History YMMV / MightyMax

** [[BigBad Skullmaster]] was always a terrifying villain whenever he appeared. Skullmaster overthrew his previous master and [[EvilOverlord took control of his subterranean kingdom]] from where he plots {{world domination}}. Skullmaster is a {{sadist}}, reveling in [[ColdBloodedTorture physical]] and [[MindRape psychological]] torture, and engages in both short term brutality and long term gambits. One of his most vile acts was vowing to save an ancient civilization from sinking beneath the sea, lying about it and trapping their souls as his slaves before in present day, sending them after Max's head "attached to the body or not." Responsible for the deaths of multiple heroes throughout the story, Skullmaster even attempted to blackmail Max for his mentor and friend Virgil's life by surrendering his magical cap. When Max turned it over, Skullmaster brutally killed Virgil anyways.

* CrowningMusicOfAwesome: The Soundtrack is REALLY good, especially the opening theme.

* FridgeHorror: The portals themselves. It's ludicrously easy for Max or anyone who happens to be near Max to blunder into them, especially since the portals are said to be invisible ([[VisibleInvisibility except to the audience]]). At the very least we've ''seen'' Max and some of his friends blunder into them. The fact that Max could just blunder into a portal and end up on the other side of the planet is already pretty scary, but now consider that some of the portals lead to places like over the open ocean (or at the bottom of it, one is said to go to the bottom of the Marianas Trench), or to the center of the Earth, or even into outer space. Yeah... imagine, just walking past some kid on the street and suddenly you find yourself halfway past Jupiter.
** Made worse because it's hinted that the portals are all one way. When Virgil and Norman used Max to get them to Greece so Norman could take his immortality trials, they took a rather convoluted path, only pushing Max himself through the final portal so he'd wouldn't have to be present if Norman lost. Max, being Max, determined to go back, but had to use the same chain of portals from before, rather than leap back through the portal that had sent him home.
** The visibility of the portals may be a case of DependingOnTheWriter. Max is clearly able to see the portals in "Dawn of the Conqueror".

** Spike was a psychotic BloodKnight who definitely WouldHurtAChild. Ten Thousand years in the past, Spike led a pack of barbarians to attack a peaceful village when the heroic Norman was just a boy. Refusing offers of peace, Spike brutally attacked and killed Norman's unarmed father before attempting to kill Norman himself. Things went wrong and Spike was buried under the snow for the next 10,000 years, but not before gleefully saying he'd find the boy, kill him and eat his heart. In the present, Spike is no less savage and continues his battle with the now adult Norman until he is defeated. Spike is so evil that Norman feels absolutely fine killing him after Spike has already been defeated, and nobody bothers to complain.
** [[MorallyAmbiguousDoctorate Dr. [=MacDougal=]]] is the first fully human villain to qualify. A MadScientist who discovered the existence of werewolves, along with the fact they were peaceful guardians of Scotland.She captured the pack and hooked them up in a rather unpleasant situation where their blood was painfully extracted into a formula for her. After drinking it, [=MacDougal=] would achieve the ability to transform herself and used it solely to kill innocent people, becoming the scourge of the highlands. When Max, a ten year old, stumbled upon her lair, Macdougal locks him inside and takes her formula so she can kill him, gleefully referring to him as "Breakfast."

%%* MagnificentBastard: Skullmaster.

* GeniusBonus: The concept of Lemuria comes primarily from Helena Blavotsky's ''The Secret Doctrine'', published in 1888, in which she describes Lemurians as darkly colored, non-mammalian, and reproducing via eggs. So it makes sense that the Lemurian Virgil would be a bird. It doesn't explain Skullmaster, unless he's Lemurian by nationality and not by ethnicity.

* HilariousInHindsight: How does a race of highly evolved, technologically superior brain-sucking aliens store their plans for an invasion of earth? On ''a floppy disk.'' Said disk can also be reprogrammed (by a teenager no less) to cause the entire ship to self destruct, which sounds similar to a certain [[IndependenceDay film]] that involved uploading a virus into an alien mothership.
* MagnificentBastard: Skullmaster.

