unheroic

adjective

un·​he·​ro·​ic ˌən-hi-ˈrō-ik How to pronounce unheroic (audio)
 also  -her-ˈō-,
 or  -hē-ˈrō-
: not heroic
unheroic policy changes
the book's timid, unheroic protagonist
We should treat old people better, if only for the unheroic prudential reason that we may one day grow old ourselves.Philip Howard

Examples of unheroic in a Sentence

the new biography casts the romanticized outlaw in a much more vicious and unheroic light
Recent Examples on the Web
Examples are automatically compiled from online sources to show current usage. Read More Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.
That larger significance is remarkably unheroic and fatalistic. Gabriel Winslow-Yost, Harper's Magazine, 23 Sep. 2024 In the world of The Boys, based on the gleefully scabrous 2000s indie comic-book series of the same name by writer Garth Ennis and artist Darick Robertson, superheroes are real, pop-culture-dominating, and with rare exceptions, entirely unheroic. Brian Hiatt, Rolling Stone, 13 June 2024 And if the moderate theory appears cautious and unheroic, well, it's got nothing on the unheroic inactivity of most Republicans hoping to defang Trumpism, who have convinced themselves that the way to avoid a worse replay of the 2020 endgame is not to fight him openly at all. Ross Douthat New York Times, Star Tribune, 7 June 2021 But rational reasoning is no way to reach Josephine, as the adults around her discover one by one — beginning with Spencer, played with commendably unheroic tetchiness by Harington, as his sensitive support gradually sours into parental oneupmanship. Guy Lodge, Variety, 2 Feb. 2023 From the costumes to the makeup, from visual effects to sound design, the goal was to be as realistic as possible and underscore the movie’s anti-war and deliberately unheroic depiction of an ordinary soldier in battle. Scott Roxborough, The Hollywood Reporter, 10 Mar. 2023 John’s figures are wood stained in unheroic reality. Bob Guccione Jr, SPIN, 17 Feb. 2023 Capturing that horror, and giving a very unheroic cinematic vision of war, was one of the main goals for director Edward Berger in his new, German-language adaption of All Quiet on the Western Front. Scott Roxborough, The Hollywood Reporter, 10 Sep. 2022 Its stars still burn brightly—perhaps especially so in our own gruesomely unheroic times—with Ernest Shackleton considered by many to be the brightest star of them all. Sara Wheeler, WSJ, 11 Jan. 2022

Word History

First Known Use

1732, in the meaning defined above

Time Traveler
The first known use of unheroic was in 1732

Dictionary Entries Near unheroic

Cite this Entry

“Unheroic.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/unheroic. Accessed 10 Dec. 2024.

Last Updated: - Updated example sentences
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