Beyond Redemption / Western Animation

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Beyond Redemption in Western Animation.

• The Amazing World of Gumball: In the episode "The Wicked", Darwin tries to prove that Margaret Robinson has a good side, only to learn the hard way that she is "evil to the core" when she watches him choke with a sinister grin on her face. From there, he and Gumball resort to catching her committing a crime and sending her to prison.
• In the penultimate episode of Amphibia, King Andrias realizes that he's become a monster by aiding the Core in its imperialist ambitions after reading his late friend Leif's farewell letter. However, he laments that he's done so many monstrous things that he can't be redeemed, and chooses to let Anne kill him when the Core pulls a Villain Override. He does survive, and ultimately helps the heroes destroy the Core, but he never expects to be forgiven.
• Arcane subverts it. Ekko believes that Jinx is this since she's gone full into her Ax-Crazy identity. Jinx used to be a sweet girl named Powder until one of her explosives worked a little too well, killing most of Powder and Vi's Family of Choice by accident. As such, Ekko argues that the girl who used to be known as "Powder" is long gone. Even so, Vi refuses to listen out of her love for Jinx/Powder, and won't quit on her. By the end of season 1, Jinx accepts her new identity and uses her rocket to destroy up the Council building much to Vi and Caitlyn's horror.
• Avatar: The Last Airbender:
  • In "The Crossroads of Destiny", Katara and Zuko (who has been unjustly hunting her for months) bond over their shared grief and Katara offers to heal his scar. Then they're interrupted by their respective factions, and in the ensuing battle Zuko attacks her. After that, Katara became the most adamant of any on her side that Prince Zuko will never change. He does eventually, but not because of anything done or not done by the heroes. The decision is one Zuko had to make for himself. After this, Katara takes by far the longest to accept that Zuko has truly changed for the better.
  • Zuko assumes Iroh will give him some sort of speech about family and redemption before he goes to confront Princess Azula, but Iroh surprises him by saying that Azula is nuts and needs to go down. Even Azula shows several redeeming traits such as her friendship with Mai and Ty Lee and was genuinely hurt when they rejected her, and showed some care for Zuko.
  • After learning of Fire Lord Ozai's plan to wipe out the Earth Kingdom with Sozin's Comet, Zuko effectively disowns his father in front of his face and then pushes Aang to kill the Fire Lord in spite of Aang's reluctance to kill someone even as evil as Ozai. He even mocks the idea of turning Ozai good by suggesting they should send him baby pictures to make him remember happier times. After Zuko meets his father in prison at the end of the series, he does tell Ozai that Aang's mercy means he now has a chance of redemption... but the tone of his voice suggests he knows Ozai wouldn't take the chance out of his wounded pride.
• Avengers Assemble: Thor admits several times his belief Loki is too evil and insane for him to hold out any hope of redemption, and yet in season 4 he still strikes up a reluctant alliance in the hope that this time Loki might change. However, Loki's evil, greed and insanity cause him to betray everyone and try to wipe out the entire universe, ending with his being consumed by the very weapon he unleashed.
• Batman: The Animated Series: Clayface is initially seen as a tragic figure, where multiple people try to cure him of his Power Incontinence. Then he murders his own daughter by eating her alive because he can't stand the idea of creating something that isn't him. From that point on, nobody even thinks about rehabilitating him; even in Justice League, where the technology to possibly cure Clayface has finally been developed, the Justice League go out of their way to prevent Clayface from stealing it.
• Ben 10: Ultimate Alien: Near the end of season 1, Kevin, in desperation, absorbs energy from the Ultimatrix to get the power to defeat Aggregor. The result: Kevin is remutated and becomes an Ax-Crazy Power Parasite who goes on a rampage absorbing the powers of everyone he comes across. After trying to reason with him and failing, Ben eventually becomes convinced that Kevin's too far gone and they have to put him down. When Gwen approaches Grandpa Max for help on the subject, she's shocked when Max agrees with Ben's approach, despite admitting that he never thought Ben would go that far.