** Skullmaster, the EvilOverlord BigBad was always a terrifying villain whenever he appeared. Skullmaster overthrew his previous master and took control of his subterranean kingdom from where he plots world domination. Skullmaster is a sadist, reveling in physical and psychological torture, and engages in both short term brutality and long term gambits. One of his most vile acts was vowing to save an ancient civilization from sinking beneath the sea, lying about it and trapping their souls as his slaves before in present day, sending them after Max's head "attached to the body or not." Responsible for the deaths of multiple heroes throughout the story, Skullmaster even attempted to blackmail Max for his mentor and friend Virgil's life by surrendering his magical cap. When Max turned it over, Skullmaster brutally killed Virgil anyways.

** [[MorallyAmbiguousDoctorate Dr. MacDougal]] is the first fully human villain to qualify. A MadScientist who discovered the existence of werewolves, along with the fact they were peaceful guardians of Scotland.She captured the pack and hooked them up in a rather unpleasant situation where their blood was painfully extracted into a formula for her. After drinking it, Macdougal would achieve the ability to transform herself and used it solely to kill innocent people, becoming the scourge of the highlands. When Max, a ten year old, stumbled upon her lair, Macdougal locks him inside and takes her formula so she can kill him, gleefully referring to him as "Breakfast."

** [[MorallyAmbiguousDoctorate Dr. MacDougal]] is the first fully human villain to qualify. A MadScientist who discovered the existence of werewolves, along with the fact they were peaceful guardians of Scotland.She captured the pack and hooked them up in a rather unpleasant situation where their blood was painfully extracted into a formula for her. After drinking it, Macdougal would achieve the ability to transform herself and used it solely to kill innocent people, becoming the scourge of the highlands. When Max, a ten year old, stumbled upon her lair, Macdougal locks him inside and takes her formula so she can kill him, gleefully referring to him as 'Breakfast.'

* TheProblemWithLicensedGames: The SNES tie-in game was so horrible the publisher didn't even bother to put it on sale. It could only be rented at select Blockbuster stores.
** It could be bought, but it was sold packed with a tape of episodes. Presumably because they knew they needed to sweeten the pot to move copies of that stink-burger.

* CompleteMonster: Skullmaster, the EvilOverlord BigBad was always a terrifying villain whenever he appeared. Skullmaster overthrew his previous master and took control of his subterranean kingdom from where he plots world domination. Skullmaster is a sadist, reveling in physical and psychological torture, and engages in both short term brutality and long term gambits. One of his most vile acts was vowing to save an ancient civilization from sinking beneath the sea, lying about it and trapping their souls as his slaves before in present day, sending them after Max's head "attached to the body or not." Responsible for the deaths of multiple heroes throughout the story, Skullmaster even attempted to blackmail Max for his mentor and friend Virgil's life by surrendering his magical cap. When Max turned it over, Skullmaster brutally killed Virgil anyways.

*** In Australia, the Mega Drive game was sold by itself. I have it, never owned tapes aside from bought ones. Don't recall seeing it with a tape.

** Spike was a psychotic Blood Knight who definitely WouldHurtAChild. Ten Thousand years in the past, Spike led a pack of barbarians to attack a peaceful village when the heroic Norman was just a boy. Refusing offers of peace, Spike brutally attacked and killed Norman's unarmed father before attempting to kill Norman himself. Things went wrong and Spike was buried under the snow for the next 10,000 years, but not before gleefully saying he'd find the boy, kill him and eat his heart. In the present, Spike is no less savage and continues his battle with the now adult Norman until he is defeated. Spike is so evil that Norman feels absolutely fine killing him after Spike has already been defeated, and nobody bothers to complain.

