Unintentionally Sympathetic: Difference between revisions

 

The opposite of this trope is [[Unintentionally Unsympathetic]].

 

* The [[Trix Rabbit]]. Seriously, is there a person alive who didn't want to see him get his bowl of cereal? Case in Point: In both 1976 and 1990, Trix held a vote where kids could cut a ballot out of the box, write whether or not they wanted the rabbit to get some Trix, and send it in. The results? Overwhelmingly "yes" in both cases, with over 80% saying yes in 1990. Of course, the cereal was quickly snatched away again after a single bite.

* The "ditch the old broom" commercials by Swiffer, which were filmed in such a way to make the "dumped" the broom/mop/wiping implement seem morbidly depressed and their human "ex" seem callous. Almost all the new commericals in the campaign feature the dismissed broom [[Cargo Ship|meeting a new house-hold implement partner]].

* A line of commercials for Comcast's "Xfinity" cable TV/home internet/digital phone service features a tired, tangled, grumpy bundle of phone lines (representing ATT's competing "U-verse" service) who repeatedly advises a family complaining about his slow speeds to get a new, better service (i.e., Xfinity). Though we're meant to feel sorry for the family, they come off as incredibly [[Ungrateful Bastard]]s who refuse to even acknowledge all the years and years of service he's given, whining because he can't instantly download movies and other petty complaints. In one ad, he wistfully talks about the good old days, and tries to tell the eye-rolling teenage son to enjoy his youth... only to turn around and find the impatient [[Jerkass]] walked out.

* There's a cars.com ad with a grey car crying because it got a bad review while a red car with a good review was being a complete [[Jerkass]]. It makes you just want to go out and buy that poor grey car.

 

* [[Yandere|Yuzuha]] in ''[[Tenchi Muyo!|Tenchi Muyo! Manatsu no Eve]]'', you could spend days drawing up alternate character interpretations due to the disappointingly short runtime of the movie, which allows for quite a bit of freedom since so much is raised and so little actually touched upon, and 70% of them would either result in [[Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds]] or an angry petulant demon child without the proper understanding of emotion.

* [[Alpha Bitch|Ursula]] from the ''[[Pokémon (anime)|Pokémon]]'' anime. She does get a fair bit of [[Draco in Leather Pants]], but even many of those who won't deny that she's a [[Jerkass]] think she would have been an interesting character, and would have liked her to get more development. Plus, some disgruntled fans don't understand why [[Designated Villain|they're supposed to boo and hiss at the girl]] (who is at least shown to love and respect her Pokémon) and, at the same time, to admire [[Jerk Sue|Paul]], who is a much worse person than she is.

 

* Rayek in ''[[Elf Quest]]'' gets stuck with this a lot.

** In the first book, when [[The Hero|Cutter]] is ruled the winner of a mental trial over Rayek, despite the fact that he ''cheated'' by using a lodestone (a potent magic item to the elves). The reasoning for this is that Cutter didn't know that his good luck charm had magic properties, but he ''did'' know, he was just too dim to remember it at the time. Rayek lost a trial of wits to an opponent who was not only less intelligent, but didn't solve ANY of the puzzles by thinking, and won by being ''rewarded for stupidity''. This is even Lampshaded by Rayek himself, saying that he could have used his own magic but did not; his complaint is utterly ignored by everyone but Leetah, who agrees, but doesn't stand up for him. Meanwhile, the rest of the Wolfriders continue laughing at him for being beaten in the test so easily.

* Many [[Strawman Political]] in ''[[Chick Tracts]]''. [[Disproportionate Retribution|Particularly those who end up in hell when they have not done anything really wrong.]]

 

* ''[[How I Became Yours]] ''does this to Mai. She was supposed to be the bitchy [[Woman Scorned]] standing in between Zuko and Katara's Super True Love, but she ''did'' have a good point as a reason for keeping the news that Katara was pregnant with Zuko's kid (namely, that the Fire Nation would collapse if news of the Fire Lord having an illegitimate child with a Waterbender, and Zuko ''was'' cheating on her when that poor kid was conceived), and there's still no discussion on how Mai didn't deserve {{spoiler|to be ''bloodbended to death'' by a badly [[Out of Character]] and [[God Mode Sue]]-ed Katara, when she could've easily restrained her with said technique so she could be sent to trial.}}

* Britney in ''[[My Immortal]]''. After all, her only "crime" was [[What Do You Mean It's Not Heinous?|liking Hilary Duff and not shopping at Hot Topic]].

