Line #55 Main/KnightOfCerebus


1	%%
2	%%
3	%% This page has been alphabetized. Please add new examples in the correct order. Thanks!
4	%%
5	%%
6	%% Image selected per Image Pickin' thread: https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/posts.php?discussion=16907407250.19569000
7	%% Previous threads:
8	%% https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/posts.php?discussion=1302578725065364600
9	%% https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/posts.php?discussion=1377702422095795100
10	%% https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/posts.php?discussion=1607893095061639500
11	%% https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/posts.php?discussion=16835332660.11892200
12	%%
13	%% DO NOT start a new thread for this page without an image suggestion.
14	%%
15	[[quoteright:350:[[WesternAnimation/PussInBootsTheLastWish https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/pussanddeath.png]]]]
16	[[caption-width-right:350:It takes a brush with [[TheGrimReaper Death]] for a fearless hero to become a [[LiteralMetaphor scaredy-cat]].]]
17	%%
18	%% Caption selected per most recent IP thread. Please do not replace or remove without further discussion in the Caption Repair thread:
19	%% https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/posts.php?discussion=1404492079030138900
20	%%
21	->''"All my days were happy, fun and cheerful. I liked that world and peace that we had. In that world, there were only thieves who stole wallets from citizens and we played who would get him first. Funny days... Normal days... School, hanging out with girls and finally beating delinquents. But one day they came... that thing came! They took everything from me! My life and my home! My friends are dead! My family was killed in front of me! My happy world fell into darkness and despair!"''
22	-->-- '''Hitori''' explaining his life after DEM Industries and Sir Isaac Ray Peram Westcott's appearance, ''Literature/DateALive''
23
24	In order to add more drama to a work which has been, up until that moment, lighthearted and comedic in nature, a villain (or antagonist of some sort) is introduced and is portrayed as a genuine threat, in contrast to the [[HarmlessVillain bumbling]] and [[IneffectualSympatheticVillain comedic villains]] the heroes have faced before. The villain's arrival is sudden, and is usually either a totally new character, or a character who has undergone a particularly [[FromNobodyToNightmare dramatic]] FaceHeelTurn.
25
26	This villain's arrival is heralded by a sudden downturn in humor (although if the villain is LaughablyEvil, expect it to turn into BlackComedy), showing the audience this one means business. In other words, a catalyst for a drastic change in mood toward the dark and dramatic. Some characters may take the story to darker territory without being villainous in the slightest, but this trope is reserved for evil creatures. GrimDark works that take place in a CrapsackWorld are much less susceptible to this kind of influence, but even they have exceptions if this villain shifts the story from BlackComedy to being more serious. This isn't only about the character themself, it is also about their relation to the story.
27
28	A Knight of Cerebus may be a blatant HeroKiller who poses an actual threat, or even an InvincibleVillain. They also tend to be the trigger of TheWorfEffect against the hero. They may be the ArchEnemy as they might have a strong personal tie to the hero or heroes of the work. They are usually distinguished from the other villains as perhaps being [[VilerNewVillain worse]], [[SortingAlgorithmOfEvil stronger]], or more [[ItsPersonal personally]] tied to the protagonists. Sometimes this type of character can be a CompleteMonster if they have no redeeming traits and do things that are terrible even by previously established standards. Often this character's arrival is a GutPunch. TheKilljoy can be this when he is the one that turns the story towards a more serious tone as well, with his pessimistic and nihilistic attitude mandating the shift.
29
30	Their opposite is the FunPersonified, who may not be able to change the tone as effectively, but still works to prevent things from getting ''too'' dark. See also DeadSerious and NotSoHarmlessVillain, when a villain starts as ridiculous but, because of some change from within, ends up becoming this. Compare ShooOutTheClowns, when the darker tone coincides with decreased screentime for comedic characters.
