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Even Bad Men Love Their Mamas
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And how.
" I'm a mama's boy. I pity the fool who ain't one!"
"Made it, Ma! Top of the world!"
— the last words of Cody Jarrett (James Cagney) in White Heat
"Strong mother fixations tend to be a big plus, so remember mom well."
Yes, even the toughest Bad Ass around can still have a soft spot for dear old Mom. Sure, you've killed scores of men using only your right thigh, a roll of twine, and pure gumption, but she held you for nine months and took care of you when you were sick!
A subtrope of Pet The Dog, this is when a tough or intimidating character is made more endearing via a loving relationship with their mother. It's usually just used for a quick punchline, but occasionally the concept is a bit more fleshed-out.
If the mother is also a Mama Bear, then the Badassness may be hereditary. If a Bad Ass, Anti Hero, or genuine bad guy tries to keep their mama in the dark about being a bad man, then you have a case of Dont Tell Mama. It is not usually a bad thing unless it turns into Mommy Issues.
Named after Ben Wade's line in the remake of 3:10 to Yuma.
Examples
Anime and Manga
- This concept is explored some in Yu Yu Hakusho when Kurama, a fox-spirit, possessed the body of a human baby to continue his existence after being killed. He planned to leave and continue his criminal ways once he regained his demonic powers, but found that he had come to love his human mother (Shiori) too much to abandon her, and was even willing to give up his life to save her from an illness.
- Hehhehheh. Hayao Miyazaki's Castle in the Sky: Mother lovin' sky pirates. A whole band of them.
- And the mother is the most Bad Ass of all!
- Lelouch Lamperouge aka Lelouch Vi Brittania, the Magnificent Bastard from Code Geass, has as one of his motives to uncover the truth behind the really messy death of Marianne "The Flash" Lamperouge aka Marianne Vi Britannia, his beloved mother. Episode 21 of the second season subverts this... because Marianne was actually not the loving, gentle mother he remembered, but a Knight Templar Parent.
- Also, the Bad Chick Karen finds a soft spot for her racially discriminated against, drug-addicted mother. A happy life with her becomes her motivation for the rebellion (well, second only to the massive Bodyguard Crush).
- It's worth noting that in Jojos Bizarre Adventure, Jotaro travels all the way to Egypt, enduring constant attacks by enemy Stand users, and then faces off with a time-stopping vampire, all to save his mother. Jotaro's Jerk With A Heart Of Gold personality prevents him from ever really admitting that he loves his mother, but his actions speak volumes to her, as she has always has had faith in his inner kindness, and in the end, she was right.
- Dio Brando himself arguably applies to this trope. As it's shown in Part 1 that Dio Brando harbors a fierce anger towards his father because according to Dio in his own words he "made mother suffer".
- Female version in Inu Yasha. Youkai leaderess Abi-hime's main motivation to strike a deal with Big Bad Naraku was to get the human blood she needed to save the life of her mother, Queen Tekkei, who was not only old but also was poisoned after defeating and eating an ogre. Granted, she's not portrayed as sympathetic and the mother is a giant bird youkai, but Abi's devotion to her mother is still noticeable.
- Not to mention Inu-Yasha himself has some serious mommy issues. You do NOT insult the late Princess Izayoi to his face and expect to live (unless you're Sesshoumaru or something).
- No, but he does end up getting his arm cut off. That was actually the only time Inuyasha one a clean victory against him.
- Female version. Nao Yuuki from Mai-HiME is said to have been very close to her mother, having become a cynical "lone wolf" and child prostitute of sorts as a twisted revenge after said mother was seriously injured by thugs. This is brought up twice: when Natsuki (whom she has attacked and kidnapped) once accuses her of being selfish and cruel in her pursuits, causing a pissed off Nao to go into a Motive Rant and explain her backstory, and when Shizuru attacks Nao in retaliation for her attacking and kidnapping Natsuki (twice), killing Nao's CHILD *and* Mrs. Yuuki, which sends the girl into a heartbreaking Villainous Breakdown in which she screams and cries for her mother. Who fortunately gets better when Mashiro intervenes in the Grand Finale, though, letting Nao start all over..
