Basic Trope: A bad guy considers another bad guy a poor excuse for a villain and establishes themselves as a more worthy Big Bad by defeating the other.
- Straight:
- Brute considers Brains a poor excuse for a villain because he simply wants to take over the city instead of destroying it. So, she handily beats him in a sword fight.
- A Big Bad Wannabe gets a good dressing-down from the real Big Bad.
- Exaggerated:
- The School Bully gets ruthlessly killed by the sociopathic Serial Killer, but not before getting a verbal beatdown.
- Brute considers Brains to be in league with the heroes because he doesn't constantly torture, rape and murder everything in sight like he does. So she destroys his planet.
- Downplayed: Bob The Bully and Alice the Delinquent get into a verbal fight about who's the tougher street thug, with Bob just barely managing to come out ahead.
- Justified: Brute's boasts about Brains stack up, but only because Brains sees no practical use in being such a wantonly evil baddie. Brute beats him because she views him as a genuine threat to her plan.
- Inverted:
- A villain with standards or a practitioner of Pragmatic Villainy believes it's their personal code of ethics or their ability to get away with their bad deeds that makes them a better villain than another.
- More Hero than Thou
- Brute and Brains greatly respect each other’s different styles of villainy. They form a functional Big Bad Duumvirate and Villainous Friendship.
- A Lighter Shade of Black
- Subverted: Brute dismisses Brains as an excuse for a villain and plans to kill him the next time they meet. However, Brute never gets the chance, as Brains is killed in a police raid organized by the heroes.
- Double Subverted: It's later revealed that Brute orchestrated the raid to take out Brains, having her Dirty Cop minion taunt the dying Brains, thus fully establishing her status as the Big Bad.
- Parodied: Brute considers herself a far worse villain than Brains, but her "villainy" amounts to inconveniencing people on their workdays. Her attempts to oust them consist of whoopie cushions and fake poo.
- Zig-Zagged: Brute and Brains are both Professional Killers, but Brains looks down on Brute and often lambasts him as an insult to their profession. Why? Because Brains is a Consummate Professional who prides himself on completing his jobs quickly, efficiently, and getting away with it; Brute, by contrast, is a Stupid Evil Psycho for Hire who prioritizes enjoying his jobs over actually completing them and sabotages his own jobs because he thinks it's funny. As far as Brains is concerned, if you're going to be a professional assassin, you should do it properly.
- Averted:
- In the event that two villains meet, they don't care about each other either way, let alone who's more evil than the other.
- There's only one villain in the story.
- Enforced:
- A show has been bouncing back and forth between plotlines involving Brute and Brains, who may not even know about each other. However, the producers want to move on to a new plotline with completely separate and all-new villain, Bill so they bring Brute and Brains into conflict, and Brute out-evils Brains, whose defeat clears the way for Bill.
- A studio head wants the popular Anti-Villain Brute to pull a Heel–Face Turn due to popular demand. As such writers introduce Brains, disgusting Brute so much that she disavows all evil and joins the good guys.
- Lampshaded: Jack the Hero comments that Brains the Evil Overlord and Brute the Omnicidal Maniac are in a struggle to prove they have the superior brand of evil. He wonders who will take the other out first.
- Invoked: Brains intentionally provokes Brute into a fight he knows he can win to gain reputation.
- Exploited: In a work with multiple recurring villains, starting off Brains knows he’s seen as insignificant. So, he invokes this trope over and over again until he’s established a reputation as the Big Bad which he’ll use to demand respect and obedience from the other villains.
- Defied: Brains, in conflict with Brute, avoids declaring himself a greater evil than Brute or taking her out because it doesn't really matter who’s more evil to him and it will only either poison people against him or bring The Hero's wrath down upon him. He simply lets the Brute draw everyone’s attention and fear.
- Implied: Brute is the Big Bad, no questions. No one dares rival her considering what happened to the last guy who tried.
- Discussed: "Hmm. I know they're both villains, but I think Brute is way eviler than Brains. If they ever get fight, she would not hesitate to take him out."
- Conversed: "2 unrelated bad guys? Yeah no. I’ve read enough comics to know that if you give it enough time these guys are going to be at each other’s throats to prove who’s worse. And there can only be one Big Bad"
- Deconstructed:
- Brute kills Brains in a spectacularly horrific display of evil, proving herself to be the baddest of the bad. However, this makes her public enemy number one and puts her on the radar of heroes who are way out of her weight class. She’s taken out in a matter of hours.
- Or rather....Brains kills Brute through a equally horrifying display of evil that most of the heroes REFUSED to go near him, leaving him in a blacklisted state(with the heroes either giving up the capes or traumatized for life...even to the point of hanging or shooting themselves...what's more, several of Brains' former allies are disgusted and voted to kick him out of future and current groups...even to the suggestion of lobotomizing him or locking him up...which turned the former mad scientist...into a cowardly shell who's ALWAYS alone and on the run...forever...and ever...and ever.
- Brute and Brains waste so much time, effort, and resources trying to fight each other, they leave themselves vulnerable to attacks from the heroes.
- Brains somehow survives the conflict, and an Enemy Mine ensues.
- Reconstructed:
- Brains knew Brute was going to kill him and fakes his own brutal death knowing this will draw all the attention of the heroes to Brute. Brains taunts the imprisoned Brute and goes on to continue his evil plans in the cover of shadow.
- Brains and Brute realized that despite all their fighting....that they never hated each other...and want to share the power...or lose the lifestyle...thus both Brain and Brute hang up their identities or "aid" the heroes from the shadows as a normal couple...I guess.
- Brains and Brute work together to spread their evil, if only out of sharing a single mutual heinousness.
- Played For Laughs: The Rogues Gallery led by Brute kidnaps the heroes and puts them on trial, already planning to declare them guilty, until Brains suddenly comes to the heroes' aid. Planning show up the other villains by acting as the defense lawyer.
Back to Eviler than Thou.
