Sandbox / The Venture Bros. The Guild

Main Character Index | Team Venture | The OSI | Venture Allies | The Monarch And Cohorts | The Guild of Calamitous Intent | Others

Characters from The Venture Brothers. This page is for leaders, members, and associates of the Guild of Calamitous Intent.

Due to the sheer number of Walking and Late Arrival Spoilers (including some characters' placement and, in a few cases, their very name), Spoilers Are Off for these pages. You have been warned.

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The Guild in General

The Guild of Calamitous Intent

Hate you can trust.

A union and governing body for the world's supervillains, the Guild of Calamitous Intent enforces strict rules and regulations on its membership, matching them with appropriately "arches" to limit casualties on either side, while providing a relatively safe means to exercise their villainy. Historically, they've been led by a chief villain designated "The Sovereign" who is served by a Council of 13.

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• 13 Is Unlucky: Invoked with their ruling body, the Council of 13, specifically for the number's connotations of being unlucky since it's associated with a guild of villains. As it turns out, this was something instituted by the latest Sovereign and the actual bylaws don't specify a required number. Considering the most recent Sovereign was The Starscream, prone to Chronic Backstabbing Disorder, and happy to betray the entire Guild to get out of a Deal with the Devil, the number's connotation remains meaningful.
• Affably Evil: The vast majority of Guild members seen, including leadership, are rather friendly and tend to treat arching as a sort of "day job" while genuinely enjoying hanging out with each other "outside of work". (The Monarch with his genuine hatred for Dr. Venture comes across as a full blown outlier, and even he will still attend Guild parties and functions.) It is important to remember not to piss them off, however, as these guys are still supervillains.
• Animal Assassin: As seen in season seven, they have an entire department dedicated to training these for villains to use. (In that case, however, they've escaped and apparently killed their handler.)
• Ape Shall Never Kill Ape: One of the Guild's most sacred rules is that a villain can't kill another villain. It's highly logical, given that the Guild is essentially a union for villains and having their members killing each other would be bad for business. When one villain does need to go after another, it's usually done quietly (like Phantom Limb and Brock's team-up against the Monarch in "Hate Floats") or in blatant disregard of Guild rules (like Phantom Limb's attack on the Monarch's wedding in "Showdown at Cremation Creek").
• Arch-Enemy: They are responsible for officially assigning "sanctioned" arches to their membership. As the Monarch finds out repeatedly to his frustration, a genuine hatred for your arch enemy is not a requirement.
• Beware the Silly Ones: The Guild is the organizational embodiment of this. As Brock notes, take away the spandex and rules keeping everything in check, and you have a group of super-rich nutjobs with death rays and private armies at their command. The O.S.I. and "protagonists" they protect go along with the "cat and also cat" game because it's less destructive than letting the villains run amok.
• Big Bad Duumvirate: After the death of the Sovereign in "All This and Gargantua-2", the remaining Council of 13 members fill the Guild power vacuum in this fashion. The council was previously secondary to the Sovereign.
• Bond Villain Stupidity: Something they Enforce on their members. Just outright executing their arches is highly frowned upon (as the Monarch learns during season three while antagonizing "arches" other than Dr. Venture), but if you can kill them with convoluted Death Traps and classically Evil Plans? That's perfectly fine, since the "protagonists" have a chance to fight back. And it all needs to happen within the bounds of "equally matched aggression". If they don't, for example, use guns, then neither can you. (This is why the Monarch's henchmen are armed with dart guns when, at least early in the series, he could afford something much stronger.) However, Heroes also have to adhere to this if they don't want to piss off the Guild, which is described as a powder keg of psychos who like playing these games but have access to far, far worse.
• Bribing Your Way to Victory: The Guild collects "dues" from members to fund itself just like a union and is stated to also take generous cuts from the crimes of its affiliated villains, with various incentives put in place to encourage its members to earn more for them.
• Card-Carrying Villain: Zig-Zagged. The Guild is a Weird Trade Union/Nebulous Evil Organization for supervillains that might otherwise wreak havoc on a whim, but it resents its members being referred to as "villains" by the O.S.I., preferring the term "antagonist." Internally, however, they embrace the label and generally encourage villainous behavior among their members, within reason. They also usually act genuinely chummy with each other (and sometimes even their "protagonists") while "off the clock".
• Chronic Backstabbing Disorder: Zig-zagged. The Guild has laws against villains outright murdering other villains as the retaliations and infighting would cripple the organization. But non-lethal methods of backstabbing, such as legal trickery, frame jobs, and exploiting loopholes within the system are not only allowed but encouraged among members.
• Contractual Genre Blindness: Simultanteously enforced and inverted. For the most part, the Guild literally requires this from their villains. They operate in a very bureaucratic manner and thus have various codes and guidelines on how villains must act that closely follow classic cliches and Villain Tropes. For example, walking up and just shooting your arch is heavily frowned upon. However, if you stick him in a classic Death Trap and he fails to escape, you're off the hook (and even gain some renown in the villain world).On the other hand, they expect their heroic counterparts to act in good faith, and when a protagonist oversteps, the retribution can be quite brutal.
• Drugs Are Bad: One of the conditions in the deals they've made with various government agencies is that their members are not allowed to deal in illegal narcotics. When Dr. Z is arrested in Singapore for possession of cocaine, the rest of the Guild leaves him to escape prison on his own due to the nature of the crime he was arrested for.
• Elite Mooks: The "Strangers" are the Guild's equivalent of an individual villain's Mook henchmen and are far more effective. Even Brock admits that they "may not make it out this time" when he realizes he's up against them rather than usual henchmen rabble. He still kills plenty throughout the series, though.
• Enemy Civil War: During "All This and Gargantua-2", the Sovereign kills most of the council and enacts a plan to destroy the Gargantua-2 space station, hoping to kill the Investors before they can collect on his deal with them while leaving the Guild to foot the blame. The remnants of the Council and other "Guild Resistance" fight him to stop him. Recovering from this is one of the main plot points of the Guild in seasons six and seven.
• Equal-Opportunity Evil: The Guild is open to seemingly anyone interested in being a villain. Men and women are seen throughout it's ranks, it includes people of color (and "people of color"), and is particularly open to victims of For Science! gone awry who are now Ambiguously Human at best. Given the flashback to Dr. Mrs. the Monarch's failed solo career in "Shadowman 9" and the rather sexist alternatives offered by the Guild, it may be Downplayed for female villains, further supported by there only being one woman on the initial Council of 13.
• Even Evil Has Standards: Enforced by the Guild on its membership. They have numerous bylaws dictating the treatment of prisoners (notably "Rusty's Law", which forces villains to release hostages who have untreated injuries), as well as requiring the release of prisoners when a ransom has been paid "in good faith", and enforces things like Contractual Genre Blindness so that villains can't just walk right up and execute their "arches". It's less about having actual "standards" and more in place to avoid outright war with the O.S.I., who is willing to play along with the Guild's "cops and robbers" game to keep them from doing far worse.
• Evil Power Vacuum: The deaths of the Sovereign, most of the old Council of 13, and the Investors effectively cripple the Guild, forcing it to regroup and make concessions to certain key members (like Wide Wale) to avoid fracturing entirely while also letting the Peril Partnership think that they can muscle in on the Guild's turf. Getting past this is the main focus of Dr. Mrs. the Monarch's season 6 and 7's plotlines.
• The Fettered: The Guild and its villains could be far more destructive than they currently are, but have put rules in place restricting what they're allowed to do while "arching" to avoid an Escalating War with the O.S.I.
• Insistent Terminology: The Guild prefers the terms "Antagonist" and "Protagonist" over "Villains" and "Heroes", or "bad guys" and "good guys", respectively. They will call themselves villains without concern, but chastise any outsiders who do it.
• Interservice Rivalry:
  • After a long, bloody history with the O.S.I., they and the Guild eventually worked out a begrudging peace between them, having agreed to a long series of interagency agreements and amendments to control the classic narrative of "protagonist vs. antagonist" between their members, thus organizing the havoc and mayhem their antics cause into a controlled system.
  • In "Arrears of Science", it is revealed that the Guild framed fellow supervillain organization SPHINX for the "death" of Jonas Venture so that O.S.I. would step in and eliminate them, thus leaving the Guild with a monopoly on villainous activity.
• A Lighter Shade of Black: A big reason why the O.S.I. tolerates them is that the Guild puts careful restrictions on supervillainy and cracks down hard on rulebreakers. Without the Guild, the world would be left with a bunch of aimless lunatics running around in laser-eyed octopus tanks wreaking havoc.
• Milkman Conspiracy: Inverted. The villainous version of the Guild was "founded" by Fantomas when he kidnapped and imprisoned (and sometimes faked the demises of) various musicians to fulfill his mad dream of fronting a "rock and roll orchestra" with his sousaphone. From there, the likes of Dragoon and Red Mantle stuck around and used their newfound anonymity as dead men and Fantomas' leftover resources to form a supervillain criminal cabal.
• Mooks: The Guild maintains "Blackout" teams of assassins who also act as guards or muscle. While more effective than the regular henchman of say, the Monarch, they still tend to die fairly easily.
  Dragoon: Dangerous idiots. They don't even make minimum wage.
• My Rules Are Not Your Rules: Naturally, their system is heavily biased towards the prosperity and protection of villains. For example, the Monarch gets away with killing several of the "super-scientist" arches the Guild tried to set him up with (while Rusty was assigned to Sgt. Hatred) and gets nothing more than a slap on the wrist.
• Nebulous Evil Organization: They are essentially a Weird Trade Union organization for super villains. They encourage their membership to "arch" heroes, steal, and murder... within the bounds of their strict rules to keep things from going too far. It's important to remember, for as ridiculous as they are, they are still a dangerous criminal organization.
• No Delays for the Wicked: Subverted and Deconstructed. The Guild of Calamitous Intent's labyrinthine rules for "arching" are designed to reign in the villains under their purview. New members aren't allowed to select their own arches (unless you bribe them), there is endless red tape and "hoops to jump through" for villains trying to move around in the Guild ranks, and their leadership is so hidebound that they follow their rules to a self-destructive "tee". The Monarch constantly bristles at the rules and lampshades how nonsensical much of it is. Come the "All This and Gargantua-2" pre-season six special, Dr. Killinger recognizes these flaws and, through a complex Gambit Pileup, clears out much of the old leadership and paves the way for a renewed Guild with fresh leadership... while still preventing the Monarch from rising in the ranks or getting to officially arch Rusty.
• Not-So-Harmless Villain: As a whole, the Guild is made up of costumed supervillains running around "arching" assorted heroes, which the O.S.I tolerates because the Guild puts strict rules on what the villains can actually do. Without an outlet for them to do so, they would be a bunch of pissed-off nutjobs with superpowers, exotic weapons, and henchmen armies with no compunction against causing massive collateral damage. Even despite being played for laughs in later seasons, they are still shown to be highly competent. Examples include having a high-ranked mole within the O.S.I before they were well known; having a super-majority stake in villainy before season six; and manipulating the O.S.I. into believing SPHINX was responsible for the Movie Night Massacre, effectively eliminating their main competition cleanly while removing blame from them.
• The Omniscient Council of Vagueness: The Council of 13, which for the first five seasons (and implied to be for decades prior) serves as a council to the Guild-leading Sovereign. They can somehow produce video of nearly any event dating back to at least as far as the Monarch's henchman days. After the Sovereign is killed in "All This and Gargantua-2", the Council, with significant new membership, takes over as Guild leaders. They downplay the trope by this point however, coming across as much less "omniscient" and less "vague", even appearing in person before their assembled membership at several meetings.
• The Order: The Guild adopts the trappings of a chivalric order as part of its mystique, including the presence of a "sovereign" at least until "All This and Gargantua-2", robes, and swords in their rituals. They generally embrace more antiquated aesthetics in contrast to the futuristic military aesthetic of the O.S.I. They also trace their origin back to Late Antiquity, claiming the real-life Gothic warlords Saphrax and Alatheus as the first supervillain and first henchman, respectively, while the modern Guild itself has existed since at least the Victorian Era.
• Power Level: Guild Members are measured on an "Equally Matched Aggression" ranking system — a "1-10" scale that serves as a rough estimate of their threat level (a combination of personal threat and resources at their disposal) as well as aggression (meaning dangerous but inactive figures can get lower rankings) and is meant to ensure that villains find a nemesis of equal footing and don't get themselves or their enemies killed in a one-sided battle. Even then the system can be easily gamed by either dangerous individuals deliberately avoiding conflict to lower their ranking or less dangerous ones simply doing menial jobs (like tutoring other villains) and/or bribing the Guild to move up.
• Pragmatic Villainy: They are a dangerous organization of supervillains but every one of their regulations is a compromise with the O.S.I. so they can keep committing evil, and at the same time keep their members safe, without the risk of escalating aggression into an all-out war.
• Punch-Clock Villain: Given the nature of the Guild, it operates less like a Legion of Doom out for world conquest and more like a business providing for super-criminals in an international cops-and-robbers game, working with O.S.I. to keep the classic "heroes vs. villains" narrative balanced and safe for the participants (or at least as safe as such a life can be).
• Rape Is a Special Kind of Evil: One of the forms of protection that the Guild supposedly guarantees to those who fight their members is that villains affiliated with them will not engage in untoward sexual behavior to heroes they have at their mercy. Subverted in that Sgt. Hatred managed to get away with touching Hank and Dean inappropriately after he got them drunk from a bit of wine, in addition to being a well-known pedophile by the O.S.I. and the Guild. King Gorilla was also a known rapist before prison, but remains in standing with the Guild. It seems the Guild will prevent rape between villain and hero, but don't care about civilians unless it publicly embarrasses the brand.
• Super Registration Act: They function as a version of this for supervillains. They frown upon "unsanctioned" villains and are known to either try to recruit them, or have them killed. This is in large part pragmatic on the part of the Guild, as members pay dues and are obligated to follow Guild regulations to avoid the wrath of the O.S.I., which unregistered villains are not. There are a few other such organizations as well (like the Canadian-based Peril Partnership) but the Guild doesn't have much respect for them.
• Technical Euphemism: The members of the Guild of Calamitous Intent hate the terms "good guy" and "bad guy", and would rather say "protagonist" and "antagonist" instead. (Still, they have no issue with calling themselves "villains" and most even take pride in that fact).
• Thou Shalt Not Kill: Downplayed in that the Guild discourages their villains from outright killing their assigned "arches", but even when they do, punishment amounts to little more than a slap on the wrist. (The Monarch, for example, killing five straight non-Rusty arches during season three just gets him chewed out.) They are also strongly against villains killing other villains, which is more pragmatic than anything as, being essentially a union for villains, members killing other members only hurts the organization.
• Unions Suck: Throughout the series, the Guild is a Weird Trade Union for supervillains. As one might expect from a villainous union, they are not depicted in a flattering light. There's corruption (Guild members taking bribes to bend its rules, falsifying the details of a "protagonist" death in order to live off of "arching insurance"), power struggles (the current Sovereign got the position by performing a Klingon Promotion, then Phantom Limb tries to pull The Starscream on him), an ossified and hidebound power structure (the Council of 13 hasn't added a new member in decades, meaning they're all old and out of touch), and loads of bureaucratic red tape that chafes the villains, especially the Monarch, preventing them from "arching" who they want.
• Villain Decay: In the first season, Brock describes the Guild as quick, efficient, and no-nonsense. He famously calls them "the only organization [he] still respects". As we see more of the Guild's operations and leadership in the following seasons, it is shown to be almost comically incapable and filled with red tape (though the individual villains themselves can still be very dangerous). The Council of 13 bickers amongst themselves about everything, the red tape proves to be even worse than initially thought, and even their shape-shifting leader can't keep his (assumed) identity secret from his minions. There are implications during "All This and Gargantua-2" and the following seasons that the Sovereign was somewhat intentionally guiding the Guild to fall apart to get out of his deal with the Investors. Several mentions are made by characters of "Sovereign-era shenanigans" like insurance fraud and important documents going missing aiding in the deterioration.
• Weird Trade Union: While superficially wearing the trappings of a Nebulous Evil Organization, in practice, the Guild is simply one of these for supervillains and their henchmen. They pay "dues", the Guild enforces rules so that the villains aren't killing each other or encroaching on each other's territory, they negotiate with the "protagonist" O.S.I. to set these rules... all traits of real-life unions.

Original Incarnation

The Original Guild

Some members of the original Guild. From left to right: Aleister Crowley, Eugen Sandow, Col. Lloyd Venture, Samuel Clemens, Fantômas, Oscar Wilde

The Guild of Calamitous Intent was not always such. It was originally an organization of Victorian-era geniuses headed by Col. Lloyd Venture. It was Fantômas who ultimately twisted the Guild into what it is today.

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• Ancient Conspiracy: The members were apparently charged with adding their "genius" to and protecting the ORB, a device of unknown power or fuction, which goes back to at least Archimedes.
• Appropriated Appellation: The modern name of the Guild was appropriated from a statement made by Oscar Wilde urging that the Guild resist becoming power-hungry and evil.
  Oscar Wilde: For shame! This guild was founded to protect and serve humanity's best. Not to be a guild of... calamitous intent.
• Became Their Own Antithesis: Fantômas usurped the Guild leadership and remade it into the villainous organization. He also ironically renamed it after a statement Oscar Wilde made decrying the path the guild was on.
• Been There, Shaped History: Lloyd Venture was the actual first man on the moon, getting there in 1902.
• Famous Ancestor: Lloyd Venture is the is grandfather of Jonas Venture Sr., his lineage going through Rusty to Hank and Dean.
• Generation Xerox: The original Guild membership mirrors that of the current cast. Lloyd Venture and bodyguard Eugen Sandow show that the O.S.I. has constantly had a Venture protected by one of their ranks as a bodyguard. Steven Rattazzi uses his same voice for Dr. Orpheus as he does for Crowley. And Fantômas is explicitly stated to be Phantom Limb's grandfather
• Historical Domain Character: Aside from Colonel Venture, other members of the guild include occultist Aleister Crowley, authors Samuel Clemens and Oscar Wilde, and Col. Venture's bodyguard is "Father of Bodybuilding" Eugen Sandow. Their rivals include inventor Nikola Tesla and his army of Avon Ladies.
• Historical Domain Superperson: Crowley is implied to actually be magic, while the others were qualified enough in some manner of magic or science to add their "genius" to the ORB.
• Multinational Team: Includes the Americans Col. Venture and Samuel Clemens, the English Aleister Crowley, the Irish Oscar Wilde, the German Eugen Sandow, and the French Fantômas.
• No Celebrities Were Harmed: Col. Venture is based in appearance, voice, dress, and military rank on Theodore Roosevelt.
• Public Domain Character: Fantômas is the only non-original fictional character amongst the original Guild's members.
• Super Team: They're a Victorian-era "Guild" of geniuses in different fields involved in adventures like protecting the ORB from Tesla and going to the moon in 1902.

Leadership

The Sovereign

The Sovereign ("David Bowie")

Voiced by: Jackson Publick (As the Sovereign Head), James Urbaniak (As Bowie)

"Pay no attention to the handsome and ageless rock star hiding behind the couch! I am the mighty Sovereign!"

The enigmatic leader of the Guild, the Sovereign is a shapeshifter whose preferred form seems to be that of David Bowie. He usurped leadership of the Guild sometime prior to the "Pyramid Wars" in the 1980s and is known to have made vague deal with the Investors he intends to get out of...

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• Actually a Doombot: After the first several seasons imply that he really is a villainous David Bowie, it is revealed in season four that he is a shapeshifter impersonating Bowie.
• Affably Evil: He is the leader of the world's foremost supervillain organization, but always come across as a friendly/charming person (such as "giving away" Dr. Girlfriend at her wedding) and his most violent acts seen are against renegade villains/traitors like Phantom Limb. "All This and Gargantua-2" sees him finally go off the evil deep-end by killing most of the Council of 13 and blowing up Gargantua-2 to get out of his deal with the Investors, but even then, he's still his usual charming self when confronted.
• Arc Villain: In the pre-season six Extra-Long Episode "All This and Gargantua-2", attempting to blow up the eponymous space station to get out of his deal with the Investors while trying to pin responsibility on the Guild as a whole.
• Bait the Dog: Comes off just as affable and quirky as any other villain on the show despite being the head of a global evil organization. Then, in "All This and Gargantua-2", he tries to murder most of his own allies and a lot of innocent civilians just to welch out on a Deal with the Devil he made with the Investors. He even lampshades it to Dr. Mrs. the Monarch, pointing out that it's hardly a surprise that the leader of the biggest supervillain syndicate in the world would be, you know, evil.
• Card-Carrying Villain: While he's generally more Affably Evil, even he admits to being one in his own snarky way.
  Sovereign: Right, the heir to the global evil organization is a bad man, who'd've guessed? Total shocker.
• Celebrity Impersonator:
  • According to Monsroso, he isn't the real Bowie, merely a shapeshifting supervillain who uses Bowie as his favorite public persona. Though apparently the two did meet and collaborate back in the '70s (the shapeshifter posed for the cover of Diamond Dogs).
  • On a meta level, James Urbaniak (Dr. Venture, Phantom Limb, etc) voices him in "Bowie" form. According to the creators, they tried to get the real Bowie, but he declined. This is also lampshaded with an on-screen disclaimer during Sovereign's first appearance as Bowie.
• The Chessmaster: In the conflicts he has been featured in, he has demonstrated an aptitude for thinking a few steps ahead of his opposition, like using the Ventures to disprove Phantom Limb's hereditical claim to leadership of the Guild. Proves to be in over his head against the Investors and Killinger, however.
• Chronic Backstabbing Disorder:
  • He tries to pull a three-way backstab in events culminating in the pre-season six special "All This and Gargantua-2". He has most of the Guild's Council of 13 killed, promises Phantom Limb and the Revenge Society the open seats, then leaves them to die on the exploding Gargantua-2 while at the same time trying to have the Investors killed to get out of a deal he made with them. He almost gets away with it, if not for an accidental shot from Head Shot...
  • Radiant is the Blood of the Baboon Heart reveals that he personally killed and usurped the previous Sovereign, supervillain Force Majeure.
• Deadpan Snarker: Witty, deadpan retorts to the more dramatic villains around him are part of his Affably Evil charm.
  "No. Please don't activate a broken coffee mug."
  "Right, the heir to the global evil organization is a bad man, who'd've guessed? Total shocker."
• Deal with the Devil: As revealed in "All This and Gargantua-2", a deal with the Investors is what helped him rise to the position of Sovereign. The events of that Extra-Long Episode are kicked by his attempt to have them killed before they collect on their end of the deal.
• Dropped a Bridge on Him: The Sovereign is accidentally killed in his eagle form by Headshot when, after the boat the latter is on rocked by the Sovereign's base self-destructing, his rifle fires into the air.
• Everyone Calls Him "Barkeep": "Sovereign" is his title rather than his actual name, but it's also what everyone calls him aside from "David Bowie," which is his disguise.
• Faux Affably Evil: He may be pleasant and charming, but he reveals his true colors in "All This and Gargantua-2" when he tries killing off the Council of 13 to get out of a deal with the Investors and nearly kills every innocent aboard the eponymous space station, a well as most of the Council of 13, in the process.
• Frame-Up: After the "Movie Night" incident, he quickly used his powers to impersonate SPHINX Commander and pinned the entire thing on SPHINX, kicking off the Pyramid Wars and wiping out their biggest source of competition.
• From Nobody to Nightmare: Even though he's not the real David Bowie, he's still the head of a major criminal organization thanks to a deal with the Investors.
• Greater-Scope Villain: Zig-zagged. He spent most of his presence in the series as an odd mix of this and Big Good, being the leader of the most powerful global evil organization, but whose main job seems to be keeping said organization from being too evil, and only showed up in person to pull Enemy Mine situations with the heroes when one of his villains is going rogue. He swerves hard to full Big Bad when he arranges the events of "All This and Gargantua-2", though even then it's with the motivation of killing the Investors.
• Huge Holographic Head: His appearances before the Council of 13 and other Guild members take this form.
• I Just Want to Be Special: His deal with The Investors allowed him to attain the position of Sovereign. When Dr. Mrs. The Monarch calls him out as a loser who just acts like he's important, he doesn't disagree.
  Dr. Mrs. The Monarch: So, who are you really?
  Sovereign: Oh, no one. Just some bloke who wanted to be anyone but himself.
• I Just Shot Marvin in the Face: Ends up a victim of this when Headshot's rifle goes off as his hideout explodes. By some inexplicable turn of bad luck, it shoots him out of the sky while in eagle form.
• Inexplicably Awesome: Very little is known about him besides his shapeshifting powers. The pre-season six special "All This and Gargantua-2" reveals he got his powers thanks to a deal with the Investors.
• Karmic Death: As pointed out by 21, it's poetic that a chump who wanted to "be somebody" died a chump's death of accidentally being killed by Headshot in his bird form.
• Killed Off for Real: Accidentally taken out by Headshot in the climax of "All This and Gargantua-2". Later confirmed by Dr. Mrs The Monarch in "Hostile Makeover".
• Klingon Promotion: Radiant is the Blood of the Baboon Heart reveals that he killed his predecessor, Force Majeure, to take over as Guild Sovereign.
• Leitmotif: A soft rock guitar riff plays whenever he first appears and often after he shapeshifts, as well.
• Mysterious Past: Very little is known about him, including his real name. He's a shapeshifter, made a deal with the Investors to become the Sovereign, and he usurped his predecessor for that position via Klingon Promotion. That's about it.
• Nigh-Invulnerability: As seen in the "Showdown at Cremation Creek" two-parter, he can shrug off Phantom Limb's Death Touch, which has been shown capable of causing instant death. The only apparent impact it has on the Sovereign is that it forces him to cycle through shapeshifted forms. However, he appears to be vulnerable to bullets, apparently being killed by Headshot at the end of "All This and Gargantua-2".
• Noble Demon: When you're in charge of an organization that enforces Even Evil Has Standards on the supervillain community, you can't avoid being this trope. Come "All This and Gargantua-2", he mostly drops the "Noble" part as he nearly kills everyone aboart the eponymous space station and most of the Council of 13 attempting to get out of a deal with the Investors.
• No Celebrities Were Harmed: The first several seasons outright imply that the Sovereign really is a villainous David Bowie with shapeshifting powers. However, season four confirms that it isn't the real Bowie, though the two know each other and have collaborated.
• No Name Given: His real name is never revealed after it's confirmed that he's not actually David Bowie. He is only referred to as the Sovereign.
• Noodle Incident: What did he pull on Brock in Berlin? And was that even him or the real David Bowie? Brock does claim to have met both...
• Open Secret: While the true identity of the Sovereign is supposed to be a carefully guarded Guild secret, just about everyone knows that he's the Bowie-impersonating shapeshifter.
• Pet the Dog: He genuinely wanted to help Dr. Girlfriend and The Monarch get married, he's quite polite to Dean and even Rusty, and even takes time to offer Phantom Limb himself a chance to return to the Guild for medical treatment after the Sovereign's Diamond Dogs catch Limb robbing State University. He didn't have to do any of that.
• Rotoscoping: His Huge Holographic Head appearance has extremely naturalistic animation in this vein.
• Shapeshifter Default Form: He's a shapeshifter whose primary form is David Bowie's "Thin White Duke" character.
• Sharp-Dressed Man: In his "default" form as "Thin White Duke"-era Bowie, he wears a very classy outfit.
• The Starscream: Prior to successfully usurping the previous Sovereign, Force Majeure. He was apparently a "down-on-his-luck shapeshifter" who made a deal with the Investors "to be anyone but himself".
• Underestimating Badassery: He clearly, repeatedly underestimates Phantom Limb's abilities, as Limb has escaped the Sovereign himself and several Guild ambushes, the latter with ease.
• Voluntary Shapeshifting: His primary superpower. His "default" form is the "Thin White Duke"-era David Bowie, but he's shifted into numerous other characters, and isn't limited to human shape/size either, having also become an eagle and a pack of cigarettes.

