History Main / IControlMyMinionsThrough

** [[HumanoidAbomination Salem]], the BigBad, proves herself to be a flexible leader and uses different methods to coerce or guide those who follow her.

** Cinder herself uses Authority; she is very authoritarian and direct when interacting with her subordinates Emerald and Mercury. She expects her instructions to be followed to the letter and does not tolerate any disobedience, telling them to "don't think, obey". She is also secretive, keeping Roman on a strict need-to-know basis. When Emerald disagrees with Cinder recruiting Mercury to the team, Cinder slaps her in response, telling her to know her place. Later, when ambushing Amber, Cinder tells them to execute the attack exactly as planned. Cinder later reprimands both Emerald and Mercury for murdering Tukson [[PragmaticVillainy as it could've blown their cover]].

** Lex Luthor leads mostly through the power of Money, though he does use Kindness to get Mercy to be his assistant and {{bodyguard|Babes}}. Of course, Lex being Lex, he leaves her to die one episode when Brainiac attacks.[[note]](Superman saves her, of course.)[[/note]] [[MistreatmentInducedBetrayal She does not take it well.]]

** Princess Azula of ''WesternAnimation/AvatarTheLastAirbender'' has several:

** [[DarkMessiah Amon's]] control of the [[AntiMagicalFaction Equalists]] in ''WesternAnimation/TheLegendOfKorra'' is fundamentally from Prejudice and Agenda against benders. He also builds up quite a bit of loyalty to himself personally through Respect and his claim that his [[BroughtDownToNormal bending removal]] came from Divine Right, and as the Equalists become more popular, he starts leaning for Popular Sovereignty. Of course, all this comes crashing down in an instant after his very public outing as [[YouAreWhatYouHate a waterbender]] who removes bending from others via [[BadPowersBadPeople bloodbending]].
** [[LadyOfWar Kuvira]] in the fourth season also relies on Agenda, with most of her followers genuinely believing in her hardcore Earth Kingdom (renamed Earth Empire) nationalism. Some shades of Fear as well, with the threat of internment in a prison camp should they betray her, but most of her army never even seem to consider that.

* ''WesternAnimation/MiraculousLadybug'': Hawkmoth uses Corruption, followed up by Power, Material Benefits, and if necessary Fear to create his Akumas. He reaches out to those who are angry, who want to right an injustice (whether genuine or not), disables all the inhibitions against DisproportionateRetribution, and then offers to give them the power they'll need to right whatever wrong they've focused on...for a small price, of course. If they get distracted later on, he keeps them in line with pain and the threat of revoking their powers.

* In ''WesternAnimation/SamuraiJack'', Aku mostly has robotic drones in his armies, but he keeps his sapient minions in line through absurdly large payouts, indulging their most depraved behaviors, and in some cases, literal worship.
* ''WesternAnimation/TeenageMutantNinjaTurtles2012'': Shredder's minions are continually threaten if they fail at whatever mission he gives them, Stockman eventually developing genuine loyalty toward Shredder when his skills prove useful to the Foot. Shredder has Baxter Stockman create mutant worms that make anyone under their influence loyal to Shredder, testing them on the Mighty Mutanimals before using them on Karai after she rebels against him.

* Swackhammer, the BigBad of ''Film/SpaceJam'', used Fear to back up Authority. Once Fear went away...

** ''WesternAnimation/StarWarsTheCloneWars'' reveals that Palpatine controlled the original Clone Troopers through organic inhibitor chips in their brains. "Execute Order 66" was the TriggerPhrase for them to [[ThePurge assassinate the Jedi]].

* In ''WesternAnimation/Wish2023'', [[SorcererKing King Magnifico]] uses combination of Material Benefits and Mind Control. The king has the power to grant people's wishes, so people become citizens of Rosas to see their wishes come true. What they don't know is that Magnifico only grants wishes he believes will benefit ''him'' and his kingdom, leaving the vast majority holding out vain hope for a wish he will never grant (in his VillainSong, he mentions having granted fourteen wishes last year out of the ''hundreds'' he took). The process of giving their wish to Magnifico also causes LaserGuidedAmnesia so no one can remember ''what'' they wish for, meaning they can't try and make their own dreams come true, making them more dependent on Magnifico's supposed generosity.

* In ''WesternAnimation/Wish2023'', [[SorcererKing King Magnifico]] uses combination of Material Benefits and Mind Control. The king has the power to grant people's wishes, so people become citizens of Rosas to see their wishes come true. What they don't know is that Magnifico only grants wishes he believes will benefit ''him'' and his kingdom, leaving the vast majority holding out vain hope for a wish he will never grant (in his VillainSong, he mentions having granted fourteen wishes last year out of the ''hundreds'' he took). The process of giving their wish to Magnifico also causes LaserGuidedAmnesia so no one can remember ''what'' they wish for, meaning they can't try and make their own dreams come true thus making them more dependent on Magnifico's supposed generosity.

