Penny is really evil.
She's just dating Captain Hammer to infiltrate his secret base and takes him out and gets into the Evil League of Evil and Dr. Horrible gets rejected but they still hook up.
- Alternatively, Penny is part of the Evil League of Evil, as Dr. Horrible's examiner. Dating Captain Hammer (Dr. Horrible's stated nemesis) is just a convenient way of ensuring she's around whenever Dr. Horrible commits his acts of evil. Penny's last words clinch it for this troper: "Captain Hammer saved us". It was already implied that Dr. Horrible's life was on the line for entry into the Evil League of Evil, however if Penny is his examiner, then it's possible that if Dr. Horrible had failed, the ELE could pull a You Have Failed Me For The Last Time and kill Penny too. An accidental death by Dr. Horrible's hands was probably preferable to what the ELE would do to her...
- Unfortunately, her last words to Billy were, "Don't worry. Captain Hammer will save us."
- Actually, it was "Captain Hammer saved us..."
- Uh, no, it really wasn't the past tense form.
Think about it: World is full of low-level weirdoes with a meta sense of humor. Cheapy production values further prove this.
Dr. Horrible and Captain Hammer are
Brothers.
Cause that would be really
dramatic.
Dr. Horrible and Captain Hammer will hook up.
Have no idea how it could happen -- it would just be really hot. But then let's hope the previous WMG isn't true.
- Hot?? Captain Hammer's inexplicable ability to make people believe he's a great guy seems to work across the divide between fictional and real world, too... urg.
- Have you seen Nathan Fillion's ass?? (Firefly episode "Trash.")
Nobody gets the girl.
Penny is turned off by the hubris of both Dr. Horrible and Captain Hammer's behavior, neither man wins her heart, and everyone learns a lesson about being a regular ol' normal person trying to make it in this tough ol' world without black-and-white, Good-and-Evil definitions.
- Well, at least the title was correct...
Bad Horse is really Hammer.
Think about it. You ever seen them in the same place at the same time?
- We never see him, period. For all we know Bad Horse is Moist. Which would be awesome.
- Or it could be Penny.
- Or it's Faith. (Sorry, had to do the Buffy reference thing.)
- Or maybe midgets.
- Or some kid is dreaming and they're all trapped inside his wacky broadway nightmare.
- Or witches, some evil witches. Which is ridiculous 'cause witches they were persecuted Wicca good and love the earth and women power and I'll be over here...
- Jossed by the theory below actually being true.
Bad Horse is an actual horse.
If Bad Horse was an actual, intelligent horse it would explain why we haven't seen him - the budget's too low for a talking horse to appear. It would also explain the lame name, as "Bad Horse" might be what someone called him before he gained human intelligence.
- He apparently "whinnies," too. Heh. And it'll probably be a bit dramatic reveal, anyway.
- Hey guess what...
- This one's true. Check the credits.
- Who didn't see this coming when they called him the "Thoroughbred of Sin"?
We should have seen this ending coming.
It's freaking Joss Whedon, and not a single person predicted a "death of love interest"? WMG is slipping.....
- Blame it on the Villain Song in Act III for making slipping sound so enticing.
- Why would you even guess it? Considering this is Whedon we're talking about and Dr. Horrible himself is almost a perfect Captain Ersatz of the three supervillain geeks combined from Buffy the Vampire Slayer, it was pretty much a given.
- He reminds me more of Spike, for all the times when Spike was making Puppy Dog Eyes and was the Butt Monkey of the universe. The tunes of some of Billy's songs resembled Spike's parts in the Buffy musical. Not to mention, the parallels: Billy = William the Bloody Awful Poet (both were shy and socially awkward around women). Dr. Horrible = Spike the vampire (the cool guy he longs to be, but who always gets upstaged by his nemesis, Hammer/Angel(us), who mocks him and steals his girl, or in Spike's case, girls, plural). Admittedly, Spike has never stalked someone in a laundromat, AFAIK. ;-)
- It's not wild enough to put on here. Just a garden-variety Whedon death.
The Death Ray Worked...
And Billy Buddy is in his own Personal Hell by the end of Act III.
- The ending is already cruel enough without dragging Hell into it.
