History YMMV / RichardIII

* DatedHistory: When Richard's remains were found in 2012, it was proven that he had moderate to severe scoliosis. The team at the University of Leicester who conducted the research of his remains concluded that it wasn't quite so severe that it would have significantly impacted his day to day life. However, they also believed that it would have caused him to have uneven shoulders that would have been noticeable to people who knew him personally and when he wasn't wearing properly tailored clothes or armor. While he wasn't a hunchback with a withered arm and limp,[[note]] His hips were aligned, unlike most people whose scoliosis is as bad as his was, so he would have been able to walk just fine[[/note]] there is a kernel of truth hidden deep within the myth.

* CommonKnowledge: The way people talk about Richard's HistoricalVillainUpgrade you'd think he was some sort of paragon of virtue. While a lot of his crimes in the play are pure fiction -- such as arranging the death of Clarence -- quite a lot of them are historical fact. Not only is Richard still widely considered the prime suspect for [[TheFateOfThePrincesInTheTower killing his nephews]], but he also unquestionably usurped them using the flimsy pretext of their illegitimacy.

** "I am determined to prove a villain" - is Richard saying ThenLetMeBeEvil, that he is choosing to be a murderous bastard out of pure spite; or, is he claiming he is ForcedIntoEvil by fate and circumstance, that due to his condition he is unable to enjoy the "idle pleasures of these days" the way his contemporaries can, and that murdering his way to the top and wrecking havoc is the only pleasure he has left?

* CompleteMonster: [[UsefulNotes/RichardIII Richard]], [[HistoricalVillainUpgrade himself]], informs us early on that he is [[CardCarryingVillain determined to prove a villain and ruin the day for everyone else]]. To that end, he [[RomancingTheWidow seduces Anne Neville]], whose noble husband [[MurderTheHypotenuse he himself murdered]], with every intent of discarding her later. He has his brother George, Duke of Clarence, sent to the Tower of London and murdered, drives his older brother King Edward IV into an early grave, and has Edward's two young sons imprisoned in the Tower of London, before having them murdered. He poisons Anne herself, and begins having his allies killed. On the night before his battle with Henry Tudor, he is visited by the spirits of his victims, who tell him to despair and die. Richard is left alone, deserted by all, and at the end, he admits that even he has nothing but hatred for himself.

* EvilIsSexy: Richard's seduction of Lady Anne definitely qualifies. It's particularly marked in the Olivier film version, where Anne is all glazed-eyes and heaving bosom for Richard.

** Richard's seduction scene of Anne might or might not be a RelationshipWritingFumble because if the actors have chemistry, it can come off kind of sexy.

** Richard himself seems more like a straight-up sociopath if one takes the play as a stand-alone, but as a sequel we see that he probably sees himself as the OnlySaneMan in his family with both of his brothers being giant screw-ups in their own respective ways, endangering the dynasty while he was the one actually running the country properly, and growing increasingly frustrated with this state of affairs. Taken as a sequel character he's practically a JerkassWoobie who undergoes MotiveDecay from a loyal, faithful hardworking Yorkist to embittered asshole who thinks that neither Edward, nor Clarence, nor Elizabeth deserve or respect the throne as much as he does, so he might as well just take it for himself no matter how selfish his motivations have become.

** Queen Elizabeth knowing that Richard "loves me not" and fearing what he'll do to her and her children makes more sense coming from ''Henry VI''- Edward wasn't supposed to marry her in the first place, but to wed the sister-in-law of the King of France as a political marriage and as part of a peace treaty. He married Elizabeth solely because she caught his eye and she brought almost no political advantage whatsoever as she was just a regular aristocrat with limited standing, and France even goes to ''war'' with England over this and attempts to put the Lancasters back in power. Richard saw their marriage as a ''huge'' disaster and frankly as an insult to their whole family for Edward endangering their hard-fought, newly-formed dynasty over some woman he just met.
** The tensions and mixed feelings everyone has towards Queen Margaret are explainable as well- in ''Henry VI'', she is an [[HateSink absolutely horrible, downright evil person]] who abused, cheated on and bullied the husband she mourns for in this play, and killed the York brothers' father and younger brother in particularly nasty, humiliating fashion, and by an attack on their home after a peace treaty was signed no less; at the same time, Richard ruthlessly murdered her young son right in front of her without warning and [[EveryoneHasStandards this horrified the entire Yorkist faction]] and leads them to spare her life, which disgusts Richard further as he saw both of them as threats to the family and wanted to execute Margaret as well. That Richard topped it off by murdering her otherwise perfectly innocent husband who was [[UniversallyBelovedLeader beloved by everyone, even his enemies]] means that she is given more sympathy than she would otherwise deserve [[note]]Granted, none of them knew how much she bullied him, so they might have sympathised with her less had they known [[/note]].

