Not So Well Intentioned Extremist / Anime & Manga

Not-So-Well-Intentioned Extremist in Anime & Manga.

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• Ajin: Sato, leader of the Ajin resistance, claims to be fighting for the freedom of his species, but in reality, he doesn't care about the Ajins' plight at all. He just wants to start a war with humanity because he sees it as a fun challenge. When the other members of the resistance discover this, all but one promptly desert Sato in disgust, although this is only the case in the anime. In the manga, only one member of the Ajin resistance actually believes in the cause they're fighting for; the others are doing it for fun because, as ajin are immortal, they literally have nothing to lose.
• The Ancient Magus' Bride: Elias attempts to cure protagonist Chise of her Dragon's Curse by sacrificing a human child Chise had befriended, just because he became jealous of their friendship. When Chise finds out and saves Stella from her fate, it breaks her loyalty to the Magus with one armor-piercing punch.
• Chainsaw Man:
  • Makima reveals herself to be the Control Devil and Horseman of Conquest, and declares her intent to use Denji to Ret-Gone the Primal Fears and other Horsemen to create an ideal World of Silence. Denji is tempted, but asks if movies she thinks are bad would still exist in her "ultra-awesome" world. She says no, revealing that while she espouses high-minded altruistic goals, whatever she does with the Chainsaw Devil's powers would ultimately depend on her own subjective, immovable tastes and strengthening Denji's resolve to defeat her as he believed that there needs to be bad in life to highlight the good.
  • Fami, Makima's sister and the Horseman of Famine, states that contrary to her role, she actually wants to prevent The End of the World as We Know It. However, like Makima her motivations are purely selfish (no humans means no pizza) with her extreme methods such as unleashing a Primal Fear on Earth causing mass chaos and destruction.
• Code Geass: Emperor Charles zi Britannia starts a war of worldwide conquest and racial discrimination only to mask his true motives: gaining access to the Thought Elevators and eliminating all of the lies in the world via Assimilation Plot. Lelouch, however, points out that he has neglected his loved ones, including himself, by sending him and Nunnally to a nation only to wage war against it, and that the world he strives for would only be kind to him (and Marianne, who is in on it as well), and would result in the world being stuck in the past.
• Cross Ange:
  • Embryo claims to be building a perfect world, but in doing so, he has destroyed worlds, and humanities that have failed him, in separate dimensions, and is about to do so once again, even as he faces resistance from remnants of the older Earth (which include the humanity that has mutated itself into dragon-like beings to survive, as well as the last of the humans who hitched a ride onto the present earth), and the rejects of the current Earth, the Norma, all of whom make their intent of saving whatever is left of their respective worlds very clear. And that's not even getting into his Attempted Rape of Ange, and his actual Mind Rape of Jill.
  • The show actually showed just how corrupt humanity became with its dependence on Mana and persecution of the Norma. Part of it was due to Embryo's desire to create the aforementioned "perfect humans", but the resulting decadence and bigotry gave Embryo grounds to "reset the world". However, it became obvious that he only cared about becoming the new world's "Adam" to an "Eve" of his choosing, with humanity's decadence being secondary.
• The Attacker/Kazuo Tengan in Danganronpa 3: The End of Hope's Peak High School wants to spread hope throughout the world, but has personally lost belief in hope, and so decides to break Ryota Mitarai in order to get him to brainwash the entire world.
• DARLING in the FRANXX: The VIRM claims that they're doing humanity a favor by having them cast off their mortal bonds and embrace the endlessly pleasurable existence of the VIRM Hive Mind. However, their hateful views toward those with souls and their willingness to destroy Earth out of spite prove that the deception, bloodshed, and sacrifices they make will never be justified as good intentions (or absorb souls without asking for the species' opinions in the matter leaves it very clear).
• Death Note: Even before his Jumping Off the Slippery Slope, Light Yagami is fascinated with becoming the god of the new world he plans to create. As time goes on, it becomes clear he just wants to be worshipped, and cleansing the world of crime is just his means of attaining it. It's not helped by the fact that he also readily kills or tries to kill anyone who questions him or tries to stop his plans on the grounds that he's justice and thus anyone who opposes him is evil for going against him. When he's outed at the very end of the series, Near states outright that Light is nothing more than a crazy Serial Killer and his rationalizations and justifications for his crimes are just self-serving nonsense.
• Digimon:
  • Digimon Frontier: Lucemon claims he's trying to make a utopia for all, but the heroes call him out, pointing out he's willing to destroy the Digital World because he doesn't have complete control over it. He "justifies" this by saying most can't control themselves anyway.
