The Pollyanna: Difference between revisions

{{trope}}

 

 

A character, usually but not always [[Double Standard|female]], who undergoes various hardships, losing almost everything she holds dear, and yet seems never to lose her sunny disposition. [[Think Happy Thoughts]] may be how she does this.

 

{{examples}}

== Anime and Manga ==

* [[Excel Saga (anime)|Excel Excel]], the ultimate oblivious [[Genki Girl]], who will always believe that she is Il Palazzo's favorite minion no matter how violently he rebuffs he, until {{spoiler|Il Palazzo shoots her at the end of episode 23. Although he has shot her before, including with antimateriel weapons, during this episode the [[Toon Physics]] are turned off}}.

* Tohru Honda from ''[[Fruits Basket]]''. In the anime, the other characters [[Extreme Doormat|use her as a doormat]], but she remains eternally perky and eventually wins them over. In the ''manga'', on the other hand, while she acts the same, she's also shown as doing some serious repression.

* Keiichi from the ''[[X 1999]]'' manga. Lost his father in early childhood, and then his mother is killed in one of the earthquakes caused by the Dragons of Earth, yet he remains optimistic and kind until finally being phased out of the series.

* Usagi of ''[[Sailor Moon]]'' isn't as much of a Pollyanna as fanfic writers would have you believe (where Usagi is a perky saint and can never be pried from her hold on a "good in everyone" mentality), but she does have an overwhelming belief in the power of love in the anime. The manga and live-action are much darker, though.

* Princess Amelia of ''[[Slayers]]'' both plays this trope straight and subverts it at the same time. While she is truly the optimistic type who finds good in ill situations, a part of it derives from her [[Royally Screwed-Up|incredibly bloody and crappy family history]] that drives her right into [[Stepford Smiler]] territory at times.

* Nana from ''[[Elfen Lied]]'' is ''clearly'' [[Break the Cutie|broken]] by the time we meet her and continues to have horrifyingly terrible things happen to and around her for the entire story. She nonetheless somehow clings to a generally positive outlook that everything will be okay, especially as long as she can be with papa again. {{spoiler|She doesn't. He explodes}}

* Subaru during ''[[Audio Adaptation|StrikerS Sound Stage X]]'' of the ''[[Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha]]'' franchise. Turns out that the [[Emergency Services]] she joined [[It Never Gets Any Easier|isn't all sunshine and roses]], and she not only gets front row seats to a [[Psychic-Assisted Suicide]], but she also loses the new friend she had rescued after she slips into a coma that may last a thousand years. Still, she never loses her smile and [[Genki Girl|energetic personality]]. After all "Even though you're so sad, you've still got to eat. And if you get sleepy, you got to sleep. And if you have to do something, you do it... When you're doing all that, all your painful memories start fading away..."

* It's very, very difficult to upset either [[D.Gray-man|Allen Walker or Lenalee Lee]] permanently. Allen in particular has been put through staggering amounts of crap by a universe that clearly has it in for him, but is nevertheless [[The Messiah]] and a [[Wide-Eyed Idealist]] who wants to save ''everyone''.

* Another male example would be Yamamoto of ''[[Katekyo Hitman Reborn]]'', who very rarely loses his smile (and when he does, [[Beware the Nice Ones|RUN]]) even in the worst of circumstances. Although he isn't unusually optimistic, he remains constantly cheerful despite the sometimes nightmarish situations he's encountered as guardian to a budding mafia boss. Perhaps this is because he [[Failed a Spot Check|thinks that his entire life in the mafia has all been one big elaborate role-playing game.]]

** Though he has currently (as of the Time Travel Arc) been told the truth, and actually knows more about certain backstory elements than any of the main characters, not to mention the readers

* Negi of ''[[Mahou Sensei Negima]]'' ''starts'' as one of these, but when he begins training under [[Noble Demon|Evangeline]], [[Combat Pragmatist|she]] specifically makes it a point to knock that out of him, because the world is not that nice, and he needs to realize that. As it turns out, she wasn't entirely wrong.

* No matter how many times Shibuya Yuuri from ''[[Kyou Kara Maou]]'' is betrayed, he is always willing to give that person a second chance. When a girl is jailed for posing as his daughter and trying to assassinate him, he smuggles her out and adopts her.