31
32	Can overlap with VileVillainSaccharineShow when the setting itself contrasts heavily with the character's grimness.
33
34	[[noreallife]]
35	----
36	!!Example subpages:
37
38	[[index]]
39	* KnightOfCerebus/AnimeAndManga
40	* KnightOfCerebus/ComicBooks
41	* KnightOfCerebus/FanWorks
42	* [[KnightOfCerebus/AnimatedFilms Films — Animated]]
43	* [[KnightOfCerebus/LiveActionFilms Films — Live-Action]]
44	* KnightOfCerebus/{{Literature}}
45	* KnightOfCerebus/LiveActionTV
46	* [[KnightOfCerebus/ProWrestling Professional Wrestling]]
47	* KnightOfCerebus/VideoGames
48	* KnightOfCerebus/WebAnimation
49	* KnightOfCerebus/{{Webcomics}}
50	* KnightOfCerebus/WesternAnimation
51	[[/index]]
52
53	!!Other examples:
54	[[foldercontrol]]
55
56	[[folder:Audio Plays]]
57	* ''AudioPlay/RefletsDAcide'' starts out as a light-hearted Heroic Fantasy parody with no villains beside monsters met by the heroes. [[MoodWhiplash Then]], we get [[OurDragonsAreDifferent Alia-Aenor]], who double-subverts this trope; when first seen, she appears as an intelligent, humongous black dragon. A few minutes later, she turns out to be a female, whose human form, much to the narrator's dismay, is a beautiful girl with a sweet, girly attitude... then she kills a bunch of thieves trying to rob her with a single spell.
58	[[/folder]]
59
60	[[folder:Podcasts]]
61	* ''Podcast/TheAdventureZone'' has Kravitz, the Grim Reaper, who informs the party that they have all [[spoiler:died multiple times]]. He's rather annoyed about this, but they're incredibly confused, because they absolutely do not remember the incidents he's talking about. It's the first sign that the party aren't being told something very important about the quest that they're on.
62	* ''Podcast/ShuffleQuest'' was a generally light-hearted RPG podcast, until a ''Mad Max''-style tyrant named The Ginormous [[spoiler:decapitated fan favorite Terok Nor.]]
63	[[/folder]]
64
65	[[folder:Radio]]
66	* ''Radio/AdventuresInOdyssey'' is largely a realistic show about realistic small-town problems and frequently more comedy than drama. It had a few forays into serious territory early on, whether it was an adaptation of a Bible story or a robbery... but when Dr. Blackgaard showed up, things ''changed''.
67	[[/folder]]
68
69	[[folder:Roleplay]]
70	* [[Webcomic/{{Homestuck}} Doc Scratch]] somehow got the players of ''Roleplay/DestroyTheGodmodder'' interested in actually roleplaying. The more he did, the more people began roleplaying.
71	* The Cult of Apophis in ''RolePlay/YuGiOhEastAcademy'' presents a real and significant danger to the heroes; their appearance marks the darkening tone of the RP.
72	[[/folder]]
73
74	[[folder:Tabletop Games]]
75	* ''TabletopGame/Warhammer40000'' effectively has [[SerialEscalation two]] in its history. While the galaxy was [[CrapsackWorld never a particularly nice place]], some people just have to make things worse.
76	** The first to appear were the four Chaos Gods. Before they showed up, humanity was more or less kicking ass and taking names. Then the Chaos Gods make their presence known by corrupting [[TheHero Horus]], turning half of humanity to their side, nearly wiping out all of Terra, having their new servant Horus cripple [[BigGood The Emperor]] and indirectly causing the imperium of man to become the CrapsackWorld it is today. However, this was only in the Horus Heresy, and it only really applied to humanity. After their first defeat, humanity began gaining ground against the forces of Chaos until they [[VillainDecay downgraded]] to TheUsualAdversaries. Something that The Eldar ALREADY saw them as.
