Favorite anti-heroes in anime

[stelok]

An anti-hero is neither a hero nor a villain.

Originally Posted by infoplease
anti-hero, principal character of a modern literary or dramatic work who lacks the attributes of the traditional protagonist or hero. The anti-hero's lack of courage, honesty, or grace, his weaknesses and confusion, often reflect modern man's ambivalence toward traditional moral and social virtues. Literary characters that can be considered anti-heroes are: Leopold Bloom in James Joyce's novel Ulysses (1922), Willy Loman in Arthur Miller's play Death of a Salesman (1949), the bombardier Yossarian in Joseph Heller's novel Catch-22 (1961), and the protagonists of many of Philip Roth's and Kurt Vonnegut's novels.

My favorite anti-heroes are:
Archer (Fate/Stay Night)
Van (Gun X Sword)
Hei (Darker Than Black)
REvy (Black Lagoon)
Masatsugu Hattori (Grader Musashi RV)
Demon Eyes Kyo (Samurai Deeper Kyo)
Char Aznable (Mobile Suit Z Gundam ad Char's Counterattack)
Aoshi (Rurouni Kenshin)
Vegeta (Dragon Ball Z)
Alex Lowe (Last Exile)

Throughout the entire anime, Van rarely played hero. All Van cares about is getting revenge on the person who killed his bride. Van sometimes even ignores helpless people who asked for his help

Neither Revy nor Hei are heroes. Revy is a mercenary, not dissimilar to Han Solo from Star Wars. Revy never plays hero nor fights for the good of the people. She fights for her own reasons but she is not a bad person, she is just selfish. In fact she fights to not just help herself, She also fights to help Rock.
She told him that she is Rock's gun and willing to protect Rock even though she has no interest in saving the Yakuza schoolgirl.

Hei isn't exactly playing hero all the time. He works as an assassin for the syndicate but he has also helped others in spite of his lack of heroism.

Demon Eyes Kyo is bad, very bad but not evil. He is not good, either. He is such a badass fighter, caring only about what he wants and not caring about heroism, good and evil.

Vegeta didn't eventually become a completely good guy until at the finale of the Buu saga. He still had selfish and nasty, if not evil intentions in his heart. So Vegeta is an anti-hero until the end of the Buu saga.

Aoshi is not bad guy, just a misguided person who doesn't know the right reason for fighting.
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[Balac]

Sorry but wrong. I remember getting yelled at by a prof. for making this mistake so don't feel bad. Shinji from Eva is an anti-hero, not these guys. Read the definition again. Keep in mind that what makes an anti-Hero depends on the culture. Odysseus was an anti-hero in the Iliad since a trickster like him was in stark contrast to the moral virtues of the time.

An anti-hero is neither a hero nor a villain.



My favorite anti-heroes are:
Archer (Fate/Stay Night)
Van (Gun X Sword)
Hei (Darker Than Black)
REvy (Black Lagoon)
Masatsugu Hattori (Grader Musashi RV)
Demon Eyes Kyo (Samurai Deeper Kyo)
Char Aznable (Mobile Suit Z Gundam ad Char's Counterattack)
Aoshi (Rurouni Kenshin)
Vegeta (Dragon Ball Z)
Alex Lowe (Last Exile)

Throughout the entire anime, Van rarely played hero. All Van cares about is getting revenge on the person who killed his bride. Van sometimes even ignores helpless people who asked for his help

Neither Revy nor Hei are heroes. Revy is a mercenary, not dissimilar to Han Solo from Star Wars. Revy never plays hero nor fights for the good of the people. She fights for her own reasons but she is not a bad person, she is just selfish. In fact she fights to not just help herself, She also fights to help Rock.
She told him that she is Rock's gun and willing to protect Rock even though she has no interest in saving the Yakuza schoolgirl.

Hei isn't exactly playing hero all the time. He works as an assassin for the syndicate but he has also helped others in spite of his lack of heroism.

Demon Eyes Kyo is bad, very bad but not evil. He is not good, either. He is such a badass fighter, caring only about what he wants and not caring about heroism, good and evil.

Vegeta didn't eventually become a completely good guy until at the finale of the Buu saga. He still had selfish and nasty, if not evil intentions in his heart. So Vegeta is an anti-hero until the end of the Buu saga.

Aoshi is not bad guy, just a misguided person who doesn't know the right reason for fighting.
__________________

[darksaint124]

Sorry but wrong. I remember getting yelled at by a prof. for making this mistake so don't feel bad. Shinji from Eva is an anti-hero, not these guys. Read the definition again. Keep in mind that what makes an anti-Hero depends on the culture. Odysseus was an anti-hero in the Iliad since a trickster like him was in stark contrast to the moral virtues of the time.

Sorry to be nitpicking but don't you mean the Odyssey. In the Iliad all he really was was a tactician. It wasn't until his voyage home that he became a true trickster.