 

* Tai Lung in ''[[Kung Fu Panda]]''. Driven to mass destruction and slaughter because his [[Freudian Excuse|father]]'s master deems him unworthy of the final piece of martial arts wisdom. Tai Lung is made [[Sympathy for the Devil|sympathetic]] thanks to his detailed backstory, flashbacks to him as a [[Ridiculously Cute Critter|ridiculously adorable]] innocent youth, his motivating desire for [["Well Done, Son" Guy|respect from his adopted father]], and the fact that he apparently spent twenty years in a [[Hellhole Prison]].

* Why were the hyenas villains in ''[[The Lion King]]''? Because they were starving to death. Why were they starving? Because the lions didn't want them eating their food, basically. Small wonder that they're not exactly kind to Simba when he stumbles in to the only place that is actually theirs. Of course their starvation may have been their own doing considering {{spoiler|what the Pride Lands look like when Scar lets them take over.}}

** Particularly henious in that Mufasa made it very clear about the circle of life, where everyone had their place and so one didn't have to feel guilty about what one ate as they would effectively one day eat you.... apparently hyenas aren't part of this food chain.

* Vincent from ''[[Over the Hedge (animation)|Over the Hedge]]''. He's spent the entire summer hoarding food to get him through the winter, only for all of it to be destroyed when RJ the raccoon tries to steal it (who given his size, surely didn't need to take ''all'' of it). The two come to an agreement: RJ has to replace everything that he lost, or else Vincent will eat him. Sounds a fair deal to me, but Vincent is portrayed as the [[Designated Villain|bad guy]] simply because he's trying to survive - just like every other animal in the movie. [[Everything Is Worse With Bears]], but the fact that Vincent ends up in a Hannibal Lector gurney and mask feels [[Disproportionate Retribution|like overkill]] for an animal that was just trying to reclaim what was ''rightfully his'' in the first place.

** The filmmakers seem to have realized this late in the production and gave Vincent an out-of-the blue monologue about how he got where he is by [[Offstage Villainy|selling out, betraying, murdering, etc. all of his former friends.]] This (and Vincent's [[Your Approval Fills Me with Shame|praise of RJ]] for being just like him) is of course the the catalyst that starts RJ on the path to redemption, but remove those two lines and you've got no villain.

* ''[[Pocahontas]]'': Percy the pug. He's supposed to be a spoiled and unpleasant purebred dog. The film does this so badly that the only thing that really counts against him is one growl in agreement with Ratcliffe. One growl. The rest of the time he's just enjoying the luxuries that come with being a governor's pet and getting justifiably angry at a raccoon stealing his food.

* The two antagonist daughters in the ''[[My Little Pony]]'' movie. Even [[The Nostalgia Chick]] felt more towards them than the ''really'' boring titular ponies.

** He's also [[Spared by the Adaptation]] as a result.

* Soto, the first [[Big Bad]] from ''[[Ice Age]]'', as he lost his entire pack/family because of the human hunters and may have been an amicable guy before and fans tend to ignore his bitter desire for vengeance against the humans.

* The monster from the movie ''[[Cloverfield]]''. It was big, it was scary, and it went on a rampage in New York City. But for some, the entire movie takes on a whole new perspective [[All There in the Manual|when they find out]] that the monster is a terrified, newborn baby looking for its mother. For others, that knowledge causes precisely the [[Fridge Horror|opposite]] reaction.

* Kids movies tend to have these, particularly the cheesetastic ones. ''The [[Lizzie McGuire]] Movie'', for example, had an "evil" teacher who was the only relatable character in the movie.

