#redemption arcs

[emeryleewho]

There's a huge difference between redemption and humanization. I feel like a lot of "redemption arcs" aren't actually redemption at all, they're just attempts to humanize the villain so that they seem multi-faceted, but people read them as "redemption arcs" and think that that is meant to justify all the evil they've done before and negate whatever made them a villain in the first place. I think true "redemption arcs" are actually kind of rare because true redemption would take making the villain acknowledge their crimes, reevaluate their actions, actively choose to do better, and then proceed to make amends and become a better person, and that would this take more time than most stories are allowed to give their characters.

I've also seen people argue that a character has to be poised for redemption from the jump for it to work because once a character does something "too bad", they can't be redeemed. I completely disagree because redemption isn't justification or forgiveness, so no matter how horrible a character's actions, they could choose to become better, but because a lot of people (including writers) think redemption means "erasing the character's flaws and making it so they did nothing wrong ever", a lot of attempted "redemption arcs" just end up erasing a character's entire history or justifying every evil thing they've ever done. And yeah, in these cases, the only way to make a character go from a villain to a perfect cinnamon roll with no flaws *is* to have been planning it from the beginning and make sure they never do anything that can't be explained away later.

TLDR: real redemption arcs require a lot of self-awareness, patience, and growth, which are things that are rarely actually allocated to villains, and that's why real redemption arcs almost never get executed. The reason people think redemption arcs are overdone is because there are so many attempts to either humanize a villain that get misconstrued as redemption or attempts to blatantly erase who a character was in the name of "redemption", which is really just poor character development.

[prokopetz]

I don't disagree that it's often the case that the redeemed bad guy dies at the end because, as a society, we have fucked up ideas about justice and rehabilitation, but sometimes it's clear they got killed off less because the writers thought it was warranted and more because they were staring at the prospect of having to wrap up five separate character arcs in the next ten minutes and decided to start pruning.

[theplottingapp]

Look in all seriousness you can't redeem a character without showing them being pathetic, deep loser energy. There are no cool redemption arcs. They have to be in the trenches. They have to hate themselves for the mistakes they made. They have to apologize and take whatever is given be it forgiveness or a punch to the jaw. ONLY then will the redemption arc be actually good because it will be cathartic. And then they get to see the good things, they get to be touched gently and held while they sleep.

These things can overlap, even into a circle but without the pathetic loser boy saga your redemption arc will feel hollow.

[midgardianqueenreturns]

The annoying thing about “ugh why can’t we have more irredeemable and unsympathetic villains, all villains get redeemed or are sympathetic these days” discourse is…most stories that have redeemed or sympathetic villains also have at least one irredeemable villain with 0 sympathetic qualities. Name a redeemed villain and I can often also name another villain from the same story as them who doesn’t get redeemed. For every Darth Vader there’s a Palpatine. You say “not all villains can be Zukos some of them should be Ozais” but miss who the obvious Ozais already are in favor of calling for the Zukos to also be Ozais.

[spop-romanticizes-abuse]

a redemption arc is not a sacrifice.

a redemption arc is not some grand act of selflessness.

a redemption arc is not meaningless pain and suffering.

a redemption arc is simply facing the consequences of your actions, fixing your mistakes and doing better, regardless of whether you will be forgiven or accepted. that's it.

[thegayhimbo]

It’s telling that if you Google about the best redemption arcs TV characters had, both Zuko and Steve Harrington appear on most of those lists.

[sketching-shark]

Been a couple of years, but I still think fondly of Grace Monroe from Infinity Train for achieving that very rare redemption arc narrative of "the people you hurt are allowed to sever all ties, and you can still become a better, happier person."

[bonefall]

Bones I don't have anyone else to turn to, and you're INCREDIBLY informed on the subject. How do you write characters who the audience WANTS to be redeemed? Especially without being able to reliably pull a 'What you are in the dark' trope like how Breezepaw eases up when away from his dad.

Any tips for how to write a good redemption/'recovery', especially one where the character has to unlearn ideas they grew up on?