The Investors

The Investors

Voiced by: Doc Hammer, John Hodgman, and T.Ryder Smith

A trio of intangible men in dark suits. Their modus operandi is making deals with people, offering immense power and rewards, but at great cost to those in their debt... While their exact status within the Guild is unclear, they have served several high-ranking members including Monstroso and even the Sovereign himself. Exactly what they are, where they came from, and the extent of their powers is never revealed.

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• Ambiguously Human: Are they magically empowered humans, aliens, demons, gods, or some other malevolent entities? "The Silent Partners" reveals that despite Billy's suspicions, they're defintely not vampires. As of "All This and Gargantua-2", they are revealed to be some form of a higher being, of the same order as Dr. Killinger. Exactly what they are is still not revealed, although they have the same names as the three Greek gods of the Southwest, Northeast, and Northwest winds, strongly hinting they may be literal Physical Gods. This is further supported by Doc Hammer in the creator commentary, musing that they may be "Greek gods or Ancient Astronauts".
• Badass in a Nice Suit: They all wear dark, snazzy suits, and the only being in the series who seriously threatens them is the equally Ambiguously Human Dr. Killinger. Not even Brock and Shoreleave can scratch them.
• Bald of Evil: Lips has a bald head and is just as dangerous as his brothers.
• Battle in the Center of the Mind: Their lightsaber battle with Dr. Killinger is revealed to be one of these once outsiders enter the room to witness it. Skeiron and Lips are shown to be dead after having been slain during the psychic contest, leaving Caicias and Killinger staring at each other in a Pstandard Psychic Pstance.
• Big Bad Ensemble: With the Sovereign in "All This and Gargantua-2", the Sovereign arranging the destruction of the eponymous space station to kill them and get out of his deal.
• Big Bad Duumvirate: They appear to be equals in power, with none being in charge of the others.
• Cain and Abel: Killinger reveals them all to be brothers, making them the three Cains to his Antivillainous Abel.
• Classy Cane: Lips carries a cane. It appears to be purely aesthetic since he hovers above the ground instead of walking and therefore doesn't actually need it.
• Deal with the Devil: Making these is their modus operandi, with them as the "devil". According to Brock, only Billy and White have "borrowed money from them and lived to panic about it". The Sovereign made one with them to become the leader of the Guild of Calamitous Intent, and his plan to destroy Gargantua-2 is an effort to kill them before they can collect on his part of the bargain.
• Diabolus ex Nihilo: Almost nothing is known about who or what these men are or where they came from. Their names imply they are Greek Gods, but this is never confirmed.
• The Dreaded: It is terrifying when they come to collect on your end of whatever deal you made with them. Even the 10-foot tall supervillain lawyer, Monstroso, is scared out of his mind when they show up for him in "O.S.I. Love You".
• Early-Bird Cameo: They first appeared in the background behind the speakers at the state university in the episode "Pomp & Circuitry", several episodes before their formal introduction. They were said to be there representing the General Consolidated Insurance company...
• Fat Bastard: Lips is more heavyset than his brothers, and the large size certainly helps his intimidation factor.
• Fallen Hero: In the Radiance commentary, Publick and Hammer boil them down to this, saying that whatever they had been, be it Greek gods or Ancient Astronauts, they were supposed to be here to help people and had fallen away from it. The conversation with their "brother", Dr. Killinger, in "All This and Gargantua-2" implies that he is continuing in their original mission, whatever it was.
• For the Evulz: The only motive they appear to have. They will commit horrific acts of villainy and make deals with deadly consequences for no reason other than because they can.
• Four Eyes, Zero Soul: Skiron and Caecius wear red-tinted glasses that help add to their sinister look.
• Ghostly Glide: They're Intangible Men who never appear to walk, instead gliding smoothly from place to place and also have the habit of entering/exiting a room by levitating out of/into the floor.
• Greater-Scope Villain: In "All This and Gargantua-2", they're revealed to be the true power behind the Sovereign-era Guild of Calamitous Intent, the Sovereign having made a Deal with the Devil with them to gain his position.
• Heart Is an Awesome Power: Their primary powers are the ability to turn themselves and whatever they touch intangible. While not that impressive in paper, this both makes them invincible from harm and able to use it to kill, ranging from turning Monstroso intangible before falling to his death out of O.S.I.'s helicarrier, to reaching into King Gorilla's chest and pulling his heart out.
• Humanoid Abomination: All three of them. It was previously implied that they weren't human, and confirmed in "All This and Gargantua-2" where they're revealed to be the same kind of higher life form as Dr. Killinger. What that life form is, though, is never explained. It's possible, for example, that they are the Greek gods of the Southwest, Northeast, and Northwest winds (matching their names). The creator commentary muses that they could be Ancient Astronauts as well.
• Humans Are Insects: They seem to view everyone else — The Guild, O.S.I., and their various members and politics — as mere pawns in a game that they're winning.
• Inexplicably Awesome: Almost nothing is known about them other than they are evil and extremely powerful, with the only hint about what they are is that they might be Greek gods.
• Intangible Men: Bullets and knives just pass right through them. They can also walk through walls and floors, reach inside peoples chests, and phase them through walls.
• Invincible Villain: As the Investors can become intangible at will, there is no chance of hurting, let alone stopping them, in most of their appearances. Even when The Sovereign tries to kill them by ensuring they are on Gargantua-2, despite his careful planning, his scheme is shown to have no chance of success as The Investors simply phase over to Meteor Majeure. It took Dr. Killinger to stop them for good.
• Killed Off for Real: By Dr. Killinger in "All This and Gargantua-2", via Battle in the Center of the Mind.
• Knight of Cerebus: Funny things happen around them, but unlike such villains as The Monarch, their actions and presence are NEVER played for laughs. The most jokes they get is how extremely creepy they are. They're also far more dangerous than any other villain seen in the series, with renowned badasses like Brock and Shoreleave unable to even scratch them. Not even the Sovereign blowing up a space station with them on-board is implied to be able to harm them.
• Lean and Mean: Caecius is much thinner than his brothers but is no less dangerous or intimidating for it.
• The Man Behind the Man: They are pulling the strings behind many of the arcs in seasons four and five ("The Silent Partners", "O.S.I. Love You") before moving into a Big Bad Ensemble role in "All This and Gargantua-2".
• Master of Disguise: As shown during "O.S.I. Love You", then can perfectly impersonate two O.S.I. "Misters", and a nonexistent third rookie agent, the point that not even the Properly Paranoid Hunter Gathers suspects anything is amiss.
• Missing Reflection: They either don't show up on film or have selective invisibility; when they approach Brock in "All This and Gargantua-2," none of them are visible on the O.S.I.'s camera feed even though Brock himself can see them clear as day.
• New Powers as the Plot Demands: The Investors mostly display intangibility and levitation powers. On occasion, they also use Voluntary Shapeshifting. In their final appearance, they also show selective invisibility and psychic powers. Given they are the same type of being as Dr. Killinger, there is likely little limit on what they can do.
• Nothing Is Scarier: Who are these men? What are they, and what is the full extent of their powers? It is all a mystery, and it all makes them more terrifying. They don't even talk in most of their appearances. They simply commit or enable acts of evil.
• Not So Above It All: While almost everything else about them is played dead serious, they're not above being as ridiculous as the other characters in the show in the right circumstance. Lips has a habit of waving to observers as he departs from whatever nightmarish thing the Investors have just done and all three of them choose lightsaber combat as their form of Battle in the Center of the Mind combat.
• Not So Invincible After All: After appearing unstoppable throughout all of their appearances, they are finally killed by Dr. Killinger in "All This and Gargantua-2" via Battle in the Center of the Mind.
• Outside-Context Problem: Brock and Shoreleave may be some of the deadliest fighters in the world, but they can't even scratch The Investors. Absolutely nothing in their arsenal can even touch these guys and in fact almost get each other killed just trying to bring them down. In the end, it takes another Outside-Context Problem in the form of Dr. Henry Killinger to kill them.
• Power Floats: We rarely see them walk when not shape-shifted, which adds to their creepiness and implied power.
• Psychic Nosebleed: Caicias suffers one at the tail end of the Battle in the Center of the Mind with Killinger after his brothers are slain, showing how Killinger has the upper hand.
• Psychic Powers: The Investors generally don't actually directly interact with the people around them, but rather use mental projections. It's why they don't show up on camera. While it looks like they're taking Killinger on in an epic lightsaber duel, it turns out to be a Battle in the Center of the Mind.
• Red and Black and Evil All Over: Their evil nature is belied by their color scheme: all three wear black business suits with red pinstripes, Caecius and Skiron wear red glasses, Caecius has black hair while Skiron had dark red, and the three wield Sith-style red lightsabers during their duel with Henry Killinger.
• Religious and Mythological Theme Naming: As revealed in "All This and Gargantua-2", they are named Lips, Caicias, and Skeiron after the Greek gods of the southwest, northeast, and northwest winds, respectively. Given their powerset that is beyond anything else seen in the series (save their apparent "brother" Dr. Killinger), they may actually be Physical Gods.
• Reverse Arm-Fold: Caecius tends to hold his hands behind his back when he's the one doing the talking, which gives him a shady-yet-professional edge.
• The Runt at the End: Inverted. Lips, the biggest of the group, is always the last to phase out whenever they make an exit; usually he takes this chance to give a faux-friendly wave to anyone watching.
• Sharp-Dressed Man: They each wear black pin-stripe suits.
• Siblings in Crime: They're stated to be brothers and commit/enable acts of evil through the deals the make with people.
• Sinister Schnoz: Caecius has a prominent nose accentuated by his pencil-thin mustache.
• Smug Super: When Brock and Shoreleave both try to fight the Investors, the trio walks away without fighting back, not considering either man a threat since neither has any way to hurt them. "All This and Gargantua-2" reveals they consider all of humanity inferior to them.
• Takes One to Kill One: Implied. While it's never stated that this is the only way to kill them, absolutely nothing else in the series even scratches them until Killinger, who they call "brother" and has a similar power set, takes them out via Battle in the Center of the Mind.
• Unexplained Accent: For some reason, they speak with Hungarian accents.
• Villainous Widow's Peak: Skiron has short, slicked hair with a widow's peak clearly visible.
• The Voiceless: Until "O.S.I. Love You" when disguised as the O.S.I. company men. Later, in All This and Gargantua-2, they speak in their own voices for the first time.
• Voluntary Shapeshifting: One of their powers, as seen in "O.S.I. Love You" when they perfectly impersonate two O.S.I. "Misters" and a non-existent rookie agent.

Force Majeure

Force Majuere

Mantilla: I'm the daughter of Force Majeure, the last true Sovereign of the Guild!

The leader of the Guild of Calamitous Intent before the Sovereign and an enemy of Jonas Venture Sr.

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• Arch-Enemy: To Jonas Venture Sr. The fact that Jonas is technically the Big Good of the Venture-verse immediately demonstrates how big of a threat this guy was.
• Bald of Evil: He's bald underneath his helmet and was the leader of the world's foremost supervillain organization.
• Blow You Away: During the flashback in Radiant is the Blood of the Baboon Heart which includes a brief scene of him battling Jonas Venture Sr. directly, he launches an attack that looks like a tornado.
• Captain Ersatz:
  • The cape and helmet are dead-ringers for Magneto, a major Marvel supervillain. The asteroid base that the Guild currently operates out of was confirmed to have originally been his, which is a reference to Magneto's go-to lair, Asteroid M.
  • The bald head, the image of him sitting at the head of a round-table for supervillains, and his position as the undisputed Arch-Enemy for the series' (apparent) Big Good position him as the Venture-verse's version of Lex Luthor, specifically the Superfriends version.
• Connected All Along: He's the father of Mantilla, who provided Rusty with her egg cells in exchange for his help transferring her mother's invisibility powers to her, which Rusty used to create Hank and Dean. He's the biological maternal grandfather to the "Venture Brothers".
• Death by Origin Story: He was killed and usurped by the Sovereign in Mantilla's backstory.
• Klingon Promotion: Fell victim to one. The Sovereign ascended to power in the Guild by killing and usurping him, in classic supervillain fashion.
• Legion of Doom: The Council of 13 while he was leader of the Guild was much closer to this than the later Omniscient Council of Vagueness it becomes under his successor. He meets with them in-person, sits at the "head" of the table, and is much more active in his villainy than the later Sovereign, even being shown attacking Jonas Venture Sr. personally.
• The Man Behind the Man: As the previous Sovereign to the Guild of Calamitous Intent, he was essentially the "boss" of all villains within the organization.
• Meaningful Name: "Force Majeure" is a term in contract law wherein an extreme, extraordinary event outside the control of both parties stops one or more of them from fulfilling their legal obligations. It's a fitting name for a master supervillain.
• Shout-Out: Beyond the meaning of the term in a legal sense, Force Majeure is the name of a Tangerine Dream album, one of several shout outs to Progressive Rock bands throughout the series.
• Posthumous Character: Has been dead for decades when he's first mentioned and is only seen on-screen during a Death by Origin Story flashback.
• Sigil Spam: Has a sigil shaped like a stylized "M" and wears it on his helmet, cloak fastener, and has his Legion of Doom-style table built in its shape.
• Unseen No More: He finally makes a physical appearance (albeit in a flashback) in Radiant is the Blood of the Baboon Heart after having been previously mentioned twice in the show.

Council of Thirteen (New)

Dr. Mrs. The Monarch

See her entry on the Monarch and Cohorts page.

Phantom Limb

Dr. Hamilton G. Fantomas (Phantom Limb, Revenge)

Voiced by: James Urbaniak

"No one retires from the Phantom Limb's shit list!"

Grandson of the adventurer and Guild-founder Fantômas, Hamilton Fantomas was born with atrophied limbs and his attempt to speed up their muscle growth instead gave him invisible limbs that could kill with a touch. After turning to supervillainy with his newfound powers, he worked his way up in the Guild, always with an eye on the Sovereign's position. Dr. Girlfriend served as his #2, "Queen Etherea", while the two dated before the beginning of the series. She returns to him in season two after leaving the Monarch, causing much of the conflict while Limb attempts to usurp the position of Sovereign in a coup. Defeated and crippled, he loses his grip on reality and forms his own rival supervillain group known as the Revenge Society, while also trying to take over the Guild regardless. With the help of Prof. Impossible, Phantom Limb's body and mind are restored and, after the Sovereign's death, he re-joins the Guild as a member of the new Council of 13,