- Naw, I like this theory. It helps explain how Billy "survived" the explosion that hurt Made Of Iron Captain Hammer and killed Penny from across the room without damaging his coat or doing anything else to anyone else. Captain Hammer is a mewling wimp, Dr. Horrible has been inducted into the Evil League of Evil, and he cannot enjoy a moment of it since he too distraught over Penny's death to gloat.
Billy's delusional.
He's hiding away in his basement and is imagining
all the success and fame because Penny's death has left him an emotionless shell, and Bad Horse has refused to let him join the Evil League of Evil because he was responsible for Penny's death.
- Wait, they'd ask him to kill someone, but then they wouldn't let him in because he... killed someone? I know Even Evil Has Standards, but, bzuh?
- Point. But then, maybe Penny's death has led to him becoming introverted and ever-so-slightly crazy and delusional, and it wouldn't exactly be conducive to good villainy to have a member of your elite group mumbling to himself and doing nothing but sing in morbid tones about the death of Penny? Perhaps Penny's death damaged him that mentally that he became unhireable. Overly-long and elaborate explanation/new part of theory thought up this minute complete.
- Alternatively, the League rejects him because he didn't kill anyone. Captain Hammer fired a malfunctioning death ray despite Billy's warning, and accidentally killed Penny. Billy is responsible for that in a sense, but it's not enough for the League.
- True but it was Dr. Horrible's death ray either way, so he was at least partially culpable for Penny's death. Plus he ruined Captain Hammer's reputation and crushed his ego, leading to months of therapy: a social and mental "kill", in a manner of speaking.
- Also, it seems possible that he suffers from multiple personalities: both Dr. Horrible and Billy Buddy refer to each other by name as if they were separate entities, especially at the end of No Mercy: "Head up Billy Buddy there's no time for mercy". The final verse of Dr. Horrible Is Here gives a similar idea: "And now the nightmare is real/Now Dr. Horrible is here".
- Actually, I think the two personalities were the same until Billy was taunted by Hammer near the end of Act II, where he actually became very evil. Then you can see at the end of Act III how Billy is almost completely dead when he finally puts on his goggles, and with the new red-and-evil suit, and how Billy, rather than Dr. Horrible, gives the last word on the blog.
- It starts off as Dr. Horrible purely being an alias for Billy (so Billy's mind is 90%, 10% Dr. Horrible), but as time goes on, Dr. Horrible manifests himself more and more. Brand New Day was a key turning point, as the two sides of Billy agree with each other: Captain Hammer must die! It also showed Billy throwing away one of his previous qualms (about murder), or rather, Dr. Horrible did it for him (so Billy's mind was approximately 50/50). By the end of No Mercy, it's clear that Dr. Horrible is in control, with Billy's nervousness holding him back slightly (25% Billy, 75% Dr. Horrible). Finally, in Dr. Horrible is Here, the first 4 lines ("Here lies everything/A world I wanted at my feet/My victory is complete/So hail to the king") are symbolic of Billy's grief about Penny's death and his anger towards Dr. Horrible (who he holds responsible). However, his next line ("Arise and sing!") is symbolic of his surrender to Dr. Horrible: he knows that there is no redemption for him now, and gives in to his Dr. Horrible persona completely. However, it is also one final command to Dr. Horrible: arise and be all that Billy wanted to be, and more! The rest of the song is Dr. Horrible making his declaration of evil, and a slight explanation of Billy's view of him taking over completely: "And now the nightmare is real/Now Dr. Horrible is here" (Billy, or rather, Dr. Horrible's mind is now 90% Dr. Horrible and 10% Billy). Billy gets the last word of the song, but the room he's in is metaphorical: we see Billy, shell shocked and trapped in his room, but the room is in his, now Dr. Horrible's, mind, having retreated into himself due to his grief.
- A simpler possible explanation along these lines The Evil League of Evil offered membership to Billy, but he rejected it out of guilt, and now spends his time sitting in his room entertaining delusions about what would have been.
- I think Dr Horrible is just a facade, after what he's done, he's got nothing to lose and he's going to rule and change the world but not in an utopic way like it was implied during his first discussion with Penny, it's going to be a nightmare. But Billie is still here and he's terribly shocked of what he's done, although he doesn't show it to anyone. He's trapped inside Dr Horrible and he can't show his grief or he won't even have the League.
