A Lighter Shade of Grey: Difference between revisions

*** True, but Light is more willing to outright murder good people just for getting in his way, and sometimes in ''really'' dickish ways without a need to - remember how he {{spoiler|made Naomi Misora, an FBI Agent whose fiancee he'd killed, commit suicide in such a way that ''nobody would ever find her body''? Or what he did to Kiyomi Takada?}} Contrast this to L, who sacrificed Lind L. Taylor in his first 'appearance' - except that Taylor was a convicted murderer sentenced to be executed the same day. On the other hand, during the period where Light {{spoiler|had no memory of the Death Note}}, he proved much less morally compromising that L did. It's all a matter of perspective, and deciding for oneself who, if anyone, is more in the right.

*** The live-action film adaptation, however, seems to place the 'lighter' ball squarely in L's court.

* ''[[Crest of the Stars]]'' [[Subverted Trope|subverts]] the usual portrayal of [[The Empire]] vs. [[The Federation]] as a [[Black and Grey Morality]]: the [[Fantastic Racism|Four]] [[The Federation|Nations Alliance]] is the [[Designated Villain]], while the [[What Measure Is a Non Human|Humankind]] [[The Empire|Empire]] [[Space Elves|Abh]] is the [[Designated Hero]].

* The two "villainous" factions in [[Neon Genesis Evangelion]] (Gendo and SEELE) are split like this. Gendo's vision is reuniting with his dead wife and ruling together to bring mankind into a new , utopian, era. SEELE's motivations are far more ambiguous, being a group of people which aren't given much time as individuals, but from what is known, they want to keep humanity as a blob of Tang and rule over it.

 

== Comic Books ==

* Mentioned by Catman when the [[Secret Six]] fought the [[Doom Patrol]]. His reasoning was that, though the Doom Patrol were heroes, both teams operated in a grey area of the superhuman community, so they should let the Six go. [[Let's You and Him Fight|It doesn't work.]]

* ''[[V for Vendetta]]'' is something like this. On one hand, it's a struggle between a repressive fascist government which may nevertheless be humanity's last hope in a nuclear-holocaust blighted world, and a fanatical anarchist terrorist who has absolutely no qualms about blowing up buildings and killing people to get his way, and whose efforts may ultimately doom humanity. On the other, however, the government is genocidal (having wiped out racial minorities and the LGBT population, amongst others) and composed pretty much entirely of hateful, dysfunctional and irredeemable bastards, while V is an incredibly charismatic guy who only lost his sanity after said regime used him for experimentation fodder, and who we first see rescuing a young girl from government hired rapists, and who comes to happily admit that he's got no place in the better world he's trying to create. It's certainly not a black and white situation, but it's hard to argue that V doesn't come across as a hell of a lot more sympathetic than the Norsefire government.

 

== Fan Works ==

* In ''[[Tiberium Wars]]'', even though the story is supposed to be about both sides equally, the author has admitted that he favors GDI over the Brotherhood of Nod, and the portrayal does reflect this; GDI characters have a few more scenes than the Nod side, and the GDI troops are portrayed as more sympathetic than their Nod counterparts, who generally come off as religious fanatics.

* ''[[Frigid Winds and Burning Hearts]]'' is supposedly an attempt to balance out Princess Celestia (who's had to do some very unpleasant things to keep Equestria from collapsing on itself) and Princess Luna (who wants Equestria to run itself and values freedom... but doesn't realize the price). However, the author is rather clearly on Luna's side, with Celestia being portrayed again and again as a tyrant and those under her as monsters, while Luna is the viewpoint character and all of the sympathetic characters are on her side. After a while, the grey unmixes into black and white (no pun intended).

 

== Film ==

== Literature ==

* House Atreides in ''[[Dune]]'' is a good example of this trope, although ''Dune'' is only [[Grey and Grey Morality]] if you consider the 'other side' to ultimately include the Corrino Emperor rather than just being the [[Exclusively Evil]] Harkonnens.

 

== Live-Action TV ==

* Joss Whedon's ''[[Dollhouse]]'' is all about this trope. In season one, you have Paul Ballard, dangerously obsessed FBI agent who is projecting his own fantasy onto Caroline, and on the other side you have the Rossum Corporation, admittedly involved in human trafficking, and in the middle, playing one against the other, a [[Complete Monster]] and [[Ax Crazy]] whose insanity was, at least partially, inflicted upon him by the Dollhouse. In season two, the enemy is the Rossum Corporation's upper management, versus Adelle DeWitt and the rapidly self-aware Actives. Adelle crosses some [[Moral Event Horizon]]s, but ends up being more [[Sympathetic POV|sympathetic]] than her fellow co-workers simply by being less evil than the rest of the Rossum Corporation.

* Within the protagonist group in ''[[The Walking Dead (TV series)|The Walking Dead]]'' Shane is definitely the darker, pure survival oriented [[Sociopathic Hero]] to Rick who thinks not only of the group but even of others outside the group and makes a conscious effort to cling to his morality.

 

== Tabletop Games ==

** With the Tau, it's on-again-off-again. There's no baseline, since even generic interpretations [[Love It or Hate It|vary wildly]] between various factions among the fandom (and [[Running the Asylum|therefore]] the [[Armed with Canon|authors]]), the main reasons being that they are sort-of-communists and run brightly colored [[Humongous Mecha]], and even one of these points, obviously, would be an enormous [[Flame Bait]]. Thus in any particular work they may fall anywhere between "extra-sinister behind the curtains", "deluded morons happily marching straight into Hell's maw and dragging others with them" and "the greatest thing since sliced bread".

 

 

* In ''[[Final Fantasy Tactics]]'', one side of the Lion War rallies behind Prince Goltana, the other behind Prince Larg, the church has got its fingers in the conflict, {{spoiler|not to mention the Lucavi,}} and then there's your player group. Out of the two main sides involved in the war, those siding with Prince Larg come out looking more like good guys, in general, by virtue of not having [[Magnificent Bastard|Delita]] on their side. Out of all groups, though, the player's party comes out looking like the best good guys of all, but whether that's due to the main character's [[Unwitting Pawn|being played]] or being honestly virtuous is a matter of debate.

** If you just focus on Goltana and Larg, it is straight [[Gray and Gray Morality]].

** The Spectres arguably are this to the Asari Justicars. The Justicars are an ancient order that patrol Asari Space in pursuit of justice and adhere to a highly strict Code that dictates what they can and cannot do. This can allow them to kill anyone who gets in their way, ''including'' other law-enforcers, should they be foolish enough to try to apprehend them. ''This rarely happens''.

 

* In ''[[Drow Tales]]'', it's [[Word of God]] that "There are no heroes or villains", but [https://web.archive.org/web/20131019103700/http://wiki.drowtales.com/index.php/Nidraa%27chal the Nidraa'chal clan] is "the threat".

 

== Web Original ==

* ''[[Ilivais X]]'' inverts the usual here: Iriana may have been horribly broken by the Aztec Empire, but her goal isn't REALLY to end the war and create a free society, it's to get revenge. Meanwhile, both empires have been at war with each other for centuries, but they're mostly not bad people, and they've maintained a society that works very nicely for the people in all that time.

 

== Western Animation ==

[[Category:Morality Tropes]]

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