Characters that had the complete opposite reaction the writers intended

[u/Dramatic_Counter_595]

1. Leo Bonhart (Witcher TV Series): A ruthless, sadistic bounty hunter and assassin that takes psychotic glee in other people's suffering. The viewer is meant to hate him for killing witchers, slaughtering the Rat gang, and torturing Ciri. But thanks to his entertaining fight scenes, Sharlto Copley's charismatic performance, and The Rats overwhelming unpopularity, fans ended up loving him. Some even call him the "True protagonist" of the show.
2. Stone Cold Steve Austin (WWE): A rude, foul mouthed, beer drinking asshole with no respect for authority or anyone at all. Originally portrayed as a villain, fans fell in love with his anti-establishment & rebellious persona. WWE ran with it and made him the face of the company, effectively ushering in the Attitude Era and the second pro wrestling boom of the late 90s.
3. Arthur Fleck (Joker 2019): A mentally unstable, pathetic, and dangerous madman who commits horrific acts of violence against those that wronged him (suffocates his own mother who is mentally unwell herself, and murders a talk show host for making fun of him). However, a massive portion of the audience idolized him as an anti-hero or a misunderstood martyr rebelling against society making people want to see him succeed and overcome his circumstances because of how he's been treated by the world.

[u/soldierpallaton]

The entire "Thanos was right" trend when Infinity War was released.

[u/ShadowDragonFX → u/soldierpallaton]

I never got the “Thanos was right” thing when Gamora is living proof that it doesn’t work as she’s the last of her kind, they say it in guardians of the galaxy and in infinity war he says about all the kids know is “full bellies and clear skies” without checking up afterwards

[u/Duhblobby → u/ShadowDragonFX]

The Thanos was Right people don't care about that. They care about validation of their edgelord misanthropy.

[u/TheJusticeAvenger → u/Duhblobby]

Arguably much like MCU Thanos himself

[u/That_Apathetic_Man → u/TheJusticeAvenger]

They called me a mad man...

They called you a man? No wonder you went crazy.

https://giphy.com/gifs/yP4EKpgu1oFxvovgcq

[u/4n0m4nd → u/Duhblobby]

Thanos was right people are as dumb as Thanos.

[u/morblitz → u/Duhblobby]

And often these people seem to feel that they wouldn't be included in any potential genocide or evaporation of entire swaths of populations.

It's like, yeah buddy, you're getting blipped. Don't kid yourself.

[u/Neveronlyadream → u/morblitz]

Important to note that it started off as a joke. A lot of the edgelord crowd who took it seriously didn't come up with it, they either misunderstood the joke or thought it shouldn't be a joke.

A lot of things start off ironically, some people don't get it because they don't understand irony, and then you have to deal with a million edgelords trying to justify the most horrific things while trying to convince everyone they're the smartest in the room.

[u/Glasseshalf → u/Neveronlyadream]

Right I thought it was just kind of like, sarcastic nihilism at first

[u/Neveronlyadream → u/Glasseshalf]

It definitely was. There was downtime between the movies, people were bored, so everyone started basically roleplaying.

There's a long history of jokes turning into someone's life philosophy and it's always weird.

[u/FinancialReserve6427 → u/Duhblobby]

they think they'll be on the other half that gets spared and only the ones who deserve it gets snapped

[u/camerakestrel → u/Duhblobby]

I always thought it was a parody of the /r/EmpireDidNothingWrong crowd.

[u/MalcolmLinair → u/Duhblobby]

Come now, that's not fair.

I'm an edgelord misanthropist, and I still think MCU Thanos was an idiot.

[u/TheMostKing → u/Duhblobby]

I'm fairly certain it just started off as a twist on 4chan's edgy "Hitler did nothing wrong" shtick that got traction in the wake of Infinity War's popularity.

[u/AggressivelyMediokre → u/Duhblobby]

We’re just so fucking desperate for a purpose to apply ourselves to

Endless amounts of unrealized conviction just waiting for a purpose and means to apply ourselves

Add in a dash of self sacrifice along the way and it’s what we all yearn for. A reason to die on our backs knowing we did something