There's a huge difference between redemption and humanization. I feel like a lot of "redemption arcs" aren't actually redemption at all, they're just attempts to humanize the villain so that they seem multi-faceted, but people read them as "redemption arcs" and think that that is meant to justify all the evil they've done before and negate whatever made them a villain in the first place. I think true "redemption arcs" are actually kind of rare because true redemption would take making the villain acknowledge their crimes, reevaluate their actions, actively choose to do better, and then proceed to make amends and become a better person, and that would this take more time than most stories are allowed to give their characters.
I've also seen people argue that a character has to be poised for redemption from the jump for it to work because once a character does something "too bad", they can't be redeemed. I completely disagree because redemption isn't justification or forgiveness, so no matter how horrible a character's actions, they could choose to become better, but because a lot of people (including writers) think redemption means "erasing the character's flaws and making it so they did nothing wrong ever", a lot of attempted "redemption arcs" just end up erasing a character's entire history or justifying every evil thing they've ever done. And yeah, in these cases, the only way to make a character go from a villain to a perfect cinnamon roll with no flaws *is* to have been planning it from the beginning and make sure they never do anything that can't be explained away later.
TLDR: real redemption arcs require a lot of self-awareness, patience, and growth, which are things that are rarely actually allocated to villains, and that's why real redemption arcs almost never get executed. The reason people think redemption arcs are overdone is because there are so many attempts to either humanize a villain that get misconstrued as redemption or attempts to blatantly erase who a character was in the name of "redemption", which is really just poor character development.
Holy MOLY the redemption arcs in this series are unparalleled; eat your heart out Darth Vader Prince Zuko Severus Snape William the Bloody. Every single book in the series has a big dang moment where a character realizes they were wrong, and then has to decide what to do next.
Edmund's the first and most famous. He's got outside forces genuinely working against him — a charismatic adult tells him to listen, his only other mentors are equally-lost kids, and he's enchanted by Turkish delight. But the text also makes crystal clear he's got inside forces too: he gets told the queen is wrong, he sees with his own eyes that she's running an authoritarian police state, and he still goes along with her plans. His fatal flaw is not being naïve; it's stubbornness. He walks outside into the snow, realizes he forgot his coat... and refuses to turn around. He initially trusts a charming lady he has every reason to trust, but then he continues trusting her after getting disconfirming evidence. And then he gets confronted with unignorable proof of her evil (the tea party being turned to stone) and he has to own up to his wrongness. He has to apologize. He has to work and struggle and nearly die trying to undo what he did. He changes for the better, he grows up, but he never loses that stubbornness, for all that he gets better at directing it.
Aravis and Caspian are sort of the same, in that they're both raised in privilege, used to not bothering to think about other people. Aravis gets confronted with her casual entitlement, in that her oh-so-clever plan for escape hinged on pinning her crimes on a slave girl who would be punished far more harshly than Aravis herself. It happens in an instant, and Aravis can never take other people's pain for granted again. Caspian gets confronted with his entire culture being one of settler colonialism, and his being the direct beneficiary thereof. It takes almost a decade for him to learn to unwind his parents' and uncle's teachings, and to learn how to use his privilege for good, but learn he does.
Same goes for Jill and Diggory, whom I'll lump together because their fatal flaw is contrarianism and impulsivity. They're both classic cases of fuck around and find out: Jill treats a serious conversation with Eustace as a game and (she thinks) gets him killed in a single careless instant, then Diggory treats everything Polly tries to tell him as a game and ends up indirectly destroying the entire world as a result. And for both of them, that's the start of the story, the note we meet them on. But don't worry; these are coming of age stories, and they'll have to learn to grow in the aftermath of their mistakes.
TBH I think Puzzle is the weakest of the set, but he's the classic case of the person who gets drawn so deep into the cult that they become an active participant in the con. And by the seventh book in the series, we all understand what lesson he's about to learn.
