My Greatest Failure: Difference between revisions
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See [[Dead Little Sister]] and [[I Let Gwen Stacy Die]] for two of the more common failures. Might result in [[We Used to Be Friends]]. Often happens to heroes who fail to [[Must Make Amends|make amends]]. Can be a [[Career-Building Blunder]]. When the failure is what put the character on the path to being the current (better) person s/he is now, it's [[Necessary Fail]]. If the plot brings about an opportunity to correct or make up for their failure, you have [[My Greatest Second Chance]].
{{examples}}▼
▲{{examples}}
== [[Anime]] and [[Manga]] ==
* To ''[[Naruto]]'', his not being able to save either Sasuke or Gaara is this, especially in the infamous [[Tear Jerker]] where he thinks he is useless for not being able to save either. Thankfully, Gaara gets better in the physical sense. Mentally with {{spoiler|Sasuke}} however, [[It Gets Worse]].
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* In the horror manga ''Presents'', Kurumi recalls an incident with a young girl whose parents would give stuffed rabbit toys as a substitute for love. Kurumi takes pity on the girl and, even though she knows better, lies and says each rabbit is stuffed with her parents' love. The next morning, however, they are anything ''but'' loving, and the housekeeper tells the girl the only reason her mother had her was to replace a pet rabbit that died. The girl violently snaps, and later that night she cuts open her parents with a pair of hedge trimmers before tearing the stuffing out of the rabbit toys and stuffing into their dead bodies. It's implied she does the same thing to the housekeeper to "share" her parents love.
* In ''[[Magic Knight Rayearth]]'', {{spoiler|being unable to save Princess Emeraude}} is considered this for Hikaru, Umi and Fuu. Mostly because they powered through the entire adventure, thinking it was completely straightforward and never thought twice about questioning their mission. It's so bad that, in the anime, Hikaru accidentally creates her own [[Evil Twin]].
== [[Comic Books]] ==
* [[Spider-Man (Comic Book)|Spider Man]] didn't stop the burglar that would shoot his Uncle Ben (in various tellings, because of spite, laziness, or arrogance); later, he was unable to prevent his girlfriend Gwen Stacy from being killed by the Green Goblin. The latter is not helped by how his using his webbing in an attempt to save her caused her neck to snap from the recoil, a fact Marvel initially attempted to gloss over but has recently admitted (through, among others, ''What If?'' - where he saves her by diving in after her instead - and ''[[Spider-Girl]]'').
** For his foe [[Da Editor| J. Jonah Jameson]], it was definitely the Scorpion. Jonah paid private eye MacDonald Gargan to undergo an experiment that would make him strong enough to subdue and defeat the hero. The scientist conducting the experiment warned both of them that he "didn't know how it will affect your brain" but they went ahead with it anyway; true to the scientist's fears, Gargan was driven insane, becoming more of a threat than Spider-Man could ever become. Jonah has never even tried to blame this on Spider-Man (at least in any convincing way); after the Hobgoblin tried to blackmail Jonah about Gargan, the publisher has taken full responsibility for the villain, and to this day, pays for Gargan's psychiatric treatment out of his own pocket and orchestrates compensations funds to aid victims of the villain's crimes. And to make it worse for Jonah, Gargan hates him even more than he hates Spider-Man for what happened to him.
* [[Batman]] blamed himself for the death of sidekick Jason Todd aka the second Robin. As well, some versions of the story have him blaming himself for the death of his parents. (Notably, in ''[[Batman Begins]]'', Bruce blames himself for the death of his parents, as they encountered Joe Chill after leaving the opera because Bruce was frightened by the bat-demon characters.)
** That's not the only form of blaming himself for his parents - in some comics versions, he convinced his mother to wear pearls to the show, and those pearls are the reason they get robbed and shot.
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** In some continuities, at least, there's also Harvey Dent, who Batman saw a a friend and ally that could really clean up Gotham in ways he himself could not - until Harvey became Two-Face.
** For a time, he considered making Jean-Paul Valley Batman this, saying that it was done at a moment of weakness and it was a mistake.
** Batman later had a more recent one where he explicitly acknowledges that he and the rest of the Batfamily terribly mishandled the death of Alfred Pennyworth, and Damian's reaction to it, recognizing that Damian was suffering from a tremendous guilt that the Batfamily should have addressed in a better way, with Bruce never once calling Damian out for running away, acknowledging that the Bat family fully deserved Damian's scorn and making a much better attempt to be present to atone for it.
* At various points in his history, [[Superman]] has had the bottled city of Kandor to deal with. More recently, he's had the only time he's ever had to kill someone; this caused him to actually leave Earth for a while.
** Of course, now that one's only sorta in continuity. Hell remembers it enough to have one (1) demon capable of trying to corrupt Superman, but the man himself doesn't remember it.