- Wholesome Crossdresser version. In Rose of Versailles, Oscar, a normally cool, passive, obedient Bifauxnen of a royal guard, becomes quite outraged when Madame Du Barry, the mistress of the king, drags her mother into her high-stakes court battle against the then-dauphine Marie Antoinette. Oscar storms into Du Barry's private quarters and threatens her at swordpoint [mind, Du Barry is the favourite of the king, and needless to say threatening of any manner should have been punished by death], her sudden display of bloodlust frightening Du Barry such that she gave up the entire scheme despite having the king's protection. Although the very passionate Oscar has and would go on to lose his temper and do stupid/reckless/etc. things over other morally-charged conflicts -such as the murder of a child- this would remain by far the angriest and the stupidest, suggesting that she is a mama's girl above all else.
- In the manga version of Chrono Crusade, Aion's partial motivation for his evil plan is that his mother was killed and turned into the demon's Hive Queen while pregnant with him and his twin brother. Towards the end of the manga, he's shown speaking fondly to her corpse, Pandaemonium. He even carries her head around...
- This makes him sound like Kadaj/Sephiroth from Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children. He's not. Seriously. There are many reasons for him to be messing around with Pandemonium's head besides her being the mother of all demons, and him and Chrono in particular. By the way, he killed her.
- Askeladd, one of the vilest men in Vinland Saga, loves his mother so much that whenever he makes an oath by her name, he is going to keep that oath no matter what. If he makes on oath on his father's name however, there's a very good chance he's going to stab you in the back.
- Vanilla, the gruff and short tempered sheriff from Kaiba is revealed to have been struggling to earn enough money to buy a new body for his mother shortly before he dies.
- Same for Popo, who pretty much has to take over the world in order to see his mother again. But then her memory chip accidentally gets destroyed...
- Fate and Lutecia, villains from first and third seasons Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha, who did what they did because the former wished to make her mother smile again and the latter hoped to awaken her comatose mother.
- Despite being profoundly creepy, The Dragon, and willing to eat his own comrade to gain power, Pride in the manga version of Fullmetal Alchemist has a soft spot for his mother. Keep in mind that this mother is adoptive and that Pride, being an Artificial Human, has no real mother. Unless, you count Father, but that's kind of creepy.
- He's also a few hundred years old. Yet to see if either Wrath or Pride's demonstrated soft spots for her will come to anything.
- Death Note's Teru Mikami is a notable inversion- he sees his mother as almost condoning the actions of evildoers by telling him that some things cannot be changed. When she is killed, he inwardly celebrates the death.
- Well, the manga states that he cried initially, so he was upset about her demise at one point. Light himself plays this straight, demonstrating love for his parents and sister long after he sinks to the point where he'd kill absolutely anyone else without a second thought.
- Well, sorta. When Sayu was kidnapped, he was open to the possibility of killing her if he thought he had to, even if he didn't like the idea.
- In fact, though he didn't like the idea, his position in the first volume was already 'if I'm found out...Kira will have to kill his own family.' He takes Souichiro's death lightly, too; his main concern at the time is convincing his dad to kill Mello before he dies, and he freaks over this failing and blames it on being upset about his dad dying.
- Light, to Ryuk: "If Sayu sees you, she'll have a heart attack."
- In Trinity Blood, when Suleiman betrays and rebels against Empress Augusta Vradica, he nevertheless refuses to shoot her, instead Taking The Bullet himself. When she asks why he hesitated, all he replies before dying is: "Is there a child who doesn't love his mother?" Please note that although he was probably not related to the Empress by blood, most vampires in the setting harbor filial feelings towards her.
