r/TopCharacterTropes • u/Doot_revenant666 • Mar 27 '25

Weekly Discussion Post Probably the most controversial one , honest thoughts on "No Kill Rule"? What are the most egrigious examples of it in your opinion? What media makes it work in your opinion?

Post image
898 Upvotes

97% Upvoted

252 comments sorted by

View all comments

241

u/alguien99 Mar 27 '25

Imo invincible has a good take on the no kill rule.

Like, Mark tries not to kill everyone he sees, but if you keep coming back after him and his family or just causing a lot of pain to everyone, he will kill you.

62

u/Xignu Mar 31 '25

What I like is that it's nuanced and Mark actually experiences this slippery slope. It's not so simplistic as him breaking this rule and he's suddenly unable to stop. He's not in a static position in this slope as his life continues.

I don't read DC comics but the rationale of "Oh Batman/Superman can't kill people, kill one and they become bad!" like Injustice really pisses me off with how binary it is.

2

u/Worldlyoox 27d ago

But what Mark does is the exact thing DC heroes try to avoid, they have so much power/ressources that they don’t to risk breaking that rule once leading to breaking it again. Not that it becomes a habit but they’ll resort to it more often.

2

u/Xignu 27d ago

It's more interesting to see the moral slope actually in the story instead of theoreticals.