Eustace is my all-time favorite, and he's more timely now than ever: he's the Gifted Kid who has spent his entire life being told by his parents that he's the smartest person in the room, and thus he's never had to do an iota of self-reflection. He uses his big vocabulary and his golden boy reputation to get away with basically anything he wants. Above all else he believes in the system, because so far the system has always worked for him. And then he gets dragged through a painting and into a world with a completely different system, one whose rules he doesn't understand at all. He doesn't adapt, he doesn't listen; he just insists on dragging his existing ideas around as everyone stares at him in puzzlement and disgust. He's every 1950s British anthropologist rolling up to a new culture to show them how it's done, so confident in the superiority of the system he's been raised in and his own mastery of said system that he is genuinely confused why everyone else can't see it too. Eustace also gets the most dramatic corner-knocking-off of anyone: apparently being thrust into a completely new society was too subtle a hint for this kid, so next Aslan thrusts him into a completely new reality for a few weeks (and forces him to shut up and listen in the process).
I love that during and post-dragoning, Eustace not only has to deal with the abominable way he behaved toward everyone around him, but also gets confronted with the terrible reality of Reepicheep's forgiveness. He hasn't yet earned Reepicheep's friendship at the time when Reepicheep chooses to give it, and that's what really humbles him. Even though Eustace learns to listen, learns to turn his cynicism to a measured skepticism, he never loses his core of being a nerd. He stays curious, he stays skeptical, and he manages to make it work for him by getting better at learning. For all the movie's many weaknesses, I love how well Will Poulter conveys Eustace's near-desperation to Get a Good Grade in Adventure, and how hard he tries to understand the rules of Narnia in the hope of getting that grade. It's then so so satisfying to see the turn away from trying to get a grade, toward trying to learn.
The most insane takes I've seen coming out of the TADC finale discourse is how some ppl are treating Jax like s/he's Russell Brand or Andy Dick or some other irl celebrity with allegations attached to them, and therefore should never have gotten a redemption arc... something that somehow warrants a bad review. Also calling her/him an "abuser" or "misogynist"- as if they're terms we can throw around so casually (they're not)- instead of, idk, a run-of-the-mill bully at most. Can we not have our fun with morally flawed fictional characters anymore?
Redemption by amnesia - the villain forgetting their crimes. They begin living a normal life, or possibly even forge a new path of virtue. They don’t even understand why the heroes keep so close to them, why everyone gives them dirty looks. Or maybe they were told their past and have to live with a guilt they can’t quite fully feel.
Redemption by empathetic experience - maybe the villain was young when they started down the wrong path. They learned the worst from evil mentors/parents, and it isn’t until they have an experience that shatters their paradigm that they realize they can/should be different. Usually these experiences humanize the people around the villain, and villain, feeling empathy, decides to change.
Redemption by de-aging - the villain reverting back to a younger age. Even if they remember what they’ve done, the heroes would likely refuse to kill them. And the younger they are, the less likely they’d face any punishment.
Redemption by whump - the villain facing unbalanced retribution. Their torture is too much for the heroes to bear. “They don’t deserve this.” The villain being taken care of in a way that changes their whole relationship with the heroes. They can’t go back to living the way they did before.
Redemption by “death” - the villain being sentenced to death and actually dying. By some means, magical or scientific, they come back to life. They technically satisfied the sentence and can carry on living, however that may go. Or it was done in secret, and they get a second chance living in anonymity.
Redemption by common enemy - “The enemy of my enemy is my friend.” The villain and hero team up to stop a bigger, worse threat. Even though villain has done terrible things in the past, the hero can’t kill or hurt them now, not right after they helped.
Redemption by family - nothing is more humanizing than a villain that cares about their family (and vice versa), and the hero can’t let villain die while their child is watching. Also looks like a brother, a mother stepping in when villain needs them most. Advocating for them, believing in them when no one else would.
@mrskywarp99 asked me what about Chloe's 'redemption arc' was better than Felix's. Sadly I accidently posted the answer incomplete, then deleted it to have time to finish it, so now it's not in ask format. The answer got LONG, so I'm going to put it under a read more. It dives into how both are handled in the narrative.