- Aya Mikage's evil cousin Kagami in Ayashi No Ceres is shown visiting his insane mother in one episode. It's one of the few Pet The Dog instances he gets in the entire series between backstabbing and Xanatosing everyone else.
- Pretty much the whole reason why Kaioh from Fist Of The North Star went Ax Crazy in the first place. His hatred for the main Hokuto family comes from the fact that his mother, a descendant of the branch family sworn to serve the main family, died while protecting a young Hyoh and Kenshiro.
- Devil's rebirth, a huge monsterous devil was quite fond of his mother who protected him despite the fact that he killed 700 people. Surprisingly she looked like a gentle old woman!
- In Bleach, the Espada Tia Harribel has an all-female Fracción. The three girls (Apache, Mila Rose and Sun Sun) fight all the time between themselves, but they're very devoted to their mistress and she also cares for them. When they lose against Yamamoto, even after creating a fearsome Chimerae by mutilating themselves, Harribel quietly and coldly goes Mama Bear on her opponent, Hitsugaya.
- Kurei in Flame Of Recca is usually Recca's sadistic Aloof Big Brother. He has different mothers (blood and adopted) and boy does he respect them well. In fact, his adopted mother is actually his Morality Pet, considering his adopted father is a Complete Monster.
- Nakago of Fushigi Yuugi. She was the only family he had left, and watching her get raped—not to mention accidentally releasing his powers and killing her in a manner most gruesome out of horror—was the reason he became a psychotic Magnificent Bastard in the first place.
Comic Books
Film
- The Trope Namer is the 2007 remake of 3:10 To Yuma. After a member of the posse transporting him to the titular prison train insults his mother, shackled Magnificent Bastard Ben Wade promptly throws him into a ravine, and utters this line to justify it.
- Joe Pesci's murderous psycho, Napoleon-complex character in Goodfellas loves his mama.
- As quoted above, James Cagney as Cody Jarrett in White Heat. Brush up on your classics, people.
- Subverted in that she's just as bad as he is.
- In The Naked Gun 33 1/3, Rocco sees his mother fall off a stage, presumably dead, and shouts down to her, "I'm coming, Ma!" — possibly the most devoted mama's boy on this list. Of course, it is parody.
- One of the major themes of The Proposition is that Even VERY VERY Bad Men Love Their Brothers. Especially their mentally-handicapped kid brothers.
- Jet Li's portrayal of the Chinese hero Fong Sai Yuk definitely qualifies as this. In the second Fong Sai Yuk movie, when the bad guys kidnap his mom, Fong goes through hell and high water to get her back, including this scene
 , qualifying as one of Jet Li's greatest fights, where he uses an arsenal of katanas to tear apart an alley full of mooks standing between him and where the bad guys have taken her. While blindfolded.
- Understandable, since his mother may be even more Bad Ass than he is. When he is defeated by his prospective mother-in-law in the first movie, it's his mum who goes and restores the family honour (disguised as his brother).
- In the Silent Hill movie, after the terrible and bloody vengeance that Alessa Gillespie unleashed on Christabella and the whole town that burned her alive for being born out of wedlock many years ago, the only survivors are Action Mom Rose, her daughter Sharon and Dahlia, Alessa's mother. When Dahlia ask Rose why is she the lone survivor out of all the Silent Hill inhabitants, Rose tells her "Mother is God in the eyes of a child."
- Oh ho, we can't forget about Walter of the video game series. In Silent Hill 4, Walter Sullivan went on a ritualistic murder spree because he believed it would reunite him with his mother. He's convinced, by the way, that his mother is an apartment.
- Darth Vader. Granted, she was dead by the time he turned fully evil, but her death filled him with murderous rage.
- In Scrooged, the Ghost of Christmas Past shows to Bill Murray's character one of his first Christmas evenings. Murray begins to cry. Earlier, the Ghost had claimed that even Genghis Khan had to cry when he saw his own mother. Murray then claims (unconvincingly) that he's crying over the lump of meat his father got him as his Christmas present, which he didn't appreciate back then.