- Semi-confirmed by Word Of God at the 2008 Comic-con: "Dr. Horrible got what he wanted and Billy lost everything"
- Not only that, but you could see Billy fighting Horrible during "Slipping" and the showstopper in the middle. The line "Hammer meet nail"? It sounds like Horrible gloating that Hammer has met his match, but really, what is a hammer's job except to pound a nail into line so that everything doesn't fall apart?
- Alternatively, this is the story of Billy Becoming The Mask
. Rather than a multiple personality, Dr. Horrible was originally just a character he was playing. To create the kind of social change he desired, he needed a supervillain to make people wake up and let go of their obedient apathy -- notice that as Dr. Horrible, on his blog, he ends his talk about what's wrong with the world with "I just need to rule it" almost tacked on as an afterthought; Billy wants to change the world, but this "Dr. Horrible" character is supposed to be a supervillain, so obviously he should want to rule it. Of course, later Billy realises that this made-up reasoning is starting to make a lot of sense, and that his goals and Dr. Horrible's goals overlap, which (judging by the lyrics of "On The Rise") worries him, but that's when he stops playing Dr. Horrible and starts being Dr. Horrible.
Dr. Horrible's true arch-nemesis was never Captain Hammer, and the Evil League Of Evil was aware of this.
Ideologically,
it was Penny, all along. If Captain Hammer had been killed, Billy would have gotten a pat on the back for the good P.R. and a post as Bad Horse's official Hoof-Picker. Unlike Captain Hammer, Penny's humanitarian actions were selfless from the start, thus making her death look like the most downright evil thing for a person to do. That's why Dr. Horrible's being shown such a prestigious top position in the League.
- At least, it looks like a top position. Not as top as Dead Bowie, but...
Dead Bowie is the David Bowie from the Buffyverse.
- Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders From Mars made a stop in Sunnydale (or maybe Cleveland), and things did not go so well.
The world will end about 2 days after the last images of the show
Think about it.
We have a villain who has nothing left to lose, who at least partly blames a corrupt world for the death of his loved one. And even if he's a bit odd about how good his inventions are, he can make some pretty nasty stuff if it comes down to it. A doomsday device should be coming about any day now.
Bad Horse got his start when he failed to win the Triple Crown
What else needs to be said?
- Alternatively, Bad Horse was ALWAYS a bad tempered horse, and the term "bad horse" was repeatedly used by his handlers. When he failed to win the Triple Crown, it was simply his breaking point, and he gained his sentience, killed his handler, and went off to a career in villainy, taking the name Bad Horse as both symbolic as his status as a supervillain and an ironic name: his past handlers thought he was bad, so now he's going to prove how right they were! The cowboys are simply a facet of his abilities: an astral projection of himself that simply manifests as singing cowboys, that can be transmitted via phone signals or can be used to "charge" inanimate objects (like letters...) so that when they are received by the intended recipient, the cowboys appear and start singing.
- That would explain why they're present at the final party--up until that point, I thought they were just a metaphorical/symbolic thing...
The entire show is told through an unreliable narrator in the form of Dr. Horrible.
Clearly, on the blog, someone asked Dr Horrible how he got his start as a villain. The entire story is, to a point, rather self congratulatory. The villain is clearly noble, first off. A superhero is portrayed as a brainless, brutish thug who also gets his joy out of deliberately and cruelly tormenting the villain.....when no one else is around to hear it. And it goes on.
Despite it obviously being him that instigated the attack, and brought the death ray, the fatal action was actually caused by the hero showing sudden and unnecessary overkill, and even ignoring the warning the villain tried to give him. From that last image of the show, we see him finishing his story, which is clear propaganda based to cast Dr. Horrible in the most sympathetic light possible.
The whole thing is actually an idea for a story being told by a writer-actor on his video blog.