Please keep in mind it isn't about 'who deserves it and who doesn't' It's about how the narrative presented things, and how that does or doesn't work, narratively.
Nearly everything 🤣
Okay, I'm going to assume you mean as presented on screen and in terms of 'why one has a better narrative'. I'll just run through how each one was done first.
Chloé is presented as a nuisance out the gate. First season and even in origins which was the end of the season but chronologically the first episode.(We don't count Derision because cramming backstory in 8yrs later that retcons/ignores established dynamic doesn't work.) She was a nuisance but importantly a *failure*. It is important that she was a failure. It does two things:
1)It robs her of any bite. I've said before that Chloé picking on someone is often the best thing that ever happened to them. It ends up drawing attention to something that had previously been overlooked. I know this is due to how the episodes work but it still establishes an overall vibe. The worst impact Chloé had was... The school kids had to clean up the courtyard once. So, despite her being 'mean' most viewers are still not inclined to hate her.
2)It establishes that her behavior is part of a pattern and *not* self serving. If Chloé were doong what she does out of self interest/gain/calculations she would stop. She loses relentlessly. She is embarrassed repeatedly. We are already primed to accept that there has to be something more than satisfaction going on, because she is denied it.
Along the way we are given little humanizing moments. She looks up to Ladybug. She makes the sacrifice play at the end of Zombisu. She saves LB in Despair Bear(while surrounded by the class of future heroes who are standing gormless). None of these moments fundamentally alter her character, instead they deepen it. She's not something *instead* of what we thought. She is something *in addiction* to what we thought.
Then we meet her mother. We get the context. The context doesn't change who she is, but it explains it. It sheds new light on past actions. We get to go back through 1 1/2 seasons of interactions and we get *more* out of what we saw.
Her first outting with a Miraculous is a screw up, but it is one so obviously rooted in the damage we have just learned about. It's impulsive, it's seeking approval, and it isn't meant to cause lasting harm. She fully intended to stop the train and 'save' everyone. She had no reason to believe it wouldn't work. She didn't give up when it didn't work. It's important to remember here that if things had gone according to plan, it would have been no more than a thrill ride at an amusement park for the passengers.
After this first time though, as a hero, she performs exemplary. She saves people, even her classmates. She fights villains. She works to defend her teammates. As Queen Bee, she shows us who she *can* 'Bee'.
As a civilian she is still far from perfect. Behavior doesn't change on a dime (foreshadowing!) We see heroic impulses and moments sprinkled into her usual meanness though. It's worth mentioning that her mother is still present in her civilian life and (not litigating blame here) the one time she got her mother's approval it was Marinette talking about how mean Chloé was. What exactly did you expect a child desperately seeking approval to do after that?
Chloé was the very first person to reject an akuma, and notably she did it alone. She also rejected Mayura's offer. It took physically isolating her, akumatizing her parents, Ladybug explicitly not letting her save her parents(which we are shown was motivated out of jealousy of Kagami), and further cajoling by Hawkmoth while he held the Bee Miraculous to make her buy in. Even then 'release my parents' was the price she demanded for her help.
See how all this, the ups and downs are all interconnected around a core that we as the audience have been shown over time? Even as we push past S3. Being isolated post Miracle Queen would make nearly anyone resentful. Then Zoé shows up, seems to be a single person on her 'side', 'betrays' her, and is instantly accepted by her enemies. So Chloé withdrawing and becoming more grumpy continues to make sense. The girl has had no one care about her in forever. Then S5 she's manipulated by Lila&Gabe&Co. She's isolated just like st the end of S3, even moreso. Multiple times she doesn't go along with their plans and has to be *actively told what to do via an earpiece no one noticed* in order to do wrong.
Even now, Chloé shifting to a more positive person wouldn't be unreasonable. Heck, being away from Paris might be good for her, especially with her mother away from her too.
Now, let's swap to Felix-
First off, before S6 there were all of seven episodes with him in them. So 7/130 or ~5% of the runtime. That's a bad start in itself. A redemption arc needs time to bake. This isn't even time enough to cook in a microwave.