* Jean from ''[[Nadia: The Secret of Blue Water]]'' is a shoe in for a inventor's competition which he ditches to save Nadia, and not only does his plane crash but he is perpertually on the run and in constant danger. And yet, through it all, he is cheerful and even enthusiastic about the technology from both sides in general. (Only exceptions is when he and Nadia exploring Gargoyle's base, and even reacting in horror to two deaths—one of an escaped fugitive, and another, a crew member.)

** [[Defrosting Ice Queen|It could even be noted, too, that Nadia herself is transformed by his caring, compassionate nature.]]

 

== Comic Books ==

* In volume one of ''[[League of Extraordinary Gentlemen]]'', we get the girl that provides our page quote (and who is of course [[Alan Moore]]'s reinterpretation of the [[Trope Namer]]). It should be noted that this scene [[Alternative Character Interpretation|can also be read]] as her simply liking the sex, and not wanting to admit as much (would you?), and using optimism as an excuse for her behaviour.

* [[Shazam|Mary Marvel]] was described as this during her pre-Countdown and Final Crisis portrayals. This was her most obvious comedic trait in the ''Superbuddies'' stories. She is also explicitly called "Pollyanna", causing her to talk about how that's her favorite movie.

* Gar Logan from ''[[Teen Titans (Comic Book)|Teen Titans]] ''is a rare male example; content with playing the [[Plucky Comic Relief]] character despite a lifetime of hardship and self-loathing until [[It Got Worse|it]] [[Beware the Nice Ones|gets]] [[Unstoppable Rage|worse]].

* Apollo from ''[[The Authority]]'' is always kinder, happier and more optimistic than [[Sliding Scale of Idealism Versus Cynicism|most other folks in the Wildstorm universe]]. Or you could think of it this way: he's powered by sunshine, and has a [[Personality Powers|personality to match]].

* [[Superman]] may also qualify, although the amount of crap in his life (and therefore the strangeness of his constant kindness and optimism) [[Depending on the Writer|varies from writer to writer, and era to era]]. However he unfailingly [[Rousseau Was Right|believes in the goodness of the human race]], and frequently bucks up other superheroes by promising that no matter how bleak a crisis looks, they can always do something to help. Like Apollo, he is powered by the fucking ''sun'', thriving on light and warmth, and it sure as hell suits him.

* Although he isn't [[Absent-Minded Professor|exactly who comes to mind]] when you think of this trope, ''[[The Fantastic Four]]'''s Reed Richards is notable for being sunnily confident that a good idea and a dash of [[For Science!|science]] is all that's needed to defeat the most untouchably powerful universe-destroying villains one can face and whisk the heroes out of the most hopeless and unsolvable of dire circumstances. [[Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?|The fact that he actually demonstrates this on a regular basis]] [[Super Intelligence|makes his attitude completely understandable.]]

* The [[Green Lantern|Blue Lantern Corps]], representing the blue light of hope, always hope for the best in even the worst situations.

 

 

== Film ==

* ''[[Annie]]'', the 1982 film, when she's in the orphanage ... she just keeps thinking about tomorrow! And her sunny attitude is contagious and transformative.

* An odd subversion in ''[[Cecil B. Demented]]'': Raven is a ''Satanist'', yet remains upbeat and perky, even as her fellow Sprocket Holes are being picked off left and right. If one didn't know better, one might question her grip on reality.

* In ''[[Cannibal! The Musical]]'', this is [[Played for Laughs]] with Swan. When his companions are complaining about having no food and being weary and lost, he suggests building a snowman via cheerful song and demonstration. Even after {{spoiler|one of his annoyed companions shoots him in the head}}, he still has a smile on his face.

* Mater in ''[[Cars 2]]'' is subjected to [[Break the Cutie]] when he realizes that everyone else sees him as a laughingstock and a buffoon. Yet after an apologetic reassurance from his best friend Lightning McQueen, he soon returns to his regularly cheerful and optimistic disposition.

* The titular heroine from the Swedish film ''Du Är Inte Klok, Madicken'' ("Are You crazy, Maggie?"), is this, much more then in Astrid Lindgren's books the film is based on.

* Played for comedy in ''[[Life of Brian]]'', in which a crucified man tells Brian to keep his spirits up and closes out the film with a jaunty musical number, "Always Look on the Bright Side of Life."