* [[Godzilla]] in the film ''GMK'' was [[Word of God|intended by director Shusuke Kaneko to be pure evil]] (Hence, why his eyes are a pure soulless white). Of course, considering that this ''is'' [[Rule of Cool|Godzilla we're talking about]] the fandom ended up rooting for him more than they did for the heroic monsters (IE: Baragon, Mothra, and, ironically enough, {{spoiler|[[Big Bad|King Ghidorah]]}}).

* Imhotep in ''[[The Mummy Trilogy|The Mummy 1999]]'' remake comes off as far more sympathetic than an [[Omnicidal Maniac]] who wants to [[Take Over the World]] has any right to be, considering he did it all for love. Likewise, his [[Love Interest]] is also rather sympathetic considering she's the unwilling sex-toy of the Pharaoh and dies (the first time) shouting: "My body is no longer his temple!"

** This is perhaps why in the sequel, Anakh-Su-Namun [[Retcon|gets portrayed]] as a manipulative [[Black Widow]] instead of an unwilling slave wearing touch-betraying body-paint. He also has a [[Alas, Poor Villain|decidedly emotional final death scene]] in said sequel.

* Sir [[Anthony Hopkins]] is said to have been shocked people liked his character Hannibal Lecter in ''[[Silence of the Lambs]]''.

* As noted on the [[Mean Character, Nice Actor]] page, although Michael Palin's character in ''[[A Fish Called Wanda]]'' spends much of the film trying to assassinate a sweet old lady, audiences invariably saw him as [[The Woobie]]. This is probably a combination of Palin being a nice guy, the fact his character is an [[Pet the Dog|an animal lover]], and that he is more likable than the film's antagonist, Otto, who consistently torments him.

* White Goodman from ''[[Dodgeball]]'' is a chauvinistic [[Jerkass]] who takes his fitness regime and business to extremes, but his backstory is that he was a morbidly obese man who decided to get his act together and used the means by which he lost weight as the basis of his business. His antagonism towards Peter is mostly because he slept with several of White's trainers, and sent a male stripper to the one-year anniversary of his gym.

* Justin Hammer from ''[[Iron Man 2]]'' comes off as unintentionally sympathetic because he is played as a comic relief joke villain. Where as he could have been played as an [[Evil Counterpart]] to Tony Stark, his utter incompetence — both in his profession and in his personal life as shown by his complete failure with women, begs the question of whether or not the writers really hated the character, or were simply parodying the [[Corrupt Corporate Executive]] archetype. Then again, they had already had a hyper-competent [[Corrupt Corporate Executive]] in the first movie, so perhaps they went too far the other way in not wanting to tread old ground.

*** He's also not the main villain of the movie.

* Ray Finkle, the deranged kidnapper and murderer of ''[[Ace Ventura]]''. ''Anyone'' would turn out at least a little screwed up after what he'd been through. Seeing as he was the only professional athlete to come out of his small town, you'd think he'd be a beloved folk hero. Instead, he misses a field goal at the biggest football game of the year....and [[Never Live It Down|the townsfolk never, ever let him live it down]]. They even vandalize his parents' home, driving his mother to irreversible insanity and making his father so paranoid that he has to get his shotgun every time he answers the door! It's no wonder that Ray's room is covered with hateful graffiti and has Ray's traumatic blunder playing on an old movie projector at all hours of the day - or that Ray was eventually committed to a mental institution and {{spoiler|suffered one hell of a gender-identity crisis}}.

* To some degree, Jade Fox from ''[[Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon]]''. Yes, she killed Li Mu Bai's master, but she reveals her reasons for it: {{spoiler|he slept with her, but then refused to share the secrets of Wudan, since he apparently couldn't stand a woman knowing them.}} Couple that with how badly she's been abused and insulted by {{spoiler|her own student, Jen,}} and you get an unfortunate, broken old woman.

* The villains in ''[[Star Trek: Insurrection]]'' can be divided into two camps: corrupt Federation officials who want to make the [[Fountain of Youth]] qualities of the Ba'ku planet generally available to the galaxy at large and {{spoiler|former residents of the planet who were exiled and now need the planet's qualities to stave off death}}. Both groups come across as quite a bit more sympathetic than the writers intended, despite their [[Kick the Dog|dog-kicking ways]]. It doesn't help that the Ba'ku only appear to occupy [[Planetville|a few hundred square kilometres]] at most.

