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Usually, this trope involves the lead characters convincing the legend that he must rise above his weaknesses and become the true [[Knight in Shining Armor|shining example]] that they thought he was. A more [[Bittersweet Ending]] is possible if one of the leads gets caught up in the hero-worship and refuses to see through the foibles to the human being inside. Or worse, if they only realize the legend is human after a [[Heroic Sacrifice]]; if only the reader realizes it and the characters all refuse to, this trope can reach [[Tragic Hero]] heights.
 
[[An Aesop]] about expecting the [[Knight in Shining Armor]] is possible. Contrast [[Feet of Clay]] or [[No Hero to His Valet]], where the "legendary hero" is anything but. Similar to [[Broken Pedestal]], but there the characters have a rational grounds for thinking the legend is better than he is because they knew him when he ''was'' better. Inverse of [[Hero Withwith Bad Publicity]]. A [[Historical Downgrade]] is doing this to a historical figure.
{{examples}}
 
== Anime & Manga ==
* Louie from ''[[Rune Soldier Louie]]''.
* L/Ryuzaki in ''[[Death Note (Manga)|Death Note]]''. Light mentions that most people would expect the #1 greatest detective in the world to be more detective-y. Instead, he's a barefoot young insomniac with a sweet tooth, non-existant social skills, and extremely poor posture.
* In ''[[Vision of Escaflowne]]'', Chid has a case of this toward [[Officer and Aa Gentleman|Allen Schezar]]: his mother's tales of Allen's skill, bravery and heroism had led Chid to expect him to be an unbeatable hero. Allen showing up badly wounded and semi-conscious is something of a letdown to the boy, who'd been expecting someone rather more invincible.
* Jiraya of ''[[Naruto (Manga)|Naruto]]'' is one of three legendary shinobi who have saved countless lives. Unfortunately for his apprentice Naruto, he's also a huge pervert who writes porn novels.
* Played with in ''[[Fullmetal Alchemist]]'', where the young Princess Mei Cheng has a sizeable crush on famed alchemist Edward Elric - whom she's never met. She imagines him to be dashing, tall, and a complete [[Bishounen]] with beautiful manners...then she meets the grumpy, snarky, vertically-challenged reality. It's done for laughs when she berates him for "toying with a maiden's affections" - and he stares at her and wonders who in the world she is.
* Holland from ''[[Eureka Seven]]''. When Renton runs away to join Gekkostate, he is disappointed to discover that his idol is a [[Jerkass]] who [[Silly Rabbit, Idealism Is for Kids|doesn't subscribe]] [[Jade-Colored Glasses|to his own]] [[Knight in Sour Armor|ideals.]]
* In ''[[Mobile Suit Gundam SEED Astray (Manga)|Mobile Suit Gundam SEED Astray]]'', [[Genki Girl|Kisato]] is a total fangirl of the legendary George Glenn, the original [[Born Winner|Coordinator]] and an [[The Ace|Ace]] of the highest caliber. He ends up coming back to "life" when the team finds his [[Brain In Aa Jar]] and [[Mad Scientist|Professor]] hooks it into a hologram projector. However, he turns out to be a very goofy and playful fellow, which upsets Kisato's image of him as an austere, serene, larger-than-life figure. In the end, she accepts him after he convinces her that he's only human and legends always exaggerate...but she's still put off by how silly he is.
 