 

== Literature ==

* This trope is a [[Flanderization]]; the original ''[[Pollyanna]]'' is [[The Woobie]] if not her novel's [[Butt Monkey]], and she has plenty of sad moments when she's alone, but she refuses to let them affect her behaviour when other people are present. She comes off as a [[Stepford Smiler]] at points in the book, clinging to her father's Glad Game to take her thoughts off the bad things that have happened to her like {{spoiler|losing her father and becoming crippled after an accident}}.

* Felicité in Flaubert's ''[[Un Coeur Simple]]'' is the perfect picture of the Pollyanna. Friends and relatives die around her right and left and she still puts on a happy face. She drops everything to help anyone who needs it.

* The Jack Polo of [[Clive Barker]]'s short story ''The Yattering and Jack'' is like this because if he displays any negative emotions regardless of what happens to him, he will face eternal damnation. Meanwhile, if the minor demon tormenting him directly attacks him without provocation (rather than merely indirectly torturing him), it's broken the rules that govern it and has to be his servant for the remainder of his life as penalty. {{spoiler|This is actually Jack's goal in the entire exercise, although the Yattering discovers this far too late to avoid it.}}

* In the fourth book of ''[[A Series of Unfortunate Events]]'', the character Phil is a clear Pollyanna. He remains quite upbeat for a guy who is working in a lumbermill, is paid with coupons, and has gum for lunch every day. When his leg is crushed, he says, "Well, this isn't too bad. [[Major Injury Underreaction|My left leg is broken, but at least I'm right-legged.]]" Somebody comments, "Gee, I thought he'd say something more along the lines of 'Aaaaah! My leg! My leg!'" When he shows up in the 9th book and the Baudelairs accidentally cause a spill in the submarine, they expect him to say, "oh nice, we have a swimming pool now!"

* Tiny Tim of ''[[A Christmas Carol]]'' even finds the silver lining in being crippled.

* Frances from ''[[Wuthering Heights (novel)|Wuthering Heights]]'' though Nelly could be embellishing the story a little. It's mentioned that she never lost her sunny attitude even when she was dying from childbirth.

* Istvan Bathory in ''[[Count and Countess]]''.

* Jill Mariner, impulsive heroine of [[P. G. Wodehouse|PG Wodehouse]]'s ''Jill the Reckless'' (alternatively titled ''The Little Warrior'' with reference to her manner of handling life). Her Uncle Chris also qualifies; at one point she quotes ''Candide'', comparing him to Pangloss.

 

* Jane from the [[Britcom]] ''[[Waiting for God]]'' is a mix of this and suffering from [[Stockholm Syndrome]] given her seemingly pathological infatuation with the smarmy weasel Harvey Baines

* Basi from the Nigerian TV show ''[[Basi And Company]]'' is remarkably cheerful for a broke, unemployed (and unemployable) man living in a one-room apartment (which he insists on calling "Basi's Palace"). Basi's landlady wants him out, but he's so sunny that nothing she does, including taking his only mattress, can get him to leave.

* Kenneth Parcell in ''[[30 Rock|Thirty Rock]]''. "My mother always told me that even when things seem bad, there's someone else who's having a worse day. [[Bread, Eggs, Milk, Squick|Like being stung by a bee or getting a splinter or being chained to a wall in someone's sex dungeon.]]"

* The British airmen from ''[['Allo 'Allo!|Allo Allo]]'' remain upbeat no matter how many times their attempts to get home are foiled.

** Something very similar to that happens in the original, too.

* Dr. Molly Clock (Heather Graham) in ''[[Scrubs]]''. Drs. Cox and Kelso decide to teach her that we live in a [[World Half Empty]].

* [[Played for Drama]] (of course) on [[Law and Order Special Victims Unit]] where one was a pregnant borderline [[Purity Sue]] that worked as a janitor on the subway without complaint [[Healing Hands|and cured Stabler's cold by merely touching him]] [[Break the Cutie|finally lost it when she was reunited with the father of her baby, a serial rapist who quickly confessed to everything]] [[Stalker with a Crush|and believed they'd live happily ever after.]] Ouch.

