Nature Hero

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The Nature Hero respects the forest and the forest respects her in return.

Ahhh, the great outdoors! —The Dryad, Warcraft 3

A hero who lives largely in isolation from human civilization in the wild. They have an uncanny affinity with the local wildlife and can communicate with them easily and have them obey their commands. This kind of hero spends time helping visitors survive the region and protecting the region and its wildlife from those who would exploit or destroy it. Quite likely to have been Raised by Wolves. Tends to have No Social Skills or become a Socially Awkward Hero if they leave the wilds. Could be either male or female.

Sometimes this hero isn't quite as friendly as some others, and openly admits that most people get on his nerves.

Often has Wild Hair.

See also Jungle Princess, Mountain Man, Wild Child.

Contrast with Science Hero.

Examples of Nature Hero include:

Anime and Manga

• Ikuto (Keenan in the English dub) of Digimon Savers (Data Squad). As an infant, he was accidentally sucked into the Digital World as a result of being too close to his parents' experimental Digital Gate. He was raised by Digimon (most notably Frigimon) to the point of thinking he was one. He sports a 'tribal' sort of look, carries a boomerang, and uses Hulk Speak, despite the fact that most digimon talk normally.
• Sul from Kiss Wood. Too bad this jungle really doesn't welcome him warmly and he needs to get the fuck out of there.
• Dragon Ball‍'‍s Goku plays this to a T.
• Despite the title of the movie, San from Princess Mononoke is more Nature Hero than Jungle Princess.
• A milder verison if Woli from Hajime no Ippo.
• The title character from Kimba the White Lion.
• In the Asgard filler of the Saint Seiya anime, Albrerich was a Nature Villain.

Comic Books

• In Elf Quest, Teir in relation to the Wolfriders when they first meet him, in general the Wolfriders in relation to everyone else, particularly humans. Reversed in a one-issue story with Little Patch, a human boy raised by elves in what humans consider to be the wild.
• Jann of the Jungle
• Sheena, Queen of the Jungle
• Sub-Mariner and, in some instances, Aquaman
• Swamp Thing
• Man-Thing
• Wolverine subverts the trope in that his childhood was as a rich boy, but he then became an orphan wandering with his sort-of girlfriend, before retreating fully into the wilderness after she was killed. He's never lost his bestial side since.
• Marvel's Tarzan Expy Ka-Zar and his wife Shanna the She Devil.

Film

• The Beastmaster
• Tom Cruise as Jack o' the Green in Legend. Ironically, he seemed to have no idea his forest was full of fairies until after his misguided attempt at romancing a princess backfired catastrophically...
• Quest for Camelot has one of these in the person of Garrett, a blind hermit, complete with a song all about how he's no good with people.
• Torzonborz in the sequel of Cat City.
• In the film Instinct, Ethan Powell became one of these after he observed a gorilla family for a long time in the wild, leaving behind an estranged daughter.

Literature

• Daine from The Immortals series starts out this way, but She Cleans Up Nicely.
• Tarzan, possibly the Ur Example.
• The Beast Master
• Not exactly heroes, but the wild men led by Ghan-buri-Ghan in The Lord of the Rings come close. Beorn, the shapechanging bear-man from The Hobbit, fits the trope much better.
  • Also, the carefree Master of the Forest, Tom Bombadil, and his wife Goldberry, Daughter of the River.
• Firekeeper in Jane Lindskold's (sp) books. Raised by oversize, sentient wolves.
• Jasmine from the Deltora series. Is constantly described with Wild Hair. Talks to birds. Raised by trees. (She can talk to them, too.) Eventually learns to live with humans, but doesn't have much patience for most of them even after falling hard for one....
• Mullet Fingers, from Hoot by Carl Hiaasen. He doesn't have egregious amounts of hair growing from his knuckles or anything. He got his nickname by having reflexes fast enough to catch a mullet with his bare hands. He lives in the woods by himself and protects the local wildlife from habitat loss in any way that he can.
• Hannah, the protagonist and MacGuffin Girl of Meredith Ann Pierce's Treasure at the Heart of the Tanglewood. She influences the seasons by her very presence, and grows useful plants in her hair.

