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This is basically the polar opposite of [[Complete Monster]].
 
Often, this is a key element of an [[Idiot Hero]], [[The Ace]], [[The Cape (trope)|The Cape]], [[The Messiah]] and [[The Pollyanna]] played straight. Heroes like these are often [[Evil Cannot Comprehend Good|sneered]] at as being [[Silly Rabbit, Idealism Is for Kids|unrealistic]] or [[Good Is Old-Fashioned|old-fashioned]], when compared to [[Anti-Hero|Anti Heroes]]—and [[Dumb Is Good|naive]], [[Evil Cannot Comprehend Good|regardless of whether they actually are]]. To some extent, there is truth in this perception—since such characters do not take part in, or potentially even understand, the daily ethical compromises that most people make, they can find it difficult to interact with the rest of society, and thus can come off as somewhat of a [[Socially Awkward Hero]]. Ironically, however, a [[Knight in Sour Armor|certain brand of Anti Heroantihero]] can actually approach this type, in an odd way. Particularly a [[Sliding Scale of Anti-Heroes|type two antihero.]]
 
In fantasy stories, this might allow the hero access to weapons (often made of [[Silver Has Mystic Powers]]) or magic for [[Only the Pure of Heart]]. Might lead to a [[100% Adoration Rating|Hundred Percent100% Adoration]] or [[100% Heroism Rating|Heroism Rating]]. Be wary that they might be [[Too Good for This Sinful Earth]]. Also very likely to be a [[Celibate Hero]]—this is one of the cases where [[A Man Is Not a Virgin]] does not apply.
 
This is what the [[Knight Templar]] and the [[Well-Intentioned Extremist]] tend to think they are.
 
See also [[Honor Before Reason]] and [[Good Is Not Dumb]]. Contrast [[Pure Is Not Good]]. This is the trope the [[Wide-Eyed Idealist]] aims for and falls short of reaching.
 
{{noreallife|this is a trope about how characters are depicted in media.}}
{{examples}}
 