  • Digimon Data Squad: Akihiro Kurata lies about Digimon being threats to humans to justify him wanting to wipe them out.
• Dragon Ball:
  • Dragon Ball Z: Frieza views the Saiyans as Always Chaotic Evil and tells Goku that he did the universe a favor in wiping them out. Of course, it falls flat considering the fact that Frieza is the one who uplifted the Saiyans and turned them into the genocidal Space Pirates they were to begin with, and his killing them all was out of fear that they would rise up and destroy him rather than any sense of altruism.
    Frieza: You do realize how hypocritical this is? Your outrage over the loss of innocent lives? The Saiyan race isn't exactly known for its mercy. Compared to you brutes, I'm a saint!
  • Dragon Ball GT: Baby had somewhat good intention in the beginning of wanting to restore the Tuffle race. But somewhere down the line his thirst for revenge against the Saiyan race and his burgeoning megalomania got the better of him; by the end of his saga, Baby's gone completely off the deep end and become no better than the Saiyans who slaughtered his people.
  • Dragon Ball Super: All incarnations of Zamasu repeatedly claim that they're doing what's necessary to create a "beautiful utopia" by wiping out all mortal life in The Multiverse, believing mortals to be Always Chaotic Evil and gods are the only beings worthy of life. For all their claims of righteousness and being bringers of justice, they ultimately boil down to nothing but sadistic racial supremacists, showing utterly sick enjoyment out of their rampage. It becomes even clearer when Goku Black and Future Zamasu wipe out all of the other gods in Future Trunks' timeline, both to prevent them from interfering and so they'd be the "supreme gods," so it's crystal clear that they're only concerned about their vision of a utopia. Goku Black in particular comes off as especially hypocritical in that regard, since he used the Super Dragon Balls to pull off a Grand Theft Me on Goku, essentially giving up his godly body for that of a mortal, and then slaughtered the entire Son family purely out of spite for Goku defeating him in what was supposed to be a friendly sparring match.
  • Super Dragon Ball Heroes: Hearts, the Big Bad of the Universal Conflict Saga, plots to Kill the Gods, insisting it's the only way to true freedom and peace. However, it's blindingly clear that Hearts' goals are purely selfish and maniacal in nature, and he has no qualms against attacking planets and killing countless people, seeing it as all for the sake of being "nourishment" for The Multiverse. When Vegeta calls him out on being nothing but a pretentious Hypocrite, Hearts not only agrees with his assessment, but openly admits to being one.
• Fairy Tail:
  • King Faust of the Edolas world just wanted to bestow an endless supply of magic and save Edolas... by using the lacrima made from Fairy Tail and the Dragon Chain Cannon to destroy Extalia. When that falls through, he gives the order for the Royal Army to just turn every Exceed they can into lacrima, and then he hops into the Dorma Armin to kill the heroes despite the fact that it drains the very finite magic supply of Edolas he wants to "save" to function and he's clearly reveling in the destruction he causes fighting the Dragon Slayers and draining even more of the world's magic supply himself.
  • The Future Rogue Cheney says he wants to save the past using the Eclipse Cannon when it's powerful enough to defeat the dragons. However, it turns out that the Eclipse Cannon doesn't exist; he wants to open Eclipse so that he can cause the disaster that will wipe out Fiore and take down Acnologia with his army of dragons.
• Fullmetal Alchemist:
  • In the Brotherhood, manga, and live-action versions of the story, Shou Tucker and his family were in danger of being in poverty. His "solution": turn first his wife and then his dog and daughter into pained chimeras, just for the sake of him being an alchemist, a job he's no good at. It's safe to say that by the time he does that to his dog and daughter, he has no good intentions, only caring about his paycheck. He's even worse in the live-action film where he doesn't bother to hide his ill intent anymore. In all versions, he tries to deliver a "Not So Different" Remark to Ed (in between punches as Ed is beating the living hell out of him and yelling he's not like him), but the reality is that while Ed and Al performed Human Alchemy out of a misguided attempt to save someone they loved, Tucker turned his family into chimeras because he couldn't bear the thought of losing a steady paycheck. It's no surprise Tucker ends up in Hell for his actions, if the "In Memoriam" Omakes are anything to go by.
