Kirito And What Makes A Hero Interesting

A few weeks ago, I talked about damsel's in distress and when they are particularly insulting. During that time I mentioned that the main hero of Sword Art Online, Kirito, was, and I quote myself, "the most boring character devised in anime." I still hold that opinion because he is, but the more I thought about it I asked what made him boring? Why did I hate this kid so much? Well the more I thought about it, the more I realized that he problem I have with Kirito can be applied to why a lot of old classic characters can be perceived as "boring." Simply put Kirito is flawless, he shows up, kills all of the bad guys, and gets all of the ladies without applying any charisma or effort into it.

As far as I'm concerned you should have one of three essentials to make a good character:
underdog, where we see the character rise from adversity;
flawed, where a character is competent but struggles with a flaw that either affects their actions, destroys them, or challenges them to be better people;
inflexible, where a character has a set of morals that they struggle with but ultimately steel themselves and change the world around them as a result.

I wanna look at characters that have one or more of these components and how it works within their stories and why Kirito's lack of such things makes him so bland it becomes interesing just how bland he is (oxymoron sure but point holds).


First we have the underdog and this pulls me to a movie I watched a few weekends ago, Captain America: The First Avenger. The best parts of that film are when we see our hero, Steve Rogers, as an underdog in the first half. We learn that it's World War II, and that Steve wants to enlist in the army and defend the innocent against tyrants and bullies but has no power to do so. The viewer is meant to be pulled in by his scrappy attitude, ingenuity, and selflessness so when he finally becomes an ultra jacked Nazi puncher it's satisfying for the viewer (at least for me). The filmmakers even add another twist by making Steve a USO rodeo clown at first (which perfectly justifies his goofy 40's comic costume), it's not till he learns people he loves are on the line that he truly becomes Captain America, showing that it wasn't just a physical challenge but a matter of not believing in himself until thrown in the fray.

In contrast we have Kirito, at the start it's established that he was a beta tester for the game he winds up trapped in so he already is more skilled than most others. But he's still level one so maybe higher level players could be a threat or even high tier monsters. But nope, in Episode 5 a murderous group of gamers attack Kirito and do nothing to him. Oh, and in Episode 14 the villain kills him but he manages to overcome the game and live at the very end. So it's quite clear that nothing is any real threat to him, Kirito can bend the game so there's no reason to bother rooting for him to be better, he already wins by default according to the author. Kirito has nothing to prove and seemingly no way to lose and that makes his story boring.

In terms of flawed characters I thought hard but I came to two conclusions, Finding Nemo and Fullmetal Alchemist. The entire story of Finding Nemo is that the main character, Marlin, is a well meaning but overprotective father who accidentally pushes his son Nemo into the trap of humans who take him to an inhospitable hell hole where only the toughest survive, or as it's known to us, Australia. So the whole story is not only about Marlin finding his son but also overcoming his over protective tendencies. Meanwhile in Fullmetal Alchemist, the main character, Ed, is well meaning but can be mean, harsh and even cocky at times. Hell, the entire show is started because Ed was cocky enough to believe that he could defy centuries old lessons of not messing with death. Ed's emotional journey, at least as I see it, is learning that he isn't all powerful and he can't defy the rules of nature. While Ed is a good person, at the end he's still a temperamental and cocky idiot, look at the train hijacking scene in the 4th manga chapter for proof on that.

On contrast we have Kirito, at the start of the show we learn he isn't very social and is very sheltered, the result of a flawed upbringing, even keeping things quiet that he should have spoken up about. It seemed like he would go through an emotional journey where he learned to open up more to people and become more comfortable with socializing, right? Nope, literally a few episodes later we see Kirito as charming, witty, and basically every woman in a 20 mile radius gets wet at the sheer sight of him. No explanation as to how he became that way, no journey, no lessons learned, he just is good with people with no real flaws. It's wish fulfillment for every loser who doesn't want to look into themselves and go, "oh, I'm the problem" when they wonder why they can't make friends or get laid. Which is just lame and pathetic frankly, and it reminds me of a younger me so I'm a but ashamed of it.

Finally we have the immovable, the moralist who, while their morality is challenged by the world, ultimately locks themselves down and changes the world around them. Two examples here, Captain America: The Winter Soldier and Fullmetal Alchemist (I will talk about this show when I can damn it). In Winter Soldier we see that Steve Rogers is in the modern world where his older beliefs are challenged and he's struggling to adjust and understand right from wrong in a Brave New World. It's Steve's emotional conflict that's part of the films heart and takes Winter Soldier above being a good political thriller. Meanwhile in Fullmetal Alchemist we have the show's deuteragonist, Roy Mustang who, in spite of his callous attitude and playfulness is haunted by the deeds he committed in a war of genocide, his morals shaken but not destroyed. In the end it's Mustang's ability to steel himself and resolve to take his fascist government down for what it did, even if he burns along with it, that allows the heroes to win the day in the finale of the series.

On this front there's not much to say about Kirito... he thinks killing is wrong, loves his girlfriend and.... that's it. Kirito has no real stand on anything moral wise, he doesn't have anything complicated to deal with. Kirito just does the most base "good guy" things and has every chick in a 20 mile radius get wet at the sheer sight of him.Yeah this is a bit of a disappointing paragraph, deal with it.

Though disappointing is basically a summary of Krito now that I think about it. But Sword Art Online got a lot of attention, especially between 2012 and 2013 until Attack on Titan overshadowed it. But I still see a lot of Kirito, especially at anime cons and I don't want disparage people wqho love him but... why? I literally just finished this blog because I dislike him. Can someone explain what I'm missing or do I need to watch more than Season 1? Because Episode 24 ensured that will never happen.