* Ted from ''[[How I Met Your Mother]]'', whose unwavering (and often irrational) amount of optimism and belief in love and friendship persists through a ridiculous amount of cynicism-inducing crap. Especially true in the field of romance, including a high school girlfriend who abandoned him immediately after tricking him into giving up his virginity for her, a college girlfriend who cheated on him constantly, having to break up with Robin even though he was in love with her, and a fiancee who left him at the altar. Oh, and he fully believed he could make it rain through [[The Power of Love]], and ''succeeded''. When he finally expresses a measure of pessimism in the season 7 premiere, it's a pretty disquieting moment.

 

== Music ==

* [[The Rolling Stones|Jumping Jack Flash]].

* Basically the point of [[Amanda Palmer]]'s "[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8C17yfGyJjM Oasis]" (warning: NSFW).

* "Float On" by [[Modest Mouse]] seems to be narrated by someone like this:

* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t30cX6OGO0U Rain drops keep falling on my head, but that doesn't mean my eyes will soon be turning red...]

* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WlBiLNN1NhQ A certain song] from [[Monty Python]]'s ''[[Life of Brian]]'', later reused for ''[[Spamalot]]'':

* Doris Day claims she feels like one of these in the song "Everybody Loves A Lover." The perky arrangement really drives it home.

 

== Newspaper Comics ==

* [[Krazy Kat]], aided by [[Selective Obliviousness]].

 

== Professional Wrestling ==

* [[Natalya Neidheart|Natalya]]'s face persona slipped into this territory more than a few times. During her feud with [[Lay Cool]], they started mocking her and claimed she'd inherited her dad's facial hair gene, complete with a photoshopped picture of Natalya with an Anvil beard. Nattie just laughed it off and also shook off all the jibes they got at her family. And when she lost her title to Eve, she teamed with her the very next night on Raw and there was no tension between them whatsoever. Then after she lost her rematch to Eve, she saved her from a backstage attack.

* Jillian Hall counts. Despite virtually everyone on the roster complaining about her [[Hollywood Tone Deaf]] gimmick, every week or so Jillian would be out all smiles ready to sing for the audience again. This is especially glaring when you consider everything her character has gone through - losing her Divas' title two minutes after winning it, being dissed by every single celebrity guest host on Raw (including the Osbournes, Jewel, Wayne Brady), being one-upped by a conniving pair of twins for weeks and being on a losing streak for three years of her career.

 

== Theatre ==

 

== Video Games ==

* Imoen, from the ''[[Baldur's Gate]]'' games, especially the second one. Though at times very much vulnerable to [[Break the Cutie]], a few minutes later she would be right back to her old cheerful self. "It's just like old times... well, except for the torture and all."

** Originally it was planned that she would {{spoiler|really be broken and transform into the slayer forcing the protagonist to kill her. If you have Throne of Bhaal, you can download (and install) Ascension to see how she was supposed to suffer the same fate AGAIN, which was only stopped by time issues.}}

* Elanee in ''[[Neverwinter Nights 2]]'' isn't exactly upbeat, but does take an insane amount of her world being shattered and rearranged before her composure finally cracks in the slightest.

* Merrill in ''[[Dragon Age 2]]'' is quite cheerful, to the point of gushing about how exciting it is that someone got mugged right outside her front door after leaving her Dalish clan on very bad terms and relocating to the Kirkwall Alienage.

*** Merrill is a different deconstruction of the same trope; she is so optimistic and foolishly trusting that she will take even demons at their word and make deals with them, believing herself equal to dealing with any possible risk. Unfortunately, {{spoiler|in the end, the unintended consequences of her [[Deal with the Devil]] fall on the people she loves instead, leaving her with a terrible burden of guilt.}}

* Marona in the PS2/Wii game ''[[Phantom Brave]]''. Feared for her ability to summon ghosts, her neighbors all send her hate mail and bilking her pay when they hire her to save them from monsters, and yet she's still unwaveringly kind to them, even though they [[All of the Other Reindeer|treat her like crap]]. [[The Woobie|She cries when she's alone, though.]]

** Colette Brunel from ''[[Tales of Symphonia]]'' is also like this. She smiles and constantly assures everyone that she's fine and nothing's wrong even though she knows she's going to have to {{spoiler|die to save the world, and stays positive even after learning that her sacrifice would have screwed over the world even more}}.

