During the investigation of recent hollers in the Complete Monster thread, it's become apparent to the staff that an insular, unfriendly culture has evolved in the Complete Monster and Magnificent Bastard threads that is causing problems.
Specific issues include:
- Overzealous hollers on tropers who come into the threads without being familiar with all the rules and traditions of the tropes. And when they are familiar with said rules and traditions, they get accused (with little evidence) of being ban evaders.
- A few tropers in the thread habitually engage in snotty, impolite mini-modding. There are also regular complaints about excessive, offtopic "socializing" posts.
- Many many thread regulars barely post/edit anywhere else, making the threads look like they are divorced from the rest of TV Tropes.
- Following that, there are often complaints about the threads and their regulars violating wiki rules, such as on indexing, crosswicking, example context and example categorization. Some folks are working on resolving the issues, but...
- Often moderator action against thread regulars leads to a lot of participants suddenly showing up in the moderation threads to protest and speak on their behalf, like a clique.
It is not a super high level problem, but it has been going on for years and we cannot ignore it any longer. There will be a thread in Wiki Talk
to discuss the problem; in the meantime there is a moratorium on further Complete Monster and Magnificent Bastard example discussion until we have gotten this sorted out.
Update: The new threads have been made and can be found here:
Please see the Frequently Asked Questions and Common Requests List before suggesting any new entries for this trope.
IMPORTANT: To avoid a holler to the mods, please see here for the earliest date a work can be discussed, (usually two weeks from the US release), as well as who's reserved discussion.
When voting, you must specify the candidate(s). No blanket votes (i.e. "![[tup]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/thumbs_up_emote.png "[thumb up]"){kind=small}
to everyone I missed").
No plagiarism: It's fair to source things, but an effortpost must be your own work and not lifted wholesale from another source.
We don't care what other sites think about a character being a Complete Monster. We judge this trope by our own criteria. Repeatedly attempting to bring up other sites will earn a suspension.
What is the Work
Here you briefly describe the work in question and explain any important setting details. Don't assume that everyone is familiar with the work in question.
Who is the Candidate and What have they Done?
This will be the main portion of the Effort Post. Here you list all of the crimes committed by the candidate. For candidates with longer rap sheets, keep the list to their most important and heinous crimes, we don't need to hear about every time they decide to do something minor or petty.
Do they have any Mitigating Factors or Freudian Excuse?
Here you discuss any potential redeeming or sympathetic features the character has, the character's Freudian Excuse if they have one, as well as any other potential mitigating factors like Offscreen Villainy or questions of moral agency. Try to present these as objectively as possible by presenting any evidence that may support or refute the mitigating factors.
Do they meet the Heinousness Standard?
Here you compare the actions of the Candidate to other character actions in the story in order to determine if they stand out or not. Remember that all characters, not just other villains, contribute to the Heinousness Standard
Final Verdict?
Simply state whether or not you think the character counts or not.
Edited by GastonRabbit on Aug 31st 2023 at 4:14:10 AM
Unofficial Wiki Curator for Complete Monster
Ah, Ozai seems like a Villain with Good Publicity then.
BTW, Bayonetta 2 was released last week FYI.
Tarkin's released in just over a week 
Be interesting to see if there's anything to add (or even a diqualifying factor, as the book's canon). We learn Palpatine's first name: Sheev
edited 27th Oct '14 9:43:47 AM by ACW
CM Dates; CM Pending; CM Drafts
Alright, if no one is in favor of keeping the characters from Divinity Dragon Commander, Dragon Rider, and EastEnders, I'll cut those in a few days. I'm also leaning to cut the Dolores Claiborne character. Irredeemable scumbag who definitely crosses the Moral Event Horizon, but unless he's got more on his plate he probably doesn't rise to the level of Monsterdom. I also don't think a death threat should be taken on the same level as (attempted) murder unless he actually goes through with it. If no one objects, I'll move him to MEH later.
Re: Harry Potter page images: I think Bellatrix holding Hermione hostage looks too dark, honestly. It is definitely a pretty hard page to picture with most of the deaths happening through wand attacks.