== Anime and Manga ==
* Belldandy from ''[[Ah! My Goddess]]'' pretty much defines the concept of an impossibly pure-hearted person. That besides, in the Season 1 Finale against the Lord of Terror, {{spoiler|when Keiichi is infected by the Lord of Terror and possessed, she offers to take his place as the host. Seeing the opportunity to get rid of the human body he was using, the Lord of Terror separated himself from Keiichi to infect Belldandy, but COULDN'T'couldn't''. She was simply far too pure. Because he had to move into something else, having detached himself, he moves into a nearby Floppyfloppy disk, leading to his defeat ... [[Crowning Moment of Funny|at the hands of Skuld, armed with a smallmetal magneticpin to flip the floopy from read-write to read-only and a small barmagnet.]]}}
** In the OVA, herBelldandy's angel is ripped out and replaced by a demon. Two minutes later, the demon radiates happiness and sparkles.
** Or the fact that the most evilestevil thing she could think of doing, was jaywalking.
** And Keiichi is no slouch, either.{{context}}
* Tomo from ''[[Seikon no Qwaser]]'' is a good example of this. She (while under her own influence and not {{spoiler|[[Brainwashed and Crazy]]}}) has NEVER done anything remotely evil or malicious, and is so pure -hearted [[The Hero|Alexander]] is actually more drawn to her than the female protagonist at first. In fact, she's so pure -hearted, the [[Ineffectual Sympathetic Villain]] finds it impossible to even attempt to do anything malicious to her as a result.
* One of Kenshiro's defining traits in ''[[Fist of the North Star]]''. Kenshiro does NOT do anything evil, will NOT tolerate any evil around him and trying to tempt him out of the righteous path will NOT end well for the offending party. He does, however, kill lots of people all the time.
* ''[[Sailor Moon]]''.: Usagi Tsukino is the embodiment of unconditional love and forgiveness.
* In [[Soul Eater]] Subverted: {{spoiler|Justin Law is apparently naturally lacking in madness but ends up being corrupted and defects to follow the Kishin.}}
* This is played straight and then averted with the titular heroine of ''[[Revolutionary Girl Utena]]''. It almost seems as though she ''strives'' to be this because of her desire to become a prince. It also helps that she is thoroughly naive and often refuses to give a deeper look into the problems of the people surrounding her. Several characters try to take advantage of her because of this. {{spoiler|[[Anything That Moves|Akio]], who will sleep with anyone and whom Utena has fallen in love with, succeeds. She sleeps with him in a blink-and-you-miss-it scene from a ''clip show'' episode, of all things.}}
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* Hayate ofk ''[[Hayate the Combat Butler]]'' may be a very capable fighter, but any moral issues at best push him into a bumbling mess of nerves. Annoyances don't even corrupt him.
* Noelle from ''[[Tenshi ni Narumon]]'' is pretty much goodness and pureness incarnated - unfortunately with a side effect of having brain capacity of a 3 year old (while technically being 15).
* Nana from ''[[Elfen Lied]]'' adheres to this entirely, never mind the fact that she is genetically predispositionedpredisposed towards genocide, or the fact that she is always being made to suffer horribly. She's so good you could probably consider it a psychological disorder for her.
** It has been stated that her personality was crafted as a mental defense to avoid going mad due to the horrific conditions of her life, so yeah, it might just be a mental disorder. [[The Woobie|Poor Nana...]]
* In one ''[[Ranma ½]]'' OVA Kasumi Tendou is possessed by a demon, which gives her horns. She's so pure -hearted the demon can't make her do anything evilworse that cut up the tablecloth.
* Vash from ''[[Trigun]]'' takes this to ridiculous levels. He's so pure it's utterly contagious.
* ''[[Gundam Seed]]'': Lacus Clyne. First, she appears to be a very naive innocent girl. Later, it is obvious she's way smarter than [[Obfuscating Stupidity|she acts]], but she's still an [[Actual Pacifist]] (aware that sometimes you need to use weapons to bring everyone to peace negotiations), and she can forgive everything once you join her fight for peace. Actually, everyone who sides with her is so much under her influence that they welcome former enemies with open arms. Athrun implied in ''[[Gundam Seed Destiny]]'' that she has little interest in sex, and she acts with Kira as if she doesn't even kiss on the mouth before wedding.
 