Some of the things outlined in the story are ludicrous, even by supervillain-story standards - for example, a car gets thrown at Dr. Horrible's head and he
survives, and a lot of things seem to happen in moments that would heighten the drama - Captain Hammer saves the day at the last minute! Captain Hammer enters just as Billy leaves! Billy appears just as Captain Hammer finishes his big song! The large number of
Metaphorgottens and
IncrediblyLazyPuns indicates he's not the most original of writers, and he winds everything up with a Godfather-esque closing of the door to the Evil League of Evil and him, the blogger, singing the final note. And the whole Act III is just one long
Creator Breakdown.
- "Ludicrous, even by supervillain-story standards"? I'd call it "time-honored tropes". I've seen more ridiculous things in Superman comics, and as you said, it heightens the drama. Superhero comics are full of cheap heightened drama and convenient coincidences. If hero and villain never met, we'd have no story.
- As for the car throw at the head bit, he said Hammer threw a car at his head, he never claimed that the car actually hit him. Maybe he dodged and stumbled and, you know, bruised his cheek. Also, the whole stunt falls squarely into the realm of Amusing Injuries and Rule Of Funny.
- Perhaps Dr. Horrible genetically altered himself to have super-resistance to strong blows, which explains how he's survived all of Hammer's punches.
- This troper thought that Dr. Horrible used the Freeze Ray on the car. Billy's comment about the Freeze Ray taking a few moments to warm up paints a picture of Dr. Horrible cackling, aiming at Captain Hammer, and firing... only for it to produce a buzzing sound long enough for Hammer to throw a car at Horrible, whose ray finally fires, saving him barely... Budgetary constraints, you know.
- Or Captain Hammer couldn't hit the broad side of a barn. With or without a car.
- As for Hammer appearing out of nowhere when Horrible was trying to steal the can with the Wonderflonium, it makes perfect sense: As Dr. Horrible finds out later, Captain Hammer had been viewing Horrible's video blog. We know that he had been blogging about the freeze ray, it's possible that he also mentioned he needed Wonderflonium to power it. Captain Hammer only had to lie in wait to catch him red-handed. It's also possible that the courier van with the Wonderflonium was set up as bait for any aspiring villain in the city, which would explain the lacking security measures; everyone expected Captain Hammer to stop the bad guys.
- And why Hammer entered the laundromat just when Billy was trying to leave: Penny told Billy that she had told Hammer about her "laundry buddy" and Hammer had expressed a desire to meet him. Given that Horrible had also blogged about Penny extensively (even if he didn't mention/know her name he may have described her), and that Dr. Horrible was concerned about Penny nearly being run over by the van, it wasn't hard to see the connection. Hammer therefore most likely already knew that Billy was Horrible before he even opened his mouth. Just look at him smirk.
- Billy says 'inadvertantly introduced my arch-nemesis to the girl of my dreams' in his blog just prior to the Bridge Dedication, so it's pretty safe to assume that Captain Hammer knew exactly what Penny to Billy was anyway.
Captain Hammer was artificially created
Captain Hammer is the product of a governmental initiative to artificially create super heroes to help fight back against the Dead Bowies and Bad Horses of the world. Why? Because, after getting struck by the exploding death ray, Hammer cries out for "someone maternal". A normal person would cry "Mommy!"/"Mummy!" at the very least, but Captain Hammer doesn't, because he doesn't have a mother so he could of been grown in some sort of vat or tube. The best he can cry out for is someone vaguely maternal to help him during his first experience of pain. Also, it could explain why he gets away with all the throwing cars around and stuff: The local police have had him assigned to them by the FBI and have to accept that he'll do things like that.
- Also, his comic on the Dark Horse MySpace Page has him claiming he was born with the ability to bench press five hundred pounds. This sort of child could not be born naturally unless his mother was Supergirl.
- Also also, in the laundromat, Captain Hammer suggests he's met Billy before at the gym, but then realises he's "naturally this way".
- Which explains his shitty personality. He might be a couple of years old, and have spent all that time being told how great he is by the men who made him. He certainly acts like a kid. “lol, I totally made out with a girl!”
- Actually, he initially calls out "Mama!" "Someone maternal" is said afterwards, presumably him realizing that his mama isn't there.
- This could also explain why he doesn't seem to have a Secret Identity.