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• Affably Evil: Before his mental breakdown and then again after recovering. He's a refined villain who enjoys the finer things, will be perfectly cordial to those around him, and even dabbles in stolen art. He can also kill you by touching you... if he's not too busy yachting or drinking wine.
• All Men Are Perverts: He really, really likes making Dr. Girlfriend wear her Queen Etherea costume and is implied to masturbate into it after she leaves him.
• Ambiguously Brown: Very ambiguously. He has a darker skin tone than most of the white characters, but his ethnicity is unclear. The Monarch at one point notes that Phantom Limb "wears an awful lot of purple for a white guy" (though given his status as a proudly Politically Incorrect Villain, this is somewhat dubious). He's descended from Fantômas, who was French and is darkly-tanned in most of his appearances, including the 1960s films where he is played by the tan Jean Marais which were an inspiration for Limb's design. The Whole Episode Flashback "The Invisible Hand of Fate" shows him with fairer skin in his pre-villain days and his "deranged" appearances as "Revenge" show him with lighter skin as well.
• An Arm and a Leg: He literally loses an arm and leg after his altercation with the Sovereign during the Battle of Cremation Creek ended with his airship crashing. It doesn't slow him down much, as even with prosthetics, he is still able to infiltrate the Guild headquarters to kidnap Red Mantle and Dragoon. Prof. Impossible later reconstructs his machine, restoring Limb's arm and leg.
• Arc Villain: He's the biggest antagonistic force of season two owing to his rivalry with the Monarch and relationship with Dr. Girlfriend. He even comes closest to outright killing the Venture family of any villain to that point, mostly just to piss the Monarch off.
• Big Bad: As the mutual enemy to Dr. Venture and The Monarch in season two. After that, he spends most of his time trying to get back into that role without success.
• Big Bad Wannabe: After his defeat during "Showdown at Cremation Creek", he makes multiple attempts to reesstablish himself as high-level villain. First, he attempts to use his heritage as the grandson of Fantômas and the ORB while in his "Revenge" persona to usurp the Sovereign, then starts his own supervillain team with the Revenge Society. In "All This and Gargantua-2", it's revealed that he has made a deal with the Sovereign to destroy the eponymous space station for a seat on the council, only to be double (or even triple) crossed and left for dead. Through the machinations of Dr. Killinger, he is saved and finally given a seat on the council.
• Card-Carrying Villain: He makes a lot of grand speeches about how awesome it is to be evil and is the epitome of a Wicked Cultured, Smug Snake, Man of Wealth and Taste-style villain.
• Cloudcuckoolander: After his defeat in the Battle of Cremation Creek, he is on the run from the Guild and goes through intense Sanity Slippage, believing his "team" consisting of a coffee mug, shoe, and toaster are all real people. With his Death Touch and intimate knowledge of the Guild, he is still very dangerous.
• Companion Cube: As "Revenge", he forms a new Guild consisting of a toaster, a mug, and one of Dr. Girlfriend's high-heeled shoes. Turns out they're not so harmless, as he manipulates them with his detached invisible limbs to use in combat... or just plain throws them at enemies.
• Deconstructed Character Archetype: Of the Wicked Cultured, Man of Wealth and Taste class of villain. He comes across as charming, handsome, and Faux Affably Evil. He is educated, well-spoken, has a taste for foreign and exotic food, has refined and excellent taste in decor, and is a competent villain, capable of earning even Brock Samson's respect. As time goes on, however, he is shown to actually be a foppish, misogynistic, narcissistic, Wicked Pretentious, Big Bad Wannabe who seems to think that he's special for appreciating unserrated knives and struggles to function as an effective villain when he is no longer backed by the Guild.
• Detachment Combat: He can still control and re-attach his invisible limbs after they have been cut off. He uses them to manipulate his Companion Cubes to break out of Guild detention.
• The Dragon: Subverted. When first introduced, he implies that he is second-in-command after The Sovereign, and is clearly in place to usurp him... But we learn that he's not actually the second-in-command (he's not even on the Council of 13) and the Sovereign never really trusted him at all. He thinks he's taking this role again in "All This and Gargantua-2", having the Revenge Society attack the eponymous space station under the geise of a heist while really scheming to destroy it at the behest of the Sovereign, who has promised him a council seat. The Sovereign double-crosses him in the end.
• Evil Counterpart: To Hunter Gathers. Both were originally archenemies as revealed in "The Terminus Mandate", and both left their respective organizations (Hunter, because he was fed up with "hot bureaucracy, poured in [his] lap", Phantom Limb because of a failed coup to take over the Guild) and formed their own groups to be/fight evil on their own terms. Interestingly, despite SPHINX's purpose being fighting villains who don't sign up with the Guild, their respective organizations never clashed onscreen.
• Eviler than Thou:
  • Subverted during his coup attempt on the Sovereign. He's a powerful villain with years of experience in the Guild, but even with the element of surprise and multiple Guild traitors on his side, he is defeated by the Sovereign/Monarch/Venture forces and left crippled with severe Sanity Slippage.
  • After pulling himself together and founding the Revenge Society (with other actual villains instead of inanimate objects), he makes a deal with the Sovereign to blow up the Gargantua-2 space station in exchange for a council seat. He proves to be in over his head, getting betrayed by the Sovereign, failing to do anything to the Investors, and is ultimately saved and brought back into the Guild by Dr. Killinger.
• Face–Heel Turn: He was a member of the Team Venture "Boys Brigrade" and spent time as a self-proclaimed "goody two-shoes scientist" before the Freak Lab Accident that turned his limbs invisible and gave him a Death Touch turned him to villainy.
• Famous Ancestor: He is the grandson of Fantômas.
• Fog Feet: His legs (as well as his arms and, apparently, penis) are invisible as a result of the super-science incident that gave him his powers.
• Freak Lab Accident: He had Billy use an experimental "muscle growth accelerator" machine on him to restore his atrophied limbs, but as Billy was working for the O.S.I. and didn't actually write the groundbreaking scientific paper Limb thinks he did, the experiment goes awry, leaving him with invisible limbs and a Death Touch.
• Freudian Excuse: Cites being born without fully functional limbs while spending most of his youth and adulthood from the Boy's Brigade to the halls of academia surrounded by able-bodied geniuses as his core reason for reaching out to the Guild and murdering one of his own students to create the experimental device he hoped would fix his arms and legs.
• Handicapped Badass: After the events of the season two finale, he has just one arm, one leg, and has become completely unhinged as "Revenge". He is still able to, first, break into the Guild to kidnap two council members and later, break out of the Guild's prison.
• Hazy-Feel Turn: While he never outright joins the "heroes", post-"All This and Gargantua-2" he's rejoined the Guild as part of the reformed Council of 13 and is much more of a team player. Notably, he seems to have dropped any misogynist attitude towards Dr. Girlfriend, being very respectful of her ability as a fellow Council member.
• He's Back!: After his run as "Revenge" and breaking out of Guild confinement, he reunites with Prof. Impossible who helps restore his lost limbs and set his head back on straight as the two found the Revenge Society.
• Improbable Weapon User: Successfully disables a series of Guild death-traps using a common household toaster and later disarms a group of Guild soldiers using a high-heeled shoe as a boomerang in "The Revenge Society".
• Knight of Cerebus: Comes far closer to killing the Venture family than anyone else has in Victor. Echo. November.. Even certified badass Brock realizes that they "might not make it this time" when he realizes it's the Guild Strangers they're up against instead of the usual henchmen rabble.
• Large Ham: He's very fond of dramatic hand motions. Not that the viewer can see them...
  Phantom Limb: I'm wringing my hands... MENACINGLY!
• Legacy Character: He is the grandson of Fantômas and believes he has a claim on leadership of the Guild as a result.
• Man of Wealth and Taste: Has a very sophisticated, aristocratic manner about him, likes fine cheeses and wines, lives in a home based on the Frank Lloyd Wright "Storer House", and sells stolen artwork as his brand of supervillainy.
• Mask of Sanity: "The Invisible Hand of Fate" depicts him as rather unhinged even before becoming a supervillain, which informs his mentally unstable actions that vary in manicness and lucidity for the next two seasons.
• My God, What Have I Done?: Once he realizes that the Sovereign betrayed him and the Revenge Society to die on Gargantua-2 after going behind the backs of his teammates to make a deal with him. He gets hit with this so badly that he genuinely considers himself unworthy of a place in the new Council of 13, a position he fiercely coveted until that point.
• Never My Fault: Believes Billy Quizboy owes him for the near-death lab accident that gave him his powers, despite is own refusal to listen to Billy's confession that his super-science expertise was bogus.
• New Powers as the Plot Demands: Phantom Limb's powers continue to change. In "The Trial of the Monarch", his Death Touch causes veins to pop up on his victims, and his arms don't seem to glow (he was wearing a heavy coat, but no light came out of the disconnect between gloves and sleeves). All other appearances neglect the veins and have his arms glow green and red for the touch of death. Season four shows he can detach and control his limbs, which glow blue, while his powers seem to be electricity based, and it seems he can regulate how much charge they give (as he stunned Dean instead of killing him).
• Not Quite Dead: Wisdom, the coffee cup Limb accused of being the shapeshifted Sovereign, has been put back together. Ironically, Chuck (the toaster) and Lady Nightshade (the shoe) "perished" in the scuffle that occurred after his escape from Guild detainment.
• Not So Above It All:
  • Despite his Wicked Cultured status, "The Inamorta Consequence" reveals that he has an apparent fondness for the old James Bond films, and even fanboys a bit about the gun on the poster of From Russia with Love ("the one that looked like the old Princess Leia gun"), being visibly saddened when Shore Leave tells him it was a BB gun repurposed as a prop.
  • His current high-ranking Wicked Cultured status is a smoke-screen; he started out as a nobody in the Guild and worked his way up by playing the game and kissing ass, and is now deeply ashamed of his humble beginnings. A brief exchange with Dr. Mrs. The Monarch mentions that his early days as a supervillain were fueled by "a diet of ramen noodles and Sphagetti-Os, driving around in a Honda Accord with a ghost on the hood."
• Obfuscating Insanity: Downplayed in that he obviously wasn't in his right mind in "The Revenge Society", talking to his Companion Cubes and attempting to activate a potential doomsday device, but he wasn't as outright batty as he seemed, either. In "Pomp and Circuitry", it's revealed that he was waiting for the perfect time to escape Guild confinement, get his body restored, and form his own Guild with other failures of superheroes and villains which actually achieves some success (including nearly killing Dr. Venture).
• Older Than They Look: Given that he served in the Team Venture "Boys Brigade" as a preteen in the late '60s and was a full professor when Sheila was a college student, Phantom Limb must be in his sixties by the time of the series, yet looks no older than the rest of the adult cast. It is implied that his limb enhancer machine also imparts youth, as he ages rapidly while on the run between "Showdown at Cremation Creek" and "The Revenge Society", but goes back to looking youthful when Prof. Impossible helps him to rebuild it in "Pomp and Circuitry".
• Professional Butt-Kisser: Phantom Limb is showy and ruthless to anyone he sees as beneath him (which is just about everyone), but he changes his tone the second he's addressing a superior in the Guild. Whenever addressing figures like The Sovereign, the Council of 13, or the Investors, he lavishes them with praise and compliments, while giving himself insincere put-downs. Of course, being The Starscream, this is all a painfully transparent act he only keeps up until he thinks he can get away with stabbing them in the back.
• Punny Name: His villain name is drawn from Phantom limb syndrome and blends well with being the grandson of Fantômas.
• Put on a Bus: He goes on the run following his failed coup at the end of season two, only appearing in flashbacks and a single Stinger in season three. The Bus Came Back with a vengeance in the middle of season four, as he's a major figure in all of "The Revenge Society", "Pomp and Circuitry", and "Bright Lights, Dean City". He (and the Revenge Society) recur infrequently after that before getting major roles in "All This and Gargantua-2", after which Limb becomes a regular as a new Council of 13 member.
• Red Right Hand: He has invisible limbs and can kill with a touch.
• Romantic False Lead: His initial role, being the ex-boyfriend Dr. Girlfriend returns to after she leaves the Monarch, driving much of season two's conflict.
• Shoe Slap: Uses a high-heeled shoe like a boomerang in "The Revenge Society".
• Shout-Out: To pulp hero The Phantom, between the names and similar costumes, with his outfit also intended to vaguely resemble that of Steve Ditko's Shade, the Changing Man.
• Small Reference Pools: Want to know just how well this show averts this? Phantom Limb is one of its major villains and is a descendent of Fantômas, a French character who is largely unknown in the US. The trope itself is, fittingly, one of his pet peeves, as seen when he tried to sell a Rembrandt to a Mafioso who only wanted The Mona Lisa.
  Phantom Limb: Look, the Mona Lisa's not a better painting, it's merely a more famous one...
• Smug Snake: He's an overconfident Wicked Cultured, Man of Wealth and Taste supervillain who thinks he's better than everyone else. It almost always leads to his downfall.
• The Starscream: To the Guild Sovereign, attempting to usurp him in the season two-ending "Showdown at Cremation Creek" two-parter, only to be defeated, cripped, and forced to go on the run. After a period of Sanity Slippage as "Revenge", he starts his own villain organization that later gets folded into the Guild after the Sovereign's death, leaving Limb on the new Council of 13.
• Start My Own: In season four's "Pomp and Circuitry", he starts his own Guild for villains including the Face-Heel Turned Prof. Impossible and Baron Ünderbheit. He later recruits new members in "Bright Lights, Dean City", gets assistance from Dr. Killinger, and then they attack the eponymous space station in "All This and Gargantua-2" after which Limb is invited back into the Guild as a member of the new Council of 13.
• Stay in the Kitchen: A thoroughly unsympathetic example. There is no misguided chivalry at work here, just plain old misogyny. Dr. Girlfriend ends up leaving him for the Monarch twice because he insists on reducing her (a brilliant engineer with a genuine doctorate) to arm candy.
  Phantom Limb: (After Dr. Girlfriend calls him out on crashing her wedding) Sweet girl, you're being irrational, and such is the curse of your sex. I forgive you.
• Straw Misogynist: He seduces and hires Dr. Girlfriend as his #2 (who is established to be a fully-capable Gadgeteer Genius) as nothing more than arm-candy, complete with a super-revealing outfit. This has led to Dr. Girlfriend breaking up with him twice for the Monarch who, when his Hair-Trigger Temper isn't getting the better of him, respects her as an equal.
• Stock Unsolved Mysteries: He at one point tries making a black market sale of "Storm on the Sea Of Galilee" to a Mafioso. The painting is a Rembrandt and one of 13 works of art that were stolen during the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum theft of 1990.
• Super Power Lottery: A big winner as far as the series goes. "I can kill a man by simply touching him. Now what were your special powers again?"
• Took a Level in Kindness: Following the events of "All This and Gargantua-2" and his addition to the Guild's new Council of 13, he becomes markedly less of an asshole, treating Dr. Mrs. The Monarch with a lot more respect compared to his sexist attitude from earlier, and overall acts like much more of a team player with the Guild.
• Touch of Death: The experimental "muscle growth accelerator" he tested on himself gave him this power as a side effect, along with his invisible limbs. He does have some manner of control over it, at least, and can use a lower-powered version to simply stun people (as he does to Dean at one point).
• Villainous Breakdown: Following his defeat at the Battle of Cremation Creek and going on the run from the Guild, he undergoes severe Sanity Slippage to the point where he talks to a coffee mug, shoe, and toaster as if they're real people. He gets better after escaping the Guild and recruiting Prof. Impossible to restore his body, then founds the Revenge Society (with real people).
• Villainous Friendship: By the time of "All This and Gargantua-2", he does actually feel some affection for the other members of the Revenge Society. He doesn't want Sovereign to kill them after they have outlived their usefulness and feels remorse for "betraying" the Revenge Society, even though he tried to justify it to them by saying he was doing it so they could all be on the Council of 13.
• Visible Invisibility: His limbs avert the trope, which is an occasional source of humor - such as when he tried "wringing [his] hands - menacingly!", only for nobody to know what he was doing.
• What Kind of Lame Power Is Heart, Anyway?: Subverted. In his first appearance, his only visible power is having invisible limbs. Later, it turns out that his limbs can instantly kill by touch, deflect projectiles, become electrified, and can perform Detachment Combat.
• Wicked Cultured: He's a villainous Man of Wealth and Taste who comes across as charming and Affably Evil. He once talks about having sold out his villainous principles for high culture accoutrements such as dealing in stolen art instead of 'the old stuff'. In that same episode, he laments how many of his fellow art thieves want to steal the Mona Lisa, for no other reason than it's a famous painting, and not because they appreciate it as art.

Red Mantle & Dragoon

Red Mantle and Dragoon

^{Click here to see their pre-conjoinment appearances} 

Red Mantle voiced by: Doc Hammer

Dragoon voiced by: Christopher McCulloch

Red Mantle: Two heads are better than one!

Dragoon: What does that have to do with anything?

Red Mantle: Nothing, I've just been wanting to say that all day. I got sick of waiting for an opportunity.

Originally the musicians Buddy Holly and The Big Bopper, they were recruited into the Guild by Fantômas. Now the seniormost members of the Guild's Council of 13, they were kidnapped by Phantom Limb during his "Revenge" phase during which Dragoon suffered a near-fatal heart attack and had to have his head conjoined to Red Mantle's shoulder to survive. Having spent decades away from active arching, they are very out of touch with the affairs of modern villainy.

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• Acrofatic: Dragoon, before their merging, was heavyset and able to throw Phantom Limb around the Council Chamber like a ragdoll.
• Ascended Extra: They were originally just two of many voiced silhouettes on the Council of 13, but became recurring characters after "The Revenge Society".
  Doc Hammer: We took silhouettes and gave them an episode.
• Bling of War: Dragoon's outfit appeared to be a 19th century ceremonial Prussian military uniform.
• But for Me, It Was Tuesday: Dragoon is credited for overseeing the execution of the Iron Infidels, something he doesn't even remember. Though that might be less because it "was Tuesday" and more because Dragoon is partly senile.
• Cloudcuckoolander: Dragoon is becoming a Scatterbrained Senior, leading to moments like this. In particular he confuses the cartoon show "Wacky Races" with events from his own life.
• Clothes Make the Superman: If a throwaway line in the season five Halloween Episode is to be believed, Red Mantle's magical powers come from, surprise surprise, his red "power mantle".
• Dishing Out Dirt: Red Mantle's apparent power (or at least one of them), as seen in the season five episode "Bot Seeks Bot" when he uses this power to move dirt onto the grave of the deceased Councilman #4 (Clue Clown).
• Enemy Mine: They pull this along with Dr. Z in "All This and Gargantua-2", offering the Sovereign's location to the O.S.I. in return for clemency and protection.
• Evil Sounds Raspy: Dragoon has a raspy voice and serves on the leadership council for a Guild of supervillains.
• Hellish Pupils: Dragoon has slit pupils. He might be a very very mild case of Draconic Humanoid, to go with the usual pop-cultural dragon/dragoon thing, but it's never made clear.
• Lawyer-Friendly Cameo: It is made very clear that they are actually Buddy Holly and The Big Bopper, with the plane crash that killed both musicians merely a cover for their induction into the Guild.
• Magic Is Evil: Dragoon's views on sorcery are extremely backwards and judgemental, especially for a supervillain. He calls all displays of magic "blasphemous" and "dark-sided", which makes his attachment to Red Mantle, a spellcaster himself, rather awkward.
• Multiple Head Case: After Dragoon suffers a heart attack from Phantom Limb's Touch of Death, he has to have his head sewn onto Red Mantle's shoulder in this fashion. After some time adjusting and coordinating to this arrangement, Dragoon insists that he will eventually take over the whole body.
  Dragoon: I've been standing here all day with my dick in my hand!
  Red Mantle: That was MY dick.
• Nominal Villain: They've been retired from active villainy for so long that they've completely lost whatever villainous edge they once held. The most hostile action they've ever taken on their own is probably throwing a pen at Snoopy.
• Older Than They Look: As Buddy Holly and the Big Bopper, they would be pushing 80 by the time of the series. Neither looks quite that old and both, especially Dragoon before their merging, are still pretty spry for that age.
• Racist Grandpa: The only way Dragoon will attend Orpheus' gathering of mystics and mages in "A Very Venture Halloween" is in costume, so they dress as The Thing with Two Heads, complete with Dragoon in Blackface as Rosey Grier. Jefferson Twilight is horrified, while Red Mantle is just embarrassed.
• Retired Badass: The two are guild masterminds and Dragoon still had some fight in him before losing his body. In fact, they have been retired for so long that they never get a final arch in "The Terminus Mandate", as they outlived every protagonist they could call an archenemy.
• Scatterbrained Senior: Dragoon appears to be going mildly senile, conflating his life with fictional events and falling asleep at odd times.
• Silence, You Fool!: Dragoon hung several lampshades on this during the Council's first appearance, calling out at innappropriate times and discussing how it makes the interrogation harder.
• Shout-Out: Dragoon's initial appearance and personality are drawn from Y.A. Dragon in The Eiger Sanction.
• Stout Strength: Dragoon, before their merging, was heavyset and able to throw Phantom Limb around the Council Chamber like a ragdoll.
• Those Two Guys: To the Guild council. Not that they have much of a choice, being a Multiple Head Case.
• Villainous Friendship: Red Mantle is revealed to have been on very good terms with Councilman #4, the Clue Clown, going so far as to mourn at the latter's funeral. The sentiment is not shared by Dragoon, who never cared for him.

Dr. Z

Dr. Z

Voiced by: Christopher McCulloch

"BAH! When Dr.Z harasses you, you'll know it! A giant metal crab would tear the roof off your trailer and no less than six suicide assassins would spring from its belly!"

The primary antagonist to Action Johnny's family, Dr. Z has long since retired from active supervillainy and serves on the Guild's Council of 13.

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• Affably Evil: He's settled down in his old age and is now downright friendly, to both fellow villains and even former arch enemies like Action Johnny. When Johnny and Rusty's "boy adventurer" support group show up to his home in "Self Medication", believing he killed their therapist, he and his wife invite them in, sit them down, and try to help them let go of the past that's haunting them. He even adopts Ro-Boy after the discussion.
• Alter Kocker: Despite clearly being of Asian descent, his accent tends to skew vaguely Yiddish. In the creator commentary, the creators discuss that it's mostly because he'd old and many non-Jewish old people can sound vaguely Yiddish.
• Arch-Enemy: To Action Johnny and his family back in the day. He also arched Jonas Sr. in the past, as well.
• Ambiguously Bi: When he comments on how much he loves his wife, Mrs. Z makes a comment that she thought she was his "beard", meaning he allegedly married her to publicly show that he was straight. He also slept with the Blue Morpho, although he was under the impression that he had seduced tennis champion and notable lesbian Billie Jean King. Jackson Publick eventually clarifies in the artbook that his love for his wife is genuine, and that he had crushed on her for a long time before they got together◊.
• Bad Boss: Years of being Surrounded by Idiots caused him to adopt a "zero bungle tolerance" policy in regards to his minions, to who he insultingly refers to as "bunglers" by default.
• Blade Below the Shoulder: "The High Cost of Loathing" shows that he carries an Assassin's Creed-style concealed wristblade.
• Buffy Speak: Lapses into this as English isn't his first language, such as describing a "cyborg" as a "super cool robot" who "had parts of a real live guy".
• Cool Old Guy: Despite being a villain, he shows up to Dr. Venture's day camp to put on a show for the kids. He also provides therapy to the boy adventure's therapy group.
• Drugs Are Bad:
  • Got "pinched" when a "bungler dropped dime" and turned him in for smuggling narcotics in Singapore in the '70s. He spent some time in prison since, as one of their general rules forbids dealing in narcotics, the Guild wouldn't help him get out. He eventually escaped on his own.
  • He wants to help Action Johnny get off of drugs and, in "The Terminus Mandate", offers to let Johnny move in with him so he can help take care of him.
• Even Evil Has Standards: After finding out that Venturion (whom he would, later on, reprogram into the villainous Vendata) was actually a cyborg and was thrown out by Jonas Venture Sr., he contemplated putting him out of his misery before ultimately turning him into a weapon against Jonas. This says a smidge more about his moral and ethical boundaries for being a super-scientist when compared to the publicly heroic Jonas.
• Evil Knockoff: Enjoyed commandeering or replicating Jonas Venture Sr.'s creations so he could use them against him. A flashback shows Dr. Z leading an army of H.E.L.P.eR. robots against their creator.
• Expy: Of Dr. Zin from Jonny Quest, who he is strongly implied to actually be in all but name.
• Happily Married: He genuinely loves his wife and one of his regrets is that he didn't marry her sooner, before she became barren.
• Lawyer-Friendly Cameo: Like with "Action Johnny" he's clearly meant to be Dr. Zin from Jonny Quest, but Warner Bros. (who owns both properties) wouldn't let them actually say it's the same character. This leads to a few clever write-arounds, like using Scatterbrained Senior moments that are really him misrembering.
• Like a Son to Me:
  • He's come to view Johnny as the son he never had and fondly recalls his time with him as an arch. When he is forced to retire as an active villain, his final arch is Johnny and he offers to let him move into his home and help get Johnny's life back together. Johnny decides that he might take the offer, but he's going to need time to think on it and maybe he can just borrow a few bucks from Dr. Z for now. In exchange, Johnny says he'll run and hide from Dr. Z so that the man can relive his nostalgia.
  • At the end of "Self Medication", he and his wife adopt the permanently young "boy adventurer" Ro-Boy.
• Mistaken for Pedophile: When he meets up with Johnny in rehab, he awkwardly clarifies that his conflict with Johnny and his father was strictly an "arch" relationship shortly after he gets caught up in the minutiae of how the word "platonic" (which is how he initially described said rivalry) is derived from Plato who himself promoted pederasty.
• Mundane Made Awesome: He revels in over-the-top classic cartoonish villainy (Evil Laugh, dramatic speeches, Milking the Giant Cow, etc.) and will still put on a show to entertain younger villains or children.
• The Napoleon: He's the shortest member of the Council of 13 and has a long history a genuinely menacing super-villain. Even in his old age where he's mellowed out considerably, he's still hot-blooded and quick to fire off a dramatic evil speech if he feels insulted.
  Dr. Z: (after Johnny accuses him of killing his therapist) BAH! When Dr.Z harasses you, you'll know it! A giant metal crab would tear the roof off your trailer and no less than six suicide assassins would spring from its belly!
• Paper-Thin Disguise: When on the Council of 13 telescreens, he wears fake ears and a fake mustache to hide his identity. Since he survived the purge of the Council, it seems to have worked. Later, when on the run from the Sovereign, he dresses as a rabbi. He's still clearly an Asian man.
• Parental Substitute: He has come to love Johnny as his own, and Z wants him to move in with him and his wife since they're actually in better health than him and can take care of him.
• Pet the Dog: He and his infertile wife adopt the permanently young "boy adventurer", Ro-Boy.
• Retired Monster: Zig-zagged. He's retired from active villainy and is fully affable by this point in his life, but will still "put on a show" in classic villainy when talking with former "boy adventurers" like Rusty or Action Johnny, while still serving on the Guild's Council of 13.
• Scatterbrained Senior: For the most part he's on the ball, but this still shows occasionally. When he tries to remember one of his adventures from Jonny Quest, he gets most of the details wrong; Hadji is a Native American instead of an Indian, Bandit is called Buddy, and Dr. Quest and Race Bannon are the same person. This actually plays into him being a Lawyer-Friendly Cameo of Dr. Zin, as Warner Bros. (which owns both Quest and The Venture Bros.) refused to let the creators use the Quest characters outright, so his misrembering allows slightly altered versions of the characters to be used while hinting at who they really are.
• Surrounded by Idiots: His view of his henchmen during his younger years. Given that they saw an Anubis mask moving because a dog was under it and thought it was the real Anubis, it's hard to blame him.
• Villain with Good Publicity: Partly due to being retired from "active" villainy, he is at least regarded as a classic professional villain. He is a genuinely decent guy outside of the whole "supervillain" thing, though.
• Yellow Peril: As an Affably Evil, Lawyer Friendly parody of Jonny Quest's "Dr. Zin", whose origin was steeped in the trope. He's an indeterminate east Asian supervillain.

Radical Left

Radical Left

Voiced by: Christopher McCulloch

Radical Left: I'm Radical Left! I want Anarchy!

Right Wing: ...And maybe a nice home and a family.

A supervillain with a disfigured left side, Radical Left was an inmate at Dunwich Asylum before he joined the Revenge Society and then the Guild as a member of the Council of 13. At some point before the series, he "absorbed" his arch enemy, Right Wing.

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• Deep South: Both he and Right Wing have very thick accents (Left's being more blustering and guttural, Right's more drawling and snide), and the shot of their American Townhouse-style duplex suggests he lives in New Orleans.
• Demoted to Extra: He only appears in a single scene in the Finale Movie and doesn't hae any lines.
• Early-Bird Cameo: First appeared in "Momma's Boys" as an inmate at the Dunwich Asylum before joining the Revenge Society in "All This and Gargantua-2".
• Expy: A pretty obvious one of Two-Face, in every way but flipping a coin. "The Terminus Mandate" reveals that he even lives in a duplex done up in stereotypical Two-Face lair fashion — brightly painted, exactingly-maintained suburban home on the right, dilapidated crust-punk house on the left.
• Fusion Dance: "The Terminus Mandate" reveals that his right side actually used to be his arch, Right Wing, until something happened that had Radical Left absorb him. They still maintain their mental autonomy, enough so that the two sides can play a game of Cluedo, with only Right knowing who the killer is and Left managing to beat him the normal way.
• His Own Worst Enemy: Zig-zagged. While his primary arch is Right Wing (his right side), the two apparently used to be separate people before Radical Left "absorbed" Right Wing through unexplained means.
• Sharp-Dressed Man: After joining the Revenge Society, he wears a nice suit that is split down the middle with each half representative of the two people that make him up.
• Two-Faced: Literally. His disfigured left side wants anarchy, his undamaged right side wants "a nice home in the suburbs".
• Visual Pun: His left and right halves represent the left and right "wings" of traditional American politics. "Radial Left" wants anarchy and is incredibly disfigured, while "Right Wing" looks like a conservative white guy who wants "a nice home in the suburbs".

Dr. Phineas Phage

Phineas Phage

Voiced by: Bill Hader (Season 4-5), James Adomian (Seasons 6-7)

"I'm gonna tell the Guild!"

A virus-themed villain with a robotic lower half and former arch for Prof. Impossible. Also an on-again-off-again member of the Council.