Advice from me is almost always going to be double, triple, QUADRUPLE underlining; CHARACTERS ARE NOT PEOPLE THEY ARE TOOLS.

Think about WHAT YOU'RE SAYING with this story. What are you trying to accomplish, besides simply having a fun villain join the main cast?

For Breezepelt, I want to dive into him finally recognizing his own flaws. I want him to realize he does have problems he needs to work on, but that he's LOVED, and his life has value! That it's never too late to do the right thing, and that happiness is within reach. A very character-driven arc.

For another character, a redemption arc could be a really good opportunity to unpack how the "bad guys" are recruited and indoctrinated. Zuko from Avatar is the best example of that, but you can also look at Peridot from Steven Universe. It's our introduction to how Homeworld Gems talk about planet colonization. Her story up to mouthing off at Yellow Diamond is essentially unpacking and rejecting the Homeworld mindset.

There's a billion ways and reasons to do a redemption arc! Show how an environment can change a person! Talk about how power acted on them! Explore what happens to an empire's underling when they start having doubts about their cause!

Think about what it can do FOR your story, and what juicy ideas you can show during it.

And... a BAD redemption arc, imo, is one that grinds your story to a halt by removing a main driver of conflict (the POINT of an antagonist), and is done for a character who has absolutely no reason to want to change.

What are your antagonist's motivations? WHY do they act the way they do? What would it take for them to willingly give up what they currently have, for something else? If they were forced out of their position and suddenly offered it all back, what would it take for them to accept the deal?

And, most importantly, do you still have a goddamn plot if this character has a turnaround? Or maybe is the story ending with this redemption! What does the redemption say for your characters and themes?

[random-jot]

Me when a character who was formerly bad grows and changes for the better and redeems themselves and becomes one of the good guys

Me when a character who was formerly good gets corrupted and worn down and becomes one of the bad guys and every fight between them and the good guys is charged with so much angst and layers because of their shared history

Redemption Arcs my beloved AND Corruption Arcs my beloved <3

[picturejasper20]

Thinking about Dagur’s redemption arc in Httyd Race to the Edge series and how it is done so differently to other arcs from other shows: -Dagur does not require help from the protagonist to start to change in comparison to others of his type. They usually require exposure or some influence from the "nice guys" to change, but this is not the case with him. -He doesn’t exactly have a tragic backstory nor he was controlled/abused since he was younger (unless you count how he was betrayed by the dragon hunters in Season 2) -Meaning that he doesn’t come off as ¨sympathetic¨ unlike other characters you know that they will eventually get redemmed on the long run. -When he appears again after Season 2 finale, the focus is on how he is trying to change and how has he changed. - At least in the Enemy of My Enemy episode, he doesn't ask Hippup to trust him or to give him a new chance, in fact, when Hippup asks him why he should believe him, Dagur tells him that he shouldn't since he "doesn't deserve it" due to his previous actions. -He decided to change for the better because he thought it would be the best for him, regardless of whether Hippup or any of the other dragon riders helped him or not. -There isn’t a moment he asks Hiccup any favor in exchange for saving him in ¨Enemy of my Enemy¨. He, however, does ask for his help to find Heather in a later episode. -Even after the team believes that he is lying about how they are about to fall into a trap and put him behind bars in "Family on the Edge", he still tries to help them and almost loses his life when trying to stop the trap. -While i have some issues regarding how some things seems to get retconned, Dagur tries compensating the pain that he caused to Heather by offering her a place to stay in Berserker Island and teaching about her Berserker culture.

[bethanydelleman]

Redemption arcs are great, you love to see one done well. We eat up Mr. Darcy overcoming his pride and Elizabeth learning the truth about her prejudices. But the one thing that rarely comes up narratively is backsliding.

In fact, if someone writes a fan fiction follow-up to Pride & Prejudice with Darcy falling back into his old ways, people get angry. "Where did his character growth go?" they cry. It feels like when Han Solo was back at square one in The Last Jedi, that can't happen, can it?