  • Fullmetal Alchemist (2003) has a short-lived example: The Big Bad Dante attempts to justify all her abhorrent actions by saying that she's keeping the Philosopher's Stone out of the hands of mortals, who would only abuse it and cause mass death with it. Ed immediately points out all the horrible atrocities she has committed with Philosopher's Stones over the years. Not to mention how she intentionally makes mortals seek out the Philosopher's Stone by driving them to desperation and leaving behind just enough hints for them to find out how to do it before swooping in and stealing the Stone.
• Gundam:
  • Mobile Suit Gundam: Gihren Zabi and the Principality of Zeon claim to be fighting a war for freedom to liberate space colonies from the oppressive grip of a corrupt Earth Federation. While later entries in the series show that they very much have a point about the Federation being corrupt, in reality Gihren is an autocrat who simply wants to make himself emperor of the world, and who will happily employ chemical weapons against the very same colonies he claims to be freeing as a means to an end. Although that doesn't mean Zeon doesn't have plenty of genuine believers in their ranks.
  • After War Gundam X: Nomoa Long told Carris that the people who died for his cause did it for uniting the world, but as it turns out, they died so Nomoa could start his revenge. Carris is horrified when he hears this.
  • Mobile Suit Gundam 00: Ever since a young Setsuna stared at him in awe, Ribbons Almark gradually twisted Aeolia's plan to advance humanity to advance humanity into serving his new God Complex, admitting he doesn't give a damn about the humans the plan was supposed to serve once he becomes arrogant enough.
  • Nobliss Gordon from Mobile Suit Gundam: Iron-Blooded Orphans spouts high-minded rhetoric about why sacrifices are necessary for the success of his revolution. The truth is that a more peaceful negotiation of rights for the downtrodden masses of the solar system won't create enough chaos for him to make a quick buck off. This is in sharp contrast to the genuine Well-Intentioned Extremist Big Bad Rustal Elion, who aims to reform Gjallahorn and manages to do so once he destroys their opposition Tekkadan and Nobliss is assassinated.
• JoJo's Bizarre Adventure:
  • Stone Ocean: Enrico Pucci states that his world of Heaven would lead to the end of suffering due to humanity experiencing the entirety of their lives, leading to them accepting their fates and removing surprise/trauma of the unknown. Yet, all his claims of being chosen by God stems from that he's merely fulfilling the desires of DIO, who was the one who conceived this Evil Plan when he sought to Take Over the World. Given that DIO has been constantly portrayed as a sociopath with a God complex, the ulterior motive of the plan is heavily implied to give him even more absolute authority unto himself than the actual concern for others.
  • Steel Ball Run: Funny Valentine cites his main motivation for obtaining the Holy Corpse is patriotism, as he wants to use the Corpse's ultimate power for the sake of the United States. However, his cruel actions throughout the story (a lot that don't line up with his goals) and the ramifications of the Holy Corpse's power on upon the rest of the world, his real ambitions are towards wanting to remain as the most powerful president without any opposition.
• The Legend of Zelda (Akira Himekawa):
  • In The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past (2005), a young Agahnim reasoned to Link's father that doing whatever was necessary to get the Triforce was the only way to end all of Hyrule's troubles. When Link’s father continued to interfere, Agahnim banished him to the Dark World. In the present and after his cover is blown, Agahnim doesn't bother to pretend that he wants power for anything except the sake of having it.
  • The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess (2016): While Zant claims that his motive for conquering Hyrule was to give his people what he claims to be their birthright, Link points out that no real king would even consider turning his people into mindless monsters.
• Lycoris Recoil: Unlike Shinji, Majima's intentions are very much in the name of chaos and destruction, being a well-known international terrorist with connections to mafia and Yakuza groups the world over, and one of the minds behind the original Skytree incident. In Episode 10, his plan to expose the public to the existence of Lycrois and the police's incompetence involves people killing each other to start a mass panic.
• MegaMan NT Warrior (2002): In the Stream season, despite claiming to defend the universe, Slur's selfish motivations boil down to culling anything and everything she deems inferior.
• Metroid (Manga): Mother Brain explains that her true goal is to bring order into the galaxy as the Chozo programmed her to be. However, she emphasizes that she will lead the new age of prosperity, proclaiming that she was born to be "the true master of the universe," and regards living species to be inferior to auto-machines (aka herself). Gray Voice, her Chozo subordinate, betrays her and then calls her out on this, stating that Mother Brain is in fact jealous of living species because they could potentially supplant her as builders of a new era, and that she is most afraid of Samus Aran being the Chozo's real legacy rather than her.
