Mysterious Protector: Difference between revisions

* Tuxedo Mask from ''[[Sailor Moon]]'' pretty much epitomizes the trope, although his counterpart from ''[[Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon]]'' is anything but.

** The Moonlight Knight from the Makaiju arc of ''Sailor Moon R''. {{spoiler|Then again, he ''is'' an expy of Tuxedo Mask himself, whom split up from Mamoru's subconscious desire to help Usagi despite having been afflicted with [[Laser-Guided Amnesia]]. Once Mamoru recovers his memories, Moonlight Knight reveals himself as Mamoru's other half and disappears, with Mamoru becoming Tuxedo Mask again from then on.}}

* Ferio from ''[[Magic Knight Rayearth]]''.

* The prince who rescues Utena at the beginning of ''[[Revolutionary Girl Utena]]'', and inspires her to become a prince. Not a love interest.

* Mihara Oujirou in ''[[Kidou Tenshi Angelic Layer]]'' is a shounen example, although the main character ''is'' still a cute girl.

** And Oujirou's brother, Icchan, is a non-romantic example.

* Haku in ''[[Spirited Away]]'' certainly counts, although his development happens over the course of a single movie rather than a TV series.

** He helped Chihiro several times throughout the course of the movie, remarking that despite not remembering anything else about his past, he remembers her. It is later revealed that {{spoiler|when Chihiro was a child, she fell into his river and he had rescued her.}}

* In ''[[Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha]] A's'', a mysterious masked man shows up to protect, err, the villains. From Nanoha. {{spoiler|He wasn't actually a man either, he was shapeshifting twin catgirls. But that's a detail.}}

** {{spoiler|He didn't have their best interests at heart, either.}}

* ''Far'' from romantic, and the series is heavily [[Seinen]], but the Skull Knight in ''[[Berserk]]'' is the reason that Guts decided to go back to the Band of the Hawks after leaving Griffith, and {{spoiler|is the only reason that Guts and Casca make it out of the Eclipse and the Band of the Hawks arc alive}}.

* Female{{spoiler|[[Robot Girl|-ish]]}}, non-shoujo example: Miyu from ''[[Mai-Otome]]'' has helped Arika out of a jam or three before simply disappearing to goddess-knows-where.

* Tamahome of ''[[Fushigi Yuugi]]'' sort of falls into this trope at first. "Sort of" because Mysterious Protectors don't usually ask for money back, and because we get to know who he is soon enough.

** Nakago briefly plays this role for {{spoiler|Yui}} after he swoops down and {{spoiler|saves her from being gang-raped by a bunch of thugs}} when she was searching for Miaka. {{spoiler|Subverted, however, because he lets her believe that something ''did'' happen to her so that she would be more willing to accept the role of Priestess of Seiryuu and do his bidding.}}

* Invoked in [[Mahou Sensei Negima]]; when Negi was a (younger) child, he viewed his father like this, to the point of getting himself in trouble so that his father would come save him. {{spoiler|The one time that things [[Doomed Hometown|truly do get serious]], his father does show up to save him. And then he has to leave again.}}

** {{spoiler|Negi's cousin Nekane}} sorta takes this role in one of the animated series.

* a Shonen example would be Phoenix from [[Metal Fight Beyblade]], who is later revealed to be {{spoiler|Ginga Hagane's though to be dead father, Ryusei}}

* Played straight in one episode of ''[[Pokémon]]'', until the end when the cloaked hero is revealed to be {{spoiler|Gary}}. Who else?

* Although he didn't make a habit of it, Dragon from ''[[One Piece]]'' was introduced as Luffy's [[Mysterious Protector]] before {{spoiler|it was revealed that [[Luke, I Am Your Father|he was Luffy's father]].}}

* In a rather odd variation, odder for being in one of the [[Gorn|bloodiest]] and [[Mind Screw|mindscrewy]] [[Seinen]] out there, Ran and Ichise ''[[Texhnolyze]]'' are this from each other. Ran, resident [[Mysterious Waif]], is the more traditional version, distant and mysterious, appearing to guide or help Ichise out suddenly at pivotal and critical moments, before fading away into the background, remaining almost anonymous until at least halfway through the anime. Ichise, on the other hand, is [[The Stoic|dark and quiet]] [[Determinator]] who tends to show up mysteriously at the right moments through more sheer luck than anything else (while all of Ran's appearances are intentional, as far as we know).