 
== Comic Books ==
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** It helps that, unlike [[Dysfunction Junction|many of the other heroes of his generation]], he had (and still has) a loving and supportive family and network of friends.
* The list of people that Eclipso can't take over is absurdly small. However Eclipso was genuinely surprised at how little evil there was in Superman.
* With most of the [[X-Men (Comic Book)|X-Men]] being a lineup of [[Anti-Hero|Anti Heroes]]es, one exception stands out in the form of Colossus, a genuine [[Nice Guy]] and [[The Cape (trope)|all 'round hero.]] His spirit is so pure that it (and the steel in his body) actually cause harm to most evil supernatural forces the X-Men fight. Just... don't tick him off. [[Beware the Nice Ones|Seriously, don't.]]
** Same with his good friend Nightcrawler; a deeply religious and good mutant who looks like a demon, who actually attempted to become a priest, and when faced with a [[Deal with the Devil]] tried to punch said devil in the face. He even makes friends with the incredibly [[Anti-Hero]] Wolverine.
* [[Captain America (comics)|Captain America]], who stands out as one of the few truly idealistic heroes in the [[Marvel Universe]].
* [[The Mighty Thor|Thor]] is often shown in this light as well. Only the purest of heart are able to wield his hammer. The list of people able to do so is pretty short (so far Beta Ray Bill, Captain America, Dr. Doom [huh?], Wonder Woman, Superman [the latter only sometimes] and a [[The Real Heroes|random paramedic]] who handed it to Thor before vanishing into the crowd. [[Word of God|Dan Slott]] has claimed that, in the future, Eddie Brock will wind up bearing the mantle as a ''What-If?''-type story).
*** Well, [[Pure Is Not Good|Doom's hatred for Reed Richards is]] [[Exact Words|as pure as you can get.]]
* [[Spider-Man (Comic Book)|Spider-Man]] is one of these. He always does the morally upright thing, even if doing so is insanely stupid (for example he constantly saves his attackers from deadly situations, and in the event of a villain vs. villain fight he'll side with the losing party to prevent one from killing the other).
** He once defeated a villain that wanted to absorb and become him by the sheer force of his character - after defeating Spider-Man and having him at his mercy, the villain realized that he couldn't kill him and take his place since Spider-Man had never killed anyone, even in his decade long career as a crimefightercrime-fighter. He promptly gave up and left.
** One of the driving forces of the character is that he is so strongly compelled to do what he sees as the right thing that he can't give up being a super hero, even with all the misery and ruined relationships that it brings to his life.
** At least, [[One More Day|he used to be...]]
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* [[Depending on the Writer]], [[Batman]] also counts as a [[Good Is Not Nice|not exactly nice example]]. ''[[The Dark Knight]]'' has the Joker enjoying this fact, as the truly incorruptible Batman provides him an eternal opponent.
** Batman is sometimes depicted as being more incorruptible than Superman, such as in ''The Dark Knight Returns''. The difference between them seems to be that Superman doesn't want to cross the line, where Batman ''does'' but simply can't bring himself to do it. Thus, Superman is good out of a desire to be good, while Batman is good because he is unable to be anything else, which makes him the incorruptible one.
* Likewise, one of the major themes of ''[[Daredevil]]'' is invoking, subverting and playing with this trope. Matt Murdock created the Daredevil persona in order to rectify his Catholic faith with the fact that he saw evil to be fought against, distancing the actions from his "real" self. Just about every writer of the character since [[Frank Miller]] likes to put Murdock through hell just to show that while someone pure of heart may bend when confronted with the evils of the world, ''he won't break''.
* Oddly enough, of all people Norrin Radd, aka the [[Silver Surfer]], often has this trait. Despite being the herald of a [[Planet Eater|world-eating]] [[Eldritch Abomination]]. One of the reasons they call him Space Surfer Jesus.
{{quote|'''Silver Surfer:''' I will not kill.
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* [[The Flash|Bart Allen]], especially as Impulse, is made of everything good in the world. In 'The Future is Now' storyline, he chooses good over evil despite three of his oldest friends going bad in a [[Knight Templar|WE ARE JUSTICE]] sorta way.
* The [[Silver Surfer]], to the point that Mephisto, basically the devil, wants his soul because it its the purest he's ever seen - corrputing it would be his greatest accomplishment. Even one early issue in which the Surfer gets good and pissed with the fact that [[Humans Are the Real Monsters|Humans Are Bastards]] and decides to exact a little payback, Mephisto doesn't say "yay, he's fallen!" No, he totally doesn't buy it, and sighs that Surfie's probably going to calm down in a few minutes and undo any damage he did and in the end nobody'd really get hurt. This is of course exactly what happens. So even on his ''worst day,'' the devil knows not to get his hopes up about the Silver Surfer getting any tarnish. ''That's'' pure.
 
 
== Fairy Tales ==
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** Also from [[Hans Christian Andersen]], Eliza in ''The Wild Swans''. When her stepmother uses [[curse]]d toads on her:
{{quote|Had not the creatures been venomous or been kissed by the witch, they would have been changed into red roses. At all events they became flowers, because they had rested on Eliza's head, and on her heart. She was too good and too innocent for witchcraft to have any power over her.}}
 
 
== Film ==
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* Implied to be the case with Princess Tamina and her ancestresses in ''[[Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time|Prince of Persia the Sands of Time]]''. According to the backstory she tells to Prince Dastan, she is descended from a girl who managed to prevent the gods from destroying all of mankind through the wish of her pure heart that humanity would be spared.
* This is literally the reason why [[Captain America: The First Avenger|Steve Rogers]] became the ideal Super-Soldier in the form of the heroic Captain America.
 