@ ACW: The reason I'm not sure on having a Star Trek page, while there are technically enough examples to justify one, is that it goes against the idealistic nature of that franchise. The only reason there are seven keeps is the sheer size of the franchise. Not sure if that's a solid objection or not. I'll also make that Conan page later on, then.
Here are several new unlisted film and television examples (6), and some that were never resolved (5).
Gamera vs. Barugon (also listed on Gamera)
- Complete Monster: Onodera. While his exposing Barugon's egg to infrared rays was actually an accident, he still earns the title in many other ways. Let's count those ways, shall we?
- He fires a revolver at the New Guinea villagers, for no real reason.
- After Kawajiri and Keisuke risk their lives to save him from quicksand, he backstabs them by letting a scorpion sting Kawajiri and then blows up the cave while Keisuke is still in it.
- He beats up a crippled man (Ichiro Hirata, Keisuke's brother) and his wife, and not only steals their money, but also sets their house on fire, while they're trapped and unable to move.
- He then tries to steal a diamond that is necessary for the military to defeat Barugon.
- And he also probably ends up giving Barugon indigestion.
Mostly generic villainy, so I'll say cut for now.
God of Gamblers
- Complete Monster: Chau Siu-Chee the antagonist of God of Gamblers Returns. The previous antagonist Chan Kam-Sing in God of Gamblers stated that he regretted working for him. Chau Siu-Chee is obsessed with gambling to the point of insanity: Forcing Chan Kam-Sing to gamble with his hands and chopping them off when he loses. And not to mention, killing off Ko Chun's wife and unborn child at the beginning of the film.
With that rap sheet (and an additional scoop of Eye Scream) I could see keeping him.
House of Cards (UK)
- Complete Monster: While it is easy to be deceived by such a planner for a while, by the end it is obvious that Francis Urquart fully qualifies.
Almost a ZCE for the show's Villain Protagonist, but he looks like an easy cut:
- Even Evil Has Standards: Urquhart describes Patrick Woolton as, "A lout, a lecher, a racist, an anti-semite and a bully." He's also genuinely haunted by murdering Mattie, and doesn't really deny the King's accusation that he's a monster
Love (Taiwan Drama)
- Complete Monster: Very few, expected given the nature of this drama, but there's one: Zhou Yingming, the final Big Bad of the show. An opportunist who will stop at nothing in furthering his ambition. As of now he is responsible for the murder of Hong Zhizhong, Tang Sichuan, Wang Wenqiang and more yet to be revealed, to cover up his evil deeds. He made Xiaoyu pregnant and later forced her into a miscarriage, killing his own unborn child. He has almost certainly crossed the Moral Event Horizon by the time he ordered Wang Wenqiang's death. He showed no remorse for any of his actions so far, and has no genuine love for anyone. He made Pre-Heel–Face Turn Guo Congmin and Xie Mingming look like decent people in comparison.
No idea, never heard of it. Judging from the writing it looks like the example has been there since way before this thread started. Anyone here a fan of Taiwanese soap operas?
Malice
- Complete Monster: Tracy. Completely remorseless about the numerous lives she must have ruined with her various schemes and willing to murder a child to get away with her latest one.
She kills her partner in the scheme and tries the same on the kid, but there's also apparently a serial child rapist in the same work; he might be a better keep.
Nosferatu
- Complete Monster: Count Orlok, the eponymous "Nosferatu," is one of the earliest examples of vampires in cinema and one of the most terrifying. When Thomas Hutter arrives in the Transylvanian Carpathian Mountains, the locals speak Orlok's name in hushed whispers and don't dare to venture out at dark. Upon meeting Orlok, Hutter is attacked and the count tries to feed from him fatally before being repulsed. Hutter witnesses Orlok loading up several coffins to be transported across the sea, and Orlok later kills the crew of the schooner transporting him. The other coffins are revealed to also contain plague-bearing rats, and Orlok's arrival spreads a deathly plague all over Europe. He uses the plague as cover to feed on the people of Hutter's home village of Wisborg without suspicion before Hutter's innocent wife Ellen catches his eye. Orlok attacks Ellen, draining her to death in her Heroic Sacrifice to keep him distracted before the sun rises to destroy him. Orlok had spawned a legion of imitators and while later vampires were portrayed as sophisticated, urbane and charming, Orlok is nothing more than a cunning, evil and ravenous beast that can barely pass as a human being.