Captain Hammer and Penny were members of the Evil League of Evil
Both of them were sent to masquerade as good people for various reasons, including to test and observe up and coming villains such as Doctor Horrible. Captain Hammer being a member is not too subtle, what with how much of a
Jerkass he is. Penny, on the other hand, was much better as feigning good, however, after Dr. Horrible got the letter from Bad Horse telling him that he will be watched, who are the two people who see him the next day during his heist? Penny's skill at pretending may also have earned her a high position in the league, which is why Dr. Horrible was in a (at least seemingly) high position the moment he was made a member, since he managed to kill her. Captain Hammer was kicked out at the end because he was too much of a wimp.
Bad Horse is David Bowie from The Venture Brothers.
He has the power of shapeshifting, and thus can take on the form of a horse. Dead Bowie is a decoy.
At the end of "Slipping", Dr. Horrible hesitates to kill his
arch-nemesis, who has
caused him nothing but grief, and actually rubbed it in, despite thinking that Penny isn't watching. Had Captain Hammer not punched Dr. Horrible, and fired the exploding death ray, he probably would have backed down. Hammer beats up Horrible anyways, Penny sees it,
really sees Hammer for the
Jerk Jock he is, dumps him for Billy, who is caught up in
Love Redeems, Hammer hooks up with one of his fangirls, everyone lives happily ever after.
- Unless Redemption Equals Death, but even in that case, at least the world in general is better off...
- ...or Hammer starts brutally beating up Dr. Horrible, and Penny picks up the death ray and points it at Hammer and tells him "Get lost! Leave us alone." and walks out with Billy. But then, Joss Whedon never does Happy Endings. And Dr. Horrible wouldn't have acquired the aura of tragedy that every good villain and Anti Hero needs.
- Oh Hammer is definitely responsible. Think about it, compare Captain Hammer's track record of blithely inflicting bodily harm on people, emotionally torturing Billy, and Hammer's fascist leanings in the comic ("report the freaks to the police") with Dr. Horrible's deeds. What evil deeds exactly has Horrible actually committed? His list of crimes comes up as.... theft of gold bars and wonderflonium (it wasn't even a robbery or breaking-and-entering!), and negligible property damage to the ceiling of a public hall. All of Horrible's weapons prior to the death ray were nonlethal. Hell, they were less lethal than a tazer gun! A freeze ray (stops time), a stun ray, and a gun that was supposed to weaken Hammer's muscles (in the comic) but it malfunctioned. So we have two cases of pointing (but not firing) nonlethal weapons at a guy who is invulnerable, one case of pointing a potentialy lethal death ray at Hammer (but not firing), and one instance of shooting him with a weapon that simply put him in stasis. Horrible has never hurt a living thing, he abhorred killing. There's nothing there that would warrant a death sentence. Yet Hammer on the other hand had no compunction about aiming the death ray at Horrible's head and pulling the trigger...
- This is related, but considering that Captain Hammer goes to Dr. Horrible's blog, he could have been the one to e-mail him asking who "she" was, and thus know exactly who to save.
- Sure, but Billie never actually said her name, did he? Correct me if I'm wrong but he doesn't say Penny during the Freeze Ray song.
- In Captain Hammer's defense, all he saw when he was unfrozen was Dr. Horrible, his arch-nemesis whom had all the reason to kill him, pointing a ray gun at his head. As far as the good captain knew, he had saved himself just in time before being killed. And almost being killed tends to piss most people off.
- Point, but Hammer had already tried to kill Dr. Horrible at least once by throwing a car at his head -- and in light of that, it's not unreasonable to suspect that he might have been about to kill Horrible even sooner, when he was choking him in front of the van, had Penny's arrival not distracted him. After two attempted murders with no justification, I'm not inclined to sympathize with the mitigating circumstances now.
- Another point - the death ray seemed to be working just fine until Captain Hammer became unfrozen. Dr. Horrible fired it into the air several times without blowing it up. The death ray probably only broke when Captain Hammer punched Dr. Horrible and made him drop it on the floor. Yet another way that Captain Hammer is responsible for the death of Penny.