Felix shows up and is immediately mean. We're told his dad died and he resents Adrien for not showing up. Important: we are told, not shown. This will be a pattern. Felix procedes to be mean because ??? We don't know why. In the end... He succeeds. He steals Gabe's ring *and* he wipes out Marinette's confession. That's more lasting harm in a single appearance than all of Chloé combined.
This isn't to measure the harm specifically, but to examine how they are set up. By presenting Chloe as a low-stakes low-impact character over time vs Felix’s sudden, high stakes, high impact introduction the audience is tuned to take his harm as deliberate and self generated. This means any consequent redemption needs to tackle that setup (Spoiler: It doesn’t)
Half a season later he returns, and continues to be a jerk, though this time it’s (mostly) focused on Gabriel. Once more he shows he is cunning and ‘wins’ in the episode, getting info and looking ‘cool’ the whole time. What this episode does is reinforce two things 1)Felix is doing things deliberately. He WANTS something and is taking steps to achieve his goals, contrast this with Chloe’s impulsive/reactive actions. 2)Felix is a liar. We saw this in his first outing, but it’s very clearly doubled down on here. He lies coolly, calmly, both for the fun of it and to achieve his ends.
Next up is the S4 finale. Ignoring the nonsensical elements of this plan, we see he is willing to trade all the Miraculous to a guy he knows is a villain and personally hates, in order to get what he(Felix) personally wants. He’d rather work with Gabriel than Ladybug. He had options and did not take them. He was in complete control once more, unlike Chloe. This pushes things farther into the ‘deliberate evil’ category. There’s no hint of a setup for redemption here. There’s no indication Felix is doing anything other than what he wants. They prioritized ‘twist’ over setting up a good redemption arc. His ‘I’m sorry’ to the sentimonster Strikeback at least gives a hint of a motivation.
Emotion- He stuffs Adrien in a Ring rather than tell him anything, then proceeds to commit some genocide on the human race. There’s no akumatization, no manipulation. This is what Felix does when he has full control and is doing *exactly* what he wants. The fact that others(Adrien and now Kagami) don’t want him to do it isn’t a factor here. A smarter narrative setup would have had him wipe out the diamond adults and maybe hare off ot target *specific* other people. How does slaughtering random bystanders while singing a little tune factor into his (eventually claimed) motivation, or any redemption? He’s not a narratively motivated act, it’s a grand gesture written for shock value. Yay they got shock value, but it undercuts the narrative they want. In the end Felix freaks out, not because he did evil but because he *lost control of the situation*. That’s the defeat of a villain, not someone you expect to be redeemed. His solution to losing control? Kill the Sentibeing he created, just like all the people he hated have done. But he is sad about it so it doesn’t count I guess? The scene is dramatic, but it doesn’t FIT with the story they’re NOW showing us they want to tell. Even if we buy in, why doesn’t he try to work with the sentimonster instead of slaughtering it?
Pretension- Okay so he’s now just a good guy, poof. Switch made. Look he’s a widdle guy trying to be good and lovey dovey! Kagami says he’s good now, so it must be true! I need a neck brace for the whiplash. Kagami’s ‘he’s just like me, he dean’t know how to express himself’ is so off kilter. Felix knows just how to express himself! Being competent in social interactions is a hallmark of his character. He’s a liar and a manipulator. We’ve SEEN him be good at these things. Claiming he isn’t now isn’t an arc, it’s just lying to the audience via the characters. If he were legitimately bad at self expression that might be an arc on it’s own but we don’t get that. By the end of the Episode Ladybug’s fine with him having the peacock then he and his sentigirlfriend hold hands at the movies. Like, what?
Representation- We see him and Kagami being the perfect little lovey dovey couple (No problems expressing themselves apparently!) Does Felix help Ladybug? He had a Miraculous! One of the THREE not in Gabriel’s hands… Gabriel’s hands where FELIX put them. Nope! Instead he tricks Ladybug *again* and makes a Sentimonster(which he kills, again!) to infodump backstory via interpretive dance. (And Kagami is just following along because she has lost all her forthright character traits somewhere). Then he and Kagami skip town. (Kagami is kidnapped, sure)
So let’s examine:
Felix is a champion of Sentirights! Except no, he’ll kill them off without concern. HE only cares if you’re the right *kind* of Sentimonster. That’s not a great narrative to unpack.
