What is an anti-hero?

[DanielPotter]

What the heading says.

 

[SailusGebel]

An antihero (sometimes spelled as anti-hero)[1] or antiheroine is a main character in a story who may lack conventional heroic qualities and attributes, such as idealism, courage, and morality.

 

[Lloyd]

It's a hero, but edgy.

 

[Ilikewaterkusa]

What the heading says.

Edgelords. Like Hitler

 

[Prince_Azmiran_Myrian]

Selfish, but not evil.

 

[Chaos_Sinner777]

Does good things, but badly. Like a Hero will get a mob boss arrested, an Anti-Hero will kill them.

 

[TotallyHuman]

It is the virgin version of the chad hero

 

[Paul_Tromba]

It's a bad guy with good morals but poor execution of these morals.

 

[Tempokai]

The one that tries to be evil but fails spectacularly

 

[UberNuber]

Does good things, but badly. Like a Hero will get a mob boss arrested, an Anti-Hero will kill them.

I like this description, but would also add anti-heroes are rarely ever spurred on by heroic qualities like courage/selflessness/etc.

They are almost always after revenge or they do good but for selfish reasons.

For example, an anti-hero may think ONLY they can be the successful king/general/etc and while they are aiming for their greater good, they follow the 'ends justify the means' approach.

In really good writing the anti-hero is objectively correct, that they are really the best suited for their goal, but it puts the reader in the position to think about morality of the person who is using methods not seen as virtuous.

Lastly, if you want to read an EXCELLENT anti-hero story, try to find the manga called Akumetsu.

 

[LilRora]

Antihero is usually a person who does questionable things for the sake of good, and is often persecuted for it. Mostly they aren't bad, evil or anything, but their moral compass is different from usual people and they end up doing what most people consider to be crimes.

Be careful not to mix it up with villain, because villains do those things selfishly and for personal gain, while anithero does them (mostly) for some greater ideals. But also don't consider it to be a hero with different morals, because they rarely do things out of selflessness or out of kindness.

 

[ACertainPassingUser]

Straight from Wikipedia (click the blue text for original link) :

Antihero​

For other uses, see Antihero (disambiguation).

An antihero (sometimes spelled as anti-hero)[1] or antiheroine is a main character in a story who may lack conventional heroic qualities and attributes, such as idealism, courage, and morality.[1][2][3][4][5] Although antiheroes may sometimes perform actions that are morally correct, it is not always for the right reasons, often acting primarily out of self-interest or in ways that defy conventional ethical codes.[6] An antihero typically exhibits one of the "Dark Triad" personality traits, which include narcissism, psychopathy, and Machiavellianism.[7]


Revisionist Western films commonly feature antiheroes as lead characters whose actions are morally ambiguous. Clint Eastwood, pictured here in A Fistful of Dollars (1964), portrayed the archetypal antihero called the "Man with No Name" in the Italian Dollars Trilogy of Spaghetti Westerns.


There is a controversy over what exactly defines an antihero. Merriam Webster defines an antihero as "someone who lacks heroic qualities", yet scholars typically have differing ideas on what constitutes as an antihero. Some scholars refer to the "Racinian" antihero, who is defined by several factors. The first being that they are doomed to fail before their adventure begins. The second constitutes the blame of that failure on everyone but themselves. Thirdly, they offer a critique of social morals and reality.[8] To other scholars, an antihero is inherently a hero from a specific point of view, and a villain from another.[9] This idea is further backed by the addition of character alignments, which are commonly displayed by role-playing games.

 

[Baltazyr]

Also, a video essay on Antiheroes by OSP:

Her take is basically, "It depends."

 

[georgelee5786]

A hero who deals with evil in far different ways from regular superheroes. While batman and superman may try and avoid killing, an anti-hero may kill criminals on a whim.

 

[DiscoDream]

What the heading says.

Basically anything that isn't childishly naive. The stereotypical hero is every platateaus rolled into a ball. Infallible, ever growing and willing to take on the rigors of the world without flinching. An anti-hero would be straying from any of that in the slightest. Like a hero who kills the bad guy, instead of putting them in the jail system and hoping it works out.

 

[OP1000]

An anti-hero is someone that has a morally gray outlook on how justice should be served, the way people of a society should act, etc.

 

[FiendsForHire]

As someone who writes an anti-hero story, I'd say people who try to do the right thing, but with less morality, legal precedent, and approval from the general public. They also have their own selfish desires for being a hero, and don't try to be purely altruistic.

 

[Le_ther]

Basically a hero with no morals or strangled by the law.

 

[K5Rakitan]

It's something you spray your car with so the hero won't pick it up and launch it at the villain, kinda like this, but for heroes instead of pets:

 

[Merrikk]

A sad cynical fuck that still has a heart of gold and a chivalrous spirit, for an example look at Geralt of Rivia.