Moral Event Horizon/Literature: Difference between revisions

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* In Tolkien's ''[[The Silmarillion]]'', Melkor's destruction of the Two Trees, murder of Finwë and theft of the Silmarils. After this, he can never again take a form that looks anything other than completely evil, and is named as Morgoth, the Dark Enemy of the World.

** In the Akallabêth, after the Silmarillion but before the events of the [[Lord of the Rings]], Sauron crosses it when he engineers the destruction of Númenor by corrupting its king; like Morgoth, after this action he can never again take an appearance that is not evil.

* While never a morally upstanding guy, Turin is one of the few sympathetic characters in Middle Earth to pass this, at the climax of [[The Children of Hurin]] when he murders a lame man in a fir of rage, leaving even himself so disgusted that he commits suicide.

* [[Battle Royale|Kinpatsu Sakamochi]] crosses it when he reveals to the class that he raped Shuya and Yoshitoki's caretaker. Just to add insult to injury, he {{spoiler|kills [[Disproportionate Retribution|Yoshitoki for having a rightful outburst from the revelation and Fumiyo for whispering]]}}.

* In the ''[[Eternal Champion]]'' novella, the human military commander played near it when he {{spoiler|killed the Eldren commander while under a truce}}. But, the main character Ekrose crossed this firmly when he {{spoiler|killed the entire human race to protect the Eldren}}.

* [[Alpha Bitch|Chris Hargensen]] attained this status in [[Stephen King]]'s first novel, ''[[Carrie]].'' It's made clear in dialogue and descriptions that she is a cruel, manipulative, sadistic creature (one of her earlier exploits involved putting a firecracker in another girl's shoe, nearly causing the girl to lose some toes) who has never really faced consequences {{spoiler|prior to being excluded from the prom}} because of her father's status and willingness to use it. [[Mugging the Monster|She sets off the destruction of the whole town]] with the [[Prank Date]] she arranges, and [[Karmic Death|nobody is sorry when she finally gets it.]]

* When [[Harry Potter/Characters/Ministry of Magic|Dolores Umbridge]] [[Tyrant Takes the Helm|takes over]], she spends most of ''[[Harry Potter/Harry Potter and The Order of The Phoenix|Harry Potter]]'' finding new and more creative ways to [[Kick the Dog]] (usually Harry). Her [[Moral Event Horizon]] probably comes when she forces Harry to write lines using an enchanted quill that repeatedly carves the words into his own hand, until it won't stop bleeding; if not, it's after she becomes Headmistress when we find out she's using that punishment against students basically indiscriminately for minor offences. She manages to get ''worse'' in [[Deathly Hallows]].

** Dumbledore invokes this trope himself in relation to Voldemort, describing the {{spoiler|creation of a Horcrux}} as "moving beyond the realm of what we might describe as 'usual evil.'" Considering the implications of {{spoiler|tearing one's soul apart}}, this is probably justified.

** This trope is notably averted by "Gentleman" Johnny Marcone. At first, he seems to be an irredeemable heartless mobster, who is willing to murder his enemies in cold blood. But every now and then, Marcone shows that there are lines that he is not willing to cross (e.g. hurting a child) and Harry realizes that Marcone can't simply be dismissed as a complete villain.

** In the short story ''Aftermath'', Murphy deals with what appears to be a mob of nasty fish-people called the Fomor. The lead Fomor callously tells it's [[Mook|Mooks]] to kill {{spoiler|Billy and Georgia's unborn child.}}

*** The villains of the book Arianna Ortega and the Red King easily cross the line soon after they are introduced. Arianna kidnaps Harry's daughter Maggie (while also having Maggie's foster family massacred) to use her in a sacrificial ritual. The reason she wants to do this? Harry's grandfather killed her asshole of a husband; the kicker is that Arianna didn't even love her husband (in fact she outright hated him.) She just felt that Harry and Ebeneezer had insulted her. She finally crosses it for good when she not only announces that she plans to go through with murdering a child in a few minutes while also saying that it's essentially "just business". Needless to say her [[Cruel and Unusual Death]] was VERY WELL DESERVED. Her Daddy the Red King manages to be even more repulsive; at first he appears to just be a Caligula style junkie (he even manages to help Harry out by ensuring that Harry not only gets to face Arianna before the sacrifice, but also ensures that the weapons to be used will be ones that will give Harry a fighting chance). Then, he reveals that it's essentially a massive act; he can actually speak perfect english which means that his junkie temper reactions to Harry's insults were all staged. He then tries to sacrifice Maggie himself just to gain the prestige Arianna would have gained. And he's the one who orchestrated the Red Court system, meaning that all of their atrocities (which include centuries, maybe even millenia) of slavery, murder, and torture of the people of South and Central America are his doing. Needless to say, the King's death at the hands of his own Bloodline Curse is also very satisfying. Both of these villains only show up in person in less then 100 pages (Arianna appears in two chapters, the Red King in five,) yet they still manage to be greater [[Complete Monster|Complete Monsters]] than even Tessa and Nicodemus.