*** {{spoiler|A lot of that optimism was a mask, though.}}

* In ''[[Grand Theft Auto Vice City]]'', in the VCPR radio station, Jenny Louise Crab is a merciless [[Deconstruction]] of this trope: not only she's a sickeningly cheerful [[Genki Girl]], to the point of not even feeling bad about having her foster family brutally murdered, but the setup also strongly implies that Jenny is addicted to hard stimulants in an effort to ignore these memories.

** Tifa is like this too: Eternally optimistic, despite having a backstory involving getting sliced with a sword, watching her father die, having her hometown burned down, and not only having her childhood friend skip town on her a few years previously, but not even helping her after the aforementioned slicing, due to [[Heroic BSOD]]. Not to mention almost having a ''city'' dropped on her when she's an adult.

* Laguna Loire of ''[[Final Fantasy VIII]]'' could be called this. He finally hits it off with his longtime crush and the very next day he's forced to jump off a cliff in order to escape a group of enemy soldiers. He's later seen in a quaint village and finds out that said crush thinks him dead, and has moved on and gotten married. Then he falls in love again and gets married, only to have his adoptive daughter get kidnapped, forcing him to search for her and leave his pregnant wife behind. He finally finds his daughter and has to send her, alone, back to his wife. Unfortunately, his wife dies in childbirth and since no one can find Laguna (who didn't even know she was pregnant), both of his children are sent to live in an orphanage and he doesn't see either of them again until they're adults. Despite this, he's as cheerful as ever years later, and rambles about needing love and friendship to complete one's mission when he isn't being totally psyched about being on a spaceship.

** Valvatorez is also delusionally optimistic. He even doesn't mind [[How the Mighty Have Fallen|falling out of power]] and winding up in a crap job because he would have never otherwise discovered [[Trademark Favorite Food|how incredibly delicious sardines were]].

* Tidus from ''[[Final Fantasy X]]'' is perhaps the best-known male example. Despite everything he's gone through with an abusive father, then loosing everything he has ever known, he remains positive and upbeat. A refreshing change from the [[Wangst|usual]] ''[[Final Fantasy]]'' hero.

** Kairi tries to be this through most of her screentime in the first ''[[Kingdom Hearts]]'' game, but she sometimes lets her inner worries slip.

* Kelly Chambers, Shepard's Yeoman in ''[[Mass Effect]] 2'' is surprisingly upbeat and friendly. Rather than reacting to some of your most vicious party members with a lot of fear, she instead sees them with a certain degree of curiosity. In fact, when you rescue and recruit Garrus, she notes that she's compelled to hug him and tell him it'll be all right for everything he's been through.

** [[Loveable Rogue|Kasumi Goto]]. She is eternally optimistic, always reflecting that things could always be worse... even when trapped inside a derelict Reaper

** If you go 100% Paragon and take Charm options whenever available, Shepard him/herself '''drips''' with this, especially in the first ''Mass Effect''. Getting him/her angry is extremely difficult, diplomacy trumps violence every time, and all species are equal and valuable in his/her eyes.

* Sayaka in ''[[Suika]]'', who is hated by virtually everyone in town for being too perceptive. Mie is horrified at how people normally treat her when they become friends because Sayaka is ''way'' nicer than everyone thinks.

* Leon from ''[[F-Zero]]'' (he made his debut in ''X''). He is a certified [[Iron Woobie]] (see that trope for the full scoop). Considering that his [[Dark and Troubled Past|backstory]] [[War Is Hell|is the]] [[Parental Abandonment|most tragically]] [[Eye Scream|horrific one]] by '''light-years''', his ability to remain so [[Keet|infectiously happy-go-lucky]] (perhaps only rivaled/outdone by [[Genki Girl|Princia]] in this regard) is simply ''astonishing''.

* ''[[Final Fantasy XIII]]'' gives us Vanille; it becomes increasingly apparent as the plot unravels that it's a coping mechanism, although she's most certainly an ''honest'' bubbly person to some extent, as she retains the trait when her issues are settled. She breaks down twice: {{spoiler|once when it comes out into the open that she indirectly ruined Sazh and his son's lives by keeping Fang uninformed of their Focus, and again when Fang tricks her into admitting she's faking amnesia.}} The second time almost gets her killed.

* Tails from [[Sonic the Hedgehog]], especially when taking his back story into account.

 

* Ayu Tsukimiya in ''[[Kanon]]''.

