My Understanding Of Dante Is That He Has A Lot Of Noble Ideals, But He Doesn't Always Live Up To Them.

My understanding of Dante is that he has a lot of noble ideals, but he doesn't always live up to them. He's a hypocrite. And I think that's very human of him.

Dante thinks the love between his mother and father was a beautiful thing that's worth celebrating, even if it was probably doomed from the very start, and it ended in tragedy not only for her, but for himself and his brother. And yet, even though Nero can protect himself and wants some kind of relationship with Dante, he hid the truth of their relationship for years in a misguided effort to protect Nero.

Dante has shown compassion to demons who live peacefully in the human world, including Trish, Lucia, Brad from the 2007 series, and there are probably more that I don't know about. Trish is a particularly noteworthy case, since she acted maliciously against him, but after she proved her capacity for good she became perhaps his most trusted ally. And yet, he won't give himself the same chance, he lives a solitary life with very few friends, and keeps the friends he does have at arm's length.

I don't think it's as simple as Dante hating his demonic side, the way Vergil hates his human side in DMC5. But in the same way that Vergil felt like an "incomplete being" in Arkham's words during DMC3, I think Dante himself feels... "Subhuman", you could say. Like he doesn't truly belong anywhere, like it's not his destiny to be happy.

It's because of his demonic nature that he inherited his father's enemies, and so many who got close to him had their lives ruined or were even killed, and it's because of his human nature that knowing that hurts so much.

He's good at heart, but also has so much trauma and a really bad case of survivor's guilt. And because of that he acts like an asshole to the people he loves sometimes.