In the current Walking Dead thread, Human Action writes:
This thread is not about The Walking Dead in general, or Michonne’s mute psychopathy, or how hot Laurie Holden is. Those are all worthy topics, particularly, the last, but if you want to talk about them you should go to the linked thread, unless you’re posting cheesecake of Laurie Holden of course, because, damn, that girl has some nice wheels. No, this thread is about the trustworthiness of fictional characters. The question is this:
You’re in a given fictional universe of the action/adventure type, and you come across Heroic Character X apparently about to assault or murder someone you had heretofore trusted. Absent evidence, what characters are you going to trust on principle and immediately, and thus be willing to await an explanation given at that character’s convenience? Contrariwise, who are you most likely to be suspicious of and want an immediate explanation from?
In the Immediately Trust category, I’m going to nominate Jethro Gibbs, from NCIS. If, while in the NCISverse, I turn a corner and see Gibbs holding a gun on Barack Obama, I’m going to think, “Holy crap, Barry really was the Manchurian candidate!”
In the Probably Suspicious, I’ll nominate Xena. If I turn a corner and see Xena’s latest reincarnation about to disembowel the president, I’m likely to think, "Damn it, woman, you backslid again? (I’m not going to try to stop her, though, as I want to live.)
But that’s just me. Anybody else
Incidentally, the spirit of the thread calls for us to restrict ourselves to heroic characters. If you turn a corner and see the Joker about to shoot someone you’ll surely assume it’s an unjustified murder unless the victim is, I dunno, the Joker or somebody. That said, I expect this caveat to be ignored by post 10, so I’m only including it so I don’t have to rant later.