Felix cares about Adrien!- Really? He doesn’t seem to consider his cousin much of a person. He gambles with and trades Adrien’s autonomy with impunity.
Felix has trouble expressing himself! When? The guy’s slick and before the very end of emotion he got everything he wanted. Heck, after that one moment in emotion he has continued to get everything he wanted. The only thing he DIDN’T get he wanted was murdering all humans and having Adrien be happy about it.
Felix makes amends! … how? He doesn’t help get the Miraculous back. *in the narrative* his little play didn’t inform Marinette that Gabriel was Hawkmoth. He took no active part at all in anything.
Felix was just abused!- Okay, first I need to preface this that *in the real world you take all claims of abuse seriously.* okay? Okay. Now, in the *narrative* the only thing we have to validate Felix’s claims of abuse are…. His own words. *and the show has explicitly set him up to be an extremely good liar* his abuse narrative doesn’t impact him negatively at all, it *only* benefits him by giving him a ‘get out of consequences free’ card. Felix could be telling the truth, but if he were lying he would say exactly the same thing and *we the audience don’t have any way of knowing which it is*. THAT IS BAD. That is the entire crux of his motivation! You need to *show* it, the impact it had, and how his struggle relates to it for there to be an arc!
In short- Felix’s ‘redemption arc’ ended without a redemption. He just switched teams and all his bad actions were relegated to ‘oopsies’ despite contributing to all of the bad events that followed. None of that ever comes up. It’s just ‘ooo look at these two all schmoopy and cute’ now?
Chloe hasn't even completely a redemption arc, and yet where she is NOW still has the makings of a better redemption arc than the one they gave to Felix.
Felix can take some solace in the fact that he’s not alone if having an ‘arc’ that isn’t an arc. The best Arc ML ever came up with(Chloe’s) and it was apparently an accident? Instead of arcs ML just flips switches then retroactively claims that’s how it always was. There are several characters who fall into this pit.
Maybe an unpopular opinion, but I wish Jellal was allowed to be angry.
Not just sorrowful.
Not just self-sacrificing.
Or self-punishing.
But furious at what was done to him. At the life he lost. At the way he’s expected to carry the weight of actions he wasn’t fully conscious of, with grace and silence.
He’s always shown as composed in his guilt, patient in his atonement—which is admirable. But sometimes it feels like it’s flattening him into a symbol of repentance, and erasing the complexity of what he endured.
He was a child. He was manipulated. He bled, he hurt, and he was twisted into something he didn’t choose.
He lost YEARS of his life in containment, upon containment, upon containment.
Years he’ll never get back.
Jellal is one of the characters who objectively suffered the most in Fairy Tail, but the narrative rarely lets the audience sit with that. His pain is shifted away, reframed through others, or skipped over entirely.
We never really get to see him process it on his own terms.
I guess what I’m trying to say is: I don’t want Jellal to be a parable.
I want him to be a person.
Let him feel what was done to him. Let him process that he was wronged, too—that he’s not just someone who caused pain, but someone who experienced it, deeply. It’s not about removing accountability—it’s about letting him grieve and exist outside of guilt.
He doesn’t need to be calm and noble all the time. That’s not healing. That’s just another kind of silence.
Let Jellal scream. Let him ask why. Let him mourn the life he never got to live—not as a villain, not as a saint, but as someone who deserves that emotional space.
I have a lot of thoughts on Jellal and how his character was handled, and I already have a breakdown/long post coming up which tackles another topic but I might make one for this sentiment too.
But as of now, I just needed to get this part off my chest.
Thank you for listening.
EDIT : Beneath is the breakdown I mentioned I would get around to doing for anyone interested:
Let Him Sin, Let Her Speak Meta Series
(+ another Jellal focused post that I made shortly after the analysis breakdown!)