  Ben: He's never gonna stop- unless I stop him. For good.
• Big City Greens: Chip Whistler started out as just a petty rival to Cricket and the Greens before transitioning to a full-on Big Bad, and Cricket has went from seeing him as an archrival to a joke that never wins and finally to a true threat to the family. By the time they face off a second time in "Chip's Revenge", Cricket has seen to it that Chip will never reform as Tilly thought, but refuses to let him face a Disney Villain Death because Tilly talked him into realizing he almost walked down the same path of evil as his worst enemy.
• In Castlevania (2017), after Lisa was burned at the stake, Alucard tried to talk his father Dracula out of the plan to wipe out humanity. In Alucard's own words, "I grieve with you, but I won't let you commit genocide." By the time Alucard is found by Trevor and Sypha at the end of Season 1, Alucard has decided that Dracula has to die after learning about the extent of his vengeance was not only to wipe humanity out but to sentence humans to be subjected to unrelenting hunts by vampires.
• The ultimate fate of The Nowhere King and the General (who are two parts of the same person) from Centaurworld. While ultimately a Tragic Villain, a lovelorn fool who split himself into two beings to be with his love and ended up going to war with himself, the acts of brutality and violence committed by both of his two sides are ultimately deemed too heinous for any form of forgiveness. He doesn't seem to object when he reforms into his original Elktaur form and is put down by the princess he did it all for.
• Codename: Kids Next Door: Subverted in the episode "Operation: F.O.U.N.T.A.I.N.". When the Kids Next Door save Leaky Leona from the Delightful Children from Down the Lane, she tells them about how she discovered the Fountain of Youth three hundred years ago. After that, she tries to kill them because of how they also now know of the Fountain. After the Delightful Children accidentally save the Kids Next Door, as Leona is hanging from a piece of stone, Numbah Five decides to just leave her behind despite Leona begging her to save her. Numbah Four convinces Numbah Five to change her mind when he reminds her about how she told him "We save kids. That's our job", and together they save Leona from the Fountain collapsing.
• In the Danny Phantom Grand Finale Phantom Planet, Jack finds out that his college friend Vlad has become a half-ghost bent on killing him and stealing Jack's wife Maddie. Despite all that Vlad had done, including the numerous previous attempts at murder, Jack attempted to reason with Vlad not to go through with his world domination plot, even apologizing to Vlad for being responsible for his bitterness that started from the moment he inadvertently activated the prototype ghost portal in front of his face and that he voted for him to become mayor in the first place. Vlad refuses to hear Jack's pleas. Thanks to that, Jack finally concludes that Vlad is not worth redeeming, so when Vlad asked him for help, Jack leaves him behind in outer space.
  Vlad: Jack, you have to help me! You wouldn't turn your back on an old friend, would you?
  Jack: An old friend? No. You? YES!
• The Dragon Prince: Even after several humiliating defeats in a row and being shown mercy each time, Karim stubbornly refuses to give up on his ambitions which only causes both Janai and Miyana (the last two people to show any sort of love towards him) to label him as a lost cause, with Janai officially sentencing him to death. She does try to give him one last chance to redeem himself by destroying the corrupted Sunforge, but he instead opts to try for another power grab which only leads to his Undignified Death by literally Aaravos's hand.
• In Elena of Avalor Season 3, Esteban is kicked out of his family and Avalor, stripped of his title as Chancellor, and charged with treason after they learn he is partly responsible for the deaths of King Raul and Queen Lucia as well as the terrible regime that ruled over Avalor for several decades. Though his grandfather forgives him after hearing why he did it, nobody else does (especially his grandmother and Elena) and they vote to exile him to a far-off remote island for the rest of his days (which was considered more merciful than letting him rot in the castle dungeons). He then digs himself deeper by escaping his jail cell before he can be shipped off and frees the Delgados so that they can defend him, which leads to a whole set of problems as the season goes on. Despite his good actions throughout the show, everyone focuses more on the fact that he's directly responsible for at least three murders and probably a lot more crimes, a reality that he refuses to properly own up to. It's only when he takes the initiative to accept blame and do something unselfishly good that Elena is willing to accept him again.