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* In ''[[The Sandman]]'', the immortal Hob Gadling will never forgive himself for having made his fortune in the slave trade.
* [[Nightwing]] had a moment revealed following ''[[Zero Hour]]''. When he was Robin, it was up to him to rescue Batman and the DA that replaced Harvey Dent when he became Two-Face. When he confronted the aforementioned villain, he was planning to hang the both of them for their "crimes". Two-Face attempted to hang the DA and Robin responded by cutting the line with a Batarang. However, he didn't realize that Two-Face's MO applied to everything - he saved the DA from hanging, but couldn't save him from ''drowning''. Batman freed himself and saved the day, but the event haunted Dick until the first time he took up the Mantle of the Bat, finally making the save when confronting Two-Face again.
** Another moment for Nightwing would be when Bane killed Alfred, as Nightwing was suffering under an alternative personality at the time, which meant he never got to see Alfred again and led to severe fallout in the Batfamily, which Nightwing believes he could have stopped it. Very tellingly, Nightwing has used his new fortune to improve the lives of people in Bludhaven at Alfred's request in his will, rather than use it as [[Crimefighting with Cash]].
* Talia al Ghul, at least [[Depending on the Writer]] heavily implies she sees her prior treatment of Damian Wayne as this. While how much of an [[Abusive Parents|bad mother]] she was to him will always vary, the best depictions of her at least try to be a better parent than Ra's was to her, but were undermined by Ra's being a constant presence, while at worst she actively encouraged Damian to believe in Ra's mission and embrace it. More recent stories have emphasized this and she has frequently called out Ra's and respected Damian's choices.
== [[Film]] ==
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* Averted hard in [[Iron Man 2]], with Tony's dad appearing on some old film stating that his greatest achievement would always be [[Tear Jerker|Tony himself]].
* [[Playing with a Trope|Played With]] in [[X-Men (film)|X-Men: The Last Stand]], where [[Big Bad|Magneto]] is the one who declares that his greatest failure is that Professor X had to die before mutant equality (or superiority) could be reached.
== [[Literature]] ==
* In the [[Redwall]] novel ''Martin the Warrior'', when {{spoiler|the title character's girlfriend is killed fighting alongside him in battle}} he blames himself and goes into self-imposed exile, setting up the events of ''Mossflower'' to which that book was a prequel.
* John in ''[[The Grapes of Wrath]]'' thought his wife had a stomach ache when what she really had was much more serious. He's never forgiven himself, and his every action is driven by a desire to atone.
* [[Looking for Alaska]]'s titular character {{spoiler|blames herself for her mother's death when she was a little kid, as she was too shocked to call an ambulance.}} Later in the novel, most of the principle cast (including the narrator) gets their own greatest failure when {{spoiler|Alaska dies in a drunken car accident halfway through the novel.}} The kicker? {{spoiler|The reason she was driving in the first place was because she realized she forgot it was the day her mother died and was trying to visit her mother's grave.}}
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* ''[[Beachwalker]]'''s protagonist had one of these in the form of {{spoiler|her mother's death.}} She is determined to keep the past from repeating itself, whatever the cost to herself.
▲== [[Live Action TV]] ==
* Wesley Wyndham-Pryce from ''[[Angel]]'' committed his greatest failure when he falsely abducted Angel's only child in order to save both from demise. The prophecy which led Wes to believe this, was altered however, never meant to come true.
** Charles Gunn's greatest failure was when he made a deal with Dr. Sparrow to make his legal upgrade permanent in exchange for signing to release an ancient curio stuck in customs. This results in the death of {{spoiler|Fred}} and resurrection of the demon Illyria. Gunn becomes so guilt-ridden, that he offers to take Lindsey's place in a hell dimension to get information to stop the Senior Partners.
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* In [[The X-Files]], Mulder is plagued by guilt over not protecting his younger sister, Samantha, from abduction when they were children, despite the fact that it involved circumstances well beyond his control. His parents don't help assuage his guilt over it; at one point a clone claiming to be his sister is killed, and his father is upset and tells Mulder that ''he'' has to tell his mother that he lost his sister...again. As a result, he becomes obsessed with protecting Scully, especially after her abduction in season two. He ditches her several times, to her annoyance, and at times demands she stay out of a case for fear of her life. And woe is you if you're the one [[Berserk Button|who hurts Scully]].
* In ''[[Warehouse 13]]'', Myka is wracked with guilt over the death of her partner and lover, while she was in charge of the mission. For Pete, it's the death of his firefighter dad in the line of duty, when Pete decided not to tell him that he had one of his bad feelings. One episode serves to get both characters to come to terms with their respective guilts and realize they're not at fault. Myka's partner disobeyed her orders and got himself killed, while Pete's dad would've done his job no matter what his son said. Everything H.G. Wells does is because of the death of her daughter during a home invasion a century ago, while she was out of town.