* In ''[[Caveman]]'', Tonda is the bad guy, and no question he's a [[Jerk Jock|jerk ass]]... but at least he's looking out for his tribe, and he was also shown to be genuinely upset when he lost Lana to the river (despite that because of his status he would be able to easily get another mate), so did he really deserve the beating (and possible death), he got in the end?

 

* Julian May's ''[[Galactic Milieu]]'' Trilogy has one of these on an organisational level. The language used in the finale and elsewhere clearly indicates that the titular Milieu are [[Designated Hero|the good guys]] and the Metapsychic Rebellion the [[Designated Villain|bad]] [[Dark Messiah|guys]]. However, the actual events of the story fail to relate this to such an extent that it's a horrific [[Downer Ending]] on first reading.

* Too many characters in the ''[[Left Behind]]'' books to count, especially by comparison to the [http://www.patheos.com/community/slacktivist/2004/03/25/lb-the-evil-of-banality/ callous], mysogynistic, [http://www.patheos.com/community/slacktivist/2004/04/06/lb-scream-morality/ self-satisfied] [http://www.patheos.com/community/slacktivist/2004/03/23/lb-rayford-mary-sue-steele/ way the alleged] heroes act.

* Intentionally subverted in John Milton’s ''[[Paradise Lost]].'' Because the poem starts off from his viewpoint, Satan comes across as more of a [[Designated Villain]] than an actual bad guy. However, as the poem progresses, the reader is shown the story from the point of view of the angels and God, and it becomes clear that Satan is rationalizing his behavior [[Author Tract|just like humans tend to do]]. The reader is supposed to sympathize with Satan, but they are not supposed to realize why they are doing so until [[Word of God|God]] (literally) tells them why he is wrong. However, because of the eloquence of his passionate arguments, even many who have read the work [[Misaimed Fandom|miss the point]], and so believe that “Satan” is in fact the hero of the story, making this a straight trope. This may be a case of [[Values Dissonance]] mixed with [[Cool People Rebel Against Authority]].

* Through most of the ''[[Twilight (novel)|Twilight]]'' series, Leah is meant to be seen as a heartless bitch who didn't bow graciously out for Sam hooking up with Emily, uses the pack mind to think of various scandals, and tell Jacob he's being overly angsty about Bella. Thing is, with all of the shit that Leah goes through (her fiance is essentially brainwashed into loving her cousin, her father dies of a heart attack, she's the only girl ever to become a werewolf, the entire pack thinks she's bitter and weak, her own brother says that she ruins everything, etc), she comes across as an [[Iron Woobie]]. She comes across as this even more so when one considers that the same people who call her selfish and whiny all coddle Jacob for being even more self-centered and whiny over Bella, who he was involved with far less than Leah was with Sam.

 

* Cole Turner from ''[[Charmed]]'' is very much this. He spent most of his life working for the forces of evil but became good because he fell in love with Phoebe Haliwell. After a great deal of work, he became a normal human. He ended up being possessed by the Source of all Evil and the Charmed Ones had to vanquish him. After he came back, the sisters just flat out dismiss him as evil and didn't trust him from the start. They didn't even bother finding out if he was possessed by evil by an entity that had possessed humans before. Cole tried over and over again to prove that he was good until he snapped and become evil. This caused a lot of Phoebe fans to hate Phoebe and feel sympathetic to Cole.

* T-Bag at various points in ''[[Prison Break]]''. This is partly because he had an egregiously awful childhood and partly because he was very well-acted by Robert Knepper. Late on in the show's run he ends up showing more compassion for a wounded foe than Linc but by the end he's turned despicable again.

