Why this character is not that awesome.

[tzimize]

I know he looks cool and all, but am I wrong, or wasn't the whole point of Rorschach that he's an unstable sociopath and a right wing nut job? (In fact, his favourite magazine is basically FOX News on paper) So why do so many people love him?

Did you SEE the movie? Fuck. Most badass dude I've seen in ages. The prison scenes just made me gawk.

 

[ChupathingyX]

Lu Bu in the Dynasty Warriors series.

I know he was one of the most, if not the most, powerful individual warrior in the Three Kingdoms era, but seriously Koei.

What are you saying? Koei made Lu Bu a weak character?

 

[Wuggy]

Kratos.

Admittedly he's fairly more badass in the original GoW but even that opens with him trying to kill himself.

Post GoW 1 he's a selfish prick who gets himself into trouble and whines when he's actually held responsible to his action. In the third installment he causes havoc around him, namely killing more or less all of the innocent populus around him, just because he has some glorified daddy issues.

 

[II2]

I know he looks cool and all, but am I wrong, or wasn't the whole point of Rorschach that he's an unstable sociopath and a right wing nut job? (In fact, his favourite magazine is basically FOX News on paper) So why do so many people love him?

You've gotten a lot of quotes on this one... people have already covered a lot of what the appeal is, but here's a few other things his character represents:

- An complete underdog, fighting [sub]with psychotic brutality[/sub] against crime and corruption; taking out the trash.

- Willpower and strength of conviction; morality on which he'll never compromise... even in the face of Armageddon

- He's a tiny guy, but has true grit, cajones and moxy to spare; nothing intimidates him, nothing keeps him down, nothing phases him and he is relentless.

- In a challenging, confusing and complicated world of grey scale morality, he stands an appealing beacon of more black and white right and wrong, delivering brutal retribution to people (most people) will agree deserve it.

-----
Plus, beyond symbolism...

- His character's visual design is impeccably perfect for the role in both the comic and in the movie, where Jackey Haley was a bulls eye casting choice and carried that sorta Clint Eastwood "Unforgiven" era cool.

- For any gingers who have been bullied for whatever reason, scenes where he lashes out in violence in his childhood flashbacks or in prison has got to be pretty vicariously cathartic.

- He's got an interesting way of talking. The now standard GRIMDARK gravelly monotone is made a lot more interesting by his "bullet point" commentary and observations typically spoken as grammatically 'off' sentences that drop the subject and roll out in a stream of predicates.

----

Also, lastly, as you may have guessed from number of quotes your post got... He's a character that MAKES people THINK about him, which means they're interested enough to consider him pretty neat .

 

[Saltyk]

Kira/Light Yagami

Spoiler: Why

He's fucking evil. And he begs for his life before he dies.

I understand that people like having a power-trip fantasy, but I've never understood why people think Light is in the right in any way. He's a murderer, plain and simple.

People think he's in the right because he only kills criminals; well at first. He lost my support when he started offing people associated with the investigation.

Spoiler

He really lost any chance of getting it back when he killed his own father to cover his tracks

I think you missed the point. You were supposed to identify with him at first. And later, to realize just how far he's fallen. He still claimed to want to make the world a better place, but he had become so arrogant and corrupt that he was willing to kill everyone around him. Power corrupts as they say.

You mention him killing his father (he didn't but he sure wasn't upset about it), but I was more shocked when he considered killing his little sister. So yeah, he wasn't a bad ass. He was just an ass.

Interestingly, I approached the show differently. I never *sympathized* with Light, per se. I never actually considered his cause just. But since this is a show and not real life, and since he's the viewpoint character, and since what he's doing is more interesting and smart and badass than the status quo, I got invested in his goal and wanted him to win. Obviously, in real life, I'd much prefer he fail--but in the show, I was in his corner.

Well, for me, I looked at it like what would I do with a Deathnote. Assuming that I used it, what's the best thing you could do? Kill the world's most violent criminals. It was also worth noting that Light only killed those that murdered in cold blood. They actually say that he didn't kill those that killed accidentally. I honestly couldn't say that I wouldn't do the same. It is even stated in the series, that the world was becoming more peaceful as time went on. Killing the people that were trying to find him seemed like a necessary evil, though I couldn't say I would have. And it is worth noting that if Light had simply let L be on television, the entire investigation would have passed by and even acted as proof that he didn't exist. Still, it created the much needed conflict.