== [[Tabletop Games]] ==
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** Of course, this is nothing compared to the Eldar race's greatest failure, which resulted in: 1) the destruction of their galaxy spanning empire (although it was admittely decadent by that point), and the deaths of billions (if not ''trillions'') of their race; 2) the fragmenting of the race into [[The Stoic|repressed ivory-tower ascetics]], [[Nature Hero|nature-attuned tribal agrarians]], and [[Axe Crazy|blood-thirsty torture-obsessed sociopaths]]; and 3) '''the creation of one of the most powerful, and [[Squick|seriously messed-up]] Chaos gods'''.
* In ''[[Exalted]]'', this is how Green Sun Princes become Green Sun Princes. They're on the edge of a heroic, epic act that would grant them Solar Exaltation...but then they choke, and then, in their moment of weakness, despair, and regret, the [[Eldritch Abomination|Yozis]] are there to offer them the [[Deal with the Devil]] that grants them the Infernal Exaltation.
== Toys ==
* Lesovikk in [[Bionicle]] once briefly hesitated in a fight against a group of Zyglak, costing him his entire Toa Team, and driving him into a millennia spanning [[Heroic BSOD]] and [[Walking the Earth]] for ages.
== [[Video Games]] ==
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* In [[Persona 3]], one of the things The Answer deals with is [[Robot Girl|Aigis's]] Greatest Failure. That is, {{spoiler|her inability to prevent the Protagonist's death despite her promise to protect him.}}
* In ''[[Tales of the Abyss]]'', Jade's backstory includes having accidentally killed his teacher with experimental magic as a child. He's mostly gotten past it now, but it drove him to extreme lengths trying to make a [[Replacement Goldfish]] for about ten years until Peony knocked some sense into him.
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* Ethan Mars from ''[[Heavy Rain]]'' believes that his his son Jason's death was his fault, and seems to suffer some degree of PTSD as a result.
== [[Web Comics]] ==
* In ''[[El Goonish Shive]]'', Grace cowered as Damien went on a killing spree breaking her and her brothers out of the lab that created them. Grace later finds out that she was created to fight Damien, and her guilt over failing to act the first time overcomes her pacifistic tendencies and drives her [[Unstoppable Rage|berserk]] when Damien threatens to kill Nanase and Ellen. Despite saving her friends' lives and freeing her brothers by defeating Damien, she feels even ''more'' guilty for losing control and then failing to keep him from committing suicide. This hat trick of perceived failure leads her to swear off using her shapeshifting powers until her sister and grandfather convince her to stop blaming herself.
* Vaarsuvius from ''[[The Order of the Stick]]'' is a highly intelligent elven wizard with a large ego. That ego takes a severe beating when the elf is unable to defeat a highly spell-resistant death knight, fails to prevent the hobgoblins from overrunning the breach at Azure City and winning the battle (including having fleeing allied soldiers ''beg'' him/her to help them and one of them cursing the elf's "useless goddamn magic" with her dying breath after V is unable to help them due to having run out of spells), and then spends months trying to overcome the effects of an anti-scrying abjuration without luck, in a situation when the fate of the world practically hinges on the elf's success. The long-term consequences for Vaarsuvius remain yet to be revealed, but in the short term, they certainly include [[Bad Dreams]], every symptom in the book for Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, and easy temptation to a [[Face Heel Turn]] when his/her self-perceived lack of ability puts his family in danger.
** Elan gets a bit of this when the half-orc Therkla is killed trying to protect him. She's poisoned, and Elan lacked the Bard spell that would have cured her. It affects Elan enough that when he reunites with Haley, he reveals that he took "Neutralize Poison" at his next level up.
* [[Homestuck]]: Even after [[Arc Number|413]] years, WV still won't let himself forget that {{spoiler|he failed to prevent Jack from murdering his army.}}
== [[Web Original]] ==
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* In [[Greek Ninja]], Sasha fails to save her sensei during the invasion of Ariadnio.
== [[Western Animation]] ==▼
▲== Western Animation ==
* Number 5 of ''[[Codename: Kids Next Door]]'' blames herself for some [[Noodle Incident]] where the Delightful Children made Number 1 bald and sees an opportunity to save a random girl from the Delightful Children as [[My Greatest Second Chance]].
* In the third season of ''[[Transformers Generation 1]]'', Optimus Prime's successor, Rodimus Prime (formerly Hot Rod) doubted his abilities to fill Optimus's shoes, in part because during Optimus's last stand, Hot Rod tried to join the battle and help, only to wind up being used as a hostage/shield by enemy leader Megatron—had Hot Rod not stepped in, Prime may have survived. Visiting Prime on his deathbed, Rodimus asked for forgiveness... But Prime slipped away before he could forgive Rodimus.
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