Live-Action TV

• Kamen Rider Amazon, who's basically Tarzan if he had super sharp claws that cut into monsters and cause lots of "blood" to fizz out of them.
• Maya of Power Rangers Lost Galaxy and Cole of Power Rangers Wild Force. Both have animal (including animals of the transform-by-magic-into-Humongous Mecha sort) communication and empathy powers without the Deanna Troi head-clutching factor, as well as high jumping ability and somewhat enhanced strength. Maya's an alien, but Cole's just Rule of Cool-powered.
• The Life and Times of Grizzly Adams: James "Grizzly" Adams (played by wild-haired Dan Haggerty) was the hero of two TV movies (1976 and 1982) and a two-season (1977-1978) series on NBC; the eponymous trapper lived in the wilderness with his pet bear.

Tabletop Games

• The druid and ranger classes (and [most of] their derivatives and enhancements) from Dungeons & Dragons (and its derivatives). The Barbarian can also qualify, though he's more of The Berserker.
  • In the new edition, the Ranger has deemphasized this, becoming a mix of The Archer and the Dual-Wielding swordsman. On the other side, there's now an entire power source (Primal) for Nature Hero characters: Shaman, Barbarian, Druid and Warden. The PHB3 added the Seeker class, whose skill at ranged weapons invokes the Ranger of earlier editions.
• Any green-aligned hero in Magic: The Gathering is likely to be this, as are the nicer green planeswalkers.

Video Games

• City of Heroes features The Woodsman, who can control plants and summon animals to fight for him. His evil Praetorian version is Shadowhunter, who can turn his skin to stone and is super strong, while commanding large packs of werewolves.
  • And player characters can of course get in the act with the various Plant powers as well as Beast Mastery.
• Gau from Final Fantasy VI.
• Elanee and the rest of the Druids of the Mere in Neverwinter Nights 2.
• Nakoruru and her sister Rimururu in Samurai Shodown. Subverted that although they are very much aware that they fight for the preservation of nature, they are much more intelligent and aware of the outside world.
• Sonic the Hedgehog started as this, although he embraced technology more and more as the series progressed. He is still a nomadic character who disdains Dr. Eggman's work, however.
• Rexxar from the Warcraft universe. Druids and Shamans can count as well, as do most Orc, Troll, and Tauren PCs.
• Morrigan of Dragon Age is either subverting this trope or playing it straight to a horrendous degree. She grew up in the swamplands, and found peace in living amongst the animals for short periods of time when not with her mother, and yet she lacks any sort of compassion for anything, will not hesitate to kill things that stand in her way, and strongly upholds her mother's Social Darwinist beliefs.
• The Naturalist in Twilight Heroes, although operating in primarily an urban environment, is capable of taming rather than defeating their foes, and uses skills inspired by animals (from such staples as wolves and sharks, to more obscure choices such as echidnas and starfish).
• Most ranger and druid characters from the Baldur's Gate series, including Jaheira, Minsc, Kivan, Valygar and Cernd. Faldorn was this in the first game, but underwent a Face Heel Turn and became an extremist that ended up doing more damage to her local grove than she was saving it from.
• Ginger in The Path seems to greatly prefer playing in the forest to listening to her family or visiting her grandmother.
• In Avadon there's no collective Gaia, and none of the animals are very bright, so Shamans rule over nature rather than seeking unity with it. However, the Shaman party member does talk about the importance of protecting nature against the various forces that would corrupt it.
• In DC Universe Online the Nature power set turns the Player Character that uses it into a Nature Hero, at least in terms of powers. One of its skill sets allows the player to turn into different types of animals and the other grants control of plants.

Web Comics

• In Endstone, Kyri was raised like this.

Web Original

• Ketrin fits this trope to some extent. He is telepathically linked to his wolflike companions and wants to save both them and humanity from an evil force - when he isn't being worshipped as a paralysed idol, that is. (NB: stories contain sexual content).

Western Animation

• Tigatron and Airazor from Beast Wars.
• Moss Man from He-Man and the Masters of the Universe.
  • Beast Man is a villainous example.
• Wild Smurf in The Smurfs.
• Fluttershy in My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic. She lives on the edge of the woods, has a special talent for communicating with animals, and has saved the lives of her friends and the Cutie Mark Crusaders utilizing this talent.

Real Life

• John "Grizzly" Adams, on whose life the TV series The Life and Times of Grizzly Adams was based
• Dersu Uzala.