[Balac]

Sorry to be nitpicking but don't you mean the Odyssey. In the Iliad all he really was was a tactician. It wasn't until his voyage home that he became a true trickster.

True the Odysseus of the Odyssey is the arch-type trickster hero but it's the Odysseus of the Iliad who is the anti-hero. While the Trojan Horse is seen as a cunning strategy to modern readers in ancient Greece it was the act of an coward without honor. Odysseus wins the war through tactics totally at odds with the heroic virtues of the time. I am such a geek for knowing this kind of stuff...

[yeoman]

Sorry but wrong. I remember getting yelled at by a prof. for making this mistake so don't feel bad. Shinji from Eva is an anti-hero, not these guys. Read the definition again. Keep in mind that what makes an anti-Hero depends on the culture. Odysseus was an anti-hero in the Iliad since a trickster like him was in stark contrast to the moral virtues of the time.

Well, depends. In it's original usage the phrase does mean someone that, while the main character, has none of the typical virtues of a hero. You're suggestion of that whiney waste of space Shinji is dead on there. It refered more to a character that took the "pro" out of protagonist.

However, the term has mutated in use over the last couplse decades to refer to the kind the original post refers to. Either heroes that are rather dark or violent in nature (Say, Roy Mustang of FMA, or Wolverine), Scoundrals (Like the aforementioned Han Solo), or characters where the label hero or villian just plain doesn't apply (Like, oh, say, David Xanatos of Gargoyles).

Really just a difference between technical definition and common usage.

[Balac]

Really just a difference between technical definition and common usage.

In common use but still wrong.

Semantics aside Shinji is actually an interesting case in point. For a manga/anime hero the common defining characteristic is his 'gambate' spirit. He may not be the strongest or the smartest but darn it he never, ever gives up. Shinji was designed to be totally lacking in that virtue. He gives up at the drop of a hat.
Aside from him I'm hard pressed to think of any other real anti-heroes in anime. Maybe Kou Uraki from Gundam 0083 but he might be more an extreme example of the reluctant hero.

[yeoman]

In common use but still wrong.


If that's the common usage than either the meaning has changed or it's gained an additional meaning. Words change over time, it's the nature of the english language. If it's the common use, than it's a valid interpretation. It's just not the original, techincal, definition.

[MKTerra]

My favorite anti-heroes are:
Archer (Fate/Stay Night)Not very on-display in the anime or the game's Fate path, but it comes to the fore in the UBW path (currently held up in installer-testing).

My first thought: Lelouch (Code Geass). He'll act to protect those he knows personally, or defenseless civilians, but thinks little of anyone else. On occasion he's happily sacrificed his allies' lives to gain an advantage. (His philosophy is something like "those who kill should also be prepared to die," making his own followers fair game.)

[Darth Joker]

My understanding of the term "anti-hero" is that it's somebody who does the right thing for the wrong reasons (to use an example, Lobo simply gets a bit of a sadistic thrill out of kicking ass, and hence helps the Justice League out by taking out Kalibak in a Justice League episode), or has goals and motives similiar to the hero, but is willing to use more questionable methods to get there (such as the Punisher, and perhaps to some extent, Light Yagami).

The anti-hero is frequently useful to the hero in a practical sense, but also can leave the hero with an unhealthy conscience from being willing to work with the anti-hero (a lot of Daredevil/Punisher, and Spiderman/Punisher, team ups were like that).

Within anime, Vegeta, Sesshomaru, and many of the Soul Society Captains, are good, well-known examples of the anti-hero.

[Ghost]

Gonna have to be Sesshoumaru for me. Gotta love Fluffy-sama.

My understanding of the term "anti-hero" is that it's somebody who does the right thing for the wrong reasons.

The definition I heard was "a protagonist that lacks the defining traits of heroism or possesses traits that are considered to negate them, and who's motivations can be considered non-heroic."

For example, Conan the Barbarian is supposed to be a typical anti-hero, because even though he does good things he doesn't go out of his way to so, and when he does it's usually mostly for his own good.

[Darth Joker]

Gonna have to be Sesshoumaru for me. Gotta love Fluffy-sama.



The definition I heard was "a protagonist that lacks the defining traits of heroism or possesses traits that are considered to negate them, and who's motivations can be considered non-heroic."

For example, Conan the Barbarian is supposed to be a typical anti-hero, because even though he does good things he doesn't go out of his way to so, and when he does it's usually mostly for his own good.

Right. Perhaps it might be more accurate if I said that an anti-hero is a character who does the right thing for reasons other than a sense of moral obligation. An anti-hero also can't be counted on to go out of his way to do the right thing - you just have to hope that doing the right thing just happens to mesh well with the anti-hero's personal goals.

And yeah, Sesshoumaru is an excellent anti-hero. :)

[aKebaNe]

i have to agree that sessho is a badass anti-hero. some of my other favs are akabane(GB) and kurei(FoR)