 
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== Film ==
* ''[[Hancock]]'': Only one character manages to see through the appearance to heroism.
* In ''[[Star Trek]]'', Zefram Cochrane was the genius who gave the human race warp drive, thus taking the first step in the founding of [[The Federation]]. ''[[Star Trek: First Contact]]'' revealed that he was a cowardly, womanizing drunk whose intentions in building the first warp ship was "dollar signs, and lots of them".
{{quote| '''Commander Riker:''' Someone once said "Don't try to be a great man. Just be a man, and let history make its own judgment."<br />
'''Zefram Cochrane:''' That's rhetorical nonsense. Who said that?<br />
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* [[Peter Jackson]]'s 2005 version of ''[[King Kong]]'' has a good one. After Ann Darrow (Naomi Watts) is taken away by Kong, the crew goes off to rescue her, but about half way (after a run in with some Raptors) Bruce Baxter, the intended star of Carl Denham's (Jack Black) film, decides to turn tail much to the disappointment of Adrian Brody's character. "I always knew you weren't the tough guy you played in the movies, Baxter, I just never figured you for a coward". Later on though, as Jack, Carl, and the rest are about to be killed, Baxter returns with the crew for a [[Big Damn Heroes]] moment and gets to be the action hero he always pretended to be.
* The all powerful ''[[Wizard of Oz]]'' turns out to be {{spoiler|nothing more than a [[Snake Oil Salesman]]. His confidence trickster skills do, however, eventually save the day.}}
* In ''[[Legend of the Guardians: Thethe Owls of ga Hoole]]'', Soren finds out that the ragged, one-eyed, rather cynical old owl Ezylryb is actually {{spoiler|his hero, the legendary Lyze of Kiel}}.
{{quote| '''{{spoiler|Lyze}}:''' Fancy it must be hard, meeting your hero and seeing that he's real and not a myth.<br />
'''Soren:''' You're just not--<br />
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* In [[Rick Riordan]]'s ''[[Percy Jackson and The Olympians|The Battle for the Labyrinth]]'', they meet up with Briares, the Hundred-Handed One, and find him demoralized and unwilling to fight, much to Tyson's distress. In the end, however, he does join in the final battle.
* In [[Poul Anderson]]'s ''Virgin Planet'', the somewhat callow hero lands on a [[Lady Land|planet inhabited solely by women]] -- and women [[Shrouded in Myth|whose myths recount the days where there were men, wonderful and marvellous beings]]. Meeting with a real, merely human man leads them to rapidly conclude that he's really an alien, not being wonderful and marvellous enough. Dealing with him, however, brings various women to realize that he really is a man. (Not at all hurt by his [[Character Development]], all the way up to offering to make a [[Heroic Sacrifice]] at the climax.)
* In [[Piers Anthony]]'s ''[[Xanth (Literature)|Xanth]]'', when the Gorgon asked Good Magician Humphrey to marry her, he set the same condition as anyone else who wanted an answer from him: she had to work for him for a year. When Dor discovers this, Humphrey explains that he feared this trope, because the Gorgon had thought herself in love after he cast the spell to keep her from turning people to stone. Working as his housekeeper for a year would ensure that she knew of all his little quirks and annoying traits before she married him -- if she married him. A little later, the Gorgon explains to Dor that she had worked this out, and [[Single Woman Seeks Good Man|it is exactly what convinced her that he was the right man]].
* In [[Terry Pratchett]]'s ''[[Discworld (Literature)/Unseen Academicals|Unseen Academicals]]'', Trev was bitter about his dead father. Nutt pointed out that his father had been only human, not a god; a good father; and, if perhaps a [[Fearless Fool]] who had gotten himself killed, yet people who had risked their lives had been important to the human race -- an insight which profoundly moves Trev.
** Discworld also references the [[Trope Namer]] in ''[[Discworld (Literature)/Feet of Clay|Feet of Clay]]'' when "Old Stoneface" Vimes, a [[Captain Ersatz]] of Cromwell, is persistently described as having 'warts and all' by historical romantics who essentially use this as their justification for considering him the bad guy (King Lorenzo, on the other side, was a [[Complete Monster]] who was "extremely fond of children" ''but he looked the part'').
* The Wizard in ''[[Wizard of Oz]]'', aka the Great and Powerful Oz. {{spoiler|Less so in the book, where he is portrayed as a kindly old man who has simply gone astray in his balloon, as in the 1939 film, where he is shown as a ''[[Snake Oil Salesman]]''.}}
 