• My-Otome: The Faux Affably Evil Big Bad Duke Nagi's stated goal is to bring an end to the Otome system that enforces Combat by Champion and sends powerful warriors off to their deaths, also killing their leaders if they lose and potentially destabilizing nations. He enforces this by mass-depowering all of the Otomes, leaving them and the rest of the world defenseless so he and the terrorist group Schwarz can subjugate them with their extradimensional alien Slave army. And not only do his plans involve mass-murder, but he later reveals that he feels it's wrong for the Otome to feel all the burdens of war because he thinks everyone should feel it, especially the common people since he feels they want it the most. Except he doesn't think he should suffer for desiring war.
• Naruto: Danzo Shimura is an interesting case. He wants what's best for the Leaf Village... so long as it ends up with him being in charge of everything. His backstory reveal also implies that the primary motivation for his actions and deeds is a sense of inferiority and jealousy towards Hiruzen Sarutobi rather than pragmatism and patriotism like he's first portrayed as. He straddles the line between this and a proper Well-Intentioned Extremist, because while he does have the strong convictions of a Well-Intentioned Extremist, said convictions are built on the core of a frustrated man that could never get over the fact that he didn't measure up to his more popular friend in the eyes of the public, taking the extreme measures he did because his rival wouldn't, to show he wasn't 'soft' like Sarutobi Hiruzen, never mind the fact that in his prime, the Third Hokage was considered one of the most powerful ninja in the world, and had no qualms about sending genin aged Child Soldiers during the Third Ninja war, as shown in Kakashi Gaiden.
• One Piece:
  • CP9 are a secret black ops agency tasked with the assassination of anyone who threatens (or just annoys) the World Government, in the name of "justice" at any cost. However, it's made clear that most of its members (especially Rob Lucci) don't really care about any of that, and are just in it for the permission to kill people freely, while even the chief simply wants to increase his status, no matter how many people die because of it.
  • The heads of the Government itself, the Five Elders, also qualify. While on the surface their extreme actions could be seen as them protecting order in the world, numerous instances like Flevance and the cover up of the Impel Down prison break shows they are willing to put those same citizens they are supposed to protect in harm's way out of greed or preventing their reputation and image from being shattered. With the reveal of Imu, it shows them being Co-Dragons to an Ancient Conspiracy that is willing to exact a purge towards anyone who could be perceived as a threat to the world government's power. They also downright enforce the slavery and racism in the system because they think some races deserve only enslavement because they are a sin against the world.
• Project A-Ko: In Uncivil Wars, Lady Xena created a cult and told her followers that she wants to destroy all universes because they are full of suffering and corruption, and by doing so, they may create a pure universe where everyone's souls can reincarnate and live in harmony. They all believe it, except not only does she take clear pleasure in mass-murder when she does finally start blowing up planets and fleets, and abandon most of her followers to die near the end, but she reveals to A-ko and B-ko in the final battle that her real motive is to become the supreme god of her new universe, meaning all her good intentions were lies.
• Promare: Kray Foresight's plan to enslave the Burnish for fuel and sacrifice most of humanity is ultimately just to serve his ego. Lampshaded by several characters in the film who note the resources put towards migration would be better served to stabilize the Earth's core. The excuses he gives, such as that it would be too hot to freeze the excess heat of the core or that the Burnish are a threat because most have no control over their powers, are rendered moot by the revelation he himself is a Burnish with full control and simply has no intention of finding a solution that would benefit anyone but himself.
• Psycho-Pass: Shogo Makishima, one of the villains of Season 1, claims to be trying to dismantle the corrupt Sibyl System so that humanity can choose how to live their own lives, but in reality he just wants to see humanity give into their most primitive impulses.
• Puella Magi Madoka Magica:
  • The cause of the series conflict is an alien Hive Mind in the form of the Incubators who manipulate and destroy humans, especially young girls, in order to harvest the energy of their negative emotions and use it to prevent the end of the universe. It would qualify as working for The Needs of the Many if they weren't willing to sacrifice every other living thing in the universe to do so, effectively leaving themselves as the sole beneficiaries of all their actions. And because they're a Hive Mind, their whole argument boils down to "I am many, so my needs comes before everyone else's". Then in Rebellion, they try to rewrite reality once again to make all this suffering exist once more, not because of any true necessity for the survival of the universe, but merely because they see wasted potential in the energy that is used. Ultimately, they are mass-producers who only care about numbers as ends to themselves and are immensely greedy and impossible to satisfy. Unsurprising, considering the complete of Lack of Empathy and lack of value towards any life other their own, which was the reason for their actions to begin with. They had cosmic powers and they could have chosen on their own to make someone wish about a better reality and yet they never looked into it, never really cared about alternate solutions.
