| abstract | - Most women do not look pretty when they cry. Their eyes puff up and turn red. Their face becomes all splotchy. So fits of tears are rarely attractive. More often they are used with a character the audience already finds sympathetic to generate an emotional response. There is a major exception to this rule. Perhaps she has been emotionally cold one times too many to the hero's affections, too damn cruel over the smallest of mistakes, or simply revealed her vulnerable side too damned late for the audience to care any more. Either way, no amount of garden-variety dere-dere moments is going to earn any tangible amount of audience sympathy. Time to go for the big guns. Show that the Tsundere is a girl after all by having her cry. There is an inexplicable phenomenon that the tougher a character is, the more adorable they will be when Sparkling Stream of Tears pour out of their eyes, windows that prove they have souls. The tyrant instantaneously becomes The Woobie, whose endearingly vulnerable sobs and pleas for sympathy makes the coldest of hearts want to hug her till she feels better. This is considered Moe beyond belief by fandom in general, even those who are not fans of the Moe sub-genre. This is an increasingly common tactic used by Manga and Anime authors who have created thoroughly unsympathetic Tsundere characters yet still wish the audience to sympathize with them, or merely wishing to convincingly give a feminine side to an otherwise overly-masculine or unemotional girl. Occasionally this moment acts as a roadstop, a turning point in which the character starts to slowly become a better person. Nine times out of 10, unfortunately, having felt embarrassed for daring to be vulnerable, the once adorable woobie will immediately thereafter turn into a tyrant of epic magnitude worse than the mere Tsundere she was to compensate for her brief moment of weakness. Note that this can also occasionally apply to a male character. What differentiates this from Manly Tears is that whereas Manly Tears shows the sensitive attributes of an already decent male, Cry Cute used on a man character is as a rule in the Alas, Poor Villain context that humanizes an unforgivably evil male. See also Tender Tears, where tears are part of a consistent sensitive depiction. Sometimes includes Biting the Handkerchief. A Super-Trope to Cry Into Chest. Contrast Inelegant Blubbering. Examples of Cry Cute include:
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