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Save the Villain: Difference between revisions
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* Exception: Jason Todd, [[Batman]]'s second, short-lived Robin, was implied (but not shown) to have pushed a rapist to his death. At any rate, he had the skills to save the man and chose not to.
** When [[Face Heel Turn|he returns as the Red Hood]], he puts Batman in a situation that fits this trope intentionally: he takes the Joker hostage and uses him as a human shield, leaving Batman with only a kill-shot on Todd himself, then demands that Batman either kill Joker right then and there or save the villain by killing his former sidekick. Batman, of course, [[Taking a Third Option|takes a third option]] and uses a ricochet to disarm Todd with a batarang, SAVING BOTH VILLAINS.
* Subversion: [[Marshal Law]], seeing the thoroughly horrible [[Batman]] parody Private Eye dangling over a meat grinder, deliberately walks too slowly to save him and calls out from several meters away, "Here, take my hand." Then he pretends (very briefly) to be sorry when the villain gets ground. Of course Marshall Law is the very model (or, depending on your interpretation, [[The Parody]]) of a [[Nineties Anti
** Although note that he does this after realizing that his hero worship of Private Eye got his partner and only real friend killed and that Private Eye was much worse than any real criminal.
* Batman, himself, has taken this trope to ridiculous extremes - to the point of once performing CPR ''on The Joker''.
** 'Course, considering [[CPR: Clean, Pretty, Reliable|how CPR actually is]], it's kind of a win-win situation: Joker lives to keep Batsy all heroic and stuff, and Batman gets to ensure this by more or less beating the shit out of him again. And in that case, it was less saving the Joker than saving [[Nightwing]] from the knowledge that he killed a man in cold blood.
** In ''Batman: Devil's Advocate'', Batman saved the Joker from the death penalty. He went out of his way and against the advice of pretty much everybody to prove Joker innocent of the crime he was scheduled to be executed for. It ended with Batman saying something like "And from now on, whatever you do, you'll know that you only live because of me. What's the matter? Don't you appreciate the joke?" Of course, seeing as this also means that the Joker is free to carry on ''murdering people'' due to Batman's intervention, the joke may be on him.
*** That's the cynical interpretation of it. The entire point of the story was to show Batman's dedication to justice. In all likelihood, the Caped Crusader was aware of the cynical implications as well, ''but did it anyway.''
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== Live Action TV ==
* ''[[Law and Order Special Victims Unit]]'': In the episode "Annihilated," Elliot Stabler is the first to learn that a man killed his wife and kids and staged it to make his wife look like the killer. When Elliot finds him on the hospital roof as if he's preparing to jump, he plays along and talks him down as if he still thinks he's a victim on the verge of suicide. As soon the guy comes down from the ledge, Elliot cuffs him. When the perp asks what he's doing, Elliot responds, "I don't know. I should've thrown you off the roof."
* ''[[
** In {{spoiler|"Journey's End"}} he tries again, this time with {{spoiler|Davros, going so far to remark "I tried to save you!" when he's turned down. He apparently also did this when Davros died during the Time War, despite the fact that they were ''[[Good Is Dumb|at war]]'' Unfortunately, the Doctor has no real reason to do this, given that Davros has the inclination and the ability to make another army of Daleks using pieces of his own flesh; doubly unfortunately, the Doctor took out his frustrations on his clone. Hypocritical bastard.}}
** In {{spoiler|"The End of Time"}} this trope is invoked yet again, when the Doctor {{spoiler|repeatedly pleads with the [[Death Is Cheap|newly-returned Master]] to let him help with the Master's mental illness. For once, the Master seems to be on the verge of accepting the Doctor's offer, but subsequent events drive him to follow the other doomed Time Lords back into the Time War. Who knows what attitude he'll have the next time he's alive again.}}
** In "Flesh and Stone", {{spoiler|the Weeping Angels beg -- or ''demand'', even -- that the Doctor to do this for them by throwing himself into a crack in time to spare their lives. Unfortunately for the Angels, they hadn't actually given him much of a reason to do so; he refuses, they fall in and [[Ret
* Subverted in the ''[[Stargate Atlantis]]'' episode "The Prodigal" {{spoiler|Michael teeters on the brink of falling off the top of Atlantis to his awful demise. Teyla not only doesn't pull him up, she actually kicks his hands to hasten his death. This is what happens when you mess with [[Mama Bear]].}}
** {{spoiler|And even the 'in the dark' portion doesn't work, since Sheppard is just offscreen.}}
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[[Category:Index to The Rescue]]
[[Category:Save The Villain]]
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