* Isabella from ''[[Robin Hood (TV series)|Robin Hood]]'' is clearly meant to be entirely unsympathetic by the end of the show's run, thereby justifying Robin and Guy's attempt to kill her (which ends up successful...at the cost of their own lives.) In that case, it probably wasn't such a good idea to have her back-story consist of Guy selling her into an abusive marriage to a sadistic rapist at the age of thirteen, or to have [[Designated Hero|Robin]] constantly breaking into her bedroom at night to make thinly-veiled threats, flip-flopping in regards to his attitude and feelings toward her, and breaking every promise he ever makes to her. And any woman who is put into a [[Betty and Veronica]] [[Love Triangle]] with [[Damsel Scrappy|Kate]] as their rival is inevitably going to look good in comparison. Even Isabella ordering the execution of Meg, which is meant to be her [[Moral Event Horizon]], is somewhat understandable, considering that she frees Meg from an arranged marriage only to catch her releasing a prisoner that has already made at least two attempts on Isabella's life. Likewise, the fact that she is one of the few characters on the show to avoid carrying the [[Idiot Ball]] earned her extra points, and even when she's [[Ax Crazy|batshit insane]] she manages to outsmart everyone around her.

* Maria Joaquina from ''[[Carrusel]]''. Granted, she was not always the friendliest person. But nobody would blame her for not liking Cirilo back. In no way is she obligated to return his love romantically for any reason. Sure sure, his parents donated blood to her mother. And he was always showering her with unwanted gifts and attention. But is she truly required to be anything other than civil and respectful towards him? That, and she is nowhere near as cruel as her other rich classmate Jorge.

* A [[Asshole Victim|pedophile rapist kidnapper]] on ''[[CSI: Miami]]'' goes from pure evil to slightly sympathetic when he reveals that he was also molested as a child ("My 'Special Friend' took me here too!") -- unfortunately that was before the cops arrive and {{spoiler|Horatio allowed the pedo/kidnapper to die after the latter was shot, hanging by one hand from a balcony, and begging for help}}.

 

** As [[The Unfavorite]], April also falls into this. [[Informed Attribute|Supposedly a]] rebellious teen, she constantly gets the short end of the stick and is supposed to be grateful for it. One week-long arc involves April deciding to skip eating dinner with her folks to focus on finishing her homework; Elly [[What Do You Mean It's Not Heinous?|reacts like this is the end of the world]] and sends John to loom threateningly over April until she comes down and apologizes. She also gets blamed for falling into the river and causing Farley's [[Heroic Sacrifice]], a guilt she lives with from the tender age of ''four''.

** Let's just say that the author's very bad at writing strawmen and very good at making the readers root for exactly who she doesn't want them rooting for.

 

 

* At the end of [[TNA]] Impact's "The Whole F'n Show," while the <s> [[ECW]]</s> EV2.0 group were gathered in the ring, Fourtune jumped them from behind as they delivered a [[No-Holds-Barred Beatdown]] to them with [[Ric Flair]] yelling at Dixie Carter that it was her fault. While Fortune are supposed to come off as heels, even before hearing AJ Styles and Kazarian's comments on "Reaction" about Dixie bringing in [[Ring Oldies]] rather than using (established) home grown talent (they even got their own PPV that was a tribute to the old ECW), many fans believed that the [[Designated Villain|"heels"]] [[Straw Man Has a Point|were justified]]. The chants of "THIS IS AWESOME!" during said beat down didn't help at all.

** More of a [[Broken Base]] type situation in some forums. Try debating how Fortune is actually in the right in this feud with EV2 to some diehard ECW fans who backs up EV2 regardless. Others also root for Fortune as they don't come off as whiny.

** What else didn't help was the fact that that episode of Impact was the '''second''' time (behind the aforementioned PPV) the Hardcore Originals took center stage just "one more time" to say "thank you". What ELSE didn't help was the fact that the EV2 guys were being treated as faces for taking the spotlight out of the gate at the expense of TNA's homegrown and long-term talent, something that Paul Heyman '''never''' allowed outsiders to do in ECW at least without earning it in the company first - which is ironically part of the reason they loved worked for him.

** Fortune are actually a greater example of this trope. They went from just unintentionally sympathetic, to unintentionally ''[[The Hero|the heroes]]''.