** Spike from the same series was a psychotic Blood Knight who definitely WouldHurtAChild. Ten Thousand years in the past, Spike led a pack of barbarians to attack a peaceful village when the heroic Norman was just a boy. Refusing offers of peace, Spike brutally attacked and killed Norman's unarmed father before attempting to kill Norman himself. Things went wrong and Spike was buried under the snow for the next 10,000 years, but not before gleefully saying he'd find the boy, kill him and eat his heart. In the present, Spike is no less savage and continues his battle with the now adult Norman until he is defeated. Spike is so evil that Norman feels absolutely fine killing him after Spike has already been defeated, and nobody bothers to complain.
** [[MorallyAmbiguousDoctorate Dr. Macdougal]] is also the first fully human villain to qualify. A MadScientist who discovered the existence of werewolves, along with the fact they were peaceful guardians of Scotland.She captured the pack and hooked them up in a rather unpleasant situation where their blood was painfully extracted into a formula for her. After drinking it, Macdougal would achieve the ability to transform herself and used it solely to kill innocent people, becoming the scourge of the highlands. When Max, a ten year old, stumbled upon her lair, Macdougal locks him inside and takes her formula so she can kill him, gleefully referring to him as 'Breakfast.'

** Dr. Macdougal is also the first fully human villain to qualify. A MadScientist who discovered the existence of werewolves, along with the fact they were peaceful guardians of Scotland.She captured the pack and hooked them up in a rather unpleasant situation where their blood was painfully extracted into a formula for her. After drinking it, Macdougal would achieve the ability to transform herself and used it solely to kill innocent people, becoming the scourge of the highlands. When Max, a ten year old, stumbled upon her lair, Macdougal locks him inside and takes her formula so she can kill him, gleefully referring to him as 'Breakfast.'

* CompleteMonster: Skullmaster, the EvilOverlord BigBad was always a terrifying villain whenever he appeared. Skullmaster overthrew his previous master and took control of his subterranean kingdom from where he plots world domination. Skullmaster is a sadist, reveling in physical and psychological torture, and engages in both short term brutality and long term gambits. One of his most vile acts was vowing to save an ancient civilization from sinking beneath the sea, lying about it and trapping their souls as his slaves before in present day, sending them after Max's head "attached to the body or not." Responsible for the deaths of multiple heroes throughout the story, Skullmaster even attempted to blackmail Max for his mentor and friend Vergil's life by surrendering his magical cap. When Max turned it over, Skullmaster brutally killed Vergil anyways.
** Spike from the same series was a psychotic Blood Knight who definitely WouldHurtAChild. Ten Thousand years in the past, Spike led a pack of barbarians to attack a peaceful villains when the heroic Norman was just a boy. Refusing offers of peace, Spike brutally attacked and killed Norman's unarmed father before attempting to kill Norman himself. Things went wrong and Spike was buried under the snow for the next 10,000 years, but not before gleefully saying he'd find the boy, kill him and eat his heart. In the present, Spike is no less savage and continues his battle with the now adult Norman until he is defeated. Spike is so evil that Norman feels absolutely fine killing him after Spike has already been defeated, and nobody bothers to complain.

* CompleteMonster: Skullmaster for one, but [[spoiler: Dr. Mac Taggart deserves a dishonorable mention. First she shackles the immortal werewolves and drains their blood so she can use it to become a hideous wolf-monster, and then she starts using her new wolf form to butcher ''and eat'' innocent people.]]
** Norman's nemesis Spike, one of the most depraved one off villains in a kid's show. Spike kills Norman's father for basically no reason and then gleefully tells Norman (who's a child now) "I killed your worthless father, and now I'll kill you!" when he's thwarted then, he cheerfully calls out he'll be back to kill Norman one day, and then eat his heart. He's so bad Norman kills him in cold blood...and nobody minds. At all.

** Not to mention Norman's nemesis Spike, one of the most depraved one off villains in a kid's show. Spike kills Norman's father for basically no reason and then gleefully tells Norman (who's a child now) "I killed your worthless father, and now I'll kill you!" when he's thwarted then, he cheerfully calls out he'll be back to kill Norman one day, and then eat his heart. He's so bad Norman kills him in cold blood...and nobody minds. At all.

* MagnificentBastard: Skullmaster
* TheProblemWithLicensedGames: The SNES tie-in game was so horrible the publisher didn't evenbother to put it on sale. It could only be rented at select Blockbuster stores.
** It could be bought, but it was sold packed with a tape of episodes. Presumably because they knew they needed to sweeten the pot to move copies of that stinkburger.