Hidan Morality Meta

[tozette]

When I write Hidan I like to give him strong moral characteristics. For example, he's committed and he would never make someone do something he wouldn't submit himself to.

Part of this characterisation is drawn from canon: we never really see him do anything even slightly sneaky, and his ritual/technique requires him to suffer exactly as his enemies do. We also see that he has an awareness of morality when he chastises Kakuzu for greediness outside the fire temple.

Part of this characterisation is because of the conventions for "bad" religious characters in media. There are a couple of different conventions, but the one I'm interested in is characters shown as hypocritical betrayers of the otherwise good principles of religion. It's fun to subvert it. Uno reverse: Hidan is a character with strong moral qualities who is completely committed to an evil religion.

For example, he's honest (good), so he's honestly telling you he doesn't believe in nonviolence and he's going to kill you to appease the god of suffering (bad).