* ''[[AIR]]'''s Kamio Misuzu. The girl knows that if she ever makes any friends they're both going to get sick and possibly die, and yet all she wants to do with her summer is play with a creepy stranger at the beach.

** It's not that she knows such bad things will happen, it's more like she just can't seem to connect with others because her optimism and personality are just so...odd. And I wouldn't say Yukito is creepy, just a hot teenager new to the town that little Misuzu thinks might appreciate her.

*** To be more specific: Misuzu doesn't seem to have trouble getting to know the other girls or Yukito that whole summer, and she doesn't know about her curse, BUT she knows from past experience that as soon as as soon as she gets close to someone she'll have physical pain and mental panic attacks. A later flashback episode shows her ready to give up on even one happy summer before she sees Yukito on the beach and has a feeling he might play with her.

* Maya Fey from ''[[Phoenix Wright]]'' rules this trope. {{spoiler|Her parents left her when she was very young, she's framed for her sister's murder, her aunt tries to frame her for ''another'' murder, she's kidnapped and starved for ransom, Dahlia Hawthorne tries to kill her in another murder plot by her aunt, AND her mother is killed in front of her by her sister's (former?) lover.}} And yet she still manages to be the perky sidekick almost all the time.

** Kay Faraday too, seeing as her {{spoiler|childhood friends Edgeworth and Gumshoe at first don't remember her, her dad was murdered when she was young, leaving her an orphan, and Calisto Yew turning her father's proud secret legacy into nothing more than a murderer and thief. Sure, she gets upset, but she always bounces back.}}

** Ambassador Colias Palaneo is somewhere between the drama and comedic versions. While his [[Stepford Smiler|near-constant grin]] may be fake, he is a genuinely good [[Nice Guy]] who happens to have an amazing tolerance for stress ([[Break the Cutie|of which he goes through a lot during the case he appears in]]).

* Battler of ''[[Umineko no Naku Koro ni]]'' is yet another male example. He steadfastly refuses to acknowledge the existence of witches (or at least refuses to admit that they're causing the murders) in a universe that is not shy in its attempts to break him. As a [[When They Cry]] protagonist, being a [[Determinator]] is a requirement. The universe REALLY pushes it, though.

 

== Web Animation ==

** Marzipan also shades towards this, although [[Beware the Nice Ones|she has her limits]].

 

* Robot 13 from ''[[Gunnerkrigg Court]]'' is remarkably easy-going about his own well-being, taking the loss of his arm (and later, {{spoiler|1=the loss of everything [http://www.gunnerkrigg.com/archive_page.php?comicID=223 except his CPU]}}) in stride. On the other hand, he becomes very distraught upon thinking that he hurt his "Mommy", Antimony.

* Joyce of ''Roomies / [[Its Walky]]'' took being a Pollyanna to new levels; Ignoring and/or avoiding anything that would put a dent in her rose-colored worldview (To the point where merely being forced to watch porn could [[Break the Cutie|break her mind]]. The argument could be made that Joyce wasn't a true Pollyanna as much as she was a different flavor of [[Love Freak]].

* Tavros from ''[[Homestuck]]''. His life is pretty horrible all around, since he can't walk, his [[Horned Humanoid|horns]] make it hard for him to sleep, his beloved Lusus (basically a cross between a parent and a pet) dies and the nicest thing anyone has done for him in the comic is {{spoiler|cutting off his legs with a chainsaw so he can get a robotic pair}}. He's pretty happy despite all of this.

** John, just... John.

** Feferi. Not even {{spoiler|being dead}} can diminish her spirit. Her friend Sollux (during one of his [[Mood Swinger|pessimistic phases]]) described her as "so ridiculously optimistic it's kind of sickening".

** Oddly enough, Aradia. She starts off as an [[Emotionless Girl]], but when she does regain the ability to feel, she becomes enthusiastically cheerful and smiles almost all the time. Even as her friends fight off killers in their midst, and she faces a near-omnipotent monster, she's convinced that there's no reason to grieve and that everything will turn out fine.

* The titular character in Equinox: Defender of The Horde. He is a silly [[Man Child]] who seems to see the world as a cartoony adventure. But throughout the story he faces death, betrayal, treason, and heartbreak, and while shaken to the bone at times with his experiences, he nonetheless manages to keep his optimistic childishness.