- Orin Scrivello, D.D.S. from Little Shop Of Horrors has a shrine dedicated to his deceased mother, who encouraged him to become a dentist due to his sadistic nature as a child.
- Tony Montana from Scarface somewhat loves his mother, even if there are rough edges to their relationship due to her being aware of his criminal activities, and when she is killed by enemy gangsters in the spinoff game The World Is Yours, he takes revenge on them.
- One particularly Badass villain from the Fingerprints turns out to be doing everything to get revenge for her mother, who was murdered when she was a child.
- In the crossover movie Freddy vs. Jason, Jason comes back to life because his mother tells him to. Of course, the "mother" was a image made by Freddy Krueger in order to start a killing spree on Elm Street. That kind of obedience can't be faked.
- Jason respects his mother in the Friday The13th series. In fact, during part II he makes a little shrine for his mother's decapitated head.
- Ronnie from Little Children is a convicted pedophile who loves his mother more than life itself, and is fully aware that she is probably the only person in the world who loves him. The film is notable for making a pedophile into The Woobie upon her death.
- Though he's not exactly "bad" (more like a Jerkass) for the first half of the movie, the only way to make Spock react in the 2009 Star Trek movie is to insult his mother or imply he doesn't love her. You do not want to do that unless you want the shit beaten out of you.
- So of course they kill her off.
- Norman Bates in Psycho has always had a special relationship with his mother, keeping her in the old family mansion and taking care of her needs and demands, even twenty years or more after she died.
- In Scream after being informed by Sidney that she's called the police Stu (whose already bleeding to death) pathetically breaks down and cries "My mom and dad are gonna be so mad!"
- Four Brothers combines this with Roaring Rampage Of Revenge.
- American Gangster: Frank Lucas, drug king pin, uses his fortune to buy a Big Fancy House for his mother and fills her room with copies of furniture that was taken from them when he was five, which he had remade from memory. When the dirty detectives invade the house looking for Frank's getaway money they assault his wife, shoot his dog and demolish the furnature. Frank's mom talks him out of a Roaring Rampage Of Revenge ("You don't kill cops, even I know that") by threatening to abandon him. It works, and they go to church instead where Frank is arrested by the un-corrupt cops who were investigating him.
- In Brick, the Pin, a drug lord, lives with his mom. His mom even goes so far as to serve snacks during his business meetings.
- In Sin City, Badass Normal Marv has the crap beaten out of him by crooked cops trying to get him to sign a confession. Marv spits blood at every paper they wave at him, until a slimy District Attorney shows up and threatens to kill Marv's beloved mother. Marv signs the confession immediately, but not before braking the DA's arm in several places.
- In The Godfather II, After Michael Corleone learns of Fredo's treachery, he orders that nothing will happen to him while their mother is still alive. Of course, once we see that shot of Mama Corleone in that casket...
Literature
- Lestat in Anne Rice's Vampire Chronicles is a daddy's boy; he becomes his father's caretaker after he goes blind, bringing him to America with him and taking care of him for decades, all the while keeping him from knowing he's become a vampire, and never attempts to turn him into one.
- Though Lestat is more than fond of his mother, Gabrielle - he did turn her into a vampire.
- And this is a very new developement for the two of them—Lestat and his father did not get along when Lestat was still human—he was patently his mother's favorite, and vice versa.
- In most tellings of Beowulf, particularly the 2007 one, Grendel is a mama's boy. A big, murderous mama's boy. Of course, his mama is even more monstrous.
- In Good Omens, Nanny Astoreth teaches about Vlad Drakula and Attila the Hun, but omits the points about Drakula always saying his prayers, or Attila being nice to his mother.
- Subverted in Hogfather; the Lilywhite boys greatly respect their deceased mother, but it's more out of quivering fear than love.
- At the same time, though, they only turn on Mr. Teatime after he snaps and goes, "To hell with your mam!"