And like you said, he was the main character, so it was basically impossible NOT to become invested in Light. And obviously I wouldn't want him to win in real life and was glad that he died in the end (though I liked the manga ending better), but I also wanted him to win. I think it was supposed to make you question yourself and morality as a whole. To make you uncomfortable. To say, "Am I really okay with this?" That's what I liked most about the series: It made you question yourself.

 

[Ampersand]

Kratos, he's a dude throwing a temper tantrum for 5 games who doesn't seem to give half a shite about his family being murdered. Also his choice of weapons makes absolutely no sense, seriously can anyone actually picture him putting in the hours of practice it would take to master that weird kusarigama technique he uses.

 

[Rooster893]

Captain Falcon.

He calls out all of his attacks like a retard, runs like a retard, and he power humps you as one of his attacks. Also, his catch phrase is SHOW ME YA MOVES. Come on, Cap... can't you think of something better than that?

 

[Zingtea]

I'd take his cakes too.

FORTY cakes. That's as many as four tens.

And that's terrible.

 

[StellarViking]

Lu Bu in the Dynasty Warriors series.

I know he was one of the most, if not the most, powerful individual warrior in the Three Kingdoms era, but seriously Koei.

What are you saying? Koei made Lu Bu a weak character?

No, I'm saying that Koei made Lu Bu such an overpowered character that it makes certain levels difficult until you have a stronger character.

 

[Nieroshai]

Cthulhu

i was not aware Cthulhu was 'awesome' or 'bad ass'

A lot of people think he is. I think the idea is pretty cool, but he isn't an unstoppable beast like people believe he is.

>.> i see, i always saw it as a stupid looking squid monster thing, a mid boss at best basically, or a tougher normal enemy, ya know, the kinda thing you flatten an move on

The whole idea is he sends of waves of terror and can psychically influence people. It's not that it has any genuine physical might, Cthulhu just has the suerpower of being able to drive any living creature to the nuthouse.

 

[Legion]

Another way he is a selfish prick is how he won't kill because that would corrupt him.Last time I checked peoples lives are more important than your feelings and he KNOWS the joker is gonna make another (insert contraption thats only weakness is a batarang here) and be back next week.

I don't so much agree with your other points about him, but I do this one. If he truly cares about saving lives then he wouldn't keep arresting the same mass murderers over and over again when they keep breaking lose to kill yet more people.

Kira/Light Yagami

Indeed. I could see him being okay at first, when it was only serious criminals, but after that he isn't redeemable in the slightest.

Suzaku Kururugi


hes hypocritical, condemns self righteousness even though he is(only one example)
fights against his friend the whole series then joins him even though he is only alive because of said friend.

Indeed. He is a complete tool. He claims he fights to stop people dying and his way of doing this is to murder his fellow countrymen. Whereas if he just stole the Lancelot and fought against Brittania he would not only be completing his goal, but he would be helping save his people.

Commander Shepard from Mass Effect.
Yes, I said it.

True enough, but I haven't ever seen anybody praise him as a badass or awesome character so does he really count?

He is, like you say, more of an avatar for the player.

 

[willofbob]

Deadpool.

He's pretty awesome, but every voice actor that has ever done him has had an annoying voice. I imagine him with sortof a cockney thing going.

Isn't he Canadian? He's definitely not English anyway.

he is, but I imagine nearly all fictional characters to be British(despite the fact that I'm Aussie)

 

[Neverhoodian]

Zero from the Megan Man X games is not awesome, and here's why:
It's basically the Mega Man equivalent of Darth Vader's infamous "NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" With just one line they killed any amount of awesomeness the character once had.

And let's not even get into Dr. Light:
"Be vewwy quiet, I'm hunting Dr. Wahwee."

 

[DTWolfwood]

I know he looks cool and all, but am I wrong, or wasn't the whole point of Rorschach that he's an unstable sociopath and a right wing nut job? (In fact, his favourite magazine is basically FOX News on paper) So why do so many people love him?

i think its cause he resorts to violence first. you don't get that a lot in "super" heroes. though the watchmen series is satire of superheroes so \/

My money is on Boba Fett as well.

few lines in the movies, and dies the most unceremonious death.

on that note, the same applies to "Ghost" Riley of the Modern Warfare series <.<

 

[DTWolfwood]

Zero from the Megan Man X games is not awesome, and here's why:
It's basically the Mega Man equivalent of Darth Vader's infamous "NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" With just one line they killed any amount of awesomeness the character once had.

im hoping that scene was more epic in its native japanese. Thats just some terrible terrible voice acting ::cringe::