• Hazbin Hotel runs with this trope as part of its Central Theme on redemption. The Princess of Hell, Charlie Morningstar, seeks to defy the idea that the Sinners of Hell aren't worthy of forgiveness with her plan to rehabilitate demons and sinners so they can reach Heaven. She's ridiculed by the other denizens of Hell who believe that no damned soul has any interest in bettering themselves. As Alastor the Radio Demon puts it, everyone had their chance to be a good person in the life they lived before, but failed and are beyond redemption. Alastor backs the hotel project anyway because he thinks the guests' futile attempts to redeem themselves will be amusing. Also, the first episode sees Adam the Archangel telling Charlie that her dream is impossible, since angels kill demons for sport and likewise believes that redemption is impossible. Charlie soldiers on all the same as a Wide-Eyed Idealist who thinks that she can do it if she tries hard enough and has a positive attitude, and there's subtle hints that her idealism rubs off on people. Charlie ultimately turns out to be right when Sir Pentious pulls a Heroic Sacrifice and becomes an Ascended Demon.
  • Season 2 explores this trope further: Pentious' earlier Heroic Sacrifice winds up flying in the face of Heaven's bureaucracy and the previous mentality behind the exterminations. The Speaker of God makes it clear that Pentious redeemed himself from his previous sin of apathy thanks to his sacrifice and allows his redemption to stand. Lute, despite overwhelming evidence that demons are not irredeemable in front of her, still sticks to her earlier mentality to the point where she wants to exterminate all of Hell herself. And when Charlie gets hit with a question by Vox that asks whenever or not he could actually be redeemed for his crimes, Charlie retorts that everyone can be redeemed. Ultimately, live video feed with evidence showing Pentious did indeed get redeemed for his sacrifice and is in Heaven is what encourages a lot of the demons to follow in his footsteps at the end of the season.
  • Also at the end of season 2, Angel, in a bout of self-inflicted Cartesian Karma, leaves the Hotel and back into Valentino's home because he winds up believing he himself is this for being an unintentional spy for the Vees and attacking his friends (including Cherri, who he strangled), all while under Vox's control. Husk and Cherri try to convince him he isn't but it falls on deaf ears.
• Kaeloo: After over a season of trying to convince Pretty, the local Alpha Bitch, to become a better person, Kaeloo finally gives up in Episode 118, stating that Pretty will never change. The trope is eventually subverted as Pretty undergoes a Heel–Face Turn, but her change of attitude came from her own heart, not because of anything Kaeloo did.
• Kipo and the Age of Wonderbeasts averts this with Hugo, who comes to truly realize the error of his ways and works to make amends for what they did, even if he isn't forgiven. However, it's played straight with Dr. Emilia, who absolutely refuses to change her ways, even trying to murder Kipo immediately after the teenager saves her from being trapped in her own mind. She fails and is taken away by Fun Gus to play with forever (much to Kipo's dismay).
• Lilo & Stitch: The Series: All the experiments in the series are capable of redemption with the exception of Experiment 627. This isn't for typical moral reasons (really, 627's barely sentient), but rather a design feature. After being fed up with Stitch's ego from capturing experiments, Jumba decides to create a new one, whose "improvements" include that it's impossible to make 627 stop being evil. As such, after defeat, 627 is dehydrated back into a pod and stored away without being given a second chance.
