The Problem with Paladin Villains (spoilers for SoD/GDGU)

[Dion]

Lots of characters get called unpleasant things by other characters in Watchmen. It doesn't mean they're accurate.

At any rate, no matter what Rorschach was, the author appears to personally despise his values, and decided to write about a society with values that put him in prison and then ultimately vaporized him.

And yet to many readers, his values are their values, regardless of the label you choose to put on him.

So, yeah... at least three views of social values, as we were discussing.

But ultimately neither Huck Finn nor Rorschach are paladins in their societies, so they’re probably not the best examples for this thread.

Judge Dredd and The Punisher may be paladins in their societies, and yet the values of those societies, and the values of the characters, are abhorrent to the authors and the majority of readers.