So, as I re-watch Big Hero 6 (SPOILER ALERT) the fact that Hiro just rebuilds Baymax at the end kinda makes the whole sacrifice scene pointless. I don’t know how I haven’t noticed it til now but that seems to be the norm in stories now-a-days. In Monsters Inc. Sully can never see Boo again to protect their world, but in the end…he CAN! In Sailor Moon the scouts die trying to defeat Queen Baryl only to come back through the power the silver crystal. In the Crudes the father tosses his family to safety knowing he won’t be able to cross the giant crater himself…but then he does! In fact in Final Fantasy, the spirit within (Not a good movie but it serves my point) when the hero dies and doesn’t come back to life the audience was kinda shocked. I mean what is the point of the heroic sacrifice if you just get a mulligan at the end?
Because it works as a temporary draw, when you believe somebody has died, but after the initial shock wears off, they bring them back to, once again, draw you in. Comic books are notorious for this. Bad or lazy writing is another set of culprits. There's also this romanticized idea that, any sacrifice, if done for another, should be honored and allowed to succeed. This can go as far as allowing the individual who died or gave up something, to return or have access anyway. It's so everybody can feel good. Also, many people behind these works, probably find the idea of killing off someone as a burden, since many of them don't want to come up with another character. They like having that comfort zone with their character creations, so to speak. It may be sad, but I'd like to see more of the harsh reality, that sometimes sacrifice, despite this comforting idea it will no go in vain, can have life say fuck you, you are a waste.
Plus this way, they can make umpteen mindless sequels without thinking too much, and rake in a lot of money, and sell cheap plastic toys at happy meals at McDonalds, while Americans stay fat, complacent and, in essence, sedated. So the main point is money, and making it in the easiest way possible, by catering to the least common denominator, as opposed to making films that cause people to think about and examine themselves and the world around them.
I'm honestly fine with the stock films on the market pulling the same crap over and over with fake sacrifices. It'll make my work better by comparison.
Sometimes it's lazy--like in comics--but sometimes a returning hero can be done to great effect with the prime example of this being Gandalf.
I'm honestly okay with that kind of trope, unless it's done really stupidly. Like if there was some way everyone could have survived and we didn't need all that drama in between, then I'll be annoyed. Baymax's scene annoyed me because he could have fired the fist the other way and it would have been enough to send them through the portal without him having to let go. Basically, if it makes sense and doesn't seem too stupid, it can work okay.
I think the biggest example of how to not do the heroic sacrifice where the hero lives is when Pain in Naruto basically retcons the entire battle of Konoha with powers that he basically pulled out of his ass. It was fucking cringeworthy.
I'll probably be alone in this example, but my mind went right to the Pokemon movies. A vast majority of them feature death followed by a resurrection two minutes later. There's only one or two exceptions that I can think of. It sort of kills the whole moment for me. Sometimes I just want to feel bad for these animated characters!
I think The Iron Giant did it best. We didn't exactly see the happy ending but it was implied that there would be one. I just find myself not being able to be sucked into that moment anymore KNOWING the hero will return in 15-20 minutes.
Honestly I am okay with Pain actually using Rinne rebirth to bring back the dead. Yeah it was a bring back to life car but in the end SOMEONE did die for it. Also there were other cases where the dead didn't come back to life like Jiraya and Asuma. I am fine with bringing someone back from the dead but if that happens SOMEONE has to pay the cost and not return from the dead or at least have some major consequence for that action like in Fairy Tail with Ultear. The perfect example of a sacrifice where they bring people back without someone else dying in return is DBZ. You can die as much as you want in that and still come back -_-
It's bad when it's done for shock value and nothing else. Sometimes you can have a resurrection or a character not really die and still have a large impact on the story though. It just depends on the writing and the execution.
As others have said, one, it's about money. Sequels, further seasons, and so on. Two, though, people like drama, but they don't *want* an unhappy ending. I hear people complain far more when things end unhappily than I do if a movie is just plain terrible. Personally I can enjoy a sad ending if the story is done well, but the majority of movie-goers consume media as an escape and want that last few uplifting moments where the hero triumphs unexpectedly. For me, Buffy is one of the worst perpetrators of this trope, though. (Major Buffy SPOILERS ahead). Buffy sacrifices herself, at the end of Season 5, to save her sister, and to save the world. It was supposed to be the end of the series, and in a show where everyday you are facing the Apocalypse it made the drama and the stakes real. It was a beautiful ending. But then, it got picked up for two more seasons through another network, and guess what, Buffy is brought back from the dead! And, the show's quality significantly tanked, as well :eusa_doh:.
I thought BH6 was really well done actually. Baymax did fully intend to sacrifice himself (despite that he could have let the air out of himself for a small thrust rofl) and somehow was holding the chip in his rocket-fist. It worked, because had Baymax died, Hiro would be right where he started out-- with technology eventually causing the death of somebody he loved. That would be one of the saddest downer endings in recent memory. Not every heroic sacrifice is a bad idea though. We need a few sprinkled in to keep the cases where they survive in the end suspenseful.
No, it was still terrible. Yeah, there was a sacrifice, but it was a villain nobody really cared about. Essentially a throwaway character so nobody important had to take the fall. Not to mention how the whole thing was presented. "Ah, you have a point and now I kind of regret destroying your village and killing a bunch of your friends. Ah well, ho harm done. I just so happens to have this technique here that can fix everything. We cool?" That's called a Deus Ex Machina. At least Ultear had an excuse to why she had her technique and she was a character that actually mattered to both main and recurring cast. I'm also a fan of how she attempted to sacrifice herself to undo the whole thing, but only managed to turn back time one minute in the end. She didn't even know if it would work and technically it didn't, she just got lucky.