77	** Then came the [[OutsideContextProblem Tyranids]]. In their first attack, they crippled the most well respected Space Marines in the galaxy. In their second, it took both the Eldar ''and'' Humanity working together just to gain a PyrrhicVictory over them. And their third assault still hasn't been stopped, [[GodzillaThreshold despite the sacrifice of billions upon billions of humans]]. Every time a Hive Fleet has appeared, the races of the galaxy have had to cross the GodzillaThreshold in order to stop it. ''Every'' Hive Fleet is treated as an apocalyptic event for the galaxy and these are just the scouting fleets, the main force isn't even here yet. While every other race has spent millennia fighting over one galaxy, the Tyranids are implied to have consumed more than one. This is just their next meal. The Chaos Gods are [[HorrifyingTheHorror scared]] of the Tyranids, because they have the power to completely block out the Warp. And the Tyranids are implied to be ''running away'' from something [[AlwaysABiggerFish EVEN WORSE]].
78	[[/folder]]
79
80	[[folder:Toys]]
81	* [[BigBad Makuta]] from ''Toys/{{Bionicle}}'' started out [[EvilOverlord menacing enough]], but his constant defeats and failures gradually robbed him of his credibility. After the original head of the Story Team left, the character of Makuta underwent a serious retcon, which resulted in him turning into a [[TheChessmaster calculating]] mastermind who had [[XanatosGambit planned his victory]] from the start, turned out to be the GreaterScopeVillain behind a lot of former villains, and by the end of the story arc, ended up ''[[TheBadGuyWins winning]]''.
82	[[/folder]]
83
84	[[folder:Web Original]]
85	* ''Blog/HamstersParadise'' starts out as a rather lighthearted nature-documentary style narrative showing the habitats and the species that live in them. Then comes the planet's first sapient species, the OmnicidalManiac race aptly called the Harmsters, which proceed to engage in war, genocide, slavery, child sacrifices, unethical Nazi-like experimentation, prison rape, bestiality and cannibalism, before concluding in a horrific ZombieApocalypse rife with BodyHorror.
86	* ''Literature/TheHeavenCycle'' starts out its [[Literature/FromHeavensDoor first]] [[Literature/BeforeHeaven two]] installments as relatively lighthearted and optimistic, with plenty of comedy and snark to balance out the ventures into dark moments, with neither Chayne or Ash ever managing to dampen the setting in a way that lasted bar the reveal of Ash's rape of Tango in the backstory. Then [[spoiler:Alice]] enters the scene halfway through ''Literature/TheTouchOfHeaven'' after having previously been introduced in ''Literature/BeforeHeaven'' as a creepy but mostly low-scale antagonist, and utterly destroys the lighthearted nature of the series by initiating the [[spoiler:attack on Haven]], with named characters killed in a contrast to the [[EverybodyLives nature of the previous installments]] and a permanent change to the status quo resulting from the aftermath. After this point in the series, CerebusSyndrome sets in, and [[spoiler:Alice]] is all to blame for it.
87	* ''[[Literature/{{Legatum}} The Smirvlak Trilogy]]'': The series, starting from ''Literature/SmirvlaksStone'' normally borders on a CerebusRollercoaster, with the worst villain being the VileVillainSaccharineShow of Lorko Maeliss -- who dies before the climax and never introduces any major lasting effect on the setting. The reveal of [[spoiler:Gnekvizz as the villain, however, completely and permanently swings the moon around, causing a complete DownerEnding with the apparent protagonist killed and the tone for the rest of the series set up with him taking the seat as BigBad.]]
88	* ''Literature/{{Worm}}'' by Wildbow was never anything close to light and soft, being about a severely bullied girl finding an escape in her life as a supervillain. The character who shows just how dark the setting is, though, is Leviathan, a [[{{Kaiju}} gigantic]], [[PersonOfMassDestruction immensely powerful]] ''[[EldritchAbomination thing]]'' that does nothing but [[OmnicidalManiac try to sink cities and countries into the ocean every year or so]]. More characters die in the first ''paragraph'' of his rampage than in the entire series up until that point. The sheer devastation his attack causes to Brockton Bay leaves the city a gang-ruled ruin that's vulnerable to various other superpowered threats. Prior to this, the only antagonists in the story were local heroes and street gangs.