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• Actor Allusion: Bill Hader voices him just like his Vincent Price impression, as demonstrated in the recurring "Vincent Price Holiday Special" sketches on Saturday Night Live.
• Affably Evil: He's the official arch for Prof. Impossible (before the latter's Face–Heel Turn), but when Impossible falls into a deep depression over losing Sally, Phage tries to arch him simply to get him out of his funk, implying they otherwise have an amicable relationship despite their roles as protagonist and antagonist. He also saves Hank and the Action Man from the wampa while in Comaland.
• Arch-Enemy: He was Prof. Impossible's official Guild-sanctioned arch.
• Cyborg: His entire lower half is made up of cybernetics that make him look like a bacteriophage.
• Expy: Design-wise, and in terms of his role as a nemesis for The Fantastic Faux-inspired Prof. Impossible, he resembles The Fantastic Four villain The Wizard.
• Mooks: His henchmen are the "Pro-Teens", teenagers in hats that looks like molecules.
• Nobody Likes a Tattletale: When he discovers Phantom Limb (the Guild's "most wanted") while arching Prof. Impossible, he immediately tries to flee and tell the Guild in a classic, childish "I'm telling!" sense, forcing Limb and Impossible to work together to stop him. Later, when the Council of 13 is re-forming after "All This and Gargantua-2" and trying to keep their members from revolting, he fuels the fire by revealing the truth about what happened, including the Sovereign's death. He's still invited back to the Council as a former member when they are desperate, but there are subtle implications that his Teleporter Accident wasn't really an accident...
• No Celebrities Were Harmed: His voice is a clear Vincent Price impersonation by frequent Vince Price impersonator Bill Hader. James Adomian keeps it up when he takes over as voice actor.
• Politically Incorrect Villain: When escaping from the Guild Council chambers following the Sovereign's attempted purge, he apparently feels up Dr. Mrs. the Monarch's "girly bits" while suspecting her of being trans. He apologies and she brushes it off once they're out, but it more than qualifies.
• Pungeon Master: When actively antagonizing, every other line is some kind of cellular biology pun relating to viruses, bacteria, infection, or similar.
  Phineas Phage: The nucleotide has turned! No one can escape the infectious grip of the fiendish Dr. Phineas Phage!
• Punny Name: A double dose. Of famed head injury survivor Phineas Gage and a bacteriophage, which fits given his "virus"-theming.
• Rules Lawyer: Knows the Guild rule-book word for word, his knowledge of which eventually gets him a council spot.
• Uncertain Doom: When he first uses the teleporter (stolen by the Guild in "Unicorn in Captivity" for a faster means to get to Meteor Majeure) in "The Saphrax Protocol", it reacts badly with his cybernetics and puts him in a coma. Exactly what state he is in physically is never made clear.

Red Death

Red Death

Voiced by: Clancy Brown

Henchman 21: [Red Death] vaporized Professor Sterling Smart and his personal army of 50 super soldiers. Vaporized!

Legendary within the hero/villain community for his lengthy career, sheer power, and massive death toll, Red Death is a Grim Reaper-themed "Level Ten" villain introduced as one of Wide Wale's sub-arches. In private, he's a devoted family man... who just happens to be a seven-foot tall red skeleton with the ability to vaporize anyone in his way. He later gains a seat on the Guild Council.

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• The Ace: Red Death has been so successful and professional in his long career that even Hunter Gathers respects him as a fellow veteran in the Hero-Villain community. While both the O.S.I. and Guild are at wits' end trying to hunt down the Blue Morpho, Red Death identifies him as the Monarch and finds his secret lair within the space of a few hours.
• Affably Evil: They don't come any more affable. When not on-the-job, he's incredibly friendly and wholesome, which only makes it more terrifying when he puts on his Game Face. As "The Rorqual Affair" proves, even on the job, he can be a very charming, sardonic kind of guy among colleagues, provided he doesn't turn on the voice.
  [21 and Dr. Mrs. the Monarch exit the elevator to reveal Red Death already there, surrounded by the bodies of security guards, holding a dead man aloft and screaming in triumph]
  Red Death: [Noticing them, cheerfully] Oh! Hi! The room is secure.
• Almighty Janitor: He's a legendary veteran villain stuck as a sub-arch of the significantly junior (relative to him) Wide Wale, due to being unable to fulfill his villainous obligations to the Guild due to getting older and his commitment to his family. By season six, he's only arching once per year (still leaving a sky-high body count when he does). Early in season seven, he schemes to get out from under Wide Wale and onto the Guild Council by turning in the Blue Morpho, then earns his seat as of "The Terminus Mandate" by working with Dr. Mrs. the Monarch.
• Always Someone Better: An unusual example for the show in that he's a fairly sincere example whose life hasn't imploded yet. He's positioned as a counterpart to much of the main cast, especially The Monarch, in that he has almost everything they don't. He has a relatively healthy work-life balance that doesn't drive away his family and friends, unlike The Monarch in particular. His past doesn't seem to control him in the same way as Rusty or The Monarch, and he's making an active effort to join the Council as a "retirement plan" so he can put active villainy behind him for good. The comparison is driven home between him and the Monarch, in that he also had a super-scientist arch who he then killed, allowing him to finally move on after a period where he realized he'd done "terrible things" and get to this point.
• Ambiguously Human: It is mentioned by various characters that Red Death is considered a veteran of the villain business, being referred to as "a legend" by Hunter Gathers and "an old man" by the Monarch. Despite this, he has a fairly young wife and a daughter still in grade school while showing no signs typical of being elderly (or even middle-aged). If he ever was human, he clearly is not now — his whole body a deep shade of red, his head looks similar to a skull, and his eyes turn yellow when feeling blood-thirsty. Whether or not he was human at one point and was transformed by magic or Weird Science or if he is something else entirely is never established. Whatever he is, it's apparently genetic as his daughter shares his skeletal appearance.
• Arch-Enemy: Professor Cadmium was his long ago, as he reveals in a story to the Monarch. He killed Professor Cadmium, strangled his family, and burnt their house to the ground. He tells the Monarch that this actually freed him, as killing the one he hated so much opened him up to greater professional villainy and encourages the Monarch to do the same to Dr. Venture.
• Ax-Crazy: Don't let his Affably Evil nature fool you — Red Death is incredibly bloodthirsty, and in fact seems to use the Guild specifically as an outlet for his killing instincts. He only mellowed out in the first place because he murdered his original archenemy, burned his house down, and butchered his entire family with his bare hands, which left him aimless enough to have an epiphany about his unhealthy lifestyle. He later offers to brutally murder the deranged Maestro Wave for Monarch and 21, entirely to satiate his pent-up bloodlust after chasing the two of them down earlier.
  Dr. Mrs. The Monarch: If I can get you that seat and save the Monarch without killing another villain, will you help us?
  Red Death: [gracious, but disappointed] Wellll... I very much like to kill.
  Dr. Mrs. The Monarch: We get to break into an O.S.I. Dummy Corp.
  Red Death: And kill?
• Berserk Button: Chauvinism and boorish behavior is something that gets under his skin. Just ask Blind Rage, who Red Death left tied to a railroad track after displaying these behaviors. He tossed out what was supposed to be his "final arch" to do this to Blind Rage instead.
• Been There, Shaped History: He was on Gargantua-1 during the infamous "Movie Night Massacre". He can still describe in graphic detail what happened to those not lucky enough to have their spacesuit helmets on.
• Bond Creatures: Has a neural link with his Hellish Horse, Daisy, allowing him to communicate through her.
• Broke the Rating Scale: Given an EMA Level of 10, the highest possible ranking, but other Level 10 villains are rightfully intimidated by or terrified of him, suggesting that this is simply the highest the Guild can give. He's established to have slowed down a little with age, which begs the question of just how unstoppable he was in his prime.
• Captain Ersatz: He's essentially the Red Skull as the Horseman of Death. His costume is also extremely similar to that of the obscure Batman villain, Reaper.
• The Comically Serious: He can switch from being a kindly gentleman to a terrifying Large Ham on a dime, leading to a hilarious contrast within the same scene.
• Consummate Professional:
  • By villainous standards, anyway. He is incredibly bloodthirsty, but after killing his Arch-Enemy long ago, he decided to keep his professional and personal lives separate. He seems to be a member of the Guild as an outlet for his bloodlust, arching just once per year to sate his cravings, while otherwise being a devoted family man.
    Red Death: "We're all villains, Monarch. With rules, we get to spill blood and taste victory! Heck, I really wanted to kill something tonight, you know? But... rules. They help us hate."
  • Subverted in "The Terminus Mandate". Instructed to go on one last arching while volunteering to deliver the Peril Partnership their payout, he instead throws away the letter containing the profile of his final arch, and gives Blind Rage a humiliating death, spiting the Partnership AND the Guild decision to pay them.
• Dark and Troubled Past: His villainy apparently hurt his loved ones when he was more active in his arching a long time ago, leading to his decision to separate his professional and personal lives. Also, he was at the "Movie Night Massacre". He claims that it wasn't him who did it, but when he talks about it, it's unclear whether he is having a PTSD flashback or a fond reminiscence of the event. That's how messed up he is.
• Dastardly Whiplash: While much more menacing than these types of characters, Red Death expresses a fondness for the Good Old Ways methods of villainy exhibited by this archetype. Despite being able to vaporize Blind Rage in an instant if he so chose, Red Death instead ties him to a railroad track since it makes his inevitable death worse given the false hope of a chance to escape.
• Dented Iron: Season seven opens with him revealing that he's getting on in years and, with arching getting harder for him and with very few career opportunities outside of being a supervillain, he wants a seat on the Council of 13 so he can support his family through the office's generous pension plan while putting himself in less direct danger.
• Do Wrong, Right:
  • Because his family wasn't in any real danger, he forgives Monarch for trying to blackmail him and steps down from arching Rusty, but encourages the Monarch to get his rivalry over with and kill his archenemy, or he's just going to keep lashing out and hurting the people close to him.
  • His lecture to Blind Rage has shades of this, emphasizing his respect for gentlemanly Dastardly Whiplash villainy in stark contrast to Blind Rage's Politically Incorrect Villain boorishness.
• The Dreaded: One of the most feared figures in the heroes/villains community, bar none. When talking with Dr. Mrs. The Monarch in Radiant is the Blood of the Baboon Heart, Shore Leave bluffs that Brock could easily beat him in a one-on-one fight; after she and Red Death leave, he blurts out that "he scares the crap out of me". Even the uber-macho One-Man Army Brock reluctantly admits that Red Death is "a little... just a little bit scary".
• Establishing Character Moment: When we first meet him, he quickly disarms the Monarch with his affable nature, even praising his human puppet trick on Dr. Venture from "Self Medication". Then he puts his Game Face on as he recounts the importance of a good work-life balance, all while nearly making the Monarch piss himself in fear.
• Even Evil Can Be Loved: He has a loving wife and daughter, who he also loves dearly. Part of his epiphany regarding his work-life balance was realizing how badly his unrestrained bloodlust was hurting those he actually cared about, and spurred his decision to restrain his villainy to a profession for the sake of his family.
• Even Evil Has Standards: Killing people and plotting global domination is part of the supervillain gig, but being a boorish prick and sexually harassing a female colleague? Red Death does not take to that lightly.
• Evil Is Bigger: He's about as tall as Brock, who is established to be seven-feet tall, though is more Lean and Mean since he's a skeletal Grim Reaper-themed villain.
• Evil Old Folks: He's pushing 80 years old and has been a supervillain for most of that time.
• Evil Sounds Deep: His sonorous baritone makes him all the more intimidating, though it also sounds quite smooth when he's not in-character and more gutteral when he is.
• Family Extermination: He slaughtered the family of his hated first Arch-Enemy, Prof. Cadmium. It gave him a realization that such "hate" was unhealthy and he chose to compartmentalize his profession and family life.
• Fluffy the Terrible: He allowed his daughter to name his Hellish Horse. She picked "Daisy".
• Foil: To badass secret agent extraordinaire, Brock Samson. Each is quite possibly the deadliest member of their given organizations (Guild and O.S.I., respectively) but each has spent much of their career in a role below their abilities (Brock because he was demoted to play Rusty's babysitter after getting too close to the Guild and Red Death because he has separated his professional and personal lives to such a degree that the latter is impacting his ability to do the former). They both share an intense bloodlust (Brock in more of a Blood Knight sense while Red Death is more Ax-Crazy when he has his Game Face on) that they've each learned to control (Brock via Character Development as seen in episodes like "Viva los Muertos!" while Red Death uses his villain career as an outlet to keep it separate from his family life) while both are, deep down, Nice Guys (Brock in a Papa Wolf, Jerk with a Heart of Gold way and Red Death as an Affably Evil family man).
• Game Face: When he gets into his villainous persona (or lapses into his Ax-Crazy habits), his eyes brighten to have yellow sclera and red irises, his voice becomes more guttural, and his skin darkens to a more pronounced shade of red.
• Good Old Ways: Reminisces about how old-school arching had elegance and class, like how tying someone to the train tracks is simple, inexpensive, personal, deadly, and gives the victim a little (cruel, false) hope that they might escape — He does exactly that to Blind Rage.
• Grim Reaper: He's a skeletal supervillain and dresses in a black, hooded cloak while "on-the-job", and even wields a scythe.
• Happily Married: He adores his wife and she (evidently knowledgeable about the nature of his work) obviously does so as well, calling him little nicknames and making sure he has his dinner as he likes it if she has to pack it up so he can go on an arching. It's hinted they do have disputes about his work life, but this is understandable, as his wife worries about his safety and what consequences might happen if Red Death brings his work home with him.
• Hellish Horse: Rides on a flying, flaming skeletal horse named "Daisy".
• Hero Killer: He killed his original Arch-Enemy, Professor Cadmium, long ago, and is stated to have one of the highest body counts among all Guild villains since, including Professor Sterling Smart and his "personal army of 50 super soldiers" which he "vaporized". He encourages the Monarch to do the same thing to Dr. Venture, freeing him from hate and opening him up to greater professional villiany.
• Kick the Dog: Reveals to Brock that SPHINX was not really behind the "Movie Night" on Gargantua-1 and rubs it in his face that O.S.I. fighting the Pyramid Wars was removing the Guild's competition, just to be a jerk.
• Large Ham: When in villain mode, he's prone to dramatic, deep-voiced speeches and theatrics. He's naturally voiced by Clancy Brown, who is famous for these sorts of characters.
• Last Episode, New Character: He first appears in the season six finale before becoming a recurring character as a new Council member in season seven.
• Lean and Mean: As you'd expect from someone who is literally a skeleton from the neck up. His muscular appearance when he's on the job is due to his padded costume, not that this makes him any less dangerous. That said, he is only mean when "on the clock," and otherwise is genuinely nice.
• Like Father, Unlike Son: Continuing what is a central theme of the series, Red Death's daughter inherited his terrifying visage, but she doesn't seem to know her father is a supervillain and acts as a standard grade-schooler, going as far as to mistake Dr. Mrs. the Monarch for a princess. She does, however, seem to have inherited at least some of his evil attitude, evidenced by her bullying another girl at the playground.
• Mayfly–December Romance: He's been a supervillain since the 1940s. His wife looks to be in her 30s at most and they have a grade school-aged daughter together.
• Mood-Swinger: A (mostly) voluntary example. He can easily switch back and forth between a reasonable, friendly demeanor and full-on nightmare-from-hell supervillainy, including a Game Face change to clue viewers into the difference.
  Red Death: [pleasantly] Kate! Can you refrigerate my dinner in a Ziplock? I've an arching tonight — it's a special one.
  Kate: Sure, lambchop. You want the roll in there with it?
  Red Death: No, no, it gets all mushy in the gravy.
  [His wife winks to say "you got it" and leaves; Red Death pulls up his hood and looks in the mirror, eyes blazing yellow]
  Red Death: [growling] Showtime!
  Kate: You want your brownie in there, too, Cuddles?
  Red Death: [delighted, eyes and voice return to normal] Brownies?! Yes, thank you!
• Mugging the Monster: Monarch and 21 (in their Blue Morpho and Kano guise) try to threaten Red Death into giving up his arching rights to Dr. Venture by lying that they kidnapped his wife and daughter. Red Death counter-threatens that he will come and kill them if they don't release his family. He then proceeds to effortlessly deduce their identity, locate their hideout, and reduce them to pathetically begging for mercy until he relents.
• Murder Is the Best Solution: Any plan of his own or any plan trying to involve has to result in him killing somebody in some way. He only goes along with Dr. Mrs. the Monarch's mostly non-lethal way to resolve the "Blue Morpho" crisis in the season seven premiere when it's implied that he'll get to kill some O.S.I. agents instead of the Blue Morpho.
• Mysterious Past: From a narrative perspective. Red Death is a well-known, highly respected, and greatly feared villain with decades of terror under his belt, introduced as the worst person the Monarch could ever hope to piss off — and also one of the most established characters in the show to have little to no information revealed about his origin. What little tidbits we do find out (his original arches, or his activities in the '80s aboard Gargantua-1) are supplied by Red Death himself.
• Noisy Shut-Up: He manages to get the attention of an entire room of villains by noisily crushing a styrofoam cup. Amusingly right beside him was chalkboard. (And it's part of a Shout-Out to Quint's introduction in Jaws.)
• No-Nonsense Nemesis: He may have a flair for the dramatic, but only because he is sure he's going to win, and you're not going to escape. When he decides to get serious, he is terrifyingly efficient and effective, as evidenced when he receives a phone call that his wife and child have been kidnapped, the 'kidnappers' (Monarch and 21 as Blue Morpho and Kano) barely get their demands out of the way before Red Death goes full-on Liam Neeson on them, silencing their threats and easily hunting them down with horrifying intentions.
• Noodle Incident: He only realized he had "lost his way" after he did "terrible things". Based on the speech he later gives Monarch, it's implied that he might've regretted killing Prof. Cadmium the way he did, or at least realized he went too far, but given the kind of Mysterious Past he has, it could've easily been something else, too.
• Papa Wolf: When Monarch tries to trick him into thinking that the Blue Morpho has kidnapped his wife and daughter (they're really safe at her mother's), Red Death paraphrases Brian Mill's speech and immediately tracks them down. When they prove that his family is safe, however, he calms down and even offers them advice.
• Punch-Clock Villain: By necessity. Originally, when he was arching Prof. Cadmium, he became fixated on how much he hated the hero and made up his mind to "deal with it"; it was only after he crushed Cadmium's skull between his hands, massacred his family, and burned down the guy's house that he realized the real problem was his own rage and obsession, which would follow him around wherever he went. Now, by compartmentalizing his work life (arching one day a year to sate his unstoppable bloodlust) and leaving his issues at the office, he's able to live as a pleasant, good-natured family man off the clock.
• Refreshingly Normal Life-Choice: Red Death had found being a supervillain full-time to be an unhealthy way to live his life and wound up finding domestic bliss with a wife and daughter, choosing to keep his work life and personal life separate. He encourages the Monarch to do the same after seeing what his hatred of Dr. Venture is doing to him.
• Retired Badass: With the other council members, he retires from active arching in "The Terminus Mandate". Possibly Zig-zagged, since he throws away his official "final arch" and instead murders Blind Rage rather than follow the Guild's order. He seemingly has no plans to stop his villainy.
• Retired Monster: He's largely retired from active villainy, only "arching" once per year due to his advancing age and family commitments, seeking to join the Council as a sort of "retirement plan" since the pension is good and it's much safer, and earning a seat in season seven. He's a genuinely friendly guy... as long as you don't give him a reason to go "full evil", as the Monarch and Blind Rage each find out.
• Red Eyes, Take Warning: When he's "in character" (as a supervillain), his eyes turn yellow and his pupils turn red.
• Shout-Out: His costume is borrowed from the Batman villain, Reaper, while his his name (and some of his thematics) are from the Edgar Allan Poe story Masque of the Red Death.
• Skull for a Head: He's a Red Skull parody, so it comes with the territory.
• Sinister Scythe: To fit his Grim Reaper look, he wields a scythe that glows red and shoots out a Sword Beam that can disintegrate anything. In the backstory, he once used it to "vaporize" an "army of 50 super soldiers".
• Ugly Guy, Hot Wife: Despite looking like a skinless Red Skull, he has a very attractive wife. His daughter however looks exactly like him.
• Unusually Uninteresting Sight: His civilian clothes don't even bother with hiding his nightmarish, inhuman face, but nobody seems to notice or care. The same goes for his daughter, who has a matching face, as well.
• Vague Age: He's been a supervillain since the '40s and Brock mentions in the Finale Movie that "[Red Death]'s like, 73" in an uncertain, ballpark-estimate sort of way. There are implications that his "condition" has slowed his aging, as well, as he's seen in the with the Guild's "new meat" in the '80s (when he would have been much older than them) during their raid on Gargantua-1. He's still a brutally effective villain by the time of the series, but by his own admission, is getting older and isn't as sharp as he used to be, thus seeking a Council seat as a sort of "retirement plan". Add it all up and he's clearly old, but it's impossible to pinpoint an exact age.
• Villain Cred:
  • Has great respect for Vendata, calling him a tactical genius. He had also heard of the Monarch, and even praises the Monarch's "marionette" arch from "Self Medication", much to the Monarch's delight.
  • Gets this in the other direction from Henchman 21, who outright refuses to help the Monarch take him out, citing an event where Red Death vaporized a protagonist and his "army of 50 super soldiers". Self-preservation is certainly part of it, but 21 recognizes how deadly Red Death can be.
• Why Don't You Just Shoot Him?: He tells Monarch that his obsession with exclusively arching one person is a self-destructive and self-feeding issue, and that he would be much better off killing Rusty and moving on to bigger things, just as Red Death himself had done.
• Worthy Opponent: He's highly respected not just by the Guild but by the O.S.I., Brock in particular. Brock is downright estatic to get a chance to fight him (even if it's just supposed to be a 'show' battle during the joint sting to capture the Blue Morpho) with Shore Leave upset that he won't get the opportunity himself.

Wide Wale

Chester Ong (Wide Wale)

Voiced by: Hal Lublin

"I got a lot of bad shark in me..."

A powerful and wealthy New York City based supervillain who lives in a penthause across the way from VenTech Tower, Wide Wale controls much of the city's supervillainy and is invited to join the new Council of 13 in order to consolodate the Guild's control. He is granted arching rights to Dr. Venture in season six, which he shares with his large number of high-ranking "sub-arches". He resigns from the Council at the end of season seven due to the "Terminus Mandate" preventing acting councilors from active arching, but remains on as an ambassador.

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• Arch-Enemy: He gets exclusive arching rights on Dr. Venture after the latter's newfound fortune in season six. This is only from a technical standpoint since there's absolutely no personal enmity between them, it's just part of the Guild's bureaucracy. Later, it's implied he did it out of spite toward the Monarch for killing his brother, since villains are prevented from killing each other.
• Arc Villain: Up until "Arrears in Science", he is the Big Bad of the Blue Morpho arc; spanning from the start of season six and up until "The Rorqual Affair". He (and his sub-arches, and the Monarch eliminating them) provide most of the arc's conflict.
• Bald of Evil: His head is as smooth as a whale, including an apparent blow hole, and he's a high-ranking supervillain.
• Benevolent Boss: Despite being a ruthless "Level 10" mafioso supervillain, Wide Wale is pretty affable with his employees, telling his personal butler Barnacle Badhul (who has a very visible skin condition) to be proud of his appearance and enters into causal banter about their personal friends with Rocco.
• Big Bad Ensemble: While the Monarch is still trying to kill Dr. Venture, Wide Wale officially holds the arching rights to him in seasons six and seven. Wale doesn't really have any personal enmity with Dr. Venture, though, and subcontracts his arching to other villains (who the Monarch begins killing as the Blue Morpho).
• Big Brother Worship: From the way Wide Wale talks about him, he worshipped the ground his older brother Douglas walked on, and he still speaks fondly of his scientific skills today. The freak lab accident that turned him into a monstrous fish-man came from a misguided attempt to make his brother proud after acquiring a faulty specimen for his brother.
• Call-Back: There was another Dr. Ong in the series, one Dr. Douglas Ong who became the super-scientist Dr. Dugong, otherwise known as one of the many super-scientists The Monarch murdered while unable to arch Dr. Venture in season three. In fact, Hunter reveals that Dr. Chester worked with his brother Doug when looking into curing cancer, and a later episode confirms they are indeed brothers.
• Control Freak: Wide Wale is this to his daughter. In addition to sending his henchmen after guys she dates, he has a tracker implanted in her and also uses the Blue Morpho's attacks as a pretext to keep her imprisoned in their suite even after he's already caught him.
• The Don: He treats his supervillainy in New York as if he were the head of the mob, including treating his daughter Sirena as his Mafia Princess.
• Early-Bird Cameo: The character design of Wale was previously used in the season five episode "Momma's Boys" as a Dunwitch inmate.
• Even Evil Has Loved Ones: Deconstruction. His love for his family causes him to do some outrageously illegal activities to either provide a nice life for them or to further their dreams. This same affection also makes him extremely controlling to the point that he used the threat of the Blue Morpho to put his daughter under house arrest (even after he had already captured the Blue Morpho) and Douglas faked his own death at the hands of the Monarch because he feared being at Chester's mercy in his weakened state.
• Expy: He's a parody of Tobias Whale from DC, who is himself an Alternate Company Equivalent to the Marvel character Kingpin (who Wale's apparent A-lister villain status seems to suggest).
• Fallen Hero: He was a former scientist who did everything in his power to help his brother, Dr. Douglas Ong, utilize the secrets of the ocean to benefit mankind which would have included, but wouldn't be limited to, spoofing the naturally high-resistance to cancer that sharks and cuttlefish possess.
• Fauxreigner: When The Monarch points out that his surname "Ong" sounds more Asian than anything Italian and his brother, Dr. Dugong, didn't speak with an Italian accent, either. As he and Rocco begin to question Wide Wale's accent, Wale admits that he only became fluent in Italian after attending the University of Palermo on a work-study visa and his wife is Italian on her mother's side.
• Large and in Charge: Is absolutely massive, functions as essentially The Don of the supervillains of New York City, and joins the Guild Council of 13.
• LEGO Genetics: He tried to mutate himself on purpose with a variety of aquatic lifeform DNA including sharks, cuttlefish, and of course, whale.
• Morally Ambiguous Doctorate: He was a criminal even before his mutation, stealing his universe's equivalent of Damien Hirst's The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living (which was virtually the same except instead of a tiger shark, it contained a preserved megalodon) because he thought it would help advance his brother's research.
• Nerd in Evil's Helmet: Though certainly not a guy to be messed with, there are signs here and there that his murderous mob-boss attitude isn't the whole truth of his persona. His daughter points out that he decided to base the theme of his henchmen off whale lice, of all things.
• Professor Guinea Pig: He tried to mutate himself on purpose to act as "the missing link" between man and aquatic life so that Douglas could study his genetics to further their experiments. When his brother tried to stop him, they both wound up warped by the device.
• Punny Name: Wide wale is a type of corduroy that Wide Wale seems to prefer wearing. He is also part whale, and very wide.
• Unmoving Plaid: His corduroy suit seems to ignore logical contours and folds.
• You Killed My Father: It's strongly implied the main reason why he wanted to be Venture's archnemesis was to screw with the Monarch in revenge for the Monarch seemingly killing his beloved older brother. He keeps a lid on how angry he is until he has the Monarch alone and in his clutches.