- In the first Thursday Next book, The Eyre Affair, one of the main villain's dimwitted henchman wants a motorway services named for his mother as his part of the ransom. It's the only part of the ransom that is granted before the situation blows up.
- After being shot in a duel with Pierre in War And Peace, Dolokhov goes delirious in the carriage towards the hospital, murmuring about how he can't die yet because his mother will be heartbroken.
- In the Richard Sharpe series, the Drill Sergeant Nasty Obadiah Hakeswill keeps trying to kill Sharpe. He has a picture of his dead mother inside his hat. "Mother, spread your wings and lift me high!" is his catchphrase. He once justifies an act of rape by saying, "Mother, you always wanted me to be happy." Of course his mother helped to save him from the gallows, so he does have a point.
- In Second Apocalypse his mother Istriya is the only person Xerius is not ready to execute at the first hint of a suspicion of possible treason. But then, Istriya is the person who made Xerius who he is, and they have a history of mother/son incest.
- In Ken Follett's A Dangerous Fortune, the death of Edward Pilaster (a minor villain and son of Evil Matriarch Augusta) is commented on thusly by the heroes:
Hugh: "He loved his mother."
Maisie: "Why do you say that?"
Hugh: "It's the only good thing I can think of to say about him."
- Somewhat subverted in Crime And Punishment: at the beginning, Sympathetic Murderer Raskolnikov is very fond of his mother and sister, but, after his crime, he begins to feel uncomfortable around them and actually feels he is starting to hate them.
- In the Deepgate Codex, main villain Menoa's Start Of Darkness was triggered when he was killed protecting his mother during his parents' war.
- In The Brothers Grimm's tale #50 ("The Devil And His Grandmother"), the Devil himself cares about his grandmother—and thus, the hero can outwit him.
- Played for maximal Mind Screw in Lionel Shriver's We need to talk about Kevin, which initially sets up expectations of a complete aversion.
- The last word of the mad god Torak in the Belgariad is "Mother!" It's identified by Belgarath as a cry to the one thing in the universe Torak thought loved him. (Granted, as a god, Torak's mother is the universe - long story.) He was right - for a split second after Torak's death, everything stops, as the universe mourns her lost child.
- In the non-fiction novel Inside Delta Force, the ex-Delta operator Hanley explains an incident from the training where he received a strike against him by the evaluating shrink for being "uncooperative." The reason? He refused to complete the portion of the psych eval which asked selectees to complete the phrase "I love my mother but..." When questioned about this, Hanley replied "I love my mother. No buts. Don't project your issues onto me." The strike was removed and Hanley went on to pass selection.
- Mark Brandon "Chopper" Read wrote in his first book, Chopper: From the Inside, that the best way to find a criminal that didn't want to be found was either to wait outside their mother's house or to put her in hospital. They would always turn up because their love for their mums was so predictable.
- Dong Zhuo in Romance Of The Three Kingdoms is possibly the most vicious tyrant in the book. When he finds out he's going to ascend to emperor, one of the first people he tells is his mother.
Live Action TV
Music
- Insane Clown Posse, best known for excessively weird, violent lyrics and their constant swearing, gave us the surprisingly heartfelt "Mom Song".
- The Decemberists' "Mariner's Revenge Song". Sailors are generally not considered the nicest or most refined people, but avoid being the cause of one's mother's death if at all possible.
- Lil Wayne:
"And mama don't cry, ya son can handle his/ I got her out the hood and put her in the hills/ Yeah when I was fourteen I told my mom we will see better days/ And sure enough I got Miss Cita in a better place"
- Merle Haggard's Mama Tried:
And I turned twenty-one in prison doing life without parole.
No-one could steer me right but Mama tried, Mama tried.
Mama tried to raise me better, but her pleading, I denied.
That leaves only me to blame 'cos Mama tried.