  • In the anime adaptation of Magia Record: Puella Magi Madoka Magica Side Story, Alina Gray is a rare straightforward example of this in the franchise, in contrast to the genuinely well-intentioned antagonists and her game counterpart. Despite being the one who created the Doppel barrier as part of the Magius' mission to stop the Incubators' aforementioned scheme for the sake of protecting her fellow Magical Girls, she is in reality not a genuine believer in such goals and in the finale has no qualms about trying to turn all humanity and Magical Girls into Witches for no reason other than her own artistic vision.
• Radiant: Captain Konrad de Marbourg wants all immigrants dead claiming they "soil" Rumble Town. The fact that he has no problem killing those who are native to the town undercuts his claims however and that he is nothing more than a xenophobic monster.
• Revolutionary Girl Utena: As "End of the World", Akio Ohtori runs the Rose Duels, where the Rose Bride Anthy is the glorified slave to both him and the winner. Near the Grand Finale, he claims that it's so someone noble can open the Rose Gate for him to free her with the Power of Dios. However, he's nothing more than a selfish manipulator in Prince Charming's clothing who wants to physically, mentally, and sexually dominate everyone, having no qualms about letting her stay his Silent Scapegoat forever just so he can escape the agony of getting stabbed by the countless Swords of Hate.
• Rosario + Vampire:
  • Fairy Tale repeatedly claim that they want to make a world for monster equality and that Humans Are the Real Monsters, but it's clear from their willingness to oppress and kill their fellow monsters that they only want equality and power for themselves.
  • Gyokuro Shuzen, one of the heads of Fairy Tale, is the most blatant example. Despite all her claims of fighting for monster equality, Gyokuro only cares about herself and what she wants, which is mostly just power for the sake of having it, and everyone, her henchmen, friends, family, and lovers included, are nothing but stepping stones to that goal. Also, everything she does is motivated by her petty jealousy of Akasha Bloodriver, her husband's mistress, because Issa paid more attention to Akasha than her; in fact, her plan to Kill All Humans is solely because Akasha dreamed of human/monster co-existence.
  • Kuyou constantly goes on about how everything he does is for the sake of justice and that Humans Are the Real Monsters, but it falls flat considering that he abused his authority as the head of the Security Committee to make everyone else at Yokai Academy miserable, and the fact that he barely needs any provocation to burn someone alive, human or monster. Fittingly, in Season II of the manga, it turns out that he was a member of Fairy Tale all along.
• Sailor Moon: The 1990s anime gives the Black Moon Clan more sympathetic motives for their actions, though the same cannot be said for Wiseman. Unlike the rest of the clan, who want to rewrite time to make a world they can call home, he retains his manga counterpart's plans of manipulating them so that he can destroy all life in the universe.
• SPY×FAMILY: Keith Kepler claims his terrorism and warmongering against Westalis is for the sake of Ostania as a country, but he doesn't care about Ostanians as people and only cares about satisfying his bloodlust towards Westalis. He doesn't care that his bombs will kill Ostanian citizens nor that a war would bring them untold suffering and death.
• Strider: Vice-Director Matic tried to force Hiryu to kill his friend Cain with the threat of killing innocent civilians if he refused. Supposedly this was for the good of the Striders, while at the same time Matic was in league with Enterprise, the creator of the ZAIN Project. As it turns out however, Matic planned for the death of Enterprise President Clay at Hiryu's hands so he can take over the ZAIN Project, while also intending to to keep his grip on the Striders so he can set his plans for global domination in motion. It's also implied he had a hand in the brainwashing of Hiryu's late sister Mariya and Hiryu's friend Cain, both of them being Striders themselves.