Former Council Members

The Former Council as a Whole

The Former Council of 13

Silhouettes of several council members (left to right: Boggles, Dr. Z, Red Mantle, Wild Fop, Vendata, Monseñor

The other former members of the Council of 13 before the Sovereign's purge, most of whom were killed in the process. Membership:

Councilman 1: Vendata
Councilman 2: Wild Fop
Councilman 3: Red Mantle (See above)
Councilman 4: Boggles the Clue Clown
Councilman 5: Dr. Z (See above)
Councilman 6: Monseñor
Councilman 7: Don Hell
Councilman 8: Dragoon (See above)
Councilman 9: Steppenwolf
Councilman 10: Unnamed (referred to as "Bug Sumarai" in creator notes)
Councilman 11: Mommy Longlegs
Councilman 12: The Nerve
Councilman 13: The Sovereign (See above)

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• A Day in the Limelight: The season five episode "Bot Seeks Bot" is heavily focused on them as they induct Phineas Phage as a new member, their first in decades, following Boggle's death. Most of them go out to Don Hell's night club to celebrate.
• Killed Off for Real: Hence why they are former members of the Council, all (save for Clue Clown, who died of natural causes before the Sovereign's purge, and Vendata, who was disabled by Brock in "Bot Seeks Bot") being killed by the Sovereign in his bid to take out the Investors.
• The Omniscient Council of Vagueness: They "met" via silhouettes on screens with enforced secrecy. Not even the O.S.I. is aware of their existence until Monstroso tells them. This is also in stark contrast to Council under Force Majeure, who were more of a Legion of Doom with younger, active villains meeting in person. Only Red Mantle and Dragoon are still around from that era.
• Retired Monster: Nearly all of them appear to be older and retired from active villainy with some, such as Red Mantle and Dragoon, apparently not having arched in decades. Some have moved onto other ventures and side projects, like Don Hell's night club and Mommy Longlegs' Hive Mind family. They are all still supervillains, however, and shouldn't be taken lightly.
• Sinister Silhouettes: How they all appear for the first several seasons, as simple silhouettes on screens within the Guild HQ.
• Villains Out Shopping: There are numerous implications that most, if not all, are retired from active villainy while picking up more mundane hobbies. Comments from Steppenwolf and Red Mantle suggest that they used to meet to race cars Wacky Races-style. They also all go out to Don Hell's nightclub while Steppenwolf and the unnamed Councilman #10 had just gotten lunch together when they are killed in the Sovereign's purge.

Vendata (Councilman #1)

Vendata (Venturion, The Blue Morpho, Don Fitzcarraldo)

Voiced by: Doc Hammer

[Vendata's Guild files] "Guild cyborg, started henching in the late '70s, earned level one status with a string of high-profile super crimes in the '80s. Largely inactive since '98."

A cyborg supervillain who served as Councilman 1, he was severely damaged by Brock Samson and presumed dead. It is later revealed that his human parts came from the deceased anti-hero, The Blue Morpho, and was resurrected as a cyborg by Jonas Venture Sr. in 1976. After he attacked a young Rusty Venture, he was dismantled and tossed out, but Dr. Z reassembled him and programmed him for evil.

For information pertaining to his pre-cyborg life, see The Blue Morpho.

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• Ambiguous Situation: He has no memory of what happened on the night of the Movie Night Massacre, so it's unclear if he killed Jonas Venture Sr. or not.
• The Bus Came Back: Returns for "Arrears in Science", after having been presumed dead since the events of "Bot Seeks Bot".
• Butt-Monkey: He's openly disrespected by his fellow councilmembers, who think of him as a "stick in the mud" and a "killjoy," and his date with Ghost Robot is really just a setup so the O.S.I. can tap him for information. He is apparently killed at the end of "Bot Seeks Bot", with the Guild presuming him as such and giving away his council seat. He survives and regains his old memories, but has to walk, near-naked and damaged, across the US to assume his old Blue Morpho identity, and is Killed Off for Real at the end of "Arrears in Science". Given how lousy his life was (including blackmail and infidelity) even before he was a cyborg, it's easy to feel sorry for him.
• Chekhov's Gunman: Originally Vendata just seems like a one-off villain who would only have importance in the episode "Bot Seeks Bot" as the O.S.I. taps him for information, then leaves him disabled and presumed dead. Then "Arrears in Science" comes along and it's revealed he's the original Blue Morpho and the long lost father of the Monarch, in addition to possibly being responsible for the the Movie Night Massacre and therefore the (apparent) death of Jonas Venture Sr.
• The Comically Serious: Due to being an (apparently) emotionless cyborg who prioritizes doing things by the book, he remains stoic and nonplussed when faced with the insanity surrounding him.
• Cool Old Guy: Of Red Death's NYC-based '80s team. Although, funnily enough, this is an opinion only Red Death holds, as he cites his tactical genius and ambition with the utmost respect.
• Cyborg: He's still got his human face and brain despite the rest of him being robotic.
• Deceased Fall-Guy Gambit: While it's still not clear exactly what happened during the "Movie Night Massacre", he is officially blamed by the O.S.I. for the death of Jonas Venture Sr. and by the Guild for the villains murdered by the Monarch posing as the "new" Blue Morpho. He's already been crushed by the P.R.O.B.L.E.M. at this point, with the O.S.I. and Guild agreeing to jointly "disassemble" what is left of him as a form of execution for his scrimes.
• Early-Installment Weirdness: In his original appearances as a silhouetted member of the Council of 13, his voice isn't as loud or droning as it is when he makes his first proper appearance in "Bot Seeks Bot".
• Evil Is Bigger: According to his O.S.I. profile, he's 6'5" and weighs 263 lbs, while being a supervillain serving on the Guild's Council of 13.
• Evil Former Friend: Of Jonas Venture Sr. and the rest of the original Team Venture, though we also learn Jonas' friendship was anything but genuine. Furthermore, Vendata is pegged to be the most likely culprit of the "Movie Night Massacre", which resulted in Jonas' (apparent) death.
• Expy: Of Alex Murphy from Robocop. Both are cyborgs who possess more emotion than they show, both talk in a similar manner, and both of them were heroes brought back from the dead through cybernetics courtesy of a Villain with Good Publicity. Both of them also seek out the people who wronged them in life for revenge.
• Foreshadowing: In "Bot Seeks Bot", Vendata begins shifting between his current memories and those he had before becoming a cyborg. At one point he mentions having a wife and being in a plane crash. The Monarch's parents died in a plane crash...
• The Friend Nobody Likes: Downplayed. While his council-mates on the Guild ubiquitously can't stand his irritating, dull demeanor and total lack of tact, they do seem supportive, if still teasing, of him finally seeming to get a date and socialize, and it is implied that a lot of their ire for him comes from his asocial behaviour. They're also sympathetic to him when it appears his "date" is ditching him in "Bot Seeks Bot". Completely Averted with Red Death and his old group, who respected and looked up to him.
• From Nobody to Nightmare: While he was feared as anti-hero vigilante The Blue Morpho, he started his villainous career as a piece of discarded Venture technology before managing to climb the ranks of the Guild and eventually taking a seat on the Council of 13.
• Generation Xerox: Just like his son, he flouted the Guild's rules and regulations in order to antagonize a Venture.
• Go Out with a Smile: He smiles right before dies, after hearing The Monarch call him "daddy".
• Honey Trap: Brock Samson and the O.S.I. set him up on a date with a disguised Ghost Robot to pry information about the Guild out of him.
• Machine Monotone: He's only able to speak in a loud, droning, robotic voice after his resurrection. This continues even after he's regained his original personality.
• Never Found the Body: The Sovereign presumes him dead immediately after the events of "Bot Seeks Bot" and offers his seat on the Council of 13 to Dr. Mrs. the Monarch. After "All This and Gargantua-2", when the Guild's new leadership is trying to fill seats on the new Council, Vendata is mentioned as missing, but they decide they can't wait for him to resurface. It's revealed in "Arrears in Science" that Vendata regained his original memories and spent the entire time since "Bot Seeks Bot" walking back to his home in Newark.
• Not-So-Harmless Villain: After spending his entire spotlight episode as the comedic relief villain, it turns out that used to be a highly-respected cohort of Red Death, and that he single-handedly planned, and (almost) successfully pulled off, a hijacking of Gargantua-1 with a bunch of Guild "new meat", which led to the Movie Night Massacre.
• Punny Name: A mash-up of "vendetta" and "data". May overlap with Meaningful Name, with the implication that Vendata perpetrated the Movie Night Massacre out of a subconscious desire for vengeance against Jonas Venture. The "Ven-" part also works with him being a cyborg originally constructed by Venture Industries.
• Reforged into a Minion: Zig-zagged. Dr. Z reveals he found Venturion's remains in a dumpster outside the Venture Compound (after having been destroyed by Kano) and decided to rebuild him as a tool to arch Jonas Venture Sr., giving him an Evil Makeover and installing a Morality Dial. However, Dr. Z was arrested in a drug bust before Vendata awoke, leaving the abandoned cyborg to become a wholly independent villain rather than a lackey of Z. This is played straight for being made into a servant of Jonas. Even his friends and Dr. Z were disgusted by this, though Dr. Z decided to exploit him anyways and turn him against Jonas because it was too poetic.
• Retired Monster: While he committed "a string of high-profile super crimes in the '80s" and earned a seat on the Council of 13, his Guild files note that he has been "inactive" since 1998.
• The Stoic: Even when he's surprised, his tone and facial expression barely change.
  Red Death: [...] But Vendata wasn't laughing. No, he suddenly got this real serious look on his face.
  Red Mantle: Did he have any other look?
  Dragoon: The man was a genuine cy-bore!
• Tin Man: As a machine, others claim him to be an emotionless husk, although his inner self shows that this is far from the truth and Red Death seems to have picked up on his subtler emotional cues.
• Walking Spoiler: It becomes much more difficult to talk about him after "Arrears in Science" reveals he's the original Blue Morpho, the Monarch's father, and the possible murderer of Jonas Venture Sr., though he claims he has no memory of that last one.

Wild Fop (Councilman #2)

Wild Fop

Voiced by: Christopher McCulloch

"The Sovereign can be such a queen bitch..."

A "Fop"-themed supervillain who served as Councilman #2.

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• Attack Animal: Has a group of attack dogs. The Sovereign uses this against him in order to kill him, swapping his perfurme with cat urine so that his own dogs would kill him.
• The Dandy: A parody of the English Restoration-era "Fop", he wears a powered wig, period appropriate clothes, and is spraying himself with perfume moments before his death. He also speaks in a high and effeminate manner.
• Early-Bird Cameo: Appears in the background as a guest at the Monarch's wedding in the "Showdown at Cremation Creek" two-parter.
• Rape Is a Special Kind of Evil: In the Guild information video Orpheus receives after being approved for a villain, Wild Fop is featured in a segment where he sexually assaults his "arch" while the video explains how this is against Guild rules.
• Shout-Out: He calls the person he is talking to on the phone right before his death "Bosie", which was Oscar Wilde's nickname for his lover, Lord Alfred Douglas. Wilde was a famous "fop" and founding member of the Guild.

Boggles the Clue Clown (Councilman #4)

Boggles the Clue Clown

Shoreleave: [Regarding Boggles] Especially when your ticker taps out behind the wheel of your clown car. Heard it took twenty minutes to pull his hench-clowns out before they could even get to him.

A clown-themed supervillain who liked to leave clues in the form of riddles. An arch-enemy of Captain Sunshine, he served as Councilman #4 and died from a heart attack even before the Sovereign's purge.

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• Antagonist in Mourning: Inverted. His arch-enemy Captain Sunshine is inconsolable and cries into his coffin during his funeral.
• Black Comedy: Invokes it during his funeral, as he has Monseñor, during the eulogy, make a "jack in the box" joke with his own casket because he wants "the last laugh". The mourners are unamused and Red Mantle yells out "too soon!"
• Clown Car: Drove one and it contributed to his death when he suffered a heart attack. It took 20 minutes to pull out his hench-clowns before they could get to him.
• Death by Irony: He was a clown-themed supervillain that drove a Clown Car stuffed with his henchmen. He suffered a heart attack behind the wheel and it took so long to get his hench-clowns out that he died before medical attention could get to him.
• Hair-Trigger Sound Effect: According to Monstroso, he punctuated every sentence with a "ludicrous" bicycle horn.
• Monster Clown: He's a clown-themed supervillain who serves on the Guild's Council of 13. He's a pastiche of The Joker (evil clown) and The Riddler (penchant for leaving clues in the form of riddles), and he happens to be Captain Sunshine's arch enemy, who is voiced by Kevin Conroy, the most prolific Batman voice actor.
• Villainous Friendship: Red Mantle considered him a friend and seems to be in genuine mourning over his death, while several other council members attend his funeral, including Monseñor who delivers the eulogy. Averted for Dragoon, who "never liked the man".
• Walk of Shame: In the flashback in the Finale Movie during Bobbi St. Simone's explanation of how the O.S.I. used her to take down members of the Guild, one sequence shows Boggles being arrested and taken out of his house while handcuffed in just his underwear as a result.

Monseñor (Councilman #6)

Monseñor

Voiced by: Larry Murphy

"I have youth group tonight..."

A luchador/priest-themed supervillain who served as Councilman #6.

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• Affably Evil: He's never witnessed doing anything actually evil, with his screen time being to deliver Boggles' eulogy and to mention how he teaches a youth group so he's unable to join the other councilors at Don Hell's nightclub.
• Gas Chamber: Killed by Sovereign pumping poison gas into his Guild Council chamber. He dies quickly while Watch and Ward are able to rescue the other remaining councilors.
• Masked Luchador: His theme, including a classic mask, while having the cliché Catholic priest theming as well.
• Punny Name: "Monsignor" is a formal way to address a high-ranking member of the Catholic church and "Señor" is, of course, Spanish for "Sir". He's a luchador/priest-themed villain.
• Shout-Out: To Fray Tormenta, aka "Friar Storm", a Catholic priest who wrestled as a masked luchador to raise money for an orphanage.
• Sinister Minister: He's a supervillain luchador/priest who serves on the Guild's Council of 13.
• Sombrero Equals Mexican: Wears one, along with a luchador mask, and is strongly implied to be Mexican with the requisite accent.

Don Hell (Councilman #7)

Don Hell

Voiced by: Christopher McCulloch

"Why don't you all swing by my place tonight? Drinks on the house!"

An "underworld"-themed supervillain and famed torturer, he served as Councilman #7.

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• Actually Not a Vampire: There is no indication that he's actually a vampire (which do exist in the Venture-verse), but his general "underworld"-theming, fang-like teeth, and high-collared cloak definitely give him the aesthetic.
• The Alcoholic: Likes to drink and owns a nightclub for villains. He actually quotes a line from the Alcoholics Anonymous "big book" immediately prior to unknowingly drinking the acid that kills him.
• Cold-Blooded Torture: He's a famed torturer and intends to inflict this on Dr. Venture and Billy when they're caught trying to get into his night club.
• Coolest Club Ever: His nightclub is apparently the place for villains to hang out, from lowly "level-ones" to even the Guild Council themselves.
• Eyepatch of Power: Has one over his right eye and is a supervillain member of the Guild's Council of 13.
• Fangs Are Evil: Has a full set of sharpened teeth and is a supervillain member of the Guild's Council of 13.
• Hell: Not only his villainous surname, but part of his "underworld"-theme.
• High Collar of Doom: Has a vampire-like one as part of his costume and is a supervillain member of the Guild's Council of 13.
• Hollywood Acid: Killed via spiked drink that melts him like acid.
• Ironic Death: On two levels. First, he's the proprieter of a villain night club and obvious drinker who is killed via spiked drink. Second, the drink was spiked with acid, which is the torture ("Acid Dip") he was going to let a lucky club patron inflict upon Dr. Venture and Billy in "Bot Seeks Bot".
• No Celebrities Were Harmed: To Don Hill, a famous New York City night club entrepreneur.
• Spikes of Villainy: Wears a spiked helment and is a supervillain member of the Guild's Council of 13.
• Vampires Own Night Clubs: While not purely a vampire, he does seem to have an "underworld" theming which fits with his villainous surname and owns a nightclub for villains.

Steppenwolf (Councilman #9)

Steppenwolf

Voiced by: Christopher McCulloch

"It's not street legal but then, I am a supervillain..."

A werewolf-themed supervillain and fan of classic cars, he served as Councilman #9.

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• Affably Evil: The only "evil" act we see him perform is driving a non-street legal car and he's easily the friendliest member of the Council, going against the Sovereign's orders to propose a get-together to celebrate the newest council member and offering to drive the others.
• Bat People: Downplayed in that he's primarily based on a werewolf, but his facial structure and ears more closely resemble those of certain bat species leading to some confusion within the fandom.
• Cool Car: Drives a souped-up classic hot rod which he admits "isn't street legal".
• External Combustion: Killed in the Sovereign's purge via car bomb along with Councilman #10 "Bug Samurai"
• Ironic Death: A fan of souped-up classic cars, he is killed via car bomb.
• Shout-Out:
  • His name is one to the classic rock band Steppenwolf (which itself was taken from the Hermann Hesse novel of the same name).
  • His Cool Car is based heavily on the one driven by The Munsters.
  • He and Red Mantle discuss villains getting together and racing souped-up cars Wacky Races-style (which Dragoon outright conflates with the show itself).
• Villainous Friendship: He is very friendly with the other councilmembers while he and Councilman #10 got lunch together right before they're killed in the Sovereign's purge.
• Wolf Man: An undersized version, he's covered in hair and has longer, floppier, almost bat-like ears compared to most examples.

"Bug Samurai" (Councilman #10)

"Bug Samurai"

Never named in the show but listed as "Bug Samurai" in creator notes, Councilman #10 is a bug/samurai-themed supervillain.

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• Bugs Herald Evil: He's a bug-themed supervillain and serves on the Guild's Council of 13.
• Drink-Based Characterization: His armor has a Samurai-look to it, his helmet and belt are drawn from Kamen Rider's, and, to tie the whole "Japanese" theming together, his drink of choice (as revealed at Don Hell's night club) is a Kamikaze.
• External Combustion: Killed via car bomb along with Steppenwolf.
• Intelligible Unintelligible: Steppenwolf, and possibly the other councilmembers as well, can apparently understand his bug-like clicking without issue.
• Samurai: His armor looks like bug-themed Samurai armor and he's listed specifically as "Bug Samurai" in creator notes.
• Shout-Out: His bug-like helmet and "Typhoon"-like belt are spitting images of Kamen Rider's.
• The Unnamed: His actual name is never revealed before his death. He is simply referred to as "Bug Samurai" in creator notes.
• Villainous Friendship: He was getting lunch with Steppenwolf immediately prior to the Sovereign's purge which kills them both.
• The Voiceless: Does not speak in any recognizable human language, simply insectoid clicking.

Mommy Longlegs (Councilman #11)

Mommy Longlegs

Voiced by: Paget Brewster

"The grandkids are visiting!"

An arachnid-themed supervillain and noted grandmother, she served as Councilman #11.

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• Affably Evil: We never see her actually engage in any acts of evil, with her visiting/commenting on her family that she genuinely cares about.
• Arachnid Appearance and Attire: Is named after an arachnid, wears all black, had red compound eyes, and has the famous black widow red "hourglass" on her chest.
• Due to the Dead: Dr. Mrs. the Monarach briefly mourns her death and promises to deliver the news to her colony personally.
• Early-Bird Cameo: Quite possible the earliest of any Guild councilor, showing up in the background of Dr. Venture's yard sale in season one's "Tag Sale, You're It!".
• Even Evil Has Loved Ones: She dotes over her grandchildren and genuinely seems to care for her "family" despite being a Guild councilor.
• Hive Mind: She speaks with multiple voices at once and in a "communal language of the colony" when she senses danger.
• Multi-Armed and Dangerous: She has six arms (giving her the eight limbs of an arachnid including her legs) and is a supervillain councilor for the Guild.
• Multiple Gunshot Death: Killed by automatic fire from a Slaughterbot while escaping the Guild HQ following the Sovereign's betrayal.
• Older Than They Look: She's a grandmother and, given that the Guild hasn't inducted a new councilor in "decades" before Phage, cannot be all that young. However, the humanoid parts of her body are youthful and shapely.
• Punny Name: Based on the archanid species Daddy Longlegs, replacing "Daddy" with "Mommy", and she is very tall for a woman with long legs.
• Spiders Are Scary: Her name, motif, and occupation as a Guild councilor all play into it. However, she actually seems to be a caring grandmother to members of her colony.

The Nerve (Councilman #12)

The Nerve

Voiced by: Christopher McCulloch

"And, ah, na na, I'm on the moon!"

A supervillain who is a brain and nervous system inside a human-shaped, fluid-filled, apparently glass body. He served as Councilman #11.

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• Artistic License – Anatomy: His eyes are set directly within his brain, when in reality, they're connected by several inches of optic nerve.
• Blatant Lies: He tries to get out of the Council outing to celebrate their new member by claiming he's "on the moon". Red Mantle calls him out on it.
• Brain in a Jar: A brain, plus eyes and a nervous system, in a glass jar-like body.
• Dumpster Dive: His body is found, shattered and leaking, in a dumpster following the Sovereign's purge.
• Speech Impediment: Has one that causes him to insert "ah" and "na" sounds into his sentences.
• Shout-Out: His appearance is Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles villain "Mutagen Man", who is likewise human organs inside of a glass, fluid-filled container.

Wide Wale's Sub-arches

Various high-ranking Guild villains to whom Wide Wale subcontracted his arching of Dr. Venture.

Haranguetan

Haranguetan (Ronnie)

Voiced by: Steve Rattazzi

"STRIKE ME!"

A high-ranking Irish-American supervillain with some simian traits.