- A fascinating version comes off of Tool's 10,000 Days album. Though Tool certainly doesn't classify under "bad men," the song "Wings of Marie", is certainly a representation of something like this trope. A two part, seventeen minute long Epic Rocking tribute from Maynard James Keenan to his mother, who lived approximately ten thousand days while paralyzed and wheelchair-bound from a severe stroke, it's arguably the most loving and emotionally wrenching song Tool has ever done.
Mythology
- King Oedipus. (Not like that!) He left home at once when told he was going to kill his father and marry his mother, which he thought meant the people who'd raised him. It didn't work out, of course, but he tried.
- Mythological example: The hero Perseus of Greek mythology was very protective of his Hot Shounen Mom Danae, and King Polydectes's motive for sending him on the quest to kill Medusa was to get him out of the way so he could get at her. When Perseus returns with Medusa's head and finds out that his mother got messed with in his absence, he promptly uses Medusa's head to turn Polydectes and his court to stone before leaving the throne to the guy's brother and Perseus's former caretaker, Dictys.
Video Games
- Not played straight, but in Final Fantasy VII and the sequel movie Advent Children Jenova's "children" (Sephiroth and the White Haired Pretty Boy threesome) are doing their best to fulfill their "mother"'s desire to... pretty much destroy life on earth.
Reno: Mother, schmother... It's Jenova's freaking head!
Yazoo: I will NOT have you refer to Mother that way!
Loz: You meanie!
- I don't know...I think Kadaj got lots of sympathy points for that deluded and desperate motivation of his.
- "Hey, your mom's cool...what the hell am I saying?"
- Final Fantasy X Seymour's mother sacrificed herself when he was a child, and... let's just say he's not coping well (Freudian backstory in a Final Fantasy game? Say it ain't so.)
- Sam And Max Season 1 Episode 3: The Mole, The Mob, and the Meatball has a professional card shark who is very fond of his late mother. When he gets on the protagonists' bad side and decides to withhold information, they decide to interrogate him with 'Yo Mama' jokes.
- Subverted on Grand Theft Auto 3 - if you listen to the Chatterbox radio station, eventually you'll hear Tony (the local Mafia boss) call in and complain bitterly about being smothered by his 'ma'.
Tony: It's my ma. She don't think I'm a real man. Can you imagine that? I mean, I do a man's job and all, but... she treats me like a little boy! All I get is your pa this and your pa that and you're not a real man, Tony! And it's driving me... freakin' nuts!
- In Liberty City Stories, the prequel where you play as Tony, his mother puts out a hit on him in a The Sopranos Shout Out, but retracts it once he becomes a made man.
- Umberto in Vice City
Umberto : "I love women chico. I LOVE MY MOTHER!"
- Halo's Sgt Johnson, who is devastated when he returns home from a long mission to find his elderly aunt dead, as shown in the Expanded Universe novel Contact Harvest.
- Earthbound: This is actually a huge part of Giygas's backstory. Earthbound Zero implies that his insanity was caused by his inability to understand or cope with his feelings toward Maria, the human who raised him.
- One could also make a case for Porky in Mother 3. His favorite restaurant is staffed with robots in his mother's likeness. Sure, it's creepy, but that's about as close to love as he gets.
- In Fallout 3, your character can be a living, walking embodiment of good or satan's favorite mortal. Either way, you'll goes through hell and high water just to find your dad. Of course, this being Fallout 3, you have the choice of why.
- Kanji From Persona 4 is an odd example. He loves his mom. He feels sorry for her for all the stuff he puts her through. To make up for it he beats up an entire biker gang that kept her up at night.
- Warden, the Man Behind The Man in House Of The Dead: Overkill, has an unsettlingly carnal relationship with his aging mother, and developed the zombie virus in an effort to keep her alive.
- The Sniper from Team Fortress 2.
- The Scout too, by the way. He's a major Jerk Ass, a Heroic Sociopath and perhaps insane too, but gets majorly pissed off when he finds out that the enemy spy is having sexual relationships with his mother. Further in-game quotes also suggest he loves his mother very much.