* In ''WesternAnimation/Wish2023'' [[SorcererKing King Magnifico]] uses combination of Material Benefits and Mind Control. The king has the power to grant people's wishes, so people become citizens of Rosas to see their wishes come true. What they don't know is that Magnifico only grants wishes he believes will benefit ''him'' and his kingdom, leaving the vast majority holding out vain hope for a wish he will never grant (in his VillainSong, he mentions having granted fourteen wishes last year out of the ''hundreds'' he took). The process of giving their wish to Magnifico also causes LaserGuidedAmnesia so no one can remember ''what'' they wish for, meaning they can't try and make their own dreams come true thus making them more dependent on Magnifico's supposed generosity.

* [[AmoralAfrikaner Hoyt Volker]] in ''VideoGame/FarCry3'' rules with Fear, as he tells Jason Brody. We're first introduced to him via a recording of him threatening to behead his {{Dragon}} Vaas Montenegro and put his head on Hoyt's car antenna if he doesn't find and kill Jason soon, and later on, when Jason infiltrates his privateers, he sees Hoyt burning a man alive for breaking the company rules (presumably by stealing from Hoyt). The above recording with Vaas is most notable, because Vaas is pretty AxCrazy himself, so it speaks volumes of Hoyt's reputation if he can intimidate the pirate into speaking to him with such humility and nervousness.

* Most of the denizens of {{Hell}} in ''WebAnimation/HazbinHotel'' are unrepentant {{Jerkass}}es who hold zero respect for any authority, even that of the Royal Family. While they feel free to berate the Princess of Hell Charlie, most will pay loyalty or recognition to [[TheDevil her father Lucifer]] out of fear of his power.

[[folder:Web Comics]]

** Lex Luthor in ''WesternAnimation/SupermanTheAnimatedSeries'' led mostly through the power of Money, though he did use Kindness to get Mercy to be his assistant and {{bodyguard|Babes}}. Of course, Lex being Lex, he left her to die one episode when Brainiac attacked.[[note]](Superman saves her, of course.)[[/note]] [[MistreatmentInducedBetrayal She did not take it well.]]

--> '''Skeletor:''' I care for no one, and no one cares for me! You see? He (Two Bad) hates me! But what is more important is he ''fears'' me! That's the way I like it! You can trust someone who's afraid of you!

* ''[[VideoGame/TrailsSeries The Legend of Heroes - Trails]]'': Averted with [[NebulousEvi0lOrganisation Ouroboros]]. With the exception of Campanella, who acts like an observer of sorts for The Grandmaster, all of the Enforcers are free to do whatever they wish - they have no obligation to obey orders given to them by the Anguis, or even by the Grandmaster, and are even free to drop out of the organization if they wish (and a few of them have). It has been acknowledged by characters in-game to be peculiar that Ouroboros can function despite this. This is however played straight with certain Ouroboros members such as Weissmann, the BigBad of ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfHeroesTrailsInTheSky'', who had no qualms about using brainwashing and emotional manipulation to keep people in line.

* In ''Series/{{Andor}}'', just like everywhere else in ''Franchise/StarWars'', the Empire relies on fear and, to a lesser extent, authority. The show is quick to demonstrate the downsides to this; early on, many places subordinate to the Empire avoid reporting bad news to avoid being the victim of a YouHaveFailedMe. So, for example, the [[LawEnforcementInc corporate police]] who the Empire contracts to supervise systems without a strong Imperial presence cover up real rates of crime and other illicit activities, and when the proto-Rebellion or random thieves manage to steal a pieces of important naval equipment from the factories producing them, those factories and shipyards conceal the fact rather than report it, leading the Empire to severely underestimate the reach and capabilities of the resistance. Later in the first season we see that the way the Empire grinds people underfoot and heavy handed Imperial crackdowns increasingly pushing people too far, so instead of fearing the Empire they begin to ''hate'' it, driving more people towards both large ([[spoiler:the riot on Ferrix in the season finale]]) and small ([[spoiler:some fisherman who can't make a living because local Imperial facilities spoiled the water decline to turn in a pair of escapees from an Imperial prison, and even give the two men a ride off-planet]]) acts of defiance.

* The Founders of the Dominion from ''Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine'' control their minions, the Vorta and the Jem'Hadar, by engineering BlindObedience into them. They also control the Jem'Hadar through rationed doses of ketracel-white, without which the Jem'Hadar will die. As for their subject races, they either use careful manipulation via infiltration or straight-up fear of being crushed by the Jem'Hadar.

* ''VideoGame/SuperMarioBros'': Bowser is one of the few villains who controls his minions through Respect, with some Power and Authority thrown in. Best demonstrated in ''VideoGame/MarioAndLuigiBowsersInsideStory'', where his special attacks involve his minions and are obtained by freeing them because they '''want''' to work for him. In contrast, Fawful in the same game simply Mind Controls everyone into obedience, then presumably somehow altering their appearance to match his.

** [[TheDreaded Salem]], the BigBad, proves herself to be a flexible leader and uses different methods to coerce or guide those who follow her.

*** [[TheBrute Hazel Rainart]] wants justice for his sister's death; [[spoiler:when they first met, Hazel killed Salem several times before he was too tired to fight anymore. After proving her CompleteImmortality, Salem then convinced Hazel to redirect his desire for vengeance onto Ozpin, promising to create a new world order with no more huntsman academies to send children to fight in a hopeless war]].

* ''LightNovel/{{Overlord}}'':