Board 8 > Best of the Trope Season 2: Day 204 - Mentor Occupational Hazard

(+) Yeah! (+)

Hello everyone, and welcome back to Best of the Trope!

Here are the rules. Each day, I will post a trope from TV Tropes, and each poster can name up to three examples of that trope. Whichever nomination gets the most mentions wins! Posters may also name as many Honourable Mentions as they like, but they are purely optional and will not count towards the running score. You may look at the TV Tropes page for that day's trope for examples, but you do not have to pick all your examples from the page. You can nominate whatever examples you like, as long as they qualify for the trope. Each trope will last around 24 hours before the next one goes up.

In the event of a tie between 4 or more nominations, a tiebreaker poll will be run at a later date to determine a winner.

Posters may also nominate any tropes they wish to see come up during the series. This is optional, and you don't have to do it every day, or at all. Tropes will be randomly selected from the list each day, except for some occasions where I will pick a thematically appropriate trope that may or may not be on the list.

Here's the list of previous tropes, so if you wish to nominate some tropes, check on here that it wasn't previously done. http://board8.wikia.com/wiki/Best_of_the_Trope

Trope list:
Lean and Mean
Fat and Skinny
Names to Run Away From Really Fast
Oddball Doppelganger
Identical Stranger
Mood Whiplash
Hostile Show Takeover
The Only One Allowed to Defeat You
Torch the Franchise and Run
Trash the Set
Grand Finale

The winner of yesterday's trope, Fat Bastard, was Eric Cartman (South Park), who got 6 votes. The winner of the tiebreaker poll, Slippy Slidey Ice World, was Cool, Cool Mountain (Super Mario 64), which got 9 votes.

Previous winners: Day 176 onwards
Launcher of a Thousand Ships - Nightwing (DC Comics)
Evil Cripple - Mr. Glass (Unbreakable)
Breather Level - 100 Acre Wood (Kingdom Hearts)
Beef Gate - Automatic 4-Star Wanted Level (Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas)
One True Love - Buttercup and Westley (The Princess Bride) / Shrek and Fiona (Shrek)
Cliffhanger - The Snap (Avengers: Infinity War)
Anti-Climax Boss - Yu Yevon (Final Fantasy X)
Lights Off, Somebody Dies - Devil / Anthology of Interest (Futurama) / And Then There Was Shawn (Boy Meets World)
Broken Base - Sub VS Dub (Anime) / Original VS Reboot (Devil May Cry) / Country VS Pop (Taylor Swift) / Casual VS Competitive (Super Smash Bros) / Genwunners (Pokemon)
Difficult But Awesome - Ana (Overwatch)
Disc One Nuke - Hawlucha (Pokemon Ultra Sun and Ultra Moon)
Lampshade Hanging - How did Yzma and Kronk get there first? (The Emperor's New Groove)
Tier Induced Scrappy - Meta Knight (Super Smash Bros Brawl)
Squishy Wizard - Alakazam (Pokemon)
Clipped Wing Angel - Genie Jafar (Aladdin)
Cruel and Unusual Death - Executions (Danganronpa)
That One Level - Escape from the Water Slums (Jak II) / Water Temple (Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time)
Ascend to a Higher Plane of Existence - Obi Wan Kenobi (Star Wars)
The Reason You Suck Speech - Quagmire to Brian (Family Guy)
Magic Knight - Geralt (The Witcher) / Bayonetta / Booker Dewitt (Bioshock Infinite) / Jedi in general (Star Wars)
Dem Bones - Jack Skellington (The Nightmare Before Christmas)
Acrofatic - Kingpin (Marvel Comics) / Obelix (Asterix) / Bob (Tekken) / Po (Kung Fu Panda) / Dr Robotnik (Sonic the Hedgehog)
Game Breaker - Detective Mode (Batman Arkham Series)
Fluffy the Terrible - Fluffy (Harry Potter)
Deathbringer the Adorable - The Grand Master of All Things Bad (Pokemon Mystery Dungeon)
Storming the Castle - Leeroy Jenkins
BFS - Buster Sword (Final Fantasy VII)

Today's trope is Mentor Occupational Hazard. Here is the link: https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MentorOccupationalHazard

Being the Mentor is never an easy job. Fighting the Big Bad yourself and stopping The End of the World as We Know It is tough enough as it is, and you would know. Now you have to do that and take this Nave Newcomer under your wing and teach them the ropes of herodom.

If you don't have to convince The Chosen One who just wants to be normal to grow a spine and accept the Call to Adventure, you have to convince your blindly excited and dangerously eager young pupil that You Are Not Ready to learn the Dangerous Forbidden Technique. When you try to protect The Hero from the Awful Truth, you end up facing their Rage Against the Mentor. If they're an orphan, you have to find them a set of Muggle Foster Parents while keeping social services in the dark. You have to endure accusations of insanity when you're trying to teach your charge that Your Eyes Can Deceive You, give them advice on how to tell a love interest "It's Not You, It's My Enemies," and keep a close eye on them 24/7.

And what is your reward for all this patience and effort?

You die.

Yes, there is a 90-100% chance that the Cool Old Guy who has stood by The Hero's side through thick and thin since the first episode/chapter/installment gets offed before the climax of the story. He might get an Obi-Wan Moment if he's lucky. He's just that cool: Too Cool to Live. It's necessary for The Hero's development can they rise to the occasion and save the day without their teacher holding their hand? Are they ready to accept the torch?

TL,DR: A hero's mentor dies, often to further the development of the hero or make the villain appear more despicable and imposing.

Nominations:
Mia Fey (Ace Attorney)
The Boss (Metal Gear Solid 3)
Dr. King Schultz (Django Unchained)

The Boss (Metal Gear Solid 3)
Tony Stark (MCU)
Chef (South Park)
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Syrio Forel (Game of Thrones)
Dr. King Schultz (Django Unchained)
Master Oogway (Kung Fu Panda)

HM:
Mufasa (The Lion King)
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Obi-Wan Kenobi (Star Wars)
Albus Dumbeldore (Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince)
All Might (My Hero Academia)
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Mia Fey
Obi Wan
Dumbledore
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Obi-Wan Kenobi (Star Wars)
Kamina (Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann)

Should be obvious by the topic title, but spoiler marking in case
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Mgs3, star wars and potter spoilers respectively

The Boss
Obi Wan
Dumbledore
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Kenobi
---

Obi Wan Kenobi
Mia Fey
Dumbledore
---

The Boss
Master Oogway
Dumbledore
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Obiwan
Oogway

Rankings so far:
Obi-Wan Kenobi (Star Wars) - 7 votes
Albus Dumbeldore (Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince) - 5 votes
The Boss (Metal Gear Solid 3) - 4 votes
Mia Fey (Ace Attorney) - 3 votes
Master Oogway (Kung Fu Panda) - 3 votes
Dr. King Schultz (Django Unchained) - 2 votes
Tony Stark (MCU)
Chef (South Park)
Syrio Forel (Game of Thrones)
All Might (My Hero Academia)
Kamina (Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann)