An Idiot's Thoughts on Necromancy

So yesterday I got my issue of GameInformer. For those of you who either live in another country or under a rock, GameInformer is a gaming magazine. It gives updates on the latest video games coming out, some awesome posters, and interviews with developers. Well this month they had a pretty cool spread on a Dungeons and Dragons RPG game. I guess with all the hype with high fantasy games they were bound to make one eventually. However I was kinda shocked, pleasantly so, when I read that the token necromancer would be a good guy with good intentions...

...

...

Yeah, either I don't read as much fantasy as I'd like to think I have, or they are doing something pretty unique. Nearly every fantasy book that's existed whether it's high fantasy, grim dark, or even urban, it's been written that necromancers are pure evil. Heck, even in my own book the necromancer is pretty corrupt. It's just strange to think that someone who does such dark and unholy magic, bringing up dead corpses is pretty dark no matter how you spin it, has good intentions. Unless of course he starts out with good intentions and it just slides down from there.

Anyway, this whole ordeal has had me thinking about necromancy and how its users are portrayed in fantasy. All of them have been evil, some more than others, and those who use it are normally outcasts of society. But does it really have to be that way? In plenty of Victorian era stories there's that one con-artist that claims to use necromancy to bring up the souls of the deceased so their loved ones can speak to them. Of course this guy is always evil and wants the money, but what if this was used by actual necromancers? Their sole purpose in  life is to give people closure if they weren't able to before or when that person died?

Also why does necromancy always revolve around corpses? Why can't it be broken down to different tiers of magic? You're able to summon souls, skeletons, or just point blank zombies? I think the default of having necromancers as just these evil people who summon zombies has been around so long that people have just accepted it as a rule, however with grim-dark fantasy being so popular I think it's about time to exploit it on a different level. If we can have a bunch of raping mercenaries as heroes, albeit they're mostly anti-heroes, why not a necromancer with kinda good intentions?

Anyway, I'm gonna go look over my necromancer now....