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• The Alcoholic: His Haranguetank is filled with empty whiskey bottles and his ex-wife works at a bar. She admits that he beats her while drunk.
• Awesome Personnel Carrier: His vehicle is the "Haranguetank", an armored RV. It's the only thing his ex-wife wants back from him after he's dead.
• Blood Knight: Really wants a good fight with Brock during his arching on Dr. Venture, even demanding that Brock "strike" him.
• Disney Villain Death: Is killed after getting punched into a deep pit by 21/Kano while under the influence of "God Gas".
• Domestic Abuse: Is said to get drunk and beat his wife.
• Even Evil Can Be Loved: Despite his many horrific traits, including outright Domestic Abuse, his ex-wife is upset to learn of his death and attempts to avenge him.
• Fighting Irish: A supervillain with a thick Irish accent, large muscules, and Blood Knight tendencies.
• Frazetta Man: While mostly human, he does have some traits of apes and is an extremely violent supervillain.
• Hot Blooded Sideburns: Has a pair of fur-like muttonchops and is extremely quick to anger.
• Mushroom Samba: Is experiencing one after being exposed to Dr. Venture's "God Gas" when he's (accidentally) punched in a pit by 21/Kano.
• No-Holds-Barred Beatdown: Beats Sgt. Hatred so severely during their first meeting that it sends him to the hospital.
• Punny Name: "Harang" means to "insult or harass", while "orangutan" is a type of great ape. He is a villain with ape-like features who loves to fight.
• Top-Heavy Guy: His upper body is much bulkier and more muscular than his legs. Fitting, given his simian traits.
• Vigilante Execution: Subverted as, while it appears to the Guild that he's been killed by the suddenly returned vigilante, The Blue Morpho, 21/Kano only punched him, not intending to kill him, while he fell into the pit Wide Wale's previous arch attempt on VenTech Tower created.
• Weapon for Intimidation: He carries a large caliber revolver but reveals that it isn't loaded. He prefers to fight with his fists.
• Would Hit a Girl: Drunkenly beats his wife. In what can be seen as karmic, his first attempt to arch Dr. Venture fails when Warriana knocks him out from behind.
• You Need a Breath Mint: Noted to have extremely foul-smelling breath by the other characters.

Battleaxe

Battleaxe

Voiced by: Barbara Rosenblatt

"Let me just go put me face on."

Haranguetan's ex-wife who runs a dive bar. After learning of his death, she seeks revenge on Dr. Venture who she believes to be responsible.

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• Avenging the Villain: Believing that Dr. Venture killed her husband, she drives to his tower to take revenge.
• Bad Guy Bar: Runs a divey tavern where the other patrons are known Guild villains.
• Ballistic Discount: Downplayed in that she doesn't kill him, but she knocks out the impound lot attendant while taking back the Haranguetank.
• Brutish Character, Brutish Weapon: She's a loud, loutish supervillain who wields a massive battleaxe as a weapon.
• Drives Like Crazy: Not helped by the revelation that her ex-husband was apparently killed by Dr. Venture setting her off immediately before getting behind the wheel of the "Haranguetank", but she drives like a complete psycho on her way to VenTech Tower, ultimately resulting in the accident that cripples both her and Think Tank.
• Even Evil Has Loved Ones: She has little good to say about her ex-husband who was outright abusive of her, but she still gets upset and seeks to avenge him when he dies.
• Fighting Irish: She's an aggressive, short-tempered villain with a vaguely Scotireland accent.
• Meaningful Name: She not only wields an actual battleaxe as a weapon, but a "battleaxe" is an archaic derogatory term for an "aggressive or overbearing" woman, which is very fitting given her personality.
• Pelts of the Barbarian: Her villain costume is mostly leather with a rough-hewn skirt in this vein.
• This Means Warpaint: What she means by "put[ting] her face on" after learning of her ex-husband's death. She applies "woad"-style warpaint before going out to seek revenge.
• Ye Olde Butcherede Englishe: Her divey tavern is named "Ye Olde Battleaxe".

Think Tank

Think Tank (Dr. Nidaba)

Voiced by: Jeffrey Wright

"Your position is untenable."

A high-ranking villain whose day job is as a philosophy professor at Stuyvesant University. He has psychic powers, a massive head, and drives a purple tank while arching.

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• Affably Evil: He's one of the most genuinely polite supervillains in the Guild. He makes sure his student, Dean, doesn't go home the night he plans on launching an attack, and he seems to want a worthy adversary.
• Antagonist in Mourning: After being rendered comatose, the superhero Stars and Garters visits him in the hospital and plays guitar for him after being told music helps in the healing process. Given his team member, Warriana has apparently battled him in the past, it can be presumed Stars and Garters was one of Think Tank's "jock" nemeses.
• Awesomeness by Analysis: He deduces that Dean was attacked by Wide Wale and visited someone in the hospital based on stains and scents. Also doubles as an Establishing Character Moment to show off his extreme intelligence.
• Brains Evil, Brawn Good:
  • Think Tank is disappointed that he's often pitted against "jock" heroes instead of a fellow genius. It's one of the reasons he's so excited to get a scientist nemesis like Rusty. Unfortunately, Rusty doesn't exactly live up to his expectations...
  • Once Brock gets to him, the two fight in this fashion. The brawny Brock comes at him with a knife while slinging childish insults like "Stink Tank", and even Think Tank being several strategic steps ahead (trapping his arm in a telekinetic shield with a cannon pointed at his chest) is lost on Brock until he's blasted out a window.
• Convenient Coma: After Battleaxe runs him over, he ends up comatose. He is still there and even shares a hospital room with Rusty in "The High Cost of Loathing".
• Evil Teacher: He's a supervillain philosophy professor. In a twist, he acts like a Cool Teacher—at least in the sense he cares about his students, like Dean, whom he warns to stay away from the place he plans to attack later.
• Expy: He's an obvious parody of Marvel's MODOK, being a large-headed, highly intelligent villain who gets around in a weaponized external apparatus.
• Friendly Enemy: He tries to be this to Rusty, whom he mistakenly believes to be a Worthy Opponent, but given that it's Rusty, it's taxing.
• Meaningful Name: Nisaba was the Sumerian goddess of, among many things, learning and writing. A fitting basis for the surname of an intellectual supervillain.
• Mind over Matter: He fights with telekinetic powers, able to create shields around him or channel them through his "tank" cannon to create a powerful blast.
• My Brain Is Big: He has a comically huge head in contrast to his small body. He is also highly intelligent and possesses telekinetic powers.
• No Celebrities Were Harmed: In terms of facial appearance, he strongly resembles Dr. Cornell West while also being a highly intelligent professor.
• Noodle Incident: Whatever happened between he and Warriana was bad enough that she gets very upset and agrees to help Brock take him out when she learns that it's him arching the Ventures.
• Not Quite Dead: Seemingly killed when Battleaxe accidentally runs him over, it turns out he survived and is comatose.
• Pet the Dog: Advises his student Dean to avoid going home that night, so Dean won't be in danger while he arches Dean's father.
• Polite Villains, Rude Heroes: Think Tank comes to Rusty expecting an enemy who can provide him the intellectual match he seeks and, despite breaking into his building, treats their encounter like meeting a new neighbor. On the flip side, Rusty treats him as an annoyance due to the number of villains barging in that he's already had to deal with.
• Scary Black Man: Zig-zagged because he's not physically threatening, being a tiny guy with a huge head, but he is a dangerous supervillain with telekinetic powers. Not that those would be obvious to the cabs who don't stop for him over the course of about 10 minutes in Midtown...
• Smart People Play Chess: This was his goal of arching Dr. Venture, a game of chess. Unfortunately for him, Rusty doesn't know how to play chess...
• Super Wheelchair: While he can walk, he prefers to get around in a floating Professor X-style wheelchair in civilian mode and a purple tank that he can channel his telekinetic powers through in villain mode.
• Worthy Opponent: He deems Rusty to be more of an intellectual equal than previous heroes he's had to fight. Clearly, he has no idea which Dr. Venture he got. While Rusty is smart, he has no patience and dislikes chess. J.J. would have been a better fit for him.

Doom Factory

Doom Factory

The group's leader, Wes Warhammer

Parody Superfriends Narrator: Ten of the most ruthlessly self-involved villains on Earth loosely align forces against the powers of good.

The Doom Factory is a group of "post-modern artist" supervillains, led by Wes Warhammer. Other members are Frigid, Serpentine, Eenie-Meanie, Gerard the Gorilla, Trashenstein, Black Mariah, Ultra-Violent, Billy Maim, She-Hemoth, and Hard Candy.

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• Attention Deficit... Ooh, Shiny!: Warhammer apparently tends to get wrapped up in a passion project, then find a new muse and involve them in said project, only to lose interest just as quickly. This was a trait his real-life inspiration, Andy Warhol, had as well.
• Beware the Silly Ones: Yes, they're extremely eccentric and gimmicky, but they were able to pull off a completely successful heist, robbing Rusty blind with effectively zero problems.
• Bunny-Ears Lawyer: Despite their eccentricities (even by supervillain standards), they are pretty effective at what they do. They manage to infiltrate and set up their party within the VenTech Penthouse without anyone noticing, they tranquillize Sgt. Hatred, immediately prevent Rusty from calling Brock for help, then rob him blind, and (from Rusty's perspective) get away with it, all of which comes across as pretty impressive. The only thing they were unable to account for being the Blue Morpho appearing as a sudden Spanner in the Works. Granted Dr. Venture is not the most astute or attentive individual and Sgt. Hatred was still healing from his injuries, but the fact that they rank up high enough in the Guild's ranks to be allowed to arch him speaks volumes.
• Cloudcuckoolander: Warhammer operates on another level entirely. Best exemplified in his final exchange with Rusty:
  Warhammer: Somebody gave me this communicator watch. I think it was Eenie. Yeah, yeah it was Eenie. And-and she said I could talk to God with it, but I-I don't have anything to say [his lip briefly trembles]. Here [gives it to Rusty] n-now you can talk to God.
• Confusion Fu: Their "arching" of Dr. Venture is to throw a huge party in his penthouse to distract him while robbing him blind. According to the Guild files on the Doom Factory (briefly brought up by 21), they also case minor annoyances and destruction in the homes of their arches:
  "The Warhammerian HAPPENING: An event-based assault on the home, belongings, and person of his intended arch. Wracking up huge phone bills, clogging toilets, emptying food stores, etc. The victims are often coerced into shameful or compromising movies and photo-shoots that are later used as blackmail."
• Drugs Are Bad: They are villains and they provide an entire candy store's worth of drugs for their parties.
• Expy: The Doom Factory itself is obviously one for the Legion of Doom, they even have a lair that rises up from the murky depths and flies. The "Factory" was the nickname for Andy Warhol's studio and each member is a hybrid of a Legion of Doom villain and a Warhol associate.

• Legion of Doom: A parody of the Trope Namer. Each member is a hybrid of Legion of Doom villain and an Andy Warhold "Factory" associate, while their headquarters rises up out of the water. They are even introduced by a parody Superfriends narrator at the start of the episode.
• Mad Artist: More of a gimmick than a motivation (understandable considering they are based on famed pop artist Andy Warhol and the Warhol Superstars), but they are referred to as " a part of this new breed of Post-Modern artsy villain" by 21 and have had an article of Modern Villain done on their hideout. Their big plan involves throwing a party at their arch's home (in this case being Rusty Venture's penthouse) where they proceed to rob them blind in the chaos. They fill their lair and the penthouse with metallic mylar-balloons filled with helium similar to the Andy Warhol and Billy Klüver's "Silver Clouds", Gerard Gorilla is always seen making screenprints, they send a threat in the form of a Screamer Prank referencing the art film Empire (1964), Warhammer distracts Rusty by making him the star of a minimalist film, they fill the penthouse with Marilyn Diptych-esq depictions of Rusty Venture, etc.
• No Celebrities Were Harmed: All of them are based on individual members of Warhol's cohort, with added elements of various comic book villains.
  • Their leader, Wes Warhammer, is a mix of Lex Luthor and pop artist Andy Warhol.
  • Frigid is Captain Cold and Brigid Berlin.
  • Serpentine is The Riddler and Ondine.
  • Eenie-Meanie is obscure DC superheroine Bumblebee and Edie Sedgwick.
  • Gerard the Gorilla is Gorilla Grodd and Gerard Malanga.
  • Black Maria is Black Manta and Paul Morrissey.
  • Trashenstein is Solomon Grundy and Joe Dalessandro.
  • Ultra-Violent is Star Sapphire and Ultra Violet.
  • She-Hemoth is Giganta and Holly Woodlawn.
  • Billy Maim is Cheetah and Billy Name.
  • Hard Candy is Bizarro and Candy Darling.
• Punny Name: They're a mash-up of DC's Legion of Doom and Andy Warhol's "Superstars" who populated his creative space known as "The Factory", with each individuals name also being a punny mash-up in this manner.
• Sissy Villain: While only brief, Warhammer's first interaction with Rusty comes across as very suggestive.
  Warhammer: Hi. You must be Rusty. Wow, it's — it's so great to finally meet you. You're really such a beauty. [He takes off Rusty's glasses.]
  Rusty: Please, don't hurt me.
  Warhammer: You're the boss, applesauce.
• Vigilante Execution: They are killed by the Blue Morpho's bombs placed inside their headquarters while they were away arching Venture.
• Whole Costume Reference: Trashenstein, as his name suggests, is based on Joe Dalessandro's look in Flesh for Frankenstein (nude and covered in stitches, with bandages over his genitals), combined with the long hair and headband he wore in Trash.

Wandering Spider

Wandering Spider

Left: legs contracted, Right: legs extended

Voiced by: Hal Lublin

The Monarch: Oh please, [Wandering Spider] is a has-been and a lush.

21: He killed Mr. Energy!

The Monarch: Oh please, Mr. Energy electrocuted himself watering his lawn. Wandering Spider just altered his report to live off of his arching insurance.

A spider-themed level ten supervillain with extending mechanical legs.

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• Asshole Victim: Downplayed as the audience never actually sees him do anything evil, but he spends most of his on-screen time begging for his life from 21 and is a level ten supervillain, certainly having done something evil to achieve that rank.
• Even Evil Has Loved Ones: He is a level ten supervillain (despite not being shown doing anything evil on-screen) and has a loving wife, who mourns hid death and slaps Dr. Mrs. the Monarch for allowing him to be out "arching" with a vigilante like the Blue Morpho on the loose.
• Expy: Of Doctor Octopus with his four additional mechanical legs, glasses, and green-and-orange track suit all matching up.
• Insurance Fraud: He allegedly killed his former arch-enemy, Mr. Energy, but the Monarch reveals that Mr. Energy accidentally killed himself and Wandering Spider simply took credit to live off of his "arching insurance".
• Never Found the Body: He was presumed dead and a funeral was held for him due to 21 (acting as Kano) making him call Dr. Mrs. The Monarch and leave a voicemail stating that he's been abducted by the Blue Morpho. His actual fate is ambiguous, with a shot of his mechanical legs extending out of a shallow grave shown at the end of the episode, 21 washing blood off of the Morphomobile at the start of the next, and 21's later Guilt-Induced Nightmare showing him as a corpse implying that he's dead.
• Punny Name: He's Ambiguously Brown, speaks with an indeterminate (vaguely Latino) accent, his costume includes four mechanical legs (giving him a total of eight limbs), and his name comes from the Brazilian Wandering Spider. He's possibly "Brazilian" and has "wandered" up to New York City where he's a "spider"-themed villain.
• Tranquilizer Dart: His weapons, aside from his mechanical legs, are neurotoxin darts implied to be PhTx3 (the one actual Brazilian Wandering Spiders produce) based on 21 getting paralysis and priapism when he is accidentally "stung".
• Vigilante Execution: In order to deflect suspicion from him being the Blue Morpho, the Monarch goes out arching while 21, as Kano, kidnaps Wandering Spider. 21 forces him to send a message to Dr. Mrs. the Monarch stating that he's been taken by the Blue Morpho at the same time the Monarch is arching Dr. Hiney. 21 then (apparently) kills Wandering Spider and leaves him buried in the Pine Barrens.
• Wounded Gazelle Gambit: 21 uses one on him (based on Buffalo Bill's in The Silence of the Lambs) to lure him into a car to be kidnapped.

Ramburglar

Ramburglar

Voiced by: Mark Gagliardi

A high-level ram-themed supervillain.

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• The Big Guy: His role in Copycat's heist team, being the most physically imposing member of the team.
• Gruesome Goat: He has ram horns and is a high-level supervillain in the Guild.
• Institutional Apparel: Wears a classic black-and-white striped prisoner shirt, drawn from the Hamburglar.
• Portal Cut: He falls headfirst into the active teleporter, effectively beheading him.
• Off with His Head!: Via Rusty's teleporter during the heist. It continues to roll around in the panic room.
• Punny Name: He has rams horns, his costume is based on the McDonald's Hamburglar character, and he's a "burglar" attempting to pull off a heist.
• Shout-Out: His name and costume are based on the Hamburglar, a McDonald's mascot that would try to steal hamburgers from Ronald McDonald.

Maestro Wave

Meastro Wave

Left: His Guild file image in-costume, Right: as a captive

Voiced by: Misha Collins

A high-ranking supervillain with apparent control of microwave energy.

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• Asshole Victim: Is murdered by Red Death. Seeing as how he killed and ate The Termite (and likely the other corpses in the room as well) in a fit of paranoid rage, no sympathy is given.
• Atomic Superpower: A downplayed case in that he can apparently control microwave energy, exhibited by him warming a cup of tea with his hands.
• Closed Circle: Spends the entirely of "Red Means Stop" trapped and shackled inside a bathroom, then is killed at the end.
• I'm a Humanitarian: Has killed and eaten the buttocks of his fellow prisoners out of the belief that the food his captor has given him is poisonous. It's not.
• Picky People Eater: Cannibalizing his fellow prisoners is shifted from horrific to funny by the fact that, for some reason, he only eats the meat off their buttocks.
• Punny Name: A "maestro" is a highly talented musician who can often be found conducting an orchestra and his apparent power is to control microwaves, demonstrated by him warming a cup of tea with his hands, thus, "Maestrowave".
• Properly Paranoid: Subverted. He earnestly believes that the food provided is poisoned and that his captor is just toying with him, but that is not really the case.
• Sanity Slippage: Being trapped inside a bathroom for weeks has turned him into a paranoid and insane wreck.

The Termite

The Termite

Left: His Guild file image in-costume, Right: as a captive

Voiced by: James Adomian

A high-ranking termite-themed villain.

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• Alone with the Psycho: Slowly realizes that Maestro Wave, the only other (living) prisoner, has gone insane, has killed and eaten the other prisoners, and is already plotting to kill him.
• Animal-Themed Superbeing: A supervillain themed around termites.
• Asshole Victim: Downplayed as the audience never actually sees him do anything evil, but he spends most of his on-screen time panicking from imprisonment and Alone with the Psycho, and he is a high-ranking supervillain, certainly having done something evil to achieve that rank.
• Bludgeoned to Death: Has his head bashed with a pipe by a driven to insanity Maestro Wave.
• Closed Circle: Spends the entirely of "Red Means Stop" trapped and shackled inside a bathroom, then is killed by the end.
• Straight Man: To Maestro Wave, at least for the first half of their episode.
• Termite Trouble: Is a termite-themed supervillain, including a power suit and helmet with mandibles that can chew through even metal and concrete.
• You're Nothing Without Your Phlebotinum: His power as a villain comes from his termite-themed power suit and helmet. If he had it, he would have been able to free himself and Maestro Wave easily, which they each lament.

Membership

King Gorilla

King Gorilla

Voiced by: Christopher McCulloch

Monarch: Oh this isn't gay. But King Gorilla over there is! And I bet he can't wait to snap off a piece of your dick in his ass!

King Gorilla: [Kissy lips]

A talking gorilla supervillain who served time in prison alongside the Monarch, who he helps to escape. Dying from lung cancer, he makes a deal with the Investors to get out of prison...for a price.

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• And Show It to You: Is killed via the Investors using their intangibility to reach into his chest and pulled out his heart. He's still alive long enough to see it.
• Back for the Dead: He's last seen in the season two opener helping the Monarch to escape from prison. He returns in season four, with it being revealed that he got out of his life sentence while suffering from terminal lung cancer. It turns out this was a deal made by the Investors and his payment is donating his heart to Monstroso.
• Black Comedy Rape: His life sentence comes from "evicerating and sodomizing Vince Neil on live television". While in prison, he's common committer of Prison Rape. He even receives a "Statutory Ape" t-shirt as a gag gift for his birthday (which he's delighted with), implying he's somewhat known for this in the villain community. All of it is played for comedic value.
  King Gorilla: Hey! I only sodomized half of him!
• Captain Ersatz: To two DC Comics villains, Gorilla Grodd and Monsieur Mallah (the latter of whom is also gay).
• Face Death with Dignity: When The Investors come to collect his heart. He doesn't panic, just gruffly tells them to get it over with.
• Heroic Sacrifice:
  • Despite being threatened by the Guild against assisting the Monarch, he still helps the Monarch because he sees that his love for Dr. Girlfriend is genuine.
  • Later, while dying from lung cancer, he gives his heart to a dying Monstroso, via the Investors who arranged his release from prison in return.
• Incurable Cough of Death: His lung cancer proved to be fatal. Or rather would have been fatal, had the Investors not ripped out his heart to give to Monstroso first.
• Killer Gorilla: Well, he is a gorilla supervillain who has "evicerated" at least one person (and likely many others).
• Love Freak: The only reason he helps the Monarch escape from prison, despite threats from Phantom Limb, is because of how much the Monarch loves Dr. Girlfriend.
• Maniac Monkeys: The Venture universe's contribution to the lineup of "evil-talking gorilla" variety, being a Captain Ersatz of those like Gorilla Grodd and Monsieur Mallah.
• Manly Gay: He's a supervillain gorilla attracted to men with none of the stereotypical mannerisms.
• Noodle Incident: It's never specified exactly what Vince Neil did to piss him off enough for him to, in Phantom Limb's words "eviscerate and sodomize" Neil on live television.
• Prison Rape: Implied to engage in this regularly. He even tried to rape The Monarch once, but he couldn't get it up because Monarch looked too much like a girl from behind. He even brought him back to his cell so that he could look at his porn at the same time, but still felt nothing.
• Rape Is a Special Kind of Evil: Subverted. King Gorilla spends most of the series in prison, even though one of the major perks of Guild Membership is that they have connections to keep its members from seeing the inside of a prison cell. At first it seems like the Guild decided to let him rot in prison because he's a known rapist and wouldn't extend their protection for such a crime. But then we find out it's only because King Gorilla "eviscerated and sodomized Vince Neil" on live television, which was too public a crime for the Guild to maintain any plausible deniability or sweep it under the rug.

Monstroso

Monstroso

Voiced by: Christopher McCulloch

Dr. Girlfriend: Monstroso? That's what this is about? He's the king of the double cross. I mean, think about it, he's a lawyer and a supervillain. That's like a shark with a grenade launcher on its head!

A massive and influential supervillain lawyer, Monstroso's favored brand of villainy is screwing people over with legal loopholes, including both arches and fellow villains alike. He's well-connected when it comes to Guild matters with both SPHINX and the O.S.I. pressing him for information.