 
== Legends ==
* While most of the [[Knight in Shining Armor|knights]] in Thomas Malory's ''[[Le Morte d'Arthur|Le Morte Darthur]]'' are not exactly corrupt, when the Grail [[The Quest|quest]] arrives, it finds that they are proud, violent, and unchaste. The honor of actually finding the Grail is reserved for Galahad, Percival and Bors. (Even Bors was not perfect, but was allowed because of the perfection of his repentance).
 
 
== Literature ==
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* In [[Gene Stratton Porter]]'s ''Michael O'Halloran'', Mickey
{{quote|''I heard a little lad saying the things that are in the blood and bone of the men money can't buy and corruption can't break''.}}
 
 
== Live-Action TV ==
* Kenneth the page in ''[[30 Rock|Thirty Rock]]'' retains his sunny optimism despite being surrounded by unscrupulous business men and jaded industry types.
** Probably the best example is the season 4 finale, in which he is unjustly fired. He crashes a party and announces that he's finally going to tell everyone present how he ''really'' feels about them and the way they have treated him over the years...he loved every minute of it and will see them all in heaven. Combines [[Crowning Moment of Funny]] and [[Crowning Moment of Heartwarming]].
** In another episode, Jack, who is actively trying to corrupt Kenneth and test his virtue, traps him in an elevator with eight other people and informs him that since there is only enough oxygen for eight to survive long enough to be rescued, one person has to die (via the conveniently placed pistol in the phonebox). Kenneth immediately grabs the pistol and tries to blow his own brains out, and when it turns out to be unloaded (duh), tries to strangle himself with his belt. This causes Jack to flee from the elevator, [[Evil Cannot Comprehend Good|completely unnerved]] and spluttering "What is ''wrong'' with you??"
* [[Mister Rogers' Neighborhood|Fred Rogers]] might very well have been a real-life version of this trope. Let's face it, the man was just ''GOODgood.'' Pure and simple.
* Fraser in ''[[Due South]]'' . He's a [[Always Gets His Man|mountieMountie]], gosh darn it!
* The 1998 ''[[Merlin (TV miniseries)|Merlin]]'' series repeatedly subverts this, as Vortigern, Uther, Lancelot, and Guinevere do not turn out to be the saintly people they were originally thought to be. Played straight with Arthur, however, and implied with Galahad.
* Alexis, [[Nathan Fillion|Castle]]'s daughter in [[Castle]]. In one episode, Castle gets paranoid about his teenage daughter having done something illegal, like drugs. Alexis assures him that she's not and hasn't been in any kind of trouble. The next morning, Alexis wakes him up, tearful and guilt-ridden about having lied to him in their earlier heart-to-heart, and painfully forces herself to confess the truth... she once jumped a subway turnstile without paying when she had a desperate need to catch the train. (The next she swiped her card twice and didn't ride to make up for it.) He punishes her. With mandatory ice cream for breakfast. She has to punish '''herself''' with being grounded for a week.
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* Ximena Fernandez, the teacher from ''[[Carrusel]]''. She never does anything objectionable and is always kind and follows her good morals. Also, Daniel Zapata and Carmen Carrillo never seem to get into trouble, are kind to everyone, and do well in school.
* ''[[My Wife and Kids]]'' has Tony, Claire's boyfriend, as this.
 
 
== Newspaper Comics ==
* The [[Calvin and Hobbes]] page image is from a story that {{spoiler|just barely subverts this. The guy vanishes into thin air upon having an evil thought.}}
 
 
== Professional Wrestling ==
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** Eve recently averted this by turning heel.
* [[Wrestler/Sting|Sting]]. (He ''has'' been a heel a few times, but many fans either don't remember or don't care.)
 
 
== Tabletop Games ==
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*** Though that has a lot to do with them being already corrupted [[Our Werewolves Are Different|in a different way.]]
* [[Deconstructed Trope|Deconstructed]] by the Unconquered Sun in ''[[Exalted]]''. He's pure in four different ways that don't interact well, and deals with the stress by hanging out playing the Games of Divinity for, oh...about the last two thousand years.
 
