in to his hunger for knowledge and betrayed humanity to Nu. He repeats what Tsuyoshi's spirit had earlier revealed to Tadashi, that he has vowed to Tsuyoshi to kill Tadashi if he [[I Want to Be a Real Man|cannot become a man]], and firmly declares that Tadashi either kill him or be shot down.}}

* ''[[Pumpkin Scissors]]'': [[Action Girl|2nd Lt. Alice L. Malvin]] has made it her mission to help people and to repair the damage done to her nation by the recent war. This means that she will not hesitate to call out ''anyone'' who she sees as contributing to or aggravating that damage, up to and including [[The Emperor]] of her own country, regardless of how capable they might be of physically or politically squashing her like a bug.