• The Lion Guard: Exploited by Scar's evil spirit in Season 3. He wishes to destroy the Pride Lands with the fire that he's now made of, and wants his grandnephew Kion's Roar of Elders to amplify his powers. To do so, he tries to make Kion use the Roar to destroy him with hate, confident that Kion has nothing but contempt for his great-uncle's evil and horrendous deeds. It ends up being double-subverted. Kion, despite being given a cursed scar of hate, refuses to give into the temptation and instead forgives his great uncle, much to Scar's shock. He then calls upon the great lions of the past to bring actual judgement upon Scar, which is a rainstorm that snuffs out the fires caused by Scar. Scar, now being literally made of fire, is permanently destroyed rather than redeemed.
• In Miraculous Ladybug Marinette still tried to reach out to Chloé Bourgeois despite her massive and repeated Aesop Amnesia, but the events of the Season 3 finale convince her that Chloé isn't worth it. Chloé willingly allies herself with Hawk Moth to keep being Queen Bee, which results in basically every supporting hero so far having their identities revealed across all of Paris, and almost gives Hawk Moth exactly what he wants. Once the ruckus is over, Marinette says that Chloé can't be trusted with the Bee Miraculous anymore.
• In the Grand Finale of My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic, Queen Chrysalis, Lord Tirek, and Cozy Glow are defeated by the combined help of every good-aligned character in the series. In spite of how many times they've lost — including coming dangerously close to winning the last time — Chrysalis, Tirek, and Cozy Glow refuse to ever give up or change their wicked ways, announcing that they'll be back to try again. This is in spite of the fact that the three found out that Good Feels Good, then actively rejected the idea. Celestia, Luna, and Discord use their powers to have the three villains turned to stone together at the end of the series, with Celestia saying that no punishment can really fit all of the evil that they've done.
• The Owl House: As Dana Terrace once stated, not everyone deserves redemption.
  • In "Follies at the Coven Day Parade", Luz tries to help Kikimora get back to her family for the holiday in a manner that would allow her to still keep her position in the Emperor's Coven. But Kikimora ends up betraying Luz upon hearing a promotion offered to her, and this act proves to be the last straw for Luz and Kikimora's family. She's permanently disowned, and is later dismissed by Luz as a Belos wannabe and an annoying nuisance at best.
  • The Blight family have a lot of dysfunctional issues thanks to their corporation and Odalia's desire for higher status, but Amity hopes that with her father Alador seeing the error of his ways, they can mend the bridges and be a true family once again. This hope is ruined when Odalia reveals that she knew about Belos' real plan with the Day of Unity, but still continues to help him for the empty promise of her family being spared and made into royalty, showing no remorse for the other witches. This act proves to be so heinous and inexcusable that the Blight family disowns Odalia on the spot, which she brushes off and states her intention to find herself a new business partner instead.
  • Emperor Belos has a tragic backstory that led to his Freudian Excuse. But Belos has done everything he could to ensure that nobody knows the exact truth of what made him the way he is, from ruining his memory portraits in his mindscape to outright pretending that his actions aren't motivated by the trauma he suffered in his childhood. Because of his refusal to open up, the Collector is unable to redeem him with kindness and forgiveness at the series finale, leaving Luz and the Titan no choice but to destroy Belos so that he can't hurt anyone else. When Belos tries to convince Luz that she saved him and wants to make peace, Luz's Death Glare makes it clear that she's not letting him fool her again, and Luz does nothing to help him when the boiling rain reduces him to a skull and goop and allows King, Eda, and Raine to finish him off.
• In Phineas and Ferb Save Summer, in spite of his Hilariously Abusive Childhood and the failures on most of his evil schemes, Doofenshmirtz succeeded in moving the Earth away to an early autumn, which caused so much unrest (especially in Danville City Hall) and allowed Doof to take over the Tri-State Area for himself and his fellow villains of L.O.V.E.M.U.F.F.I.N.. However, Doof is discomforted to see his rival Rodney taking control of L.O.V.E.M.U.F.F.I.N. and exploiting the event for his true intent to take over the world by sending it to a new Ice Age. Knowing that Rodney's plan would condemn all lifeforms in the planet to eternal frostbite, Doof angrily (yet rightfully) objects to this, but Rodney is still hellbent on accomplishing his goal just to prove that he's a better villain than Doof. And when Rodney disables the reverse switch and self-destruct button on his machine to ensure that his plan won't be stopped, this provokes Doof to smack Rodney out with a mop; even Perry, Monogram, Carl and Monty willingly help Doof in foiling Rodney's plot, with Perry knowing fully well that the imminent cataclysm would endanger his host family (especially Phineas and Ferb) as well. And upon the Earth being saved, Monogram gets Rodney arrested while thanking Doof for rectifying his actions.