 

** Even Tolkien realized the [[Unfortunate Implications]] in the Orcs (an [[Exclusively Evil]] race conflicted strongly with his Catholic faith), and [[Word of God]] is that they were as diverse as the other races off-screen but we only see the evil soldiers and bandits.

 

* Shylock from ''[[The Merchant of Venice]]'' to modern readers, who are much more prone to sympathize with an oppressed Jew getting some payback on an antisemitic society. While Shakespeare gave Shylock some sympathetic motivation, he very possibly did not intend the audience to root for him. Shylock is, after all, a heathen who wants to murder a Christian over injured pride.

** In modern productions, he is often intentionally portrayed as sympathetic and sometimes even as the victim.

** There are those who believe that Shakespeare may have intended exactly this interpretation, having written the play as a veiled attack on anti-Jewish bigotry.

* Many fans of the musical ''[[Wicked (theatre)|Wicked]]'' think of the Wizard as sympathetic and think that [[Alternate Character Interpretation|Madame Morrible is the real villain]]. It's not entirely without reason; his songs are entirely about how he wants to make people, including Elphaba, happy and he's genuinely heartbroken when it's revealed that {{spoiler|[[I Am Your Father|he was Elphaba's father]]}}.

* It's really, really hard not to be sympathetic to Harry Beaton in ''[[Brigadoon]]'', given that all he wants to do is leave a village where he is utterly miserable and in which he has been essentially imprisoned for all eternity without his consent.

 

* [[Kingdom Hearts II]] : The Nobodies. They are played as disposable monsters without hearts, incapable of any emotion. Still, despite their blatantly evil acts, some fans empathize with the Nobodies' desire to obtain hearts. It doesn't help that they act out what they remember of their emotions, making it easy to forget that they're technically uncaring. It also doesn't help that {{spoiler|Roxas}} is a Nobody, and definitely seems to still have feelings, though he's said to be a special case because {{spoiler|he was created with Ven's heart.}}

** Interestingly, there are two scenes where the Nobodies straight out acknowledge that they are emotionless. Twice, one of them gets a big speech on how they're in the right, one talking about the pain of not having a heart...when Sora points out that they can't have pain, as they don't have a heart. The response? To completely shift out, and basically tell Sora, "Okay, ya got me." This behavior mimics that of real-life sociopaths.

** This has been addressed by the creators; the nobodies got a game revolving around them ([[Kingdom Hearts: 358/2 Days]]), and in [[Kingdom Hearts 3D]] {{spoiler|it has been confirmed that they all got their hearts back and became whole again after being defeated. Lea in particular seems to be playing an important role in the story.}}

* ''[[Gears of War]] 3'' barely averts this. While the Locust were portrayed as genocidal monsters in 1 and 2, 3 finds them [[The Remnant|as badly wiped out as humanity]], struggling against an insane mob of their own mutated kin and a glitchy human superweapon that will render their entire species extinct. On top of this, there are strong implications that Adam Fenix initially cooperated with the Locust against the Lambent years before the start of hostilities between the two species and is now (albeit reluctantly) firing said superweapon because it will save his own species while it destroys theirs. Sympathy is averted only because of brutal, unrelenting hostility and disregard for human life shown by the Locust, both their loyal remnants and savage encampments, but especially by [[Dark Action Girl|Queen Myrrah]] herself.

 

* Angelica from Jay Naylor's ''[[Original Life]]'' was meant to be the personification of everything the author didn't like. She ended up being the most likeable character in the entire strip, especially because everyone else is such an unrepentant tool to her, she comes across as [[The Woobie]].

* Syphile from ''[[Drowtales]]'' is treated like [[The Woobie]] by many fans, despite her mistreatment of Ariel since the latter was only an infant and treating many of her friends and servants poorly. This is due in part to her background as a [["Well Done, Son" Guy]] to her adoptive mother Quain'tana, who she was never able to satisfy, and the apparent abuse she suffered at the hands of Sil'lice, because she was tainted (and to top it off, the only reason she became tainted was to please Quain'tana, who then immediately rejected her). The author said that she was "not meant to have much redeeming features, she lost them all over time. I wouldn't portray her as anything else" but {{spoiler|given her recent death}} it's obvious that a lot of people felt for her. This is further compounded by the [[Continuity Snarl]] of the canon, where certain elements like stories where Quain'tana explicitly beat her or Sil'lice and Mel'arnach raped her her are no longer considered canon. In other words, she certainly wasn't treated well, but not nearly as horrifically as was formerly portrayed.

