Actually surprised at all the "Akuma is evil" talk pages ago. He's definitely not evil, hell Capcom's just had to alter his story a bit in order for people to get that. For one that submarine ending was misunderstood by a lot of people. Rewatch it. Akuma destroys a shipwreck as a sub crew looks on. The one Akuma destroys is rusty and broken down, the one the crew watches from is completely fine. For years people have been saying Akuma destroyed the other sub when really he didn't, it's wild.
Secondly, those Hitler comparisons are silly considering Hitler was a real person and Akuma's a created character. You can't compare the two especially when the text that came with the Akuma baby pic actually said his V-Trigger would be "rocking the baby to sleep and then he could use his power", also said the baby never leaves his back regardless of what he does. Akuma was holding back to protect the kid and still protects the kid no matter what he does. A juxtaposition to this is how Shadaloo (the bad guys) treat kids which is kidnapping and making them work with zero pay. In Akuma's case, he was actually protecting a baby and raising them. Completely different. This is a common trope that they do with badasses to show they're really "not evil" on the inside. Happened with Piccolo/Gohan, happens all the time and the sole reason they even thought of that design for Akuma is to show a different side to Akuma's character people haven't seen, to flesh him out a bit for them and let them know he's not evil because there's still confusion. Hell, that pic with Akuma cross-legged with the kid didn't convince people, that story about Akuma and that kid didn't convince people, that pic of Elena and Akuma didn't convince people, I don't get it. Hell, there was even a translation issue in Akuma's SFV story where he said he followed down the path of the demon when really he meant Oni, how it's read however is people thinking he went "further evil" when really he was saying "nah bruh, I didn't go further to heaven, I didn't go further to hell, I just went further with Oni." If he truly meant he was going "evil with demons" then he wouldn't have cut hell out like that.
Even more so, someone mentioned a comment about Ryu being the protagonist and since Akuma's his most direct antagonist he's a bad guy against the hero. That's silly. They even threw in Akuma's Story Mode for SFV where he kills the guy after the protagonist (Necalli), listens to Ryu's lecture, smiles and jumps away as Ryu's got his hand out wanting a fist bump. That's not some villain shit lmao. That's actually something that would happen if it were in Sagat in Akuma's place.
Akuma just lives by his own morality which revolves around fighting, nature and "being true to yourself" rather than being evil. I mean even one of dude's Alpha endings should have stopped this.
Last comment is this; imagine if that was Bison who beat down Ryu instead of Akuma in SFV. Guaranteed, Ryu wouldn't be smiling on the ground looking like he just had an orgasm wanting a fist bump as he gave a lecture like he did when it was Akuma. He'd be pissed and Bison would have then had his way with him.