• In She-Ra and the Princesses of Power, Adora tried numerous times to convince Catra to leave the Horde, all of which Catra threw back in Adora's face. At the end of season 3, Catra has thrown a Suicidal Cosmic Temper Tantrum, tried to destroy Etheria, and made Queen Angella perform a Heroic Sacrifice to stop it. And all of this was because Catra was so desperate to beat Adora at something that even The End of the World as We Know It was on the table, even if it meant that Catra would also die. Adora gives Catra a Death Glare, with Catra's face showing an appropriate reaction. It didn't help that Catra put the blame for all of her problems and actions on Adora, only for Adora to snap back and call Catra out on refusing to own up to her own mistakes. It's only when Catra takes the initiative to accept blame and do something unselfishly good that Adora is willing to help her again. Ultimately it wasn't that Adora decided that Catra was beyond redemption but rather that Catra was beyond Adora's ability to redeem.
  Adora: Can we skip the speech? I'm done playing your games, Catra. Too many people got hurt when you set off that portal. I hope it was worth it. Because I won't let you hurt my friends, or anyone else, ever again!
• South Park: Many people deem Eric Cartman to be irredeemable, especially Kyle, because Cartman kept committing appalling actions and refuses to ever learn from his mistakes. This leads to Heidi Turner breaking up with Cartman at the end of season 21 when it's made clear that Cartman will never change from his horrible self and staying with him has only brought her down to his level. At the end of Post Covid: The Return of Covid everyone thinks Cartman is irredeemable, including Butters who tells Stan and Kyle not to feel sorry for Cartman being a homeless, lonely, and miserable drunk saying that nothing could have saved Cartman from himself before cursing right back at him. The Irony of Butters' statement however is that in a previous timeline Cartman finally did redeem himself where he sacrificed his happy life to make the future better for his peers.
• Star Wars Resistance:
  • After Tam joins the First Order at the end of Season 1, everyone except Kaz accepts that there's nothing more they can do for Tam, because as far as they know, they'll never see her again. Kaz attempts to reach out to Tam and apologize for his actions, but it proves impractical as doing so allows the First Order to track the Colossus, and also distracts him from helping keep the Colossus together, soon leading to Kaz giving up on Tam. Synara makes it clear she will never accept Tam back, and Neeku, while seemingly neutral about the effects of Tam's betrayal, has disowned her as one of his friends. In the meantime, Tam's perspective shows that there's still hope for her, from her various heroic/decent acts to what Magnetic Hero Venisa has to say about redemption.
  • In the Grand Finale, Tam does get her redemption and tries to convince Rucklin to defect from the First Order with her. With his jerkassery and caring only about himself, he rebuffs her offer. If that wasn't enough, he still supports the First Order despite being declared a traitor alongside her. As a result, Tam gives up on Rucklin, punches him in the face, and left him to die at the explosion of Star Destroyer.
• Steven Universe:
  • The Crystal Gems come to believe Peridot can't be changed, despite their efforts throughout the Barn arc, when she says in "It Could've Been Great" that Rose's rebellion screwed over Homeworld's plans to turn their beloved Earth into a wasteland (which, in all honesty, does hold some water). They then spend the entire next episode believing she's going to report them to Yellow Diamond, but Peridot was actually trying to persuade her into sparing the Earth.