89	* [[WebAnimation/Supermarioglitchy4sSuperMario64Bloopers SMG4]] has quite a lot of Knights of Cerebus, from the omnicidal Ztar, to the genocidal Francis. But Zero easily takes the cake as this series' main Knight of Cerebus, his one comedic moment can be seen as more gross than funny, and every other time he is on screen, all comedy flies out the window. Not to mention that the former two only attempted their goals and didn't get that close to completing them, meanwhile Zero has succeeded in destroying multiple universes and was the closest anyone has ever gotten to killing Mario '''TWICE'''.
90	[[/folder]]
91
92	[[folder:Web Videos]]
93	* ''WebVideo/AtopTheFourthWall'' starts off as a silly show lighter than many other Website/ChannelAwesome productions, but the emphasis of more story-based elements into the series also introduced one character who took the series into a whole new direction: Linkara's robotic counterpart, Mechakara, who was ''completely'' devoid of humor and introduced a serious CerebusRetcon about the true origin of Linkara's Magic Gun. Further appearances don't diminish his threat either and the darker tone established with his presence sticks around through the rest of the series with the introduction of nastier {{arc villain}}s like Lord Vyce and the Entity.
94	* ''WebVideo/DragonBallDC'' starts off as a mostly lighthearted look at [[AdaptationalNameChange Kakorat]]'s origin story in the ''Franchise/DCUniverse''. Then it gets to the origin for the villainous Saiyans. They are introduced as waging their personal war where they killed countless people, before they are kidnapped by ''ComicBook/{{DARKSEID}}'' whose cruelty shapes them into obedient soldiers in his army. The Saiyan Saga sees them attack and kill millions, include a number of superheroes. Even after Vegeta's defeat and he ceases to be an antagonist, episodes focused on him are much darker than plots focused on Kakarot due to Vegeta's acts ranging from him being a jerk to being downright evil, while any comedic moments with him are few and far between. [[spoiler: In The Doom Saga when Vegeta makes it clear he intends to kill Kakarot and become the sole Super Saiyan, unlike in canon where Vegeta CantCatchUp and isn't made out to be a threat, him killing Kakarot is presented as a very real possibility due to their being far less of a power gap and Kakarot suffering from a virus.]]
95	** Mongul serves as this for The Entity Saga. The search for the [[Franchise/GreenLantern Emotional Entities]] is initially set up as a fun MacGuffin hunt, with them being aquirred without much difficulty. Then Mongul appears and presents the first real obstacle in the arc. It gets worse form there as ComicBook/{{Sinestro}} and Rogal Zaar enter the picture after he appears.
96	** In the Doom Saga, the Parasite. Gohan's first outing as a hero has him face a trio of villains that includes Parasite, ComicBook/{{Deathstroke}} and [[ComicBook/CaptainAtom Major Force]]. He easily defeats the latter two in a one sided, in the case of Deathstroke, comedic fashion. But his victory Parasite turned out to be nothing of the sort as he was just feeding the villain energy, who became too strong and nearly killed him.
97	** Also from the Doom Saga, [[Franchise/TheFlash Godspeed]], who appeared in what had previously been a very comedic episode with the Kakarot and Gohan teaming up with the Batfamily. Unlike ComicBook/TheRiddler, who didn't pose a threat on his own, and Titano, who while not harmless, was the focus of fight scene that featured funny antics from Gohan and Damian Wayne, Godspeed is an entirely serious villain. His own SuperSpeed combined with Kakarot suffering a virus that is slowly killing him, and has worse effects the more energy he uses, leaves Kakarot unable to use his full strength and he's nearly killed. Even after Godspeed is beaten, the virus causes Kakorat to vommit up BloodFromTheMouth and cough incesentally, telling the audience that he really is dying.
98	* ''WebVideo/TheLizzieBennetDiaries'' starts off as mostly a regular rom-com, with short flashes into more serious things such as the Bennet family's finances and the disputes between Lizzie and both Charlotte and Lydia. The story gets exponentially darker when George Wickham enters their lives, ends up dating Lydia, [[DomesticAbuse is psychologically abusive]] and [[ManipulativeBastard manipulative]], almost publishes a sex tape of himself and Lydia for money without her permission, and denies the entire thing later on when Gigi, Lizzie's friend (and sister of Lizzie's love interest Darcy), confronts him about it. (Keep in mind that Gigi dated Wickham once herself, and it ultimately ended up that he was only interested in her because of her money.) He seems to [[KarmaHoudini completely get away with it]], even though the tape is never released thanks to Darcy's intervention. The worst part about it is that it is heavily implied that Wickham did it just to get back at Lizzie [[DisproportionateRetribution for siding with Darcy instead of him]] over a dispute between the men that was ages ago and ''didn't even involve her''.