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• Affably Evil: He's downright nice to Billy, typically a Butt-Monkey among Butt Monkies, in "The Silent Partners". Monstroso brings Billy aboard his Cool Ship, sympathizes with his problems, and finall helps him to get laid. Granted he was trying to butter Billy up before asking him to perform a heart transplant, but it's not like he couldn't have simply put a gun to his head or counted on the bribe of becoming a real doctor - he went out of his way to show Billy a good time.
• Amoral Attorney: He's a supervillain lawyer. His favored brand of villainy is to take his targets down with legal loopholes and, of course, double-crosses. And based on the diploma hanging in his office in "Pinstripes and Poltergeists", he has a degree from Harvard.
• Ascended Extra: We first hear about Monstroso in the henchman-published book that leads to the Monarch and Dr. Girlfriend's break-up in the first season.
  Monarch: And there's this picture of you in Monstroso's lap!
  Dr. Girlfriend: That was at a party. Look at his lap! There's like five people on there!
• Big Beautiful Man: We've gotten enough looks at him shirtless to confirm that he's got a great physique for his size. The fact that Molotov Cocktease dropped her famous chastity belt just for him already speaks volumes.
• Billy Needs an Organ: He requires a heart transplant and, given his size, not just any will do. He makes a deal with the Investors who then make a deal with King Gorilla to get him released from prison in exchange for his heart prior to his death from lung cancer. Billy then transplants it into Monstoso.
• The Brute: Subverted. He's an Amoral Attorney Of Wealth And Taste who happens to be a ten-foot-tall wrestler.
• Card-Carrying Villain: Subverted in that it's only when he's dealing in Guild business. He appears to run a genuine law office as a "day job" and keeps his villainy separate. He only puts on his "devil hood" when working with those from the Guild.
• Chain of Deals: He needs a new heart, so he makes a deal with the Investors to get him one. They make a deal with King Gorilla to get him out of prison for his final days while dying from lung cancer in exchange for his heart. Monstroso then gives Billy a medical degree in exchange for him transplanting the heart.
• Chronic Backstabbing Disorder: Double-crossing is his MO, and it's perfectly allowable (and encouraged) by Guild law. The Monarch finds out the hard way when he goes to Monstroso to help him arch Venture, only to learn that Monstroso is planning on seizing both Venture's estate and the Monarch's.
• Cigar Chomper: Loves his cigars and offers one to the Monarch about four times in their first 90 seconds together until the Monarch finally takes one.
• Cut Lex Luthor a Check: Averted. It's heavily implied that he is also a practicing attorney in his civilian life, which he keeps mostly separate from his "Guild business," which might explain his substantial wealth.
• Dark Lord on Life Support: During the second half of the fourth season, while recovering from heart transplant surgery.
• Disney Villain Death: Seemingly dropped to his doom from the O.S.I. Helicarrier by The Investors.
• Evil Sounds Deep: Has an inhumanly deep voice, which fits with his devil motif and general supervillain status.
• Expy: Shares many similarities with Marvel Comics villain, The Kingpin, including his monstrous size, nice suit, and being a businessman running a criminal empire.
• Genius Bruiser: Obviously very intelligent as a high profile lawyer, he also seems to be just as strong as he looks since he actually survived the epic beatdown delivered by Brock and 21.
• Karma Houdini: Subverted at the very last minute in his first appearance, where it seems like he'll get away with arching Venture and double-crossing the Monarch, only for 21 and Brock to show up in The Stinger to deliver a beat down.
• Large and in Charge: 7'4, to be specific◊ and he runs an apparently well-to-do law office while also being a high-level supervillain.
• Loophole Abuse: He attempts to arch Dr. Venture (and the Monarch) via zoning law violations. It's implied that this is pretty typical for him, both the legal loophole abuse and the double cross, the latter of which is not only allowed but encouraged by the Guild.
• Man of Wealth and Taste: He's a supervillain lawyer businessman with a massive yacht and a taste for fine cigars.
• Names to Run Away from Really Fast: A play on "monstrous" and he definitely deserves it, being a massive supervillain lawyer.
• Never Found the Body: At the end of "O.S.I. Love You", he goes missing after being phased through the wall of the O.S.I. helicarrier and dropped from thousands of feet in the air.
• No Celebrities Were Harmed: In addition to his basis as an Expy of The Kingpin, he also shares some traits with Anton LaVey, founder of the Church of Satan, including his facial hair, devil hood, and general devil motif. Hilariously this gives him a motif similar to one of Kingpin's archenemies: Daredevil.
• Oh, Crap!: When The Investors appear during his interrogation on the O.S.I. Helicarrier, he has a severe freakout. Nothing had fazed him before, from fighting 21 and Brock simultaneously to being at the mercy of the O.S.I. Against the Investors, he's scared witless.
• Running Gag: He offers the Monarch a cigar four times in about ninety seconds.
  The Monarch: Fine, yes! Gimme a fucking cigar!
• Smug Snake: Trying to defeat both the Venture family and The Monarch simultaneously... with zoning law fine print. Then he has the audacity to mock 21 for apparently showing up alone to fight him, before 21 reveals that he brought along Brock Samson.
• Square-Cube Law: Though it doesn't seem to be as bad as Humongoloid, it's suggested he has similar problems with moving, breathing, and stamina. That he had to get his heart transplanted from a giant gorilla speaks volumes.
• The Stool Pigeon: After being captured by the O.S.I. in "O.S.I. Love You", he doesn't hesitate for a second to spill everything he knows about the Guild, the Council of 13, and even offers photos taken from a secret pinky ring camera. The Investors quickly (apparently) eliminate him to stop his squealing.

Torrid

Torrid

Voiced by: Christopher McCulloch

"Save my place in the queue. There's something I feel I must do. Something torrid."

The Order of the Triad's Guild-sanctioned, fire-themed archenemy.

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• Arch-Enemy: Officially the "guild-sanctioned" arch enemy of the Order of the Triad.
• Captain Ersatz: Of Pyro from the X-Men (matching powers and ethnicity, although Torrid can create flame and also teleport) wearing Deadman's costume with Dormammu's (from Doctor Strange) mystical connections.
• Gass Hole: Much fuss is made over the smell he leaves behind in the Venture bathroom.
• Genre Blindness: In "The Better Man", while summoning and attempting to control the "hell beast from hell". Not only does it disobey, but it tosses him right back into the portal.
• Hellgate: Begins "The Better Man" opening one, summoning an Eldritch Abomination-like creature out of it, while the Order of the Triad attempts to stop him.
• I Have Your Wife: Lands the job as the Order of the Triad's arch after he "kidnaps" Orpheus' daughter, Triana. Downplayed in that she's actually safe, having been teleported to a tropical island, but the Triad doesn't know that when Torrid tells them.
• Land Down Under: He speaks with an Australian accent and is based, at least in part, on the Marvel character Pyro who is also Australian.
• Never Found the Body: The Order of the Triad believe he's dead following "The Better Man", where he blinks away after petrifying the Outrider. The Guild seems to agree, giving The Alchemist a lecture about how it's not their problem if his arch has been "terminated by a third party".
• Playing with Fire: Being a Captain Ersatz of Pyro, although he can create the flames himself and also teleport.
• Teleport Spam: A fiery version, though he uses it more to dodge than to attack.
• Wounded Gazelle Gambit: Begs the Outrider for a Mercy Kill, saying that he's seen too much while inside the "hell portal". When the Outrider goes to do it, Torrid jumps him.

Augustus St. Cloud

Augustus St. Cloud

Voiced by: James Urbaniak (Season one), Christopher McCulloch (Season five onward)

"You win this time, but mark my words, and mark them well: I will get you, Quiz Boy!"

An incredibly rich fanboy and collector of nerdy pop culture, he is a rival to Billy Quizboy and joins the Guild in season five as Billy's official arch.

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• Arbitrarily Large Bank Account: He is the billionaire son of a "plastics magnate" and even claims his "superpower" is the fact he has "lots of money" when applying to the Guild. He can drop millions of dollars on anything, even an entire Greek island, without concern.
• Arch-Enemy: To Billy Quizboy, with the two being rival pop culture collectors and St. Cloud still upset about Billy's cheating against him on Quizboys. In fact, he joined the Guild specifically to legally, officially arch Billy.
• Ascended Extra: He appears as a background character throughout the first four seasons, most memorably getting Baron Underbheit's boot in his ass at Rusty's yard sale in season one's "Tag Sale, You're It!"
• The Collector: Of pop culture props and memorabilia, many of them ridiculously expensive. Billy utterly hates him for this, because he never lets anyone else see them except to show them off and damages them for his own amusement (like altering Auric Goldfinger's pajamas so they'd fit him). He also collects albinos.
• Crimefighting with Cash: Inverted. He decides to join the Guild to arch Billy Quizboy and states that his supervillain power is "having a lot of money".
• Didn't Think This Through: He breaks into the apartment of Billy's mother Rose and Col. Gentleman in an attempt to intimidate Billy. Gentleman subdues him with ease and happily stands aside as Rose immediately beats him to a pulp when he tells her that Augustus is after Billy.
• Early-Installment Weirdness: In his first appearance in season one's "Tag Sale, You're It!", he has a different voice and personality than what he displays when he's reintroduced as Billy's arch enemy in the season five opener.
• Evil Counterpart: To Billy, sharing his fanboyish obsession with pop culture artifacts. He is also attended by an albino servant who is the silent, athletic, Asian version of Pete White.
• Evil Is Petty: Will often use items from his collection to do little more than anger Billy, such as using a puppet from Mister Rogers' Neighborhood (a show Billy loved as a kid) as a shower mitt. When Billy and Pete come to his house to try to barter with him for a flying ship, he agrees on the condition that Billy eat a dollar's worth of pennies. The reason? Billy outbid him for an action figure on eBay by a dollar.
• Evil Nerd: Downplayed in that he's much more Laughably Evil and his "arching" of Billy mostly qualifies as "trolling", but he is a full-fledged (if level one) member of the Guild and is very much a nerd.
• Expy: He's a rich, snobbish version of Comic Book Guy (especially his voice).
• Friendly Enemy: To an extent. He and Billy Quizboy genuinely piss each other off, but at the same time, they obviously both enjoy arching each other, so they're an example of how arching is actually supposed to go.
• Geek Physique: Has the classic "short and fat" version while being a Stereotypical Nerd and Pathetically Weak.
• Harmless Villain: So pathetic as a villain that he really has no good reason to be in the Guild at all. He has an EMA level of one since he's incompetent at anything regarding actual supervillainy and has no weapons or superpowers at his disposal, with only a single henchman. He mostly uses his immense wealth for little more than annoying Billy or distracting him to steal from him. Even the other villains realize this, as they refuse him entry to Don Hell's villainous night club.
• Hypocrite: He still holds a grudge against Billy for cheating on the Quizboys show in his youth, yet he cheats audaciously in the Spanakopita events.
• Laughably Evil: His attempts to be "evil" more often than not seem more like petty acts of trolling that can get a laugh out of you, such as demanding that Billy eat a dollar's worth of pennies and taunting Billy by destroying pop culture props.
• Mugging the Monster: In "The Bellicose Proxy", his attempts at arching Billy leads him to breaking into a house of retired adventurers and trying to act threatening. An amused Col. Gentleman easily manhandles him before handing him over to Rose, who subjects him to an offscreen No-Holds-Barred Beatdown.
• Nerd Hoard: He antagonizes Arch-Enemy (first unofficially, and later officially after signing up for the Guild) Billy Quizboy by outbidding him in online auctions for pop culture memorabilia and acquiring one-of-a-kind items that he keeps in his own personal collection rather than places the public can enjoy them. A few notable items in the massive collection include The Staff of Ra and the Ark of the Covenant, Twiki and Dr. Theopolis, the vintage Batmobile, the puppets from Mister Rogers' Neighborhood (which elicits a You Monster! response from Billy when St. Cloud uses Henrietta Pussycat as a shower sponge), and many more.
• Nice to the Waiter: Is always cordial to his manservant, Pei Wei.
• Not-So-Harmless Villain: When Pete and Billy infiltrate his boat in "Spanakopita!", he responds by tranquillizing them and tying them up on rocks to be burnt by the sun, a particularly grisly fate for the albino Pete. This seems to be a one-off exception because in every other instance he's portrayed as a Harmless Villain.
• Opaque Lenses: Starts wearing them when he fully becomes a villain. We can see his eyes in his earlier appearances.
• Pathetically Weak: His one and only physical fight was with an octogenarian lady with arthritis who messed him up so bad he needed make-up to hide the bruises. Then there's a moment where Monarch and 21 are showing off his new lightning gun and just lightly tossing it to him is enough to knock him flat on his back.
• Poke the Poodle: Really, most of what he does isn't even illegal, let alone evil, but it's all calculated to get under Billy's skin.
• Pyrrhic Victory: Tries to pull one on Rusty and Billy by announcing he bought the island where Spanakopita is held after they win the final event, unaware that the locals had sold him "Spanakopita," the spinach pastry, rather than "Spanakos," the actual name of the island. What's more, the locals were scamming him as well as Rusty the entire time.
• Screw the Rules, I Have Money!:
  • Manages to bypass many of the Guild's set rules (such as new members being unable to choose their own archenemy) by bribing them with money.
  • He likewise bribes his way through the Spanakopita events just to get under Billy and Rusty's skin, then when he loses, tries to buy the entire island (but is scammed by the locals).
• Shadow Archetype: His enmity with Billy is a stripped down reflection of the rivalry between the Monarch and Rusty sans nuance of character development. To wit, an extremely petty man becomes a "villain" for the sole purpose of devoting his time and considerable resources to acting out a personal grudge a single person (who is far less well-off financially), while his target usually couldn't care less about the enmity which is supposed to exist between them and is simply exasperated by the whole thing. Like the Monarch and Rusty, they're both redheads to boot.
• Shout-Out: His name is inspired by Batman love interest Silver St. Cloud, and when he's properly introduced in the season five opener, he arrives driving the Batman (1989) Batmobile.
• Slavery Is a Special Kind of Evil: He collects albinos the same way he collects memorabilia. Pete is understandably appalled by this.
  Pete: People don't own albinos!
• Stereotypical Nerd: Has all of the classic traits including incredible awkwardness, glasses, being short and fat, Pathetically Weak, a multitude of physical ailments (lupus, fibromyalgia, restless leg syndrome), and collects all manner of pop culture collectables and props.
• Un Evil Laugh: When being trained to do an Evil Laugh, St. Cloud can only mutter out a pathetic "Nyeh heh heh" that the Monarch and 21 consider weird creepy, and not in a villainous way.
  21: What the hell was that? Are you having an asthma attack?
• Villain Decay: In seasons five and six, while he's not exactly threatening, St. Cloud is very good at getting under Billy's skin, which seems to be his main objective anyway. When he returns to arch Billy in season seven, he's shown to be utterly inept at it. Probably justified in that while St. Cloud excels at petty trolling, the supervillain theatrics that the Monarch tries to make him replicate are a poor fit for him.
• Villainy-Free Villain: He focuses more on getting under Billy's skin than actually committing crimes. Most of the time, the worst things he does are outbidding Billy on auctions, cheating at games, and mishandling the pop-culture memorabilia he accumulates.

Copycat

Copycat

Voiced by: Toby Huss

"Oh, well now doesn't that just put a turd in your soup?"

A high-ranking supervillain with self-duplication powers and the theme of a 1950s "cool cat" entertainer who seeks to join the reformed Guild council.

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• Aborted Arc: In his first appearance, he seems to be attracted to Dr. Mrs. the Monarch and tries to drive a wedge between her and the Monarch. This is dropped by his next appearance.
• Chronic Backstabbing Disorder: He acts friendly with the Monarch in his first appearance only to screw him over by making him look bad to Dr. Mrs. the Monarch. Later, he plots an elaborate heist with several other supervillains, with his real plan being to betray his entire crew after using them as decoys.
• Early-Bird Cameo: Makes a brief appearance in "All This and Gargantua 2", three episodes before his real debut.
• Face Death with Dignity: His reaction to a damaged helicopter about to crash into him is a nonchalant "oh, well now doesn't that just put a turd in your soup?"
• Faux Affably Evil: He's a smooth talker with a 1950s "swinger"-style of speaking but it isn't genuine and he just acts affable to manipulate others, such as having no qualms about selling out a bunch of other villains by using them as decoys during his heist.
• Four Is Death: Or at least villainous. His suite is #44-44, with the repeating numbers also reprenting his duplication power.
• Karma Houdini Warranty: After getting away scot-free in "Faking Miracles" from making the Monarch look bad to Dr. Mrs. the Monarch, he tries to betray the heist team in "Unicorn in Captivity" so he can get away with the teleporters himself. It almost works, but he's killed by his would-be getaway helicopter crashing into him.
• Logical Weakness: He can duplicate himself dozens of times and retract the duplicates back to the original at any time. However, that "original" is as vulnerable as anyone else, unable to do anything when, for instance, a helicopter is about to crash into him...
• Me's a Crowd: His main power. Each duplicate of himself can recall himself at any moment and rejoin the original.
• Mugged for Disguise: Tricks and then knocks out the Monarch in "Faking Miracles" so he can swipe the Monarch's costume and impersonate him, making him look bad to his wife.
• No Celebrities Were Harmed: He looks and talks just like Dean Martin.
• No Honor Among Thieves: He has no hesitation in selling out the other villains on his heist team as decoys while he enacts his own plan to steal the teleporters during the VenTech heist.
• Punny Name: On two levels. Copycat is itself, of course, a term for one who copies another, describing his Me's a Crowd powers pretty well. He's also heavily based on Dean Martin, who was known to affectionately call people "cool cats".
• Schemer:
  • In season six, he frames The Monarch for illegally arching Dr. Venture by creating a duplicate, stealing his costume while tricking him into changing out of it for a party at Wide Wale's apartment, tranquillizes him to incapacitate him, and then trashes Dr. Venture's penthouse, all while tricking Dr. Mrs. The Monarch into checking up on her husband to only direct her attention to his own duplicate in The Monarch suit across the way.
  • Season seven has him return as the leader of a group of supervillains intending to steal Dr. Venture's latest successful teleporter invention. With The Monarch subbing in for Tiny Eagle who was killed by Brock earlier in the episode, he sets it up so a group comprising Tunnel Vision, Ramburglar, Presto Change-O, and Dot Comm infiltrate VenTech Tower while The Monarch does aerial recon and "Driver X" drives the getaway car. His real plan is to use this team as decoys so his army of duplicates can steal the teleporter pads which he knew would end up in the Ventures' panic room, and Driver X is just another one of his duplicates in disguise. However, he doesn't account for The Monarch not bringing his functional wings with him and 21 discovering his actual plans on the way out of the building. In the end, The Monarch and 21 end up with both teleporter pads and Copycat is almost certainly dead from the helicopter his duplicate was flying getting shot down between buildings only to crash into his apartment.
• Uncertain Doom: He presumably dies when a helicopter crashes into him, though the camera cuts away from him before the exact moment it happens and other villains have survived worse in the series.

Tunnel Vision

Tunnel Vision

Voiced by: Hal Lublin

A tunneling-themed supervillain.

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• Artificial Limbs: It's implied that the drill and screw driver on each arm are actually his limbs, not just something he wears over them.
• Crippling Overspecialization: He's a great tunneler, with a drill helmet, another drill on his left arm, and a screwdriver on his right. He's not good for much else, unable to even pick up a simple object like the teleporter pad in "Unicorn in Captivity".
• The Generic Guy: Other than his power to dig, Tunnel Vision has a shockingly normal personality in comparison to everyone else on the VenTech heist team.
• Recurring Extra: Appeared in the background of Guild functions as early as season three and recurred until he's properly introduced in season seven.
• Shout-Out: During the Guild's frantic manhunt for the Blue Morpho, Tunnel Vision tries to claim the bounty by killing and dressing up a homeless man to look like the Blue Morpho, just like the scene with the bull shark from Jaws.
• This Is a Drill: He's a tunneling-themed supervillain with a drill helmet and another on his arm.
• Uncertain Doom: Last seen being dragged into the sewers by Brock Samson following the botched heist. Knowing Brock, it was likely to his death.

Presto Change-O

Presto Change-O

Voiced by: Mark Hamill

A shapeshifting, clown-themed supervillain.

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• Actor Allusion: Mark Hamill also frequently voices The Joker, another clown-themed supervillain.
• Alien Blood: Has bluish-green blood which can be seen after Brock stabs him.
• Amazing Technicolor Population: He has green skin and teal hair, which he maintains even when he transforms.
• Ambiguously Human: Exactly what he is isn't made clear, with his green skin, teal hair, and bluish-green blood suggesting that he isn't fully human. Additionally, while the series does have other shapeshifting characters, Presto Change-O's seem to be less magical in nature than theirs and more him contorting/stretching his body into different shapes while retaining the same color scheme and voice.

• Fatal Flaw: While he can transform into any shape, he can't change his color scheme or voice. Brock manages to see through his H.E.L.P.eR. disguise because of this and proceeds to discover the heist attempt.
• Monster Clown: A downplayed example as he isn't outright malicious that we see or even that bad of a guy, but he is a member of the Guild and joins the heist on Dr. Venture.
• Non-Action Guy: He uses his shapeshifting abilities mostly for mobility and subterfuge, but can't seem to do much in a fight. The best he can do when the heist team is being chased by Brock is to momentarily delay him.
• Practically Joker: Less vicious than his inspiration, but as a clown-themed villain who cracks jokes, he definitely draws from the Joker and his most famous voice actor.
• Rhyming Names: Presto Change-O.
• Shout-Out: While drawing character basis from The Joker as stated below, Presto Change-O's color scheme and shapeshifting abilities are likely inspired by Impossible Man.
• Uncertain Doom: The last we see of him is him getting stabbed in the head by Brock Samson and writhing on the ground in pain, injured but apparently still alive - it's possible his body-morphing powers somehow protected him from what should have been a lethal blow, but he hasn't been seen since.
• Voluntary Shapeshifting: His main power. He can transform and contort his body into any shape or form, though retains his original color scheme and voice.
• Weaksauce Weakness: While he can seemingly shapeshift into just about anything, he keeps his original color scheme and voice. This is how Brock notices that something is up while Presto is imitating H.E.L.P.eR.

Dot Com

Dot Com

Voiced by: Kate McKinnon (season six), Annie Savage (season seven)

A hacker supervillain.

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• The Cracker: A Guild supervillain whose specialty is hacking.
• Early-Installment Weirdness: Her first speaking appearance has her voiced by Kate McKinnon and credited as "Dot Comm", with two "m"'s. Later appearances, particularly when she gets A Day in the Limelight as part of the heist team in "The Unicorn in Captivity", instead has her voiced by Annie Savage and credited with just one "m" in her name.
• Freeze-Frame Bonus: In "Tanks for Nuthin", a look at Dr. Mrs. the Monarch's email inbox shows Dot Com had applied to become a member of the Council.
• High-Powered Career Woman: Has elements of this trait, wanting to see more women on the Guild's Council of 13 (there were only two before the purge, one of whom was the newest member) and later applying for a position herself. Given that Copycat and the Monarch are both on the heist team specifically to impess the Guild leadership, it's reasonable to think she's there for the same reason.
• Mission Control: Her role during the heist, hacking into VenTech Tower security and guiding the other team members.
• Recurring Extra: Appeared a few times in Guild crowd shots with a few lines before "The Unicorn in Captivity" gave her a prominent role during Copycat's heist.
• The Smurfette Principle: The only female member of Copycat's heist team.
• Tron Lines: Has them on her costume, which is clearly themed after the trope-naming film, and is a hacker supervillain, speaking to her technological prowess.
• What Happened to the Mouse?: Falls out of the escape van right as 21 drives away in "The Unicorn in Captivity", leaving her fate unknown.

"Driver X"

Driver X

An expert getaway driver who is part of Copycat's heist team... or so it seems.

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• Expy: Of Top Gear (UK)'s "the Stig", being a voiceless, faceless, Badass Driver.
• The Mole: He is really just a duplicate of Copycat, hiding his identity beneath a racing helment and suit. Copycat retracts him to leave the rest of the heist team stuck as decoys.
• The Voiceless: Doesn't speak, mostly because using his real voice would give him away.

Turnbuckle

Voiced by: Paul F. Tompkins

A boxing-themed villain who decided to arch Jonas Venture Sr. His subsequent brutal death is responsible for the entire "Equally Matched Aggression" level system of the Guild.

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• Badass Normal: Subverted. He's a fairly well-built guy with boxing gloves and no apparent powers, and does (briefly) manage to kidnap Rusty, but misses on the only punch he throws and gets absolutely curb-stomped by the Action Man.
• Boisterous Weakling: Despite his boasting about a devastating punch, he only manages a single clumsy jab that completely fails to connect.
• Boom, Headshot!: After Pistol-Whipping him to near-death, the Action Man finishes him off like this.
• Boxing Battler: His whole schtick is themed after boxers of the The Gay '90s. Unfortunately for him, his opponent is a Super-Soldier with no such compunctions for adhering to the "Queen's Rules".
• Bullying a Dragon: Seriously, what kind of idiot decides to pick on the original Team Venture with no superpowers or special technology? Especially if it's Action Man, who, as the Monarch notes, was a "full-on psycho" and the least likely out of any of them to show any mercy.
• Chest Insignia: Has a stylized "T" tattooed on his chest.
• Combat Aestheticist: Styled himself after a stereotypical "gay-nineties" gentleman boxer, complete with waxed mustache, interjections like "caution!" and an exaggerated orthodox stance. This proved completely useless against an unhesitating armed opponent, as Action Man dodged his first slow punch and then took the opportunity to Pistol Whip him senseless.
• Curb-Stomp Battle: He was murdered so gratuitously by the Action Man that the Guild had to establish a ranking system to ensure that such a one-sided affair never happens again.
• Defiant to the End: Tells the Action Man to "kiss [his] ass!" after he's been beaten to a pulp. The Action Man responds with Boom, Headshot!.
• Disproportionate Retribution: On the receiving end. After the Action Man had already beaten him "into the ground like a tent pole," Turnbuckle tells him to "kiss my ass!" Action Man shoots him in the head without a second's thought.
• Harmless Villain: His "kidnapping" of Rusty was just taking him to a slightly different part of the estate he lived in, and all he wanted in exchange for his return was a boxing match with Jonas (which Jonas probably would have won, since from what little we see Turnbuckle isn't a stellar boxer). He didn't make any move to hurt the kid and was armed only with boxing gloves. The Action Man responding with lethal force was so extreme a reaction that it led to the current system for pairing up villains with arches that would be a fair match to them.
• Manly Facial Hair: Has a waxed mustache styled after the gentleman boxers of The Gay '90s and is a well-built, if inept, villain.
• Never Bring A Knife To A Gunfight: He evidently thought that picking a fight with an Ax-Crazy Super-Soldier with nothing but his fists was a good idea.
• Posthumous Character: Long-dead, courtesy of the Action Man, but still has an impact on the plot as it was his brutal death that led to the Guild's current "Equally Matched Aggression" ranking system.
• Punny Name: He's a boxing-themed villain whose shares his name with the piece of equipment that supports the ropes of a boxing ring.
• Unwitting Instigator of Doom: Or "bureaucracy", more like, which can certainly be a form of doom. His poorly-thought scheme and subsequent brutal death was the catalyst for the modern "arching" system and protocols used in the setting, which causes no end of trouble for the main cast, especially the Monarch.