- Although that freakin' Scout was the Spy, that would probably have been the Scout's reaction to seeing the pictures anyway.
- And the Demoman bought a mansion for his mother, and makes her tea.
- Dante from Devil May Cry keeps a photograph of Mommy at his house/devil-hunting shop. Plus, in the first Devil May Cry, he falls for this demon created to look exactly like his mother.
- Ayane, generally a cold and bitter girl as a result of her upbringing and the prejudice against her for the circumstances of her birth nonetheless lets the armor crack and the tears slip when she's forced to kill her adoptive father(and the only person that ever showed her concern growing up besides Kasumi and Hayate), Genra, after DOATEC transforms him into the demonic Omega.
- Malik of Wild Arms 3. After all, he chose life technology as his field of research was to find some way to resurrect his mother.
- The death of Laharl's mother is one of the main reasons he's so emotionally messed up.
- Left 4 Dead's resident Badass Biker Francis, when he isn't screaming like a little girl, sometimes calls out for his mama when he gets killed.
- In Batman Arkham Asylum, Enemy Chatter reveals that at least one of the Joker's mooks is nervous about dumping a suspicious contaminant into the Gotham City water supply because his beloved mother, who lives down by the docks, might get affected by it.
Web Comics
- Female example: in Boy Meets Boy, Tabitha's mother is literally the Devil. Tabitha loves her and it appears the only thing she fears is her mother being disappointed in her.
- Although not a bad man by any stretch of the imagination, Lawful Good Deadpan Snarker Nodwick complains about being cloned, "Could you at least tell me which helmet is mine? It was a gift from my mom."
- In a twisted way Drip, the Sin of Lust and a Complete Monster even by the merits of demons in Jack, experiences a strong affection to his grandmother coming into sensual (and sexual) enthrallment. Mind you, she's almost as bad as he's and in fact played a mojor role in depraving him into a serial rapist and killer. She's now encased into a wall of Drip's infernal lair but that doesn't stop her from bossing the her nightmarish grandson around and coerce him to put up with her debauch urges.
Web Original
Western Animation
- Johnny Bravo loves his mama; in fact, it's one of his few redeeming qualities. Of course, he isn't actively BAD; however, he is obnoxious, vain, and so clueless it can warp the laws of time and space.
- Subverted with Ma Beagle of Ducktales, who treats her boys like dirt, even though they love her.
- Ditto Mom, of Mom's Friendly Robot Company on Futurama.
- Spoofed in the Looney Tunes short Deduce, You Say , in which the little old flower seller Dorlock Holmes [Daffy] harasses turns out to be the hulking Shropshire Slasher's beloved Mother. After the ensuing melee dies down, they head off down the street: "I told the nice gen'lman I'd give meself up now, mother." "You always was a good boy, Slasher."
- Subverted in The Simpsons with the Springfield Mafia:
Louie: Man that's a spirit lifter. I could whack my own mother now.
Fat Tony: Funny you should mention that.
Louie:: What?! Aw, but she makes such great pasta.
Fat Tony: It comes in a can.
Louie: She's a corpse.
- In the episode "Sweets and Sour Marge", the day planner of an evil CEO consists of nothing but "Evil Deeds", except for an hour break for "Lunch with Mom".
- Shredder from the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles was revealed to have a still-living mother on the show, whom he presumably loved but who REALLY cramped his style. Possibly a subversion to the trope above: by the end of the episode he teleports her out of the Technodrome and back to her retirement home, then laughs triumphantly and with great relief.
- Dr. Drakken of Kim Possible. Despite being out to rule the world and loudly bragging about his supervillain status to anyone who will listen, he still hasn't managed to "come out" to his mom about being a maniacal powermad villain. She thinks he has his own radio show; his real name is Drew Lipsky, and it's implied she mistakes him for Dr. Drew Pinsky.
