'Tis a classic case of what TV Tropes calls "Designated Evil."
Designated to hell and back actually as while I certainly do agree that Terra is a flawed character, he does not really have
anything he needs to truly redeem himself for.
You do not need to redeem yourself for bad things that happened outside of your own control and intention.
People like to pick on Terra because of his apparent "stupidity". Personally, I don't get the excessive hate either. He's just like Sora in the sense that he trusts people too much for his own good. All the Disney villains that Terra interacts with, he doesn't judge them because he's an outsider to their world.
It's really somewhat weird as for example Axel/Lea seems to get a free pass for everything he did not only by the fandom at large, but also by the narrative itself as his "killing" Zexion and Vexen (okay, they were villains, but that still doesn't make his actions okay and Terra never did something comparable), manipulating/using the Riku Replica and kidnapping of Kairi gets pretty much swept under the rug.
Yea, but unlike Sora, he doesn't have plot armor and main protagonist bonus and the narrative needs to get him screwed over.
Agreed, Terra is a outsider just like Sora, the only thing he should redeemed is what happened to his master and his friends and the ten plus years his body has caused.
The ten years+ his
body caused havoc are exactly what Terra
doesn't need to redeem himself for because that wasn't him doing those things. He never at any point had full control during those times as far as we know.
What happened to his friends is certainly to 100% Xehanort's fault as well and the issue with Eraqus is more complex than that:
1. Terra didn't kill him, they fought each other to exhaustion, Xehanort delivered the Death blow.
2. Eraqus was trying to kill a minor who happened to be Terra's best friend. Thus on Terra's side this can be interpreted as an act in self-defense.
If one wants to be really nitpicky, the beginning of this is not so different from Goofy jumping in the way protecting Sora from Riku's Dark Firaga in KH 1 as Terra does literally the same.
Unlike Riku though, Eraqus does not only not cease his attacking and aggressiveness, he doesn't explain one damn thing and has actually the impudence to
command Terra to step aside and just watch him killing his friend and
that's what sends Terra over the edge in rage.
In Terra's defence, he was trying to defend Ventus. And it was technically Master Xehanort who delivered the death blow, not Terra.
Exactly, Eraqus was the dumbass provoking a violent response with his insistence on killing Ven.
Scratch the "technically", Master Xehanort
did deliver the death blow by himself. Eraqus and Terra fought each other to a point of exhaustion and then both realized what they were doing was foolish.
Granted, what one
could "blame" Terra for is that he acted so rashly and overly aggressive instead of picking the most sensible solution, as in i.e. taking Ven and
leaving the world completely without engaging Eraqus at all, but I think it should be obvious that Terra was not really in an emotional state calm enough to act rationally after witnessing his master trying to kill the kid he considers to be his baby brother
and him also having the audacity to demand him standing aside and just let it happen.
Makes one wonder how
Aqua would have handled the whole thing if she was there at that moment instead of Terra.
Would she just have deflected Eraqus' attacks again and again with her barrier while shielding Ventus, trying to reason with him and not rushing into actual battle? Or what?
Her reaction at the Keyblade Graveyard to Terra telling her that Eraqus tried to harm Ven is just a sigh if I recall correctly, so it is rather ambigious how she thinks about the whole issue.
TRUTH. It seems like everyone sees the situation through Aqua's eyes, but people are quick to forget that Aqua's pretty clearly framed to be in the wrong for being so accusatory here, as well as for not understanding the situation as it actually happened. Terra was gullible for listening to any of those shady people, sure, but Aqua should then be held accountable for believing what they said about Terra as well. Aqua might have said "you're lying!" or something along the lines of that in the heat of debate, but Radiant Garden makes it pretty clear that she took their words to heart.
Granted, the wonky and clearly mismatched story-writing of BBS itself doesn't help things there as while Aqua switching between trusting and distrusting is shown throughout her scenario, she doesn't actually get to see anything substantial about Terra's exploits, it's all hearsay and she gets arguably an equal amount of positive and negative things to hear.
Ventus is the same, and he actually gets to hear
more of the supposed negative things Terra apparently has done.
On one hand, one could say that Ventus apparently trusts Terra so much that he simply doesn't let his faith waver by what some third party says yet on the other it could also be his childish naivety in that he doesn't
want to admit that there might be something wrong with Terra.
I also don't think that Aqua actually totally believed everything said by Maleficent and co., but unlike Ven she
did have doubts and during the Radiant Garden "fiasco" lack of proper communication and jumping to conclusions was done by
all three of them, yet Aqua sort of started it by being needlessly confrontational after Terra mentions the "dangerous task" they have ahead of them and why he wants Ven to go back home.