Intangible Fancy

Intangible Fancy

Voiced by: Christopher McCulloch

A ghost-like supervillain.

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• Barbie Doll Anatomy: He states that the accident that turned him into his current form caused him to lose his genitals.
• Ectoplasm: He is stated to be made entirely out of it.
• Fog Feet: His lower half has no discernable legs, similar to the silhouette of someone wearing a long robe.
• The Gadfly: He is known to be a troublemaker even beyond the standards of a Guild villain, causing a commotion at Rusty's tag sale by liquifying another villain and is later seen being interrogated by the Council of 13 for smuggling contraband.
• Intangible Man: His powerset seems to be similar to that of a classic cartoon ghost, being able to fade in and out. He can still manipulate physical objects.
• Living Ghost: He has multiple "ghostly" powers including intangibility, being able to control other people's bodies by entering them, and being partially invisible. He claims that he is the victim of a science experiment gone awry and is still technically living, given that the Council of 13 discusses executing him.
• Our Ghosts Are Different: His appearance is similar to that of a classic cartoon ghost.

Brick Frog

Brick Frog

Voiced by: Christopher McCulloch

A level one villain who dresses like a frog and throws bricks.

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• Ascended Extra: He first shows up during the Terrible Interviewees Montage for the Revenge Society, getting booted very quickly. He continues to show up as a background villain in group shots for the rest of the series, then actually gets a few moments of prominence in the Finale Movie.
• Harmless Villain: He's a guy in a frog costume who throws bricks.
• Punny Name: He's just a normal guy in a frog costume who throws bricks from a sack.
• Stealth Pun: In masonry, a "frog" is the indentation in the center of a brick.
• Took a Level in Badass: In the Finale Movie, he is revealed to have joined ARCH, becoming powerful enough to blow up and rob a legitimate scientific facility.

Associates

Dr. Henry Killinger

Dr. Henry Killinger

Voiced by: Christopher McCulloch

"Killinger. Dr. Henry Killinger. And this is my Magic Murder Bag."

A mentor to villains and would-be villains who uses his immense power to help them find their true purpose and fulfillment in life. He typically conveys using an umbrella capable of flight and carries his "Magic Murder Bag" from which he can pull any item his clients could possibly need. Exactly what he is, where he came from, and the extent of his powers is never revealed.

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• The Ace: A villainous mentor version who can fix up any problem his client has, professional or personal, with his impressive psychoanalysis, management planning skills, and his Magic Murder Bag. He isn't just The Ace, he's a character for whom the role of The Ace is so exaggerated he'll have a huge comedic effect.
• Affably Evil: To the point that the "evil" part is debatable. He is downright friendly to his clients and their associatates, helping them to achieve their desires and unlock their potential apparently pro bono in each case. The only malevolent acts we see him perform are to kill a bunch of union leaders and attempt to turn Dr. Venture into a supervillain who arches his own brother. Even that is because he genuinely believed that he was helping Rusty into a role that made him feel satisfied, and agreed to leave without a fight once Rusty said no.
• Ambiguously Human: He certainly looks like an older human, but possesses abilities and implements far beyond anything else seen in the series. Not even Orpheus' magic can phase him. It's revealed in "All This and Gargantua-2" that he is a being on the same order as the Investors, but exactly what that is is never revealed. Given that the three Investors refer to Killinger as "brother" and have the same names as the three Greek gods of the Southwest, Northeast, and Northwest winds, they may literally be Physical Gods with Killinger as the missing "Southeast" god.
• Anti-Villain: He only ever helps those he works for, teaching them in such a way that they grow and earn what they desire. It just so happens that those he helps are always villains, along with the occasional morally-questionable protagonist. This is also in contrast to his "brothers", the Investors, who give their clients what they desire but exact a heavy price in repayment.
• Bag of Holding: His Magic Murder Bag, which looks evil, but holds at least an umbrella and whatever he needs to help somebody fix their personal issues (i.e. a bouquet and the Monarch's journal) rather than any real implements of murder. The exception is the time he used it to silence the complaints of several union leaders causing problems for Rusty's work by reducing them to ash.
• Big Good: A fascinating Reconstruction of this trope from the perspective of the villains. Rather than be the supreme evil leader Big Bad, Killinger is akin to a life coach designed to improve the psychology and wellbeing of his clients however he can. Even though he's guiding them down the path of evil, all of his clients actually really enjoy his work and seem to be happier, healthier people than they were before. He even takes this to the next level by ascending to Greater-Scope Villain level and reforming the Guild with new leadership after the Sovereign's purge.
• Big, Stupid Doodoo-Head: He usually insults people by calling them "silly billy".
• Blue-and-Orange Morality: Killinger operates on a strange sense of ethics where he helps his clients to achieve their desires, willing to kill others in that pursuit and not caring that most of his clients are villains who will go on to harm others. However, he will not harm his clients or do something against their wishes. One way or another, the people he helps are better off thanks to him.
• Bond, James Bond: Introduces himself as "Killinger, Dr. Henry Killinger".
• Bunny-Ears Lawyer: He's a German-accented old man with a propensity for calling people "silly billy" who flies around with his umbrella while wearing a skull mask, black doctor's garb, and bunny slippers...and has completely turned around the fortunes of everyone he has worked for, usually while helping them realize the hidden potential they had all the long.
• Cain and Abel: Relatively speaking, he's the benevolent Abel to the Investors' collective manipulative and self-serving Cain, though he's the one who kills them.
• Character Development: One his superpowers is to cause this in his clients. He turns the Monarch's organization around in almost no time while reuniting him with Dr. Girlfriend. He solves all of Rusty's problems by turning him into a supervillain, and, though Rusty ultimately can't go through with it, does give him a much-needed Heel Realization that resonates throughout the rest of the series. He turns the Revenge Society from a rag-tag group into genuine competition for the Guild. Finally, he saves the Guild from Sovereign's corruption and the Investors' influence, helping it grow beyong its hidebound and ossified "old fashioned" ways.
• The Chessmaster: Of all the factions manipulating one another during "All This and Gargantua-2", he comes out on top with his top competition (The Sovereign, the Investors) killed off.
• Combat Pragmatist: During "All This and Gargantua-2", while he and the last Investor are having their epic lightsaber battle, the Monarch and the Guild Resistance pop in, revealing that they were simply having a Battle in the Center of the Mind. When the Investor becomes distracted by the intruders, Killinger stabs him with his Umbrella in the physical world.
• Dressed to Heal: Besides his bunny slippers and skull half-mask, he wears a black doctor's uniform, complete with a stethoscope, the medical bag he keeps handcuffed to him, and red highlighting. Oddly enough, he actually gets closer to fulfilling this trope without edging into Deadly Doctor territory (beyond aesthetics) given the psychological help he gives to all of his clients.
• Evil Chancellor: Inverted. Despite being an advisor to villainous clients, Killinger only operates to improve the lives of those he is charged with rather than undermine their every move.
• Evil Mentor: Tries to be one toward Rusty in "The Doctor is Sin", though he's more benevolent than most examples. (His teaching doesn't take, but it does give Rusty a much-needed Heel Realization.) In a twist on this trope, he's not so much a mentor that turns people evil and more simply a mentor to evil people (The Monarch, Phantom Limb, etc.) The fact that Rusty attracted his attention says a lot more about RUSTY'S character than it does Killinger's.
• Humanoid Abomination: A benevolent one, in contrast to his siblings, the Investors. Exactly what they are is never made clear, but they have powers and implements far beyond any normal human in the series.
• Hypercompetent Sidekick: He works wonders for the lives of those he helps, though his true calling is to make them realize just how far they can go without him.
• Inexplicably Awesome: He can do practically anything with no backstory or rational explanation for it. It make sense when it's later revealed that he and the Investors are of the same order of being, but there is still no clarity about how or why any of them do what they do.
• Leitmotif: Has a rather ominious one that plays each time he first appears/introduces himself in given episode.
• Magical Guardian: For the people he assists, doubling with Evil Mentor (though he himself isn't evil, he tends to mentor villains) and Hypercompetent Sidekick (helping his clients to realize and earn what they desire rather than just handing it to them). Nothing seen in the series even phases him and he doesn't allow anything to threaten his clients.
• Nigh-Invulnerable: Perhaps the strongest example in the series. He completely No Sells Orpheus' magic and later kills all three Investors at once without a scratch.
• No-Sell: He is completely unphased by Orpheus' magic, even causing it to backfire on Orpheus who suffers a Psychic Nosebleed from their encounter.
• No Celebrities Were Harmed: Zig-zagged. His mention of working for Richard Nixon implies that he may actually be this universe's Henry Kissinger, not merely based on him. Given that Killinger only works for villains (or morally questionable protagonists who he thinks could become villains), this says a lot about Nixon, as well.
• Physical God: Given his relation to the Investors and them being named after the other Greco-Roman gods of the winds, he may in fact be Apeliotes, the of the southeast wind.
• Parasol Parachute: Like a certain English nanny who also greatly improves the lives of her clients, he can use his umbrella to fly while it also serves as a conduit for his more supernatural abilities a la Hagrid. This may also be so people aren't put off by him in the same way they are with ultra-creepy Investors.
• Red and Black and Evil All Over: Zig-zagged. He does wear a lot of red and black, and he does serve as a mentor to villains, but he himself is so anti-villainous and affable that he barely qualifies as "evil."
• Screw This, I'm Outta Here: Very politely leaves The Monarch and Dr. Girlfriend to fend for themselves when Phantom Limb attacks the Flying Cocoon during their wedding in the second season finale.
• Sheep in Sheep's Clothing: Downplayed. Killinger helping the Monarch and Rusty leads to others suspecting he has some ulterior motive or is planning a double cross. In both cases, he is helping with no strings attached. However, in Rusty's case, Killinger did still murder union leaders who were causing Rusty trouble and nearly set Rusty up to arch his brother. Even then, when Rusty rejects the idea, Killinger accepts his decision. Killinger is willing to kill to help his clients, but only if it is people his clients want dead in the first place.
• Shout-Out: He draws heavy inspiration from Mephistopheles in Faustian myth, especially in his "The Doctor is Sin" appearance where he stays by Rusty's side as a guide and chaperone. Orpheus outright references the similarity. Ironially, while Faust is the Trope Codifier for Deal with the Devil, it's Killinger's "brothers", the Investors, who indulge in that trope while Killinger himself is much more anti-villianous.
  Orpheus: [Killinger's] is the way of the serpent and the apple!
• Small Role, Big Impact: Has only had three major appearances to date (with a few bit appearances in other episodes,) but has made a significant impact on the Venture universe in each. He helps to rebuild the Monarch's organization and reunite him with Dr. Girlfriend in "I Know Why the Caged Bird Kils", setting Monarch down the path of becoming a Not-So-Harmless Villain, and gives Rusty Venture a much needed Heel Realization in "The Doctor is Sin", which eventually helped to bring out more of Rusty's heart of gold tendencies. These pale, however, in comparison to his third (and final) appearance in "All This and Gargantua-2", where he slays the Investors and reforms the Guild of Calamitous Intent after the Sovereign's defeat.
• Trickster Mentor: Another inversion. While he is astoundingly good at managing and organizing supervillain operations, his actions ultimately lead his clients to realize something about themselves but is usually a truth they've either pushed aside or were unaware of. All a part of the growing process Killinger employs as a life coach.
• Weaksauce Weakness: Sometimes when he flies away, his umbrella gets stuck.
  Dr. Killinger: My umbrella is caught on something... I require assistance.
• White Sheep: Downplayed as he is more of a much "lighter shade of grey" sheep compared to the Investors, who are considered his "brothers". While the rest of the Investors' modus operandi revolves around giving what their clients want but taking a Faustian bargain as their price, Killinger doesn't name a price, but instead makes his clients earn what they desire most, in order to help them make important realizations about themselves.

Watch and Ward

Watch and Ward

Voiced by: Christopher McCulloch (Watch) and Doc Hammer (Ward)

"Should you ever have any issues with our service, please feel free to call our helpful Hate-Line."

High-ranking Guild dispatch (Watch) and communications (Ward) officers, who report directly to the Sovereign. They're fairly good at their jobs, when not distracted by inconsequential matters or having off-topic conversations.

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• Affably Evil: Both are incredibly polite and professional when interacting with those who need their services and neither is seen doing anything "evil" directly, just supporting the Guild.
• Ambiguously Bi: Watch. When Shore Leave and Al are trying to set the record straight on what kind of a sex act the "Rusty Venture" is, they call up Col. Gentleman and Watch. The first three are all canonically attracted to men, so it's probable that Watch is as well. He is also attracted to women though, as he also finds Kimberly McManus hot.
• Author Avatar: Their conversations are often taken from actual conversations between Jackson and Doc. Unlike most of the other Those Two Guys Author Avatars in the series (Billy and Pete, 21 and 24), their physical resemblance is based on their voicing creator as well, including facial structure with both Doc and Ward being blonde, as well.
• Bumbling Henchmen Duo: Downplayed in that they're actually pretty effective whenever performing their Guild duties, but their constant bickering and Seinfeldian Conversations make things more challenging.
• Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass: They're quite idiotic and can sometimes make you wonder how they even became high-ranking officers in the Guild, but "All This For Gargantua-2" shows that they are fairly competent and smart, leading the Guild Resistance, saving a few members of the Council of 13, and helping to thwart the Sovereign's plan.
• Goggles Do Something Unusual: They've each had one eye removed and wear a belt-strapped goggle over the socket that feeds information, including emails, directly into their brains. They also, apparently, "never stop itching".
• Heterosexual Life-Partners: They spend all of their time together, finish each other's sentences, and genuinely seem to like one another. Note that Watch being Ambiguously Bi doesn't preclude them from fitting this trope, as they don't appear to be in an actual romantic relationship.
• Idiot Ball: Failed to notice Phantom Limb's escape from Guild HQ, due to Watch having a bug clinging to his back.
  Watch: Aah! It's one of those ones that flies!
• La Résistance: They help form the "Guild Resistance" against the increasingly murderous Sovereign in "All This and Gargantua-2".
• New Job as the Plot Demands: While officially the Guild dispatch and communications officers, they get involved pretty much any time the inner-working bureacracy of the Guild is shown in whatever role they are needed. They "star" in the cheesy Guild video sent to "protagonists" once they've been selected for an arch, give tours to villains through Guild HQ, range from being at the personal beckon of the Sovereign to not even qualified to sit at the "big table" with the Blue Morpho Task Force... Their actual role varies wildly.
• Paper-Thin Disguise: They dress up as decoy Hank and Dean during the Guild/O.S.I. joint sting operation to catch the Blue Morpho and don't even come close to passing.
• Punch-Clock Villain: Almost to the point of Minion with an F in Evil in places. You'd have a very hard time naming any point where they actually did something evil, primarily just supporting Guild operations so others can perform evil.
• Suspiciously Similar Substitute: To henchmen 21 and 24, being somewhat bumbling Author Avatars of the creators who engage in Seinfeldian Conversations while gaining greater prominence in the mid-later seasons after 24's death.
• Theme Naming: They take their names from the archaic expression "watch and ward", meaning a guard's total commitment to his duty, and the New England Watch and Ward Society, an old-money organization dedicated to harshly monitoring and censoring printed and spoken material in the city of Boston. Both are quite fitting for a pair of guys that work as security, comms technicians, hatchet men, and fixers.
• Villainous Lineage: Watch's father was also a villain and Watch claims in "Fallen Arches" that Jonas Venture Sr. "stole [my father's] leg".
• Villain Respect: They both hold Jonas Venture Sr. in high regard as the model "protagonist". Ward outright claims that Jonas Sr. is the reason he "got into this business".

Sirena Ong

Sirena Ong

Voiced by: Cristin Milioti

"[scoff] I grew up around 9's and 10's [EMA-level villains]. Those guys are like -3's."

Wide Wale's daughter and Hank's love interest. She attends Stuyvesant University where she is classmates with Dean.

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• Brooklyn Rage: She's got the accent and the temper, not hesitating to lash out with full force at her dad and his minions for for interfering with her life. However, to everyone else, she's pretty nice, if rather foul-mouthed.
• Dating What Daddy Hates: Subverted by dating Hank. Given that her father is a high-level supervillain and she "grew up around" Guild affairs, it seems like this trope is in play and Hank even brings it up directly. She says that it's not the case and that she genuinely likes Hank, is enjoying their date, and is more interested in nice guys who want to get to know her rather than jerks who just want to "get her drunk and mess around".
• A Family Affair: Sleeps with Dean while dating Hank.
• Lascivious Beauty Mark: Has one on her right cheek and is acknowledged in-universe as being attractive, flirty, and sexually forward. She apparently has quite a few exes and hooks up with both Venture brothers.
• Locked Out of the Loop: Downplayed in that her father tries to keep her unaware of certain parts of his life, ostensibly for her protection. However, she pretty clearly recognizes that he's a supervillain and even understands the Guild's "Equally Matched Aggression" level scale. This can also reach comically unnecessary levels, like when her dad didn't even tell her she had an uncle.
• Mafia Princess: To Wide Wale's The Don. With his mafia schtick, Wide Wale keeps Sirena mostly locked away in their penthouse "for her protection". She's aware of her dad's activities and is pissed about how they interfere with her life.
• Meaningful Name: "Sirena", from the Sirens of Greek mythology. Due to her father's super-science accident, she inherited the ability to breath underwater and needs to get her skin wet every six hours, traits reminscent of mermaids. While the actual Greek tales don't give detailed descriptions of the Sirens, later fiction often portrays them as having mermaid-like traits, just like Sirena. Interestingly, Sirens are famous for tempting sailors to their deaths thanks to their beautiful voices. Sirena's voice, with her harsh Brooklyn accent and foul mouth, is easily the most abrasive part about her. She's still popular with the guys.
• Nice Girl: She's nothing but nice and pleasant with the Ventures, as well as her uncle Douglas. The further removed from her father's smothering parenting, the nicer she seems to get.
• Not So Above It All: She found Hank's attempts to impress her (staging muggings, fake paparazzi, taking her to a ninja-themed restaurant) rather charming, if a bit childish.
  Sirena: Four different albinos held us up! It's cute.
• Our Mermaids Are Different: As her father used super-science to infuse himself with the DNA of sea creatures, Sirena herself hasn't escaped the super-science transformation into a part-aquatic creature. She possesses gills and apparently has to get her skin wet every six hours. Although she insists she's "not a friggin' mermaid".
• Rescue Introduction: Subverted in that Hank attempts this when he sees her apparently drowning in her pool. However, she actually has gills and is perfectly fine. She still notices him and recognizes him later, leading to them actually dating.
• Seen It All:
  • Hank apparently told her off-screen that both he and Dean are clones. She took it in stride.
  • The Monarch's attempted arching of her college professor Victor von Helping annoys her more than anything, even as 21 has his wrist blade to her neck. As she later explains to Dean, she grew up around much higher leveled villains who make the Monarch seem like a joke.
• Single Woman Seeks Good Man: It's played as an inversion of All Girls Want Bad Boys, since Sirena's a "bad girl" who's only dated good guys like Hank and previously Brown Widow (although, likely, she didn't know of his super alter-ego). Hank believes that she's only into him to piss off her father, but Sirena tells him that she is having fun on their date. When Hank starts becoming too fixated on their relationship in season seven and starts smothering her, she ends up cheating on him with his equally good-natured if more reserved brother, Dean.
  Sirena: I'm used to guys just trying to get me drunk and then mess around!
• Star-Crossed Lovers: Sirena is dating Hank while her father is the Guild-sanctioned archenemy of Hank's father.
• Suspiciously Similar Substitute: For Triana Orpheus as a Venture brother love interest and is the only other woman in the show besides Triana to give Dean an erection. Rather appropriately in a dark sense, Sirena winds up cheating on Hank with Dean in season seven after she grows weary of Hank's growing clinginess.

Rocco

Rocco

Voiced by: Mark Gagliardi

Wide Wale's top henchman who is a big Guido stereotype with an overprotective (bordering on inappropriate) nature regarding Sirena.

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• Bodyguard Crush: He seems a little too interested in Sirena at times, even apparently having her bras memorized.
  Sirena: What are you, going through my underwear drawer!?
• Cloudcuckoolander: He's an awkward Moment Killer prone to interrupting those around him with non-sequiturs and other poorly timed and thought-out commentary. When he has the Blue Morpho captured and beaten, he wants to play Mad Libs with him.
• Composite Character: He's a mixture of Brock's competence in combat and Sgt. Hatred's gun-totting immature goofiness.
• The Dragon: Wide Wale's #2 and most seen associate.
• Enemy Mine: When Hank and Sirena sneak off for their date, he teams up with Brock to find them. They actually get along and show some begrudging respect toward one another.
• Joisey: He's an over-the-top Guido stereotype with the requisite accent.
• Offscreen Moment of Awesome: He easily captures Sheila during the season seven two-part premiere after she takes out three other henchmen.
• Powered Armor: The "whale lice" costume he wears is a "power suit". Brock notes it and calls him a "pussy" during their fight.
• Retractable Weapon: Wields an electrified retractable harpoon as his primary weapon.
• The Worf Effect: He's the top henchman of a level 10 villain and he ably demonstrates this fact by not only fighting but surviving against Brock, who is such a recognized Mook Horror Show that henchman will willingly commit suicide rather than be killed by him.

S-464

S-464

Voiced by: James Adomian

A Guild Stranger who is revealed to be a mole for the Guild's Canadian rivals, the Peril Partnership. He forms a relationship with an O.S.I. agent and is convinced by the Guild to serve as a double agent. He has a plastic dome on his head with tubes coming out of it.

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• Brain in a Jar: A downplayed version as he still has most of his body, but the top of his head has been replaced by a transparent plastic dome with tubes coming out of it. You can see his brain through it. Exactly why this was done or what advantages it confers is never revealed.
• Cold Sniper: He's armed with a sniper rifle during the joint Guild/O.S.I. sting to capture the Blue Morpho (where he first meets Kimberly) and, due to the procedures performed on him, has very limited emotion, making him seem cold and aloof.
• Dating Catwoman: He's the "Catwoman" as he forms a relationship with O.S.I. Agent Kimberly McManus.
• Laser-Guided Amnesia: After stealing a weather machine from the Guild to get Kimberly's attention, the Guild decides enough is enough and blanks his memory of her. This isn't revealed until after the O.S.I. has already agreed to a Prisoner Exchange for him.
• The Mole: He's acting a mole for the Guild's Canadian rivals, the Peril Partnership. After some threats from Dr. Mrs. The Monarch, he agrees to act as a double agent for the Guild if they help him get his girlfriend back.
• Pet the Dog: Despite being an Elite Mook for a guild of supervillains, he has a pet dog that he's fond of and asks that the dog not be shot.
• Prisoner Exchange: After stealing a Guild weather machine to get Kimberly's attention in "The Forecast Manufacturer", the Guild agrees to swap him to the O.S.I. in exchange for a Guild villain they're holding. They don't reveal that they've wiped S-464's memory until after the exchange has taken place, much to Kimberly's dismay.
• Punch-Clock Villain: He's a pretty nice guy whose job consists of being a mook for an evil organization.
• Star-Crossed Lovers: In love with an O.S.I. agent named Kimberly.
• Tin Man: He claims that due to the procedures performed on him, he can't feel sadness, saying you could shoot his dog in front of him and he wouldn't cry. Then he asks the person he's talking to not to shoot Billy because "he's a good boy." He also shows a lot of fear when Dr. Mrs. The Monarch gives him a To the Pain threat.
• You Are Number 6: Only referred to by his Stranger identification.

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