Victorious Loser

At one point in one character's life, things really go downhill for them. Either they're humiliated in public, their reputation ruined, people they're close with die, and most of all they could never make those who make them suffer pay for their crimes, making the culprit a Karma Houdini. But wait... why is he happy? Why is he moving on with a smile in his face, as if nothing happened? Or as if it's for the best? He can enact revenge to the culprit, and hit them with the hammer of karma as payback for making him suffer, but why didn't he?

This is the character who we'd like to call Victorious Loser. He may have lost on the outside, but in the inside, he certainly is victorious... In many ways, this can mean his personality and conviction remains untouched despite the outer humiliations that have been inflicted upon him, he can still live on the way he is, the way he originally wanted. Perhaps he realizes that the things on the outside doesn't matter much compared to what's inside, or perhaps there is a greater good to be achieved by accepting the humiliation in full brunt, or perhaps he fears that achieving that victory comes at the cost of his personality or mentality and he wants to preserve them all, or perhaps despite his death, his philosophies prevail. So... while he would accept the ridicule and all at first, he will be the one who had the last laugh, as usually those who ridicule him would end up miserable or unable to achieve their goal.

In short, they want to avoid unnecessary Pyrrhic Victories as much as possible. Sometimes, they have the mindset of If You Kill Him You Will Be Just Like Him.

This may be the outcome of the Nerdy heroes who endured bullies from the Jerk Jock (or Alpha Bitch), and eventually came out on top.

Honor Before Reason may be this, from the character's point of view.

Contrast Pyrrhic Victory. Compare Silent Scapegoat.

WARNING! There are unmarked Spoilers ahead. Beware.

Examples of Victorious Loser include:

Anime and Manga

Mikagami Tokiya in Flame of Recca, in the second half of the manga, had two cases of defeat and humiliation, turning into a Dude in Distress. All this could've been rectified had he been more cruel, like the way he was in the past, but doing so would turn him into a Revenge-obsessed man that he has refused to embrace in the end of the first half. This is later shown when one of the Quirky Miniboss Squad commented that by letting go of vengeance and also his suicidal tendencies, he is way stronger, and in the end, he avoids the mistake of killing his own grandfather and evolved into a more mature person in general.
Lelouch Lamperouge in Code Geass. After playing a Complete Monster persona for months and gets called out by everyone else, he lets himself get killed just so war will stop and opening a new road for possible peace. He may have been reviled as the most hated person in history and a loser in war, but at least his true goal is achieved.
Averted by most of the 'good guys' in Hell Girl. In short, these characters have had their life so horrible that they turn into Hell Girl, seemingly victorious sending their nemesis to Hell, but in turn, in the end of their life they will go to Hell, thus submitting themselves into defeat. So much for endurance of life so they can be happy in the afterlife (Heaven)...
When Naruto had to fight Arrogant Kung Fu Guy Jerkass Neji and was uncharacteristically depressed, feeling he didn't have a chance, Fan of Underdog Hinata managed to give him his confidence back by telling him that what inspired her most about him was his ability to laugh in the face of his worst failures and keep on going. Her biggest compliment for him was that, to her, he was "a proud loser".
- Made more notable by the fact that Hinata herself had just gotten out of the hospital after Neji almost beat her to death in the preliminary rounds.
Both inverted and subverted in Liar Game at the end of the Contraband Game. After Yokoya has made a large profit and is prepared to walk away with it, Nao points out that she is this trope and Yokoya is an inversion - a Non-Victorious Winner - because his victory didn't come from domination as he had planned. Yokoya agrees with this analysis and thus stays in the game. The subversion is that Nao's true goal, to save everyone, was not met at all with Yokoya making such a large profit at the expense of his teammates, so she pretended that she was a Victorious Loser in order to get Yokoya to stay in the game so she could win the money back from him.
Yu-Gi-Oh! GX: Shou might've lost his duel against his brother in season two, but he proved he had a stronger grip on the respectful dueling concept than Ryou did in doing so. He proved that unlike his brother, he wasn't willing to abandon the respect concept just for the sake of victory.

Film

Batman in The Dark Knight. The Joker has turned Harvey Dent AKA Two Face from hero to a madman, if this goes public, Gotham City would fall into despair. In order to prevent that, Batman takes the blame for Harvey's murderer and is considered a criminal. So although he physically lost to Joker (couldn't save Harvey, being considered a villain, and can't even kill Joker due to his No Kill Policy), Batman technically won, since he prevents Joker's idea of a mad lawless world, the thing that matters the most for him.
Misawa the Ronin in After the Rain is the embodiment of this trope.
In the 1983 movie The Dead Zone, Johnny finally decides to kill Stillson. All is in place, he's got his gun, he's in the right position, but he misses. He gets fatally wounded, but until then, Stillson uses a baby as a human shield. As seen in his vision, this turns out to ruin Stillson's political career and drives him to suicide. Not as planned, but he's happy about it before he dies.
Kambei in Seven Samurai points out that this is the fate of all the surviving samurai. The townspeople are prospering and planting while singing and nothing but cold graves or hunger and the road await the samurai. Saved from being a Downer Ending by Kambei's wise outlook and the amazing heroism of the seven.