Except it can! My husband says that when I visit home, I act younger and somehow my 'character development' of the last 20-ish years means very little. And then we have the most common serious cases: addiction and leaving domestic abusers. You can in fact hit "rock bottom" more than once, you can return to a toxic person and then escape multiple times. You can leave one bad relationship and fall into another. I think part of the reason this is so hard to accept is that we are taught that once you mount the top of that redemption arc, it's over, you'll never slide back down. But humans can and do, again and again and again.

I have had trouble with this mysterious concept of "tact" since I was a child. I have grown (I think), but every so often I just say the stupidest, most tactless thing to someone. If I was a book character, someone would scream at the page and ask where my character development went. It's there, I've been working on it, but I still make mistakes. I get tired, I misjudge, I get too comfortable and tell a stupid joke around the wrong people. At this point I've just accepted that it will always be a struggle for me, I will never complete my arc, I have to just keep trying.

So... the point is have a little mercy. We aren't characters in an epic novel, hopefully we learn, hopefully we grow, but we also stumble and backslide and screw up. And we are prone to make the same mistakes over and over again. You just have to decide to keep loving people, flawed as they are.

[miraculouscriticismshub]

@muggle-born-princess @immaturityofthomasastruc @anxresi

[prokopetz]

Level 1: character gets a redemption arc for something that's not really that bad because the writers are cowards and don't want to risk making them truly unsympathetic.

Level 2: character gets a redemption arc and the text just straight up refuses to specify what they actually did, but trust us, it was really bad. (AKA Schrödinger's war crime)

Level 3: character gets a redemption arc for something the writers clearly think is really bad, but it's... kind of not? (Bonus points if it's a weird gender role thing.)

Level 4: character gets a redemption arc for something that genuinely warrants it, but the writers seem to have very strange ideas about why it was bad.

[friendrat]

While we're on the topic of redemption arcs:

I honestly really love Damian. I feel like it's becoming more popular to like Damian now, but I have always liked him. I am a sucker for a redemption story, and I'm not ashamed to admit it.

[midgardianqueenreturns]

“Not every villain needs a redemption arc!”

Correct. However, who on earth is calling for ALL villains to be redeemed? Even the most pro-redemption folks can name villains they don’t think should be redeemed. Just because someone wants a redemption arc for a villain you don’t think needs it doesn’t mean they apply that to ALL villains. This argument is nothing but a disingenuous strawman.

[kyliafanfiction]

I think it's important for 'Rejected Redemption' arcs to exist.

Not in terms of other characters rejecting the villains's attempt to redeem themselves, but characters who should have all the ingredients for redemption (sympathetic tragic backstory, pet the dog moments, sexy appealing brand of evil, just a hint of the 'do I really want to be like this', etc) and even get the prospect of redemption hinted at -

BUT who, when given the chance to be redeemed by other characters (especially if that character is a redeemed character themselves) or by the narrative, or when they genuinely start to consider becoming a better person...

Reject that chance. When they decide that they don't want to give up their rage, their hate, their revenge, their power, their... whatever it is that drives them.

Villains who could have been redeemed, but actively made the choice to refuse the real opportunity held in front of them.

Redemption is good. I love a redemption arc in fiction. But it is a choice. It is always a choice. The villainous character has to actively choose to make a change.

Redemption arcs are not the inherent right of every character that has a tragic backstory and a sympathetic motive and a few pet the dog moments and some times of self-doubt.

Evil is a choice. And some evil characters will never even consider not evil, and some evil characters will not only consider not evil but even embrace goodness, and some evil characters will genuinely consider not evil...

And then turn away from it.

And while I want more Redemptions arcs, god yes, I do want more rejected redemption arcs too. It is critical that the redemption be genuinely offered, that it be a real redemption (death of personality does NOT count), etc, because the option, the chance, the opening, the possibility does need to exist.

Because redemption is a choice, and for that choice to have narrative meaning and weight, we need characters who don't make that choice.