 
== Theater ==
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* The protagonist Violane in the play ''L'Annonce faite à Marie'' (''[http://www.archive.org/stream/tidingsbroughtto00clau/tidingsbroughtto00clau_djvu.txt The Tidings Brought to Mary]'') by Paul Claudel. Violane is moved by pity to kiss a leper, and gives him her engagement ring to help finance the church. This of course does not sit well with her fiancée Jacques—especially now that she has contracted leprosy herself. Jacques marries Violane's sister instead, but when their child dies, the saintly Violane, blind and forsaken in the lepers' colony, brings the kid back to life.
* Daesdaemona in [[William Shakespeare]]'s ''[[Othello]]'' is the embodiment of rational virtue. As such, she is as incorruptible as it gets.
 
 
== Video Games ==
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* Pit and {{spoiler|Dark Pit}} from [[Kid Icarus: Uprising]] have shown to be this. The best example is the Mirror of Truth, which is supposed to reflect the dark side of someone who looks into it. Pandora tricked Pit into breaking it and creating Dark Pit, but Dark Pit ends up being neutral at worse. However the game implies that {{spoiler|Dark Pit is just as pure or more pure hearted than Pit as shown in the Chaos Kin arc. Viridi says that the Chaos Kin only feeds on the purest of souls and the Chaos Kin ash idol states that Dark Pit was needed to be revived. Hades also says that Pittoo's soul is different from the rest of the souls he could eat.}} In other words, {{spoiler|Pit's darkness is also pure}} which says something about his character.
 
== Web Comics ==
 
== Webcomics ==
* Piffany the cleric in ''[[Nodwick]]'' is so full of incorruptibly pure pureness that she had only one utterly trivial entry in the universal [https://web.archive.org/web/20100819104757/http://nodwick.humor.gamespy.com/gamespyarchive/index.php?date=2008-09-17 Book of Misdeeds].
** She's so pure, in fact, that she's been known to motivate those with terminally tarnished souls just by the threat of making her cry.
** She's so pure she can make ''[[Jerkass|Artax and Yeager]]'' do good.
** From her official bio: ''Piffany is the epitome of goodness, sweetness, and light. Her birth was said to be heralded by rainbows, songbirds singing in three-part harmony, and her entire village having a "nice day." She was given to her clerical order by her parents, who reportedly were sleep-deprived due to Piffany's 300-watt halo of purity keeping them (and most surrounding farm animals) awake at night.''
** Suffice it to say, Piffany is such a pure example of this trope, there's justification to rename it "The Piffany".
* Kiki from ''[[Sluggy Freelance]]'' has never intentionally caused anyone any harm and seems to love everyone. Unfortunately, she's also a [[Too Dumb to Live|colossal idiot]] and [[Genki Girl]], so the amount of harm she causes ''unintentionally'' can be quite staggering.
** Her counterpart Good Bun-Bun from the Dimension of Lame has a similar purity, although he's smarter than she is. Actually, ''all'' of the people in that dimension are completely non-violent, kindhearted and incorruptible, which turns out not to be a good thing. When he's about to leave that world, Torg said to Good Bun-Bun, "You're the only one who's been straight with me in this entire world."
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* Somewhat subverted or parodied with Joyce from the [[Walkyverse]]. She was so innocent that she was the only one immune to the Aliens' torture of choice: being forced to watch ''[[The Sound of Music]]''. So they showed her pornography instead. Despite being a college student, she had no idea of how human sexuality worked, and this [[Heroic BSOD|messed her up]] so badly that she used an alien memory erasure device to delete ''all her memories'', and it takes her years to get them back. Although she has since matured to the point where "pre-marital hanky-panky" no longer bothers her (and she frequently engages in such with her fiance Walky), she is still the nicest, sweetest, most innocent person you are likely to ever meet.
* Claire of ''[[Sister Claire]]'' has but one vice in all the world; she loves cats, and can't help stopping to play with them should she meet any outside the walls of the convent (which is actually more serious than you might think, since the nun who is her mentor and mother-figure is flagrantly allergic to cats and even a little bit of fur on Claire's clothes will cause her to swell up like something funny that swells up really big). She's vaguely aware of the ''existence'' of evil but has difficulty conceiving of it in others (with the possible exception of Sister Marguerite, with whom an antagonistic relationship would be an improvement for poor Claire). Her chipper innocence almost gets her in serious trouble when Gabrielle takes her to a supernatural nightclub.
 