 

* Tom of ''[[Tom and Jerry]]'' fame is an even more gratuitous example. In this case, Tom is simply defending his home and getting abused by the freeloader when he tries to stop him. This has, in at least one occasion, resulted in Tom being killed. For trying to keep Jerry from stealing from him.

** However, there were cases where he '''deserved''' the punishment. For example, in one episode a sympathetic Jerry lets in a starving Tom from the freezing outdoors and offers him food, wine, and comfort. When the owner of the home returns and is about to throw Tom out, he betrays Jerry by trying to get in her good graces by throwing '''him''' out (out of the highest room of a 12-story building no less!). It's any wonder the audience roots for Jerry when he gets back at Tom for being such an ungrateful bastard.

* The Ice King from ''[[Adventure Time]]'' comes across as this a lot, even before {{spoiler|he's established as a [[Tragic Villain]]}}, because in many episodes he's just minding his own business while ''Finn'' is the troublemaker. In addition, almost anything bad he ''did'' do was a misguided and desperate attempt to be happy.

** The Earl of Lemongrab of ''[[Adventure Time]]'' is basically a complete asshole to everybody around him, yells at his butler for no good reason, makes a child cry, and sends everybody in his kingdom to the dungeon for one million years. But he's engendered a lot of sympathy from certain fans. Why? Because of his "off" mental state- thanks to Princess Bubblegum making a fateful mistake in her laboratory during his scientific creation. (Also, he doesn't have any friends.) Fans on his side will tell you that he's either retarded or just mentally unadjusted, the fact that he's a terrible ruler isn't his fault, and that Princess Bubblegum, his creator, was unjustified in tormenting him when it was her fault he's like that. He's a [[Tragic Villain]] and a [[Jerkass Woobie]] to his fans, in a similar way to the Ice King.

** The show has pretty much redeemed Trixie in canon now, after her second episode showed that even after being possessed by and driven insane by an artifact of ultimate evil, Trixie still doesn't have it in her to actually seriously injure anypony. Of course, she ''was'' arrogant and powerhungry enough to put that amulet on in the first place, but presumably it didn't come with a consumer safety advisory of 'Warning: Side effects of using the Alicorn Amulet may include paranoia, megalomania, poor impulse control, irrational phobias, and being reduced to the common sense of a particularly thick doorknob.'

** The high-tier villains also get this. Some people actually manage to sympathize with [[Mad God|Discord]]'s goals. It helps that he's a silly, goofy [[Trickster Archetype]] who spent [[And I Must Scream|1000 years]] [[Fate Worse Than Death|sealed in]] [[Taken for Granite|stone]]. (Even though he was sealed precisely for being evil in the first place, and his idea of fun involves copious amounts of [[Mind Rape]] and [[World Gone Mad|chaos]].)

** Nightmare Moon: even before she got better and turned into Luna, [[Ensemble Darkhorse|possibly the most beloved pony in the fandom,]] she came over as more of a [[Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds]] than villain because at the very start of the pilot we are told that the reason she's been taken over by her evil alter-ego is because no-one appreciated all the hard work she was doing controlling night time. Sure, her [[The Night That Never Ends|Night That Never Ends]] would have killed everypony in Equestria when the food ran out, but all she wanted was a hug from her big sister.

*** Season 5's finale has a brief visit to an alternate timeline where Nightmare Moon won, and as it turns out endless night ''doesn't'' kill everypony in Equestria. OTOH, it also means that Celestia is enjoying an involuntary stay ''in the center of the sun'', so Her Nocturnal Majesty comes across as just a bit creepier even at the same time she is revealed as being less omnicidal.

 

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