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Never is it mentioned that there's a risk of disease from his antics, nor does he ever have any bastard children that he has to pay attention to, nor does anyone ever point out that real reformed rakes had a tendency to turn into gigantic prudes. He never backslides even when he is revisited years later in other books. Compare to [[All Girls Want Bad Boys]], but here the trope is not just that the bad boy is attractive, but that [[Love Redeems|all he needs is love to fix everything wrong with him]], so you can have both that trope and [[Single Woman Seeks Good Man]] simultaneously.
 
More often than not, the core of [[Fan Fiction]]s written by teenage girls, when they don't want their self-insert [[Relationship Sue]]s to become a [[Love Martyr]].
 
Also, an interesting [[Double Standard]] can be pointed out in light of this trope: men can be redeemed with a woman's love and become faithful, loving, protective husbands and good fathers, nevermind their criminal pasts. On the other hand, women wih a criminal record or, worse, [[My Girl Is Not a Slut|who have known several men sexually]] are irredeemable, which is why no good man would ever bother with them in the first place. The [[Hooker with a Heart of Gold]] may defy this but, in most cases, she's at best a [[Temporary Love Interest]].
 
Compare [[Ladykiller in Love]], a more realistic take on this issue, and [[Female Angel, Male Demon]] for a metaphor of this trope when the two aforementioned characters are in love.
 
Related to [[Draco in Leather Pants]].
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** And Wally ''does'' it...after being married a while. [http://outthere.keenspot.com/d/20070427.html\]
* Naveen from ''[[The Princess and the Frog]]'', after he marries. Considering he says that [[Did I Just Say That Out Loud?|he's dated thousands of women]]...
* There's a romance novel titled ''Stranger In My Arms'' that actually [[Deconstruction|deconstructs]] this trope: The heroine's husband has been presumed dead for years, and she isn't too sad about it because he was unfaithful to her and never seemed to enjoy having sex with her. Then, out of the blue, he returns [[Back Fromfrom the Dead]], says that he's a changed man, and proceeds to be passionate and devoted to her in a way he never was before. The heroine is pleasantly surprised, but can't shake off the feeling that rakes don't reform ''that'' thoroughly, and gets uneasy when her friend uses her husband's changed behavior to justify [[Love Martyr|her staying with her own physically abusive husband in the hope that he'll change eventually]]. It turns out that {{spoiler|the heroine's husband ''did'' die all these years ago, and her current "husband" is actually her husband's half-brother who [[Love Before First Sight|learned about her through diaries her husband left behind]] and decided to [[Dead Person Impersonation|use his impersonation abilities to be the loving husband she never had]]}}.
* Deconstructed in "The Rake's Song" by [[The Decemberists]]. The Rake gets married, is ''apparently'' reformed, "no more a rake and no more a bachelor"...but then he realizes that sex leads to babies and discovers that the married life really isn't for him. Cue [[Offing the Offspring|infanticide]] and [[Rape Is Love|abduction]]!
* Tramp from ''[[Lady and the Tramp]]''. Falling in love, being adopted into a family, and becoming a father will do that to a dog.
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