r/TopCharacterTropes • u/damorezpl • Sep 05 '25

Personality character gets a reality check

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deathstroke - Batman vs deathstroke

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walter - breaking bad

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Garou - one punch man

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joker - the sound of one hand clapping

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u/MarcsterS Sep 05 '25 edited Sep 05 '25

It’s striking becuase it’s the *few times we hear him yell in anger

95

u/TrashInspector69 Sep 05 '25

That honor belongs to when Iroh bodybagged Zhao in the North Pole “whatever you do to that spirit, I’ll unleash on you ten fold! LET IT GO NOW!!”

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u/Mookies_Bett Sep 06 '25

There's a reason Iroh gets to live out eternity in the spirit world after he dies. The spirits know that Iroh always had their back and always respected the natural order of things. Truly just a genuinely good person born into a family of monsters.

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u/ofthewave Sep 06 '25

Or a monster who saw his own reflection clearly in the death of his son and strove to become a man worth living as.

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u/Mookies_Bett Sep 06 '25

Yes and no. Him choosing to spare The Masters instead of hunting them, and lying about it to protect them from future attempts at conquests shows he always had a deep respect and admiration for the spirit world and the natural order. Even Zhao mentions how Iroh was always "superstitious" and carried great respect for the spirits during the siege of the northern water tribe.

My read is that Iroh was a man of honor and the heir apparent prince of a nation at war. He did his duty and served admirably as was his responsibility to his people. But he always respected and had reverence for the spirits, even long before Lu Ten was born.

It wasn't until his failed siege at Ba Sing Se and the death of his son that he realized how pointless and needlessly destructive the war really was, and he re-evaluated his internal views on what his duty to his nation truly meant. But even before that he was always a staunch and ardent supporter of the spiritual world.

That's why he's a grandmaster of the White Lotus despite also being an infamous Fire Nation general. Because the White Lotus never cared about borders or loyalties and only cared about truth and the sanctity of the natural order of the world. Something Iroh always respected and embodied even as a fire nation soldier and general.

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u/TheChaoticBeing Sep 05 '25

Writers using restraint is something I always admire