- It definitely broke when it hit the floor. Before, it worked just fine; afterwards, the gun was sizzling and crawling with red energy discharges. You can hear and see it. When Hammer points the gun at Horrible, who is lying on the floor, you can see Horrible noticing that something is wrong only after he tilts his head and takes a closer look at the gun (he probably heard the sizzle). That's when his expression changes and he says urgently, "Don't...!" Hammer misinterpretes that as "Please don't shoot me!" and cuts him off and gloat, when Horrible really was trying to warn him, "Don't fire that, it's overloading!" Since Hammer was previously frozen and had not seen the death ray when it was not yet broken, he probably thought the red discharges were a feature of the gun.
Dead Bowie's superpower is a form of subconscious mind control that manifests itself in dreamlike hallucinations.
"Am I freaking you out, Bret? Is this a freaky dream?"
Bad Horse is a political puppet
He's just a normal horse and those singing cowboys who speak for him with absolute authority are the real power behind the Evil League of Evil.
- But what about his whinny? His terrible, Death Whinny!
Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Blog is Joss Whedon's attempt at an NGE style Deconstruction of the Super Hero genre.
Think about it, every cliché and standard of the Super Hero genre is either subverted or inverted:
- Hero is the main character: inverted, the villain is the main character.
- Hero can survive through anything through strength of character: subverted, Captain Hammer throws himself into every situation heroically, but once he feels pain for the first time, his ego crumbles and he winds up in therapy as a sobbing wreck
- Hero gets the girl: subverted - she dies (then again, this is Joss Whedon we're talking about)
- Villain is foiled by the hero: partially subverted, Dr. Horrible's plan was to kill Captain Hammer, but ends up killing Penny instead
- Hero is a good and moral person, villain is evil and corrupted: subverted AND inverted - Captain Hammer is a jerk and womaniser, but is still proclaimed as a hero, in a similar way to a Villain With Good Publicity. Dr. Horrible initially has qualms about murdering someone under orders from the Evil League of Evil, but has no qualms about theft. He also cares for Penny, and his key invention is a Freeze Ray which, unlike other villains who would use it for selfish purposes, plans to use it to give him time to actually speak to Penny without stuttering or mumbling.
- Hero cares about keeping up the masquerade, villain doesn't: inverted - Captain Hammer is (apparently) Captain Hammer 24/7, whereas Dr. Horrible lives a double life.
- On the other hand, the sequence of events constitute a perfectly good tragic origin story for a villain in the superhero genre. At least, this is Dr. Horrible's debut as a scary villain people hear of and take seriously, as opposed to a guy named Billy who had never hurt anyone, was not apparently wanted by the cops, and was taking voice lessons to manage proper maniacal laughter.
What's the point of being a mad scientist if he can't manage a little necromancy?
- Then there's Moist namedropping a woman called Hourglass, who has some form of time-related powers. Can you think of anybody who might want certain events in his past tweaked?
- Hourglass seems to be able to see someone's future (she knew that boy would grow up to be a future president) like the protagonist of The Dead Zone, but she must probably meet someone in person for it to work; otherwise, she might have told Moist to warn Dr. Horrible against doing certain things. Which she didn't.
- I for one will be super-villain-origin-story-dissapointed if this does not come to pass.
Penny never realized that Billy is Dr. Horrible
She never did really get a look at the "good" doctor -- remember, she was hiding during the entire master plan -- until she was already dying, at which point, all she sees is his face (completely missing the goggles and labcoat). She never quite makes the connection there, and thinks Billy was just in the audience for the unveiling of the new shelter. And so, even though she knows that Captain Hammer is a
Jerkass, she lies to Billy and tells him that Cap will save them to reassure him. Of course, because Billy
is Dr. Horrible, this has the opposite effect than intended, and acts to seal his descent into madness.
- Alternatively, she did realize it (she picked up on the "Head up, Billy buddy" line, after all), but in the shock and trauma of her mortal injury can no longer recall anything that's happened over the past quarter hour and so dies believing the integrity of both Billy and Captain Hammer to be unblemished.
This is all just a ploy to get tons of money off DVD sales.
Why else would the Whedons take it off the web after only one week?
- Well, duh. Joss all but said this on the "Master Plan" page on the site.
- And movies are ...? In fact, you don't even get to see those for free until they're broadcast on TV.
- And regular TV shows have a much smaller window of opportunity. Until reruns -- and even then you have to stick to the TV schedule (well, unless you record everything).
