Neutral Female: Difference between revisions

The [[Distressed Damsel]] who was earlier captured by the villain and who the hero is there to rescue doesn't try and aid her escape by, say, [[Improvised Weapon|throwing a vase]] at the villain.

 

 

Justified whenever [[This Is Something He's Got to Do Himself]] -- ''none'' of the hero's allies can jump in and help him then. Same goes for if she's incapacitated and couldn't help even if she wanted to. Note however that, at least from the writer's perspective, this is perfectly justified by the fact that the hero, almost by definition, ''should'' be able to defeat the villain on his own. If the hero were to [[Let's Fight Like Gentlemen|use some underhanded trick while the villain fights honorably]], it would skew the entire narrative. In general, the [[Incorruptible Pure Pureness|purer]] the hero, the more likely the Neutral Female. Someone closer to the [[Anti-Hero]] will be more likely to receive aid from the bystander, as they won't be expected to necessarily win honorably.

* A variation in ''[[The King of Fighters]] 2003'': Rose Bernstein calmly sits on the sidelines and plays the piano while her older brother Adel and the player beat the tar out of each other. People are throwing fireballs around and she doesn't seem to have any supernatural powers, making her less than optimal help anyway.

** ''[[The King of Fighters]] XI'' pokes fun at this with Adel's "G. Princess" move; it calls Rose into the battle... by which we mean she strolls in under an umbrella and makes fun of Adel.

** Aversion: In the final battle of ''[[The Legend of Zelda the Wind Waker (Video Game)|The Legend of Zelda the Wind Waker]]'', Princess Zelda actually fights -- competently! -- alongside Link; in fact, the final boss would be impossible to beat without her.

** Lampshaded in ''[[The Legend of Zelda Spirit Tracks (Video Game)|The Legend of Zelda Spirit Tracks]]'', the first game in the series where the player has to switch between Link and Zelda to complete tasks, to paraphrase: "You go off into the dungeons and I wait here, it is family tradition"; after which the [[Eccentric Mentor]] informs Zelda she has to go and help anyways.

* Iris, during the fights between Zero and Colonel in ''[[Mega Man X]] 4''. [[All There in the Manual|Supplemental material]] justifies this: She and her brother were the result of an experiment to create the ultimate combat reploid. The repliforce scientists couldn't get the warrior and pacifist sides of the personality to mesh, so they were split into Colonel and Iris and they have a mental link from sharing over half the same mental programming. She's literally unable to go beyond her neutral-ness if Colonel's alive.

** Peach subverts the trope in the first two ''[[Paper Mario (Video Game)|Paper Mario]]'' games. In both cases she's being held captive in... inaccessible places, but still takes care to make sure that Mario is sent all information she finds out. In the first game, she is also able to send Mario items to help him out and is able to give Twink the power to stop Kami Koopa.

** In the second ''[[Paper Mario (Video Game)|Paper Mario]]'' game, she also {{spoiler|manages to resist possession by the Shadow Queen long enough to completely refill Mario's various health meters}}.

* Nicely averted at the end of ''[[Outlaws]]''. When the [[Not Quite Dead]] [[Big Bad]] comes into the room and puns a gun to the main character's head (echoing the way he killed the main character's father), [[Distressed Damsel|his daughter]] shoots him.

* In ''[[Final Fantasy IV (Video Game)|Final Fantasy IV]]'', Rosa just sort of shouts at Kain when he shows up to steal Fabul's crystal and nearly kills Cecil. [[Final Fantasy IV the After Years (Video Game)|Seventeen years later]], she does nothing to stop {{spoiler|Kain's dark side}} from kidnapping her, and in the battle between Edward and {{spoiler|Dark Kain}} she sits on the sidelines, untargetable, doing nothing to help, not even healing Edward.

[[Category:Double Standard]]

[[Category:Neutral Female]]