* Misty Knight from ''[[Kaitou Tenshi Twin Angel]]''.

* [[Code Geass|Zero]] fulfills a similar role for Nunnally in her manga spinoff: ''[[Nightmare of Nunnally]]''... sort of. He shows up out of nowhere whenever Nemo is in the middle of a battle, and usually brings about chaos, allowing Nemo to win or escape. It can be seen most obviously near the end, where Zero acts as a [[Supporting Leader]] along with Euphie, Suzaku, and their combined armies.

* ''[[Digimon Adventure]]'': After the Chosen [[We Were Your Team|fall apart following Taichi's disappearance]], Sora completely disappears and acts in this capacity, working to get everyone (except herself) back together in the face of PicoDevimon's trickery tearing the team apart.

 

 

 

== Live Action TV ==

* Angel from season 1 of ''[[Buffy the Vampire Slayer]]''. Fitting, considering Joss is a fan of Sailor Moon and the first few seasons of Buffy can be seen as a warped, live-action magical girl show. {{spoiler|He even shares the "main character has to stab him to save the world" bit with Tuxedo Kamen.}}

* ''[[Doctor Who]]'', "The Girl in the Fireplace". Inverted in that we see it from the side of the Mysterious Protector himself.

* In ''[[Misfits]]'', the mysterious "Superhoodie" keeps showing up to save the Misfits, and seems to know an impossible amount of information about them. {{spoiler|He's actually Simon's [[Future Badass]] counterpart.}}

== Video Games ==

* In ''[[Fire Emblem]]: Radiant Dawn'', this trope is possibly subverted. A major, presumed dead antagonist from the previous game actually plays this role to the hilt with the new protagonist, Micaiah. {{spoiler|The Black Knight almost takes this role to ludicrous levels, never being content to just simply make a normal entrance: he always uses magic to directly teleport to his destination -- which is often right next to his charge. His statistics are so broken in terms of gameplay that using him almost ensures victory, making him stand out from members of this trope that can only act in a supporting capacity.}}

* ''[[Fallout]]'' has a perk which causes a "Mysterious Stranger" to appear and assist the character randomly in battles.

** The Mysterious Stranger can also occasionally serve as an inversion as he is infamous for accidentally shooting the player in the back with sometimes fatal results.

*** Maybe that's because if he appears when you fire a shotgun or an explosive in tight quarters you often hit HIM

** Early on in New Vegas, if the player is having trouble, Victor the robot cowboy will show up to help fight off your enemies. While he accredits this to being a generally good-natured robot, the truth is that [[The Chessmaster|Mr. House]] is using him to make sure that you make it to Vegas.

** In Honest Hearts, you can learn about Randall Dean Clark, a former US Marine turned survivalist who eventually became this for a bunch of children {{spoiler|who would later become the Sorrow}}, watching over them and giving them supplies and books while remaining unseen to them. In the end, you find his skeleton on the {{spoiler|Red Gate as he was about to die from a lung disease, so he left a personalized message to each child, telling them he would be silent but still watch over them, and climbed to his resting spot, dying to the elements. His legend lives as the Father in the Caves.}}

** Unfortunately, the chances of him appearing in later fights goes down every time he rescues you. If he's saved your ass once or twice, he's unlikely to do it again, possibly because he's becoming too worn out between world-traveling and fighting (though again, it's a gameplay mechanic, so it's possible that the programmers simply didn't want to promote too much laziness as he is rather powerful and it is sometimes better suited to the fight then Sora and Co. He can't actully kill anything however, his move list lacks a finishing move which is required for the final blow on bosses, planting him even further into this troupe.

 

 

== [[Visual Novels]] ==

** Somewhat attracted to him? This is Emiya Shirou we're talking about; [[Memetic Sex God|EVERY female is attracted to him]].

* In ''[[Under the Moon]]'', Zero [[Stealth Hi Bye|appears out of nowhere]] to bail the heroine Ashe out of some tight spots, but disappears just as quickly.