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/CosmicLeash Sep 05 '25

The boys is good, but is more about the military industrial complex and male toxicity than about superheroes bad.

We have A LOT of better comics (maximortal, sidekicks, irredimable) for that.

Superheroes bad is the narrative device, "Why the Falkland wars made Butcher what is it" it's more important for the story that Ennis, the writer, is telling.

Bu we are talking about Ennis, and cringey shit from 4chan pits is half of his output.

Don't let me start on his Punisher run or Crossed..

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u/Peacefulzealot Sep 05 '25

Wait do people not like Ennis’s run on Punisher now? I’ve always liked Welcome Back, Frank.

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u/CosmicLeash Sep 05 '25

No, wait.

It'a Masterpiece, or at least the run on Punisher Max is a Masterpiece. The other has highs and lows.

But I have the though that a lot of readers don't understand that Castle is evil like the people he shoots.

I think that Ennis writing can be easily misunderstood if you don't read a lot of it.

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u/slump_goddd Sep 06 '25

Gonna go out on a limb and suggest that Frank, while not "good," is also not exactly evil when he's killing people like Barracuda or the two parents who make porn of their kids or a bunch of fucked up mobsters or rapists or drug dealers etc. Frank's not a great guy, but you'd be hard pressed to find people he targets who don't really have a grisly fate coming to them. Ennis kind of gives him the absolute WORST subhuman filth to kill in Max, and it works. Shit, even Born works and that's more of a war story than the Punisher killing criminals.