- Disney's Robin Hood has a Running Gag of the evil Prince John remembering his mother and going sucking his thumb because he was The Un Favorite, compared to his brother King Richard. He even does it while attacking his snake right-hand man. And remember, Prince John is voice by Peter Ustinov.
- Female version from Avatar The Last Airbender: A big part of Magnificent Bitch Azula's Villainous Breakdown in the Grand Finale is represented by her hallucinations involving her Missing Mom, Princess Ursa. Azula, who had only mentioned in passing how she felt she was her mom's unfavorite, is shown screaming and crying at that.
- The series also has an aversion. Yon Rha is not very fond of his abusive hag of a mother, at one point suggesting to Katara that she should kill her as An Eye For An Eye. He is very obviously excited by this prospect.
- In Disney's Peter Pan, when Wendy is singing "Your Mother and Mine" to her brothers and The Lost Boys, Captain Hook and the other pirates overhear her. Anti Villain Smee gets emotional, as he lifts up his shirt - and displays the "MOTHER" tattoo.
- In Cosgrove Hall's adaptation of Soul Music, Anti Villain Satchelmouth Lemon has an identical tattoo, revealed in similar circumstances (although the song isn't specifically about mothers).
- One of the most common instances of this trope is the stereotypical image of a large, imposing, angry biker sporting a large tattoo of a heart with "MOM" written in it on his shoulder. One would assume it's not a chest tattoo like Smee's because the giant ZZ Top beard they all seem to have have would cover it up.
- Not considered a bad MAN, but Sperg from The Grim Adventures Of Billy And Mandy has gotten upset when Mandy has called his mother a 'respected and worthy person of the community' (which is bad in Sperg language) and in another episode where Billy makes fun of his mother and made her cry.
- Subverted to humourous effect in Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog. Robotnik has a mother, but she's bats in the belfry insane and he hates her! (Even if he's absolutely terrified of her as well.)
- The Cat in the Hat discovered that the Grinch's mother is his soft spot.
Fan Fic
- Ultimate Sleepwalker has a male example that shows how Even Bad Men Love Their Papas. The supervillain 8-Ball, a sociopath who's killed at least a dozen people during his armed robberies, and has also done such horrible things as firebombing a hospital for pay, uses some of the proceeds from his criminal activities to pay for the long-term hospital care of his father, whose drinking has just about killed him.
Real Life
- As seen in the page quote, Mr. T. He even sang a song about it.
- Josef Stalin. For her part, his mother is alleged to have said he should have become a priest instead. Supposedly, he was so scared of his mother (Georgian women are tough) that his oppression of the Georgian Orthodox Church was less thorough than elsewhere in the Soviet Union.
- There was also the former leader of Turkmenistan, who renamed April (the month) after his mother.
- Not to mention Adolf Hitler, who carried a picture of his mother around after her death. Adolf loved his mother so much he made special concessions for the Jewish doctor who cared for her, even after she died.
- Thats... terrifyingly heartwarming.
- Though there's still debate on the subject of him being "bad" or not, Hugo Chávez is a self-admitted and PROUD mama's boy, and she's his First Lady since he's been divorced twice.
- The Kray twins, English gangsters of the 1960s, doted on their mother.
- Subverted with baseball's Ty Cobb. He once claimed to have loved only two things in his life: Jesus and his (Ty's) father. More disturbing in that Ty's mother killed his father.
- The Roman emperor Claudius seems to have loved his grandmother, since he convinced the Senate to declare her a goddess. (His argument largely boiled down to reminding them that they had declared her husband, Augustus Caesar, a god, and he would be lonely without her.) It was commonplace for popular emperors to be declared gods after their deaths, but empresses were another matter.
- Matricide and paedophilia are generally regarded as the two unforgivable crimes among the inmates of any prison.
- Reversed with cocaine queenpin Griselda "The Godmother" Blanco: Even Bad Women Love Their Sons, whom she doted on, especially her youngest Michael Corleone (yes really). Anyone else's kids were out of luck, to the disgust of the other druglords.
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