* AdvertisedExtra: Advertising for the film prominently featured Robert Downey Jr. Downey even appears prominently on the poster and DVD cover for the film, and his name receives one of the highest billings....despite the fact that he plays Rivers. While not necessarily a minor character, the Earl of Rivers is at most a supporting role who dies a little before the halfway point. Ironically, while Downey appears prominently on the posters for the film, Jim Broadbent, despite playing the large role of Buckingham, doesn't physically appear anywhere on the film's poster and his name is at the same level as Downey's.
* AwardSnub: Rumor has it Creator/IanMcKellen missed out on a Best Actor Oscar nomination by a single vote. Not to mention the film also lost both its Oscar’s nominations best art direction and best costume design.

** [[UsefulNotes/RichardIII Richard himself]], Duke of Gloucester, is a scheming, [[CardCarryingVillain self-described villain]] who is out to make the world around him as miserable as possible in his quest for power. After personally leading the slaughter of King Henry, his son, and their entire cabinet, Richard dedicates himself to seducing the daughter and wife of his victims simply to prove he can. He uses the woman, Anne, as a steppingstone for power that he mistreats before killing her when he grows bored of her. To ensure his personal ascent to the throne, Richard frames his brother Clarence and has him killed in prison, blaming his death on their older brother Edward, which drives Edward to a despair-induced death. Richard uses the [[ProfessionalKiller assassin James Tyrell]] to brutally kill multiple other members of his own family--from brother-in-law Earl Rivers to Richard's child nephews--only to later shoot Tyrell in the face during a petty rage. After eliminating all political rivals, Richard [[DayOfTheJackboot takes over England]] and begins [[PuttingOnTheReich transforming it into a fascist dictatorship]], planning to wipe out thousands of rebels against his rule before forcibly marrying his own niece so his bloodline will reign forever.
** [[AdaptationalVillainy James Tyrell]] is a cold-blooded social climber, loyal to Richard only for [[OnlyInItForTheMoney money]] and the [[AmbitionIsEvil hope of promotion]]. Tyrell acts as Richard's pet assassin, murdering Richard's brother, George, and brother-in-law, Rivers, and hanging Lord Hastings on trumped up charges during Richard's rise to power. Following Richard's ascension to the throne, he has Tyrell--now the head of StateSec--smother his child nephews for good measure, and when Richard's ally, Buckingham, abandons him, it is Tyrell who captures, tortures, and ultimately strangles the duke while Richard looks on. Void of all emotion save self-satisfaction, Tyrell proves himself every bit as monstrous as his [[ANaziByAnyOtherName tyrannical boss]].

* RetroactiveRecognition: Adrian Dunbar, who plays Tyrrell, became well-known in Britain for his starring role in Series/LineOfDuty . He also played Richard III's father Richard of York in Series/TheHollowCrown
* SpiritualSuccessor: Just like this movie adapted Richard III to a 1930's Britain and made the story a metaphor for the rise of Fascism, the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macbeth_(2010_film) 2010 Macbeth adaptation]] by Rupert Goold adapts Macbeth to a 1960s-ish Britain and frames the story on the rise of the communists; Creator/PatrickStewart's Macbeth is clearly channeling Nicolae Ceaușescu.

* AdaptationDisplacement: The play firmly established the popular image of Richard III as a crookbacked tyrant. To the extent where he's the only king of England to have his own ''fan club'' aimed at exposing this as a case of ArtisticLicenseHistory (spoofed in the first series of ''Series/{{Blackadder}}'', in which he really is a pleasant king who utters inverted versions of Shakespearean lines).
** This was partly debunked / proven by the discovery of his remains, showing that he was not exactly hunchbacked but did have a bad case of scoliosis, resulting in the uneven shoulders seen in his portrait, meaning a case of both sides being somewhat correct.