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* Poignantly subverted in ''[[Firefly]]''. After arriving at a village that has put Jayne up as a folk hero due to a misunderstanding, Jayne eventually tries to make the townspeople understand he's just a regular guy, even going so far as to push over his own statue. They don't believe him.
{{quote| '''Mal''': It's not about you, Jayne. It's about what they need.}}
* In ''[[Star Trek: Deep Space Nine]]'', Dahar Master Kor is a legendary warrior that everyone gushes over. But he is really old and becoming more and more senile as time goes on. His legendary status gets stripped away when he starts reliving a battle from his glory days which gets a lot of his people unnecessarily killed. Shown for the senile old man that he was, the crew rejects him. But he redeems himself when he undertakes a suicide mission and shows that he still has the skills that made him the legendary figure in the first place.
* In the ''[[Doctor Who]]'' episode "Father's Day", Rose meets up with her dead father, whom she knows only from her mother's stories. He proves to be up to his neck in get-rich-quick schemes and he and her mother quarrel almost continuously. However, in the end, her father makes a [[Heroic Sacrifice]] to save the universe. Rose's voice-over at the beginning and end of the episode are both about her father, but the concluding one is full of new insight.
* Textbook demonstrated in an episode of ''[[M*A*S*H (TV)|Mash]]''. Hawkeye's nightly habits catch up to him, and a hangover prevents him from finishing surgery on a patient. Radar, laid up due to an earlier injury, chastises Hawkeye for his failure, which results in his hero angrily yelling at him. After much discussion (and literally everyone in camp chewing out Hawkeye for his lost temper, Hawkeye included) Radar reaches the conclusion that he was human all along, and that seeing him off the pedestal, he might be able to like him more as a person than an idol.
* Occurs in the ''[[Babylon Five5]]'' episode "Atonement". Delenn warns Lennier to stay on Babylon 5 when she goes to face the clan council, lest he find out about her biggest wart. He refuses because of his [[Undying Loyalty]]. When he finds out what it is - that she had cast the deciding vote for the Earth-Minbari war - Lennier tells her that he ''still'' has [[Undying Loyalty]] for her.
** This, by the way, was despite the fact that Lennier had had family aboard the Black Star. He never held a grudge, either against Sheridan (who destroyed it) or Delenn (when he found out she had ordered it into danger in the first place). Lennier doesn't seem to have gone in for grudges.
 
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== Webcomics ==
* Rose of all people in ''[[Homestuck (Webcomic)|Homestuck]]'', from {{spoiler|Kanaya's}} point of view.
 
 
== Western Animation ==
* Played with in the first episode of ''[[Batman: theThe Brave And The Bold (Animation)|Batman the Brave And The Bold]]'': [[Batman]] and the [[Blue Beetle]] (Jaime Reyes) end up on a distant alien planet that reveres the Beetle (actually, a previous owner of the scarab) as their savior. Like the ''[[Firefly]]'' example, Jaime tries to convince the aliens that he's no savior and that [[Holding Out for Aa Hero|they should stand on their own two feet]], but it fails... until the climax of the episode, of course.
* In ''[[Hey Arnold (Animation)|Hey Arnold]]'', Eugene is disillusioned when he learns that his idol is a foul tempered hypocrite. However, he's also a good person as demonstrated when he selflessly saves Eugene and Arnold from untimely deaths.
* On ''[[Daria]],'' an old sports hero comes to Lawndale High for a dedication, and everybody has to put up with what a [[Jerk Jock]] he is. The discrepancy between his honored status and caustic personality becomes even more difficult when {{spoiler|he dies in an accident, evoking sympathy and [[Never Speak Ill of the Dead]]}}.
* ''[[Beast Wars (Animation)|Beast Wars]]'': [[Invoked Trope]] by Dinobot via his {{spoiler|[[Last Words]]}}:
{{quote| "Tell my tale to those who ask. Tell it truly, the ill deeds along with the good, and let me be judged accordingly. The rest... is silence."}}
 
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