Basic Trope: An authority figure who is hated by all of their subjects/subordinates and somehow retains their power even though no one likes working for them.
- Straight: Emperor Evulz is hated by every single citizen of his Empire, as well as his ministers and underlings.
- Exaggerated: Evulz is not only hated by the people, but every living being that lives under his rule—including insects, plants, and bacteria.
- Downplayed: While most of the citizens hate Evulz for his dictatorial leadership, those who know him personally are more or less fine with him.
- Justified:
- Evulz regularly abuses his underlings and kills those who displeases him, or simply because he's in a bad mood. He never gives anyone a reason to like him, so nobody does.
- Evulz is an Authority in Name Only with a huge ego, so when he tries to leverage his "position", people just think he's annoying.
- Inverted: Universally Beloved Leader
- Subverted:
- Some of those who expressed discontent with Evulz are only pretending in order to weed out dissenters. Those few subordinates are completely loyal to Evulz and are willing to die for him.
- Most of the citizens are xenophobic and hate Evulz simply because he is not from the bloodline of the Founder of the Kingdom. Those who are less prejudiced about heritage are fine with him.
- Double Subverted:
- The "loyalists" were kidnapped and brainwashed test subjects, and once they are freed from his control, they hate him even more than everyone else does.
- Until Evulz introduces a particuarly terrible law that alienates the people who were once willing to accept him, causing him to be truly hated by everyone in his Empire.
- Parodied: Evulz regularly conducts a popularity poll on himself, and always receives a negative score. He tries to remedy this by implementing even more outrageously terrible policies drawn straight out from the "Terrible Ruling Advice" handbook, which inevitably causes his popularity to plummet further. Rinse, lather, repeat.
- Zig Zagged: Evulz constantly changes his laws on a whim. Most of the laws he introduce are horrible, which enrages the people and provoke their hatred. Then, fearing an uprising, he abolishes his more unpopular laws or introduce new ones that would pacify the people. And it works, until he introduces another terrible policy that riles up everyone again.
- Averted: Evulz has an average approval rating.
- Enforced: "Evulz is too sympathetic. Surely if I say everyone else hates him, the audience will too."
- Lampshaded:
- "WHY DOES EVERYBODY HATE ME SO MUCH?!"
- "It is better to be feared than loved. Just as well, as it is apparently a bit much to ask people to love me..."
- "The greatness of a man is measured by the hatred of his foes. As you can no doubt tell, I am a very great man."
- Invoked:
- Zero-Approval Gambit
- Evilz believes Bad Is Good and Good Is Bad, and spends vast amounts of money "Disimproving" his image.
- Exploited:
- General Cruel decides that now is the most appropriate time to stage a coup d'etat. Not only is nobody willing to defend Evulz, General Cruel gets a parade and that day is now National Liberation Day.
- Zero-Approval Gambit by Evulz.
- Same as above but by Evulz is exploiting his None-Approval rating with the Power Of Hate to power-up himself or some machine.
- Bob manages to infiltrate Evulz's minion army by complaining about their boss, allowing him to find common ground.
- Big Bad Ensemble member Lord Reptilian uses the hatred against Evulz to earn the support of the public.
- Defied:
- Evulz decides to change his image, usually via Heel–Face Turn, so his people can like him.
- No matter what Evulz does, he will never have a zero-percent approval. Maybe it's a point-two percent, about 200 truly loathsome and deluded fanatics who will die on this hill (in every way of the term) as the other 99.8 gang up on them, but a true-blue zero percent is literally impossible.
- Discussed: "It may be better to be feared than loved, but it's definitely not pleasant. I do not envy that man."
- Conversed: "Somehow I doubt Evulz could ever maintain his rule...particularly when EVERYONE he knows despises him."
- Deconstructed: Due to his unpopularity, Evulz is unable to exercise is authority to its fullest extent. His subjects flee from the country whenever they find the opportunity to do so, and his underlings frequently sabotage his orders out of spite. The country suffers a rapid economic decline, resulting in numerous riots and civil unrest. When disaster strikes the land, the foreign countries are unwilling to send aid, and the Empire eventually collapses on itself.
- Reconstructed: Evulz is such an effective ruler precisely because he doesn't care about the masses' opinion on him, and he is able to dedicate all of his time and resources to his goals and visions without getting sidetracked by the need to superficially build up good publicity. He is such a powerful Sorcerous Overlord that the displeased subjects can't do anything to him anyway.
- Played For Laughs: Evulz is a Butt-Monkey, and his citizens and underlings insult him at every opportunity, causing him to sulk in the Corner of Woe.
Back to 0% Approval Rating. God knows why, nobody likes them.