  • This is played straight in Future with Aquamarine and Eyeball Ruby. Both of them resent Steven for his efforts to reform the Diamonds, which turned them from war heroes to just standard gems. They are among the only villains in the series, known for its redemption acts, who refuse to change and still plot revenge on Steven. This is in fact the theme of the episode in question, as summed up by Greg.
    "I love how you believe in everyone. You stuck to your principles, and I'm proud of you. I mean, everyone can change, but not everyone wants to."
• Zig-zagged with Cassandra in the final season of Tangled: The Series. Since her Face–Heel Turn upon grabbing the moonstone and being infused with it, Cassandra starts going through a Sanity Slippage upon finding out that she is Mother Gothel's biological daughter but abandoned her for Rapunzel and this causes the insecurities of her self-worth that she's been developing in the second season to reach their peak. While she does have moments here and there where she still has some morality, her ego and need for validation keep overshadowing it. While a lot of the characters believe that she is no longer the friend she once was, Rapunzel utterly refuses to believe in this trope and repeatedly tries to see the good that once was in Cassandra. Ultimately, Cassandra does reform in the Grand Finale upon being Out-Gambitted by the Greater-Scope Villain Zhan Tiri, who kept manipulating Cassandra into being evil for her plan to destroy Corona to succeed.
• In Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (2012), Splinter has been trying to end his feud with Shredder through reason, appealing for their happier times as brothers, and pointing out how Shredder's life has been wasted on revenge and turned him into a literal monster. Shredder rejects Splinter's offers and eventually, he manages to kill Splinter in the penultimate episode of Season 4. This heinous act is enough for the Turtles and their allies to deem Shredder as truly irredeemable and the final episode of Season 4 is them laying siege on Shredder's hideout to kill their Arch-Enemy for good.
• In the Teen Titans (2003) season 2 finale "Aftershock (Part 1)", the Titans try to get Terra to stop working for Slade, but she refuses. After she defeats them and goes on to wreak untold destruction and death upon the entire city off-screen, in the next episode "Aftershock (Part 2)", the Titans decide that they’re done trying to talk to her and effortlessly wipe the floor with her, forcing Terra to retreat back to Slade. However, they try one last time to get her to turn against Slade, as he’s controlling her body to kill Beast Boy, and their pleas allow Terra to successfully break free from Slade’s control, but her thrashing of Slade accidentally triggers a volcano that threatened to destroy the city. Terra performs a Heroic Sacrifice to stop the volcano, which grants her a Taken for Granite Redemption Equals Death... At least until the Grand Finale, where she, through unknown means (though it's speculated to be due to Trigon's defeat), came back to life, with seemingly no memory of her time with the Titans.
• In Transformers: Prime, Optimus had hoped that he could find a way to end the war with the Decepticons through diplomacy. But when Megatron, souped-up with Dark Energon, attacks Bumblebee while he was taking Raf home, and nearly killing them both, Optimus realizes that there can be no diplomatic solution to the Autobots and Decepticon’s perpetual conflict, and declares that Megatron must be destroyed.
• Wander Over Yonder: The titular Wander is an All-Loving Hero who believes in the best of people and tries to befriend every villain he meets. However, Lord Dominator proves herself to be utterly incapable of being a good person, even having a Villain Song called "I'm the Bad Guy" in which she revels in being a Card-Carrying Villain who does evil things because it's evil. Towards the end of the series, Wander has a Heroic BSoD when he finally admits that Lord Dominator is a truly awful person who doesn't want to improve and will never accept his help. Though even after this, Wander still decides to Save the Villain. This is even lampshaded by Sylvia early on as she tries to remind him that his philosophy "an enemy's just a friend you haven't made yet" isn't always true.
  Sylvia: Sometimes an enemy is just an enemy.
• X-Men: The Animated Series: Professor X tries to see the good in everyone, even holding the belief he can heal the psyche of the Ax-Crazy Sabretooth, but it takes one look at Apocalypse for him to declare the ancient being is too insane to bother reasoning with. Only problem is Apocalypse is pretty much impossible to destroy.