* ''[[El Goonish Shive]]'': Grace suffered years of trauma at the hands of [[Complete Monster|Damien]] before being introduced. Although she reacted as anyone else would when it caught up with her, she has since become the most upbeat, positive character in the comic. However, this is strongly implied to be a facade; she's still a wreck underneath, and it sometimes shows.

 

== [[Web Original]] ==

* In ''[[Human Centipede the Musical]]'', Steve retains his cheerful demeanor even when he wakes up tied to a bed and finds out that he’ll be part of a human centipede.

* What Pollyanna calls "the glad game" and others call "counting their blessings" is a coping mechanism that ''[[Cracked.com]]'''s Felix Clay calls "trivializing adversity" in [http://www.cracked.com/blog/4-ways-we-dont-realize-we-suck-at-coping-with-adversity/ 4 Ways We Don't Realize We Suck at Coping With Adversity].

 

== [[Western Animation]] ==

* In some instances, ''[[SpongeBob SquarePants]]'' himself.

* Brandon Higsby on ''[[As Told by Ginger]]''. This often makes him the butt of Carl and Hoodsey's jokes.

* Butters from ''[[South Park]]''. This is actually mildly subverted in his "Very Own" Episode, which depicts his parent's anniversary and their annual trip to the restaurant Bennigan's. His mother asks him to tail the father to see what he is getting her, Butters finds out his dad is gay without realizing it himself (he describes what he saw and his mother puts it together), driving his mother mad, and prompting her to kill him and commit suicide. Both fail, but she doesn't know that the former did. The rest of the episode is the parents pretending that a stranger kidnapped their child, and when Butters shows up and everything is admitted, he is fine, saying "When I have a chipotle blu cheese bacon burger at Bennigan's, I'll forget all about my dad being queer and my mom trying to kill me." "Really?", he is asked by the other kids. "No, I'm lying." (His happy face barely cracks, though.)

** Don't worry, he gets better through [[The Power of Love]].

** Uncle Iroh also counts. His son was killed in a battle he lost, his reputation was destroyed, he lost his rightful place on the throne and was banished from his home, his beloved nephew treats him like dirt, and yet he not only remains patient and cheerful, but is eventually able to help his nephew solve many of his personal problems without even breaking a sweat.

** Eugene in nearly all situations. He's the show's [[Cosmic Plaything|jinx]]. His usual action after an insane run of bad luck-based injuries? "I'm okay."

* ''[[Jimmy Two-Shoes]]'' is this in the town of [[Exactly What It Says on the Tin|Miseryville]].

*** He still pretty obviously ''is''. The ruler of the town is named [[Satan|Lucius]], after all.

* In the [[Animated Adaptation]] of ''[[Where's Waldo]]'', Waldo would gleefully and knowingly walk into perilous adventure with the cheerful demeanor he always wears in the books.

* Like the above comic example Miss Martian as seen in ''[[Young Justice (animation)|Young Justice]]'', only here she is supposedly Martian Manhunter's niece.

* The titular character from Disney's ''[[Cinderella (Disney film)|Cinderella]]''. She puts up with the demanding work her stepmother and stepsisters bullies her to do constantly, all with a cheerful smile and a pleasant attitude. It was only when they tore her dress and destroyed any hopes of her going to the ball that Cinderella [[Break the Cutie|broke down.]]

* The title character of ''[[Scaredy Squirrel]]'' is pretty much this. It takes quite a bit to make him cry but when [[The Woobie|he does cry....]]

* Phineas of ''[[Phineas and Ferb]]'', who has near-constant optimism and a can-do attitude. Because of this, he quite literally ''can'' and ''does'' achieve the impossible, [[Once an Episode|every episode]], with the help of his friends and family. That being said, he can occasionally [[Heroic Blue Screen of Death|crack]]...

 

== [[Real Life]] ==

{{quote|'''"I keep my ideals, because in spite of everything I still believe that people are really good at heart."''}}

* In realistic proportions, this is actually method of coping with extreme stress and problems. As any coping methods, it can be used right or wrong way, but if it is honest and right, its actually very good one.

 

{{reflist}}

[[Category:Happiness Tropes]]

[[Category:Idealism Tropes]]

[[Category:The Idealist]]

[[Category:Double Standard]]