 
== Western Animation ==
* [[Transformers|Optimus Prime]]. There's a reason no other leader of the Autobots has gone uncontested.
* ''[[Moral Orel]]'', as stated in the abovepage quote. Orel lives in a [[Crapsack World]] of [[Stepford Smiler]]s but continues to be a genuinely nice, moral, faithful, and kind person... and it pisses his father off to no end. Even after he's {{spoiler|become disillusioned after trying so hard and failing to find any reason to honor his selfish, abusive, philandering asshole of a father, and the series ends with a grown-up Orel with his wife and children, there's a ''picture of said asshole father'' still on the wall, implying that Orel's come to graceful terms with it, and keeps him in his life.}}
** Even when demonstrated to not be fully immune to corruption it is never his fault, due to some adult giving him terrible advice.
* Butters Stotch. ''[[South Park]]'' keeps on using him as [[The Chew Toy]], but he remains relatively well-adjusted despite almost hitting the breaking point a couple of times. Even when he [[Poke the Poodle|tries to be evil]], he fails miserably.
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* ''[[Samurai Jack]]'', to the point where he was able to resist being ''stabbed through the chest'' by his own weapon because of his purity.
** There ''was'' a notable instance of Aku manifesting Jack's evils (anger and battle-lust - basically the sin of Wrath - which culminates in a frustrated Jack attacking his shoe) as Dark Jack. The episode turns into a [[Double Subversion]] when Jack defeats the Dark clone by simply calming down and purging himself of those thoughts. Not completely incorruptible, but very close.
* Aang of ''<nowiki>[[Avatar: The Last Airbender]]</nowiki>'' aims for this. He has faltered (especially when Appa and Katara were endangered), but in the end he achieves this.
* Ned Flanders from ''[[The Simpsons]]'', [[Flanderization|especially]] in the early seasons.
* ''[[The Zeta Project]]'' gives us Zeta, who in essence becomes this after his moral epiphany during the pilot. Though he did immoral things before handbeforehand, once he obtains sentience he becomes a soft spoken, loving, gentle, compassionate person who is innocent to the ways of the world. He seems to have a self -imposed moral code of never killing anyone and doing his best not to hurt anybody, and his sincerest wish is to live his life peacefully.
* Princess Tenko from ''[[Tenko and the Guardians of the Magic]]'' is "always pure of heart and soul" and a good example of a [[Purity Sue]].
* ''[[Jimmy Two-Shoes]]''. The entire show is about a guy who is [[The Pollyanna]] while being trapped in [[Hell]].
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* The Flash in ''[[Justice League]]''. [[Word of God]] said that they had to kill him off in the [[Knight Templar|Justice Lord timeline]] because they couldn't think of ''anything'' that would make him willingly [[Face Heel Turn]]. In-universe, Wally's absence is what lets the normally incorruptible League fall off the path.
** As noted in the Comic Book section, Captain Marvel in this series as well.
* In the season 2 premiere of ''[[My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic|My Little Pony Friendship Is Magic]]'', [[Manipulative Bastard]] [[Beware the Silly Ones|Dis]][[Manipulative Bastard|cordDiscord]] goes out to [[Corrupt the Cutie|corrupt the mane six]]. He manages to easily brainwash four of them into becoming the opposite of their respective Elements of Harmony (such as Applejack, the Element of Honesty, becoming a perpetual liar). Fluttershy, however, is ''so'' pure and nice, that he has to just brainwash her with brute force.
** Princess Celestia, probably. We've only seen her get even slightly angry twice, and both were rather extreme circumstances. The return of a tyrannical, reality warping, anthropomorphic personification who wanted to make existence a living hell for all her subjects, and her favorite student inadvertently brainwashing the whole town into a brawl simply so she could complete a school assignment. All other times, Celestia has shown the patience and virtue of a saint, and was rather forgiving on the second mentioned occasion.
 
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