- Jossed by Joss himself. Hulu.com has it.
Billy never wore a white lab coat.
For most of the show Billy seems to wear a white lab coat while he's in the "Dr Horrible" persona, changing back into civilian clothes when he's just Billy. Except that in Act I he ducks behind a wall in normal clothing for a second, then stands up wearing the lab coat. The only explanation is that Billy wears normal clothing at all times - the lab coat is just a visual representation of his state of mind. Even the red coat at the end could be imaginary in the same way.
- Doesn't really work. Even if Captain Hammer recognized him right away, waiting for Penny to leave the room first suggests that he knows Penny is oblivious to Billy's supervillain identity.
- Sure? Even if Penny did know, or Captain Hammer thought she knew, Captain Hammer did say some things that he probably didn't want his girlfriend to overhear.
2 days after the last images of the show, Billy commits suicide
- Then how is there going to be a sequel?
- Well, that wouldn't necessarily be a problem. But really... there shouldn't be a sequel. There, I said it.
- Agreed. No matter how much we like the character, some stories are... complete in themselves. They are cheapened by sequels.
- Why two days? Just out of interest.
- I picked a random number, but really... his situation needs some time to sink in. The first few days he just gets swept up by the whole new Evil League of Evil thing, robbing banks etc, other villains cheering him on. It stops him from thinking about what really happened. But once the first exitement is over and Billy faces days (or nights, it's night in the last shot) full of emptiness and despair, walking the city streets, passing by the laundromat where she won't be waiting for him, never again... how long do you think he will last? If he makes it past the first few months, then he'll probably live, because he has managed to return to some semblance of normalcy. Or "Billy" as we know him will disappear completely, as he commits symbolic suicide by utterly embracing the Dr. Horrible persona and never ever looking back. But even supervillains have to go to sleep. Brush his teeth, eat breakfast, watch as some henchman does his laundry for him...
Captain Hammer's penis actually is a hammer
This was why Penny was
really getting distant from Captain Hammer.
- He does seem the kind of guy who might... name his superheroic pseudonym after his junk.
- What sort of hammer is it, though? I'm guessing a ball-peen.
- Claw hammer, if his chest insignia is any indication...
The reason why Doctor Horrible became a supervillain is because everyone expected him to.
He really lives in a world where exceptional students in science are reported to the police for surveillance.
- Not to mention, look at what the world is okay with accepting as a hero. If that's their idea of a hero, of course he couldn't go that route.
- The public police-state-like prejudice against scientists and engineers might even be the reason why Billy seems to have no job! He's a brilliant gadgeteer (he can build rayguns that freeze time!), but he has to go to the laundromat to get his clothes washed, so he's probably poor, and he shares an apartment with Moist. Don't ask me where he gets the parts for all the gadgets he designs from if he is poor... perhaps he steals them, like he did the Wonderflonium? Perhaps he used to have more income in the past? Perhaps he's using up an inheritance from his dead parents? And of course in comic books, supervillains and superheroes are either filthy rich or seem to have just enough mysteriously sources of income to get along (unless they're called Spiderman) and have access to technical gadgets even if they're living in the sewers. It's just one of those things.
- Billy's whole attitude is a mixture of extreme shyness and bitterness and frustration, like someone who has been beaten up by life so often that he has withdrawn into himself. Normally you would expect someone like him to be courted by corporate and military headhunters and offered vast sums of money to design weapons. Of course, Billy is an anarchist and revolutionary at heart, not to mention a pacifist, so maybe he declined those offers and lost his job. Another reason why he is bitter. He wants people to acknowledge his genius, but instead they're all cheering for a smarmy jerk who lives on government funding (the Hammercycle, the Ham-jet).
- Is there a chance that Dr. Horrible's last name is actually Horrible? That's got to limit your career options.
- Nope. It's Buddy. It's in the credits, and also mentioned in Slipping.
- Is it? I'm pretty sure on the cast list the character's identified as "Dr. Horrible" with no reference to his given name, first or last.
Captain Hammer will become Mal Reynolds
After experiencing pain he becomes slightly more humble and retires but is still abit of a jackass. Due to his superhuman nature he out lives all memory of his being a Superhero and he fights aginst the Alliance during the war in order to redeem himself...and well this one needs to be said.