Live Action Television

Worf in Star Trek: The Next Generation was forced to take familial responsibility for the Romulan betrayal of the Klingons at his home colony. Defending his family honor and providing evidence that it was the Duras family would have thrust the Klingon Empire into a full blown civil war. Of course, the Durassholes wound up getting greedy and showed their hand by allying with the Romulans to take over the empire, creating the very civil war Worf tried to avoid.
In Episode 3 of Victorious, Tori takes several detentions and a humiliating punishment rather than tell the school principal that Jade faked the injury Tori was accused of causing, despite having proof. When Jade asked her why, Tori said it was because she didn't want to fight with Jade all through high school.
Gomez Addams from The Addams Family is an attorney who takes gleeful pride in how many cases he's lost, mainly because winning against an Addams is almost always a horribly painful, if absolutely hilarious, Pyrrhic Victory. Oh sure, Gomez lost to you... but you'll wish he hadn't in the end.
New York in Flavor of Love competed in two consecutive seasons; she spent both of them being hated by just about all the other girls yet both times making it to the final round. Both times, Flav chose her opponent over her. In the end, Flav didn't stay with any of the contestants while New York was laughing her ass to the bank with her own dating show!
- Speaking of I Love New York, Both Real and Chance competed and made it to the final three. Both ended up placing in third and second respectively. At the end New York didn't stay with the winner while both brothers received a dating show of their own.

Literature

Paksennarion embodies this trope toward the end of Oath of Gold; she accepts being tortured by evil priests because it's the only way to redeem the evil priests' misguided followers.
In one of the Goosebumps books there is a short story about a boy who gains the ability to fly by reading an how-to-fly book. Rumors spread and another kid challenges him to a race. The boy knows if he flies he'll win, but then he'll have to prove his ability. At the race the boy pretends he's lost his ability to fly. Surprisingly, the opponent has found the how-to-fly book himself. He takes off into the air and into a celebrity lifestyle and being closely followed by the government. Meanwhile, everyone else loses interest in the hero, so he's left alone and can fly unharassed at night, which is really all he wanted anyway..

Video Games

Lamia Loveless in Super Robot Wars Original Generation series, for refusing the ODE's attempt to absorb her, was shot down by the ODE as an irregular that must be deleted. She was unable to repel it, thus she was defeated by it. Of course, she later came back and managed to help defeat her other manipulator Duminuss, but it is clear that she never have a clear direct shot towards the ODE who shot her down. But considering the ODE is doomed as Duminuss' eternal pawn and was even discarded, while Lamia could live on with her conscience left unscarred, she technically won. She also won against Juergen, whose body was used by the ODE to do the kill, because compared to her, Juergen's defeat, in form of the loss of his family, caused him to drastically change the ODE and was killed in result.
- Thanks to a certain Drama CD, Axel Almer manages to run on this trope with awesome sauce. General audience knew that he lost his fight against Beowulf, but the Drama CD makes it clear that in a sense, Axel is the true victor, since he managed to wipe out Beowulf's death squadron singlehandedly, leaving him alone and putting him in a trap and in the same time, stalled enough time that his allies safely escape to the other side, and left Beowulf screaming in rage of defeat despite him kicking Axel's ass and be victorious in battle, since he let Axel succeed his true mission.
Ramza Beoulve in Final Fantasy Tactics, in the end of his whole quest to save the world and his sister... either dies or survives but leaves the country in obscurity (depending on your view. We now speak about the latter.). In process, he is also branded as a heretic and villain by the Corrupt Church, but he wouldn't even bother clearing his name, because he got what he wanted: life with his sister in peace, which to him count as a victory. This is a direct contrast to his best friend Delita Hyral, who after losing his sister, changed from an upstanding soldier into one hell of a Manipulative Bastard... who eventually ends up Lonely at the Top with his Pyrrhic Victory.
- Crosses with Belated Happy Ending - by the time we reach Vagrant Story, the truth of the Corrupt Church is known. At some point in history, Ramza's name is cleared.
Milla Vodello in Psychonauts. Despite the fact that the orphanage she once worked for burned down, and all of the children in it died, she's moved on and become a much more cheerful person. Aggressively cheerful. While some think that she's really a Stepford Smiler, because she keeps her bad memories tucked away, her dialogue indicates that she's come to terms with her past, and has had a good life since then.
The end of Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney Justice For All has this. Phoenix happily accepts his first defeat because his client really did do the crime, for once. When Franziska berates him for losing his perfect status, Phoenix replied with "Perfection isn't everything."
Subverted in Tekken. King's story in the fourth game in the series revolve around him trying to avenge Armor King's death on Craig Marduk. He succeeded in beating Marduk and hospitalizing him, but couldn't bring himself to kill Marduk, realizing that it would end up as an empty victory. So although he didn't personally avenge Armor King by killing Marduk, he somehow has felt quite victorious that he beat Marduk in fair combat, and didn't dwindle into a Revenge-driven bastard. This rolls back in the later games where eventually Marduk is Easily Forgiven and becomes one of his allies.

Web Comics

Vaarsuvius from The Order of the Stick against Xykon. V doesn't accomplish the intended goal of the destroying him for good, but does send Xykon's Soul Jar flying into the sewers, causes his right-hand-man to lose an eye, and rescues a prisoner who not only knows most of Xykon's spells, but is best friends with his secret weapon.
- Also a good learning opportunity for Vaarsuvius, because the elf finally accepts being not all powerful, but also that power can take on forms besides powerful spells, and to not discount his/her victories.
  - The second one, surprisingly, was taught to him by Xykon himself.

Real Life

The Day the Music Died: Tommy and Ritchie flip for a seat on the plane with some pretty famous musicians. Tommy lost the coin toss...and the plane crashed. Bit of a Downer Ending overall, anyway.