* Count Olaf of ''[[A Series of Unfortunate Events]]'' arguably crosses the line with his habit of abusing children (both mentally and physically), blackmailing, murders and attempted murders of numerous people (if we count in those who he burned to death), multiple hoaxes and kidnapping of at least three people, while one of them being about 2-years old toddler. And who knows what else he got up to before the books.

* Achilles from the ''[[Ender's Game|Ender's Shadow]]'' series is decidedly a [[Complete Monster]] who kills out of the most psychopathic need to prove his own superiority to his victims. He enters the Moral Event Horizon as soon as he kills Poke. But before he kills Poke, and to any character who doesn't know about his killings, he seems normal enough that the people worried about him killing someone appear to be the paranoid ones.

* In ''[[Rainbow Six]]'', one member of a group of Basque separatists seeking to spring prisoners from jail coldly murders a [[Littlest Cancer Patient]] on live TV. No one really objects, though Ding does give a perfunctory dressing-down, when one of the team's snipers puts a round through the killer's liver so that he bleeds painfully to death rather than taking a [[Instant Death Bullet]] [[Boom! Headshot!]].

* The [[Christopher Pike]] teen horror novel ''Chain Letter 2'' is all about invoking this trope. Each of the protagonists is given a task to complete which will push them over the horizon. If the task is not completed, the character in question will be killed, effectively giving each of them the choice between death and damnation. The tasks given ranged from the truly horrific ( {{spoiler|Kip's was to set his younger sister on fire and burn her right arm off}}) to the [[What Do You Mean It's Not Heinous?]] ( {{spoiler|Brenda cutting off her own finger and delivering it to one of the other characters was definitely a moment of [[Squick]], but it's hard to see it as something worthy of eternal damnation}}).

* Napoleon of ''[[Animal Farm]]'' has crossed the line several times, such as by {{spoiler|purging the farm of so-called traitors}}, but his ''definitive'' crossing of the Moral Event Horizon, the moment when you ''know'' he has become no better than Farmer Jones, the animals' original oppressor, is when he {{spoiler|sells Boxer, the most hardworking and loyal of all the animals on the farm, to the knacker because he is injured and no longer able to work}} in a cruel and heartless [[You Have Outlived Your Usefulness]] moment. At least in the [[Animated Adaptation]], {{spoiler|Napoleon gets his comeuppance big-time}}.

* In the [[Father Brown]] story ''The Sign of the Broken Swords'', we learn that {{spoiler|a brilliant but amoral general had betrayed his country, in wartime, [[Pride|so that he could appear wealthy to his daughter's beau]].}} And as if that weren't bad enough, {{spoiler|he murdered a subordinate [[He Knows Too Much|who knew too much]], and, when he saw he'd broken his sword, he [[The Uriah Gambit|led his men on an intentionally foolish charge]] to make said subordinate look like a casualty of war.}}

* In ''[[Star Trek: A Time to...|Star Trek: A Time to Kill]]'', Prime Minister Kinchawn crosses it rather early, after he uses his illegally-acquired weapons to shoot down 10 Klingon ships in orbit of Tezwa, killing 6,000 warriors. If this didn't represent his crossing the line, his casual willingness to see millions of Tezwans killed in a Klingon counterstrike, including his own family, certainly does. What makes it worse is his apparent self-image as a [[Well-Intentioned Extremist]], when he's really totally [[Drunk with Power]]. He sees his own children's death as merely a means to acquire more sympathy and thus more support and power, and seems to truly believe this is somehow reasonable.

* For Esteban Garcia in ''[[The House of the Spirits]]'' it probably happens when he molests, and likely rapes, Alba when she is still a little girl. But if that isn't enough he helps to organize The Terror. During that which he find her again. This time we know for certain he that he rapes and tortures her and at least threatens to let his men rape her as well.

* {{spoiler|Ivo Corbière}} from the ''[[Brother Cadfael]]'' novel ''Saint Peter's Fair'' has already stooped to murder to get his hands on {{spoiler|a list of Empress Maude's partisans to give to King Stephen, so that he, Corbière, can win an earldom at least}}. {{spoiler|Emma has it, and Corbière}} crosses the Horizon when he {{spoiler|threatens to rape her to get it--and enjoy doing so}}. The readers cheer when {{spoiler|Emma, in resisting him, knocks the brazier over and he burns to death.}}

** This is how Beringar regards {{spoiler|Renaud Borchier, alias Cuthred's betrayal of his liege in her darkest hour}} in ''The Hermit of Eyton Forest''.