Captain Hammer will become Caleb
The First Evil was empowering him from birth, and once he gets over the pain, he'll don the priestly collar and go after Buffy.
The purpose of this show was to show the reality of the relationship between Lex Luthor and Superman
Think about it. Superman/Captain Hammer is born with endless power. He has never felt pain or fear, and he is basically spoiled by the universe. He's not going to be a good person, he's going to be a pathetic jerk that is convinced he can do whatever he wants, and who upholds the status quo because it's easy and people love him for it. Meanwhile, Lex Luthor/Dr.Horrible have nothing but their brains and money, coupled with a desire to change a world enforced by a superhuman. They have to be a strong person with real goals and ability because they have to change the world with nothing to go on but what they make for themselves. Basically, only in comic book land is Lex Luthor evil and Superman good; in the real world, or in Dr. Horrible, the roles are reversed, and Dr. Horrible is a villain, and evil, but is not a "bad guy".
- Wait. The man who can go into Hell itself uncorrupted is evil, but the guy who goes into restaurants, gives poor (fiscally) married waitresses 30 minutes to decide "have sex with me for millions for a weekend or not" then ditches before they can decide to give them gnawing guilt for years is a good guy? Oookay then.
Penny is not dead.
This leaves room for Dr. Horrible to accidentally kill her
again in the sequel when he blows up a hospital or something! Oh, snap!
Billy suffers from a common hero affliction -- he can't tell the girl he loves how he feels about her. In a "straight" example, the hero tells the girl he loves about his feelings, usually towards the end, and they defeat the bad guys and live happily ever after. In Dr. Horrible, Billy ends up indirectly killing the girl he loves without ever letting her know how he felt, despite the fact that she obviously likes him, and it all could've been avoided if he'd asked her out for frozen yoghurt during the first song.
After his humiliating public defeat, Captain Hammer becomes the next member of the Evil League of Evil
Hammer's reputation is pretty much shot to pieces. The media will look for a new "hero" while Hammer is in therapy. Even if Hammer tries to return to his role, he'll never dare to antagonize Dr. Horrible, for fear what Horrible will do next. Cut off from the government honey pot, Captain Hammer decides to turn to a life of crime where he can do what he loves best (beating people up). He sends his application to the Evil League of Evil, commits some atrocities, and is accepted almost instantly, which will piss Dr. Horrible off big time. Once he is part of the League, Hammer starts intimidating and upstaging Dr. Horrible
again, because Hammer has a natural talent for being a jerk. The rest of the League watches in amusement. Either Dr. Horrible leaves the League in disgust, muttering about falling standards, or he gets his eye-twitch again and shoots Hammer with his latest desintegrator gun.
Billy/Dr. Horrible is an alternate universe version of Toby from Sweeney Todd
Both were played by Neil Patrick Harris (in the Concert version, that is), both were sweet if slightly neurotic, and both
became crazed and murderous after the death of the woman they love (who in both versions is killed by her boyfriend).
Billy can't control what persona is in control at any given time
One of Horrible's trademarks (besides the goggles and lab coat) is the squinty expression he gets when annoyed, or happy, or... pretty much whenever. But we see Billy get this expression, if only for a split second, at several points -- in the middle of the significant pause when he's talking to Penny and says the power needs "to be put in ... different hands," when Captain Hammer is taunting him, and so on. Obviously, by "Slipping," Billy is having serious trouble keeping his Dr. Horrible persona in control, but it could be triggered before that. After
Penny's death, the tables are turned; Dr. Horrible usually is active, but Billy pops up from time to time -- hence the ending.
The Fangirls killed Penny.
We know that the Fangirls "have a problem with her". When Captain Horrible fired the malfunctioning Death Ray, they took advantage of the situation, and
murdered Penny with some loose shrapnel. When they saw that Captain Hammer had fled the scene, but
Dr. Horrible actually cared, they switched loyalties.
- Why the hell does this make so much sense?
- This troper would not be surprised, especially given that shrapnel flying fast enough to dig into the walls would probably leave a larger wound than the ones Penny had.