99	* ''Franchise/{{Noob}}'' is set in a {{MMORPG}}, so the early villains, while annoying and sometimes genuine threats in-game, were no longer a problem once characters logged off. Then enter Master Zen, who has a deep resentment against the protagonists and is willing to go after them in real life. A plot present in all three incarnations of the franchise included him breaking into one of the protagonist's apartment, while the webseries had him resort to kidnapping and the comic showed outright (but fortunately failed) murder attempts. Even this wasn't enough for StupidGood Sparadrap who still thinks of Master Zen as his former Guild Master, so his own storyline has Roxana: she become the first player he genuinely hates after she [[spoiler:kills his pets]] and he eventually gets her to break out of her ButForMeItWasTuesday attitude towards the incident, which causes her to hate him back.
100	* Similar to ''WebVideo/AtopTheFourthWall'', ''WebVideo/TheSpoonyExperiment'' has managed to pull this trope off. The first was with Black Lantern Spoony, who [[HostileShowTakeOver tries to kill the clone Spoony and take the show over]]. Unlike Spoony's other would be murderers who are dealt with in comedic ways, there is nothing humorous about him. His current arc has [[VideoGame/FinalFantasyVII Sephiroth]]. While his exact goals are unknown, he has no comedic traits to him, and the hints we have of his plans are pure NightmareFuel. [[spoiler:The Guardian, the BigBad of the Ultima story arc, in fact states he had no plans of conquering Earth because Sephiroth's (though he doesn't refer to him by name) EvilPlan, he feels has already doomed the planet]].
101	* [[Series/{{Ultraman}} Geronimon]] in ''[[https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLCC859CE898BAFADC Godzilla and His Amazing Friends]]''. While previous enemy monsters weren't exactly lighthearted, he's the first one to be depicted as explicitly out to kill the group and have planned to do so (previous monsters were primarily predators or space monsters the group happened to come in conflict with). WordOfGod has stated that Geronimon's goal is to kill Godzilla's friends one by one, then kill Godzilla himself, and that he's done something in the past that [[ThisIsUnforgivable Godzilla will never forgive]]. He also has the dangerous ability to resurrect other monsters. Not only do he and his monster army nearly beat Gomora and Godzilla to death, [[spoiler:it takes the [[GondorCallsForAid entirety of Monster Island's inhabitants to stop them.]]]] And on top of that, [[spoiler:he manages to [[HeroKiller brutally kill Gomora]], a recurring ally, by stabbing him to death with his feathers and escape before Godzilla can take his revenge.]]
102	* ''WebVideo/VinesauceTomodachiLife'' had the Jahns and [[spoiler: Vlinny]]. The streams started out like any other stream from Vinesauce, but then, it goes full on [[spoiler:Alien Invasion]] when these weird guys show up.
103	* ''WebVideo/VitaCarnis'' has the [[HumanoidAbomination Mimics]], compared to the previously introduced MeatMoss creatures. The Crawl, the Trimmings, and the Meat Snakes, as gross and creepy as they might be, are characterized by the documentary as harmless toward humans and other living organisms. But the WhamLine that Mimics feed on humans reveals that at least one Living Meat creature really is as dangerous as it looks — and all the creatures revealed after this one are even worse.
104	* ''WebVideo/UnwantedHouseguest'': Doctor Litchfield. Unlike the somewhat vague threat of the Shadow Demon, he's very explicit in his plans to [[spoiler: Subject the Houseguest to a FateWorseThanDeath. We're also shown that he's already done it to many others.]]
105	[[/folder]]
106

Context Main / KnightOfCerebus