• The two main members of the Big Bad Ensemble in Tokyo Ghoul rally their followers under protecting ghouls and humans respectively, and ending the Forever War between the two while destroying the Government Conspiracy responsible, but in truth, they only want to do this for the sake of revenge against the people they blame for their respective bad childhoods:
  • In the original series, the One-Eyed Owl/Eto Yoshimura is the leader of the Anti-Human Alliance Aogiri Tree, and unites the ghouls working under him with his promise to create a world without human prejudice against ghouls, in addition to the real goal to end the Forever War between humans and ghouls. However, he performs several actions that contradict this goal. In addition to masterminding attacks on innocent humans just for being human, he orders Yamori to attack the Anteiku coffee shop, which is full of peaceful ghouls, and capture half-ghoul Kaneki to put him through Cold-Blooded Torture, and in addition he has worked alongside feared ghoul-killer Kishou Arima and deranged human Mad Scientist Akihiro Kanou, used them to victimize many innocent ghouls as well, and has no problem manipulating fellow ghouls. But the moment that really makes it clear he is this is when she, upon finally meeting her father who was nothing but kind toward ghouls and loved her with all his heart, hands him over to Dr Kanou to perform horrifying experiments on him. Despite claiming to want freedom and happiness for ghouls, the Owl simply hates the world and wants to burn down human society, and will step on human and ghoul alike to do so. Ironically, Arima himself is more of a genuine Well-Intentioned Extremist, since he cares nothing for revenge but truly believes in his cause.
  • Kichimura Wasshu in :re, backstabber and manipulator who gleefully engineers anti-ghoul atrocities (especially once he takes over the CCG), and psychologically tortures Kaneki to turn him into the Dragon, claims to be doing it all to protect humanity from ghouls and bring about Super Peace (which turns out to mean he also wants to end the Forever War by hijacking the Government Conspiracy and uniting humans and ghouls against the Dragon). However, he manipulates and kills his fellow humans just as much, works with the Pierrot Gang and Ghoul Restaurant to victimize innocent humans, and cooks the book editor of his Arch-Enemy Eto into a bento box just to spite her. He also claims to be doing this out of love for Rize Kamishiro and to give her a better world, but he also hands her over to Kanou to do experiments on her, wants to rape her and make her his alone, and is willing to turn her into the core of the Dragon. Kichimura, like the Owl, claims to have eternal peace as his end goal, but is more concerned with vengeance on Chairman Tsuneyoshi, his abusive father.
• Tweeny Witches: Grande plans to destroy the Human Realm with the forbidden dark magic, claiming that it's so the warlocks can escape the eventual destruction of the Magical Realm. In practice, he not only oppresses the wizards, the other faction of his people, for preferring magic to technology, but he wages war against the witches as well, unwilling to let both share his world. His Establishing Character Moment even has him swallowing his Honest Advisor whole in front of the latter's son, Sigma, simply for opposing his Evil Plan. Furthermore, "Light Magic" reveals that his real goal is to make a new world so he can rule it by any means necessary, including — as stated in Japanese — driving people to despair with dark magic.
• Yatterman Night: Lord Yatterman initially appears to be a Knight Templar who wants to keep his kingdom happy and prevent the rise of another evil like Dokurobey, the leader of the original Doronbo Gang who wiped out much of the Earth. To this end, he exiled Dokurobey's harmless minions and left them to starve, then sets about trying to kill the New Doronbo Gang and any innocents in the way. But it is shown his kingdom enslaves its citizens and forces them to be happy doing hard labor, making him look more like a power-hungry tyrant hiding behind a heroic image. Which is confirmed when he is revealed to be Dokurobey himself, who exiled his minions to punish them for failing him and only wanted to tarnish the original Yatterman's image as revenge.
• Yu-Gi-Oh!
  • Yu-Gi-Oh! 5Ds: Divine/Sayer started the Arcadia Movement in order to gather all psychic duelists under his banner and oppose those who oppress them. However, he performs deadly experiments on psychics and brainwashes the strongest psychics into becoming Ax-Crazy footsoldiers. He later admits that he only sees his fellow psychics as pawns for world domination and doesn't care about uplifting them.
  • Mr. Heartland in Yu-Gi-Oh! ZEXAL goes so far as to quote the Bernard of Clairvaux's quote (given on the page for Well-Intentioned Extremist) nearly word-for-word before his duel with Kaito in the second season (cut from the dub); however, given his actions, it's very hard to believe he has any intentions for what he does - committing acts of genocide against the Astral World in the service of the Big Bad - except greed.
  • Yu-Gi-Oh! VRAINS: Lightning claims that humanity will destroy the Ignis, which is why he wants Bohman to assimilate the Ignis and take control of humanity in order to prevent future conflict. While he has a point that humanity will seek conflict with the Ignis, it's also clear that he doesn't truly care about the other Ignis, since he destroys their home and has them assimilated against their will. During their duel, Revolver reveals that Lightning harbors an inferiority complex about being the only Ignis who cannot coexist with humanity. Lightning's true goal is to have himself and his siblings become a part of Bohman so that he can be considered successful by proxy and not have to acknowledge his flaws.

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