- The remake attempts to subvert this categorization by conveying a sense of pathos regarding Dracula's condition as one consigned to a predatory existence, doomed to be despised by those he wants to love and, absent that, to destroy those who return his affection. However, Dracula remains just as repugnant here as Orlok is in the source material, and it is clear that he is compelled to spread contagion and misery wherever he goes.
Orlok was proposed and kept, but does the remake version count (presumably Werner Herzog's Nosferatu the Vampyre)? It sounds like he's being portrayed too much as a Tortured Monster.
Previous examples that were buried and still need resolution:
Nicholas Quinn from Crownies: keep, rewrite.
Rhyss from Cybergirl: I think we agreed to cut him for being a rather generic villain, but he's still on the YMMV page with an expanded write-up.
Goth, Stark, and the Doctor from Kindred: The Embraced: I'll support keeping Goth and cutting the rest for now based on Lightysnake's breakdown here.
Harry Warden from My Bloody Valentine 3D: Never seen the film, but I'm still inclined to keep him: he reaches a staggering bodycount in his limited screentime (including child murder), and we also have several other Silent Antagonists like Michael Myers. I'll do a vote count later to see where he stands.
Romano from The Secret in Their Eyes: Unless someone has a good argument I'd say cut him, he ultimately doesn't do enough.
edited 27th Oct '14 10:05:28 AM by Morgenthaler
You've got roaming bands of armed, aggressive, tyrannical plumbers coming to your door, saying "Use our service, or else!"
On Chalis, having played Dark Dawn and having disqualified Alex, I'd say Chalis should be kept. Blados and Chalis share much the same crimes, and they are incredibly heinous (how's drowning a continent in darkness for you?) but in the same vein of those two from A Walk Among The Tombstones, Chalis is heavily implied to be about to backstab Blados and seize the Apollo Lens herself. If she has reasons, they're vile. They both stand out in different ways; Chalis is a seductive, patient manipulator who'd backstab anybody given the chance, and Blados is a bloodthirsty psychopath who likes to battle and kill at that.
Speaking of those two, I might have a rewrite for both them and Grings Kodai soon. Albert Spica should probably be looked at, Lighty, since I brought him up months ago and he was simply buried.
edited 27th Oct '14 10:31:47 AM by Scraggle
Unofficial Wiki Curator for Complete Monster
- I think Spica's there.
![[tdown]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/Thumbs_down_emoticon_3571.png "[thumb down]")
3D!Harry.
- Rhyss: Think the issue was not enough details. This new writeup is better.
I think he's talking about rewriting Spica.
![[up]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/smiles/arrow_up.png "[up]"){kind=icon}
Could you give a summary of what they do? Or has a detailed write-up already been given?
edited 27th Oct '14 1:57:22 PM by AmbarSonofDeshar
I believe the discussions have already been had
Their writeup is made already, but I feel it a bit choppy and needing of the spoiler tags removed. Dark Dawn is a four year old game that hardly anybody knows about.
To give a brief summary of their crimes, they kidnap a child, manipulate a city, activate the Grave Eclipse (shrouding almost the entire continent in darkness and thus releasing dark monsters on the populace, killing them by the thousands. We see their dead bodies and everything) and uses a previously manipulated victim as a sacrifice to fire the Apollo Lens onto their own allies. Then there's the issue of their motives; For the Evulz for Blados, personal gain for Chalis.
edited 27th Oct '14 2:31:22 PM by Scraggle
Unofficial Wiki Curator for Complete Monster
Current writeup:
- Golden Sun: Dark Dawn: Blados and Chalis are two agents of the mysterious country Tuaparang. These two have no problem with kidnapping children, activating a tower that would eseentially switch off the sun and unleash hordes of monsters on the innocent populace of their world, and to top it off near the end, intending to use the king of Morgal - already a victim of their manipulations - in order to fire a powerful attack on their own Tuaparang allies using another weapon, knowing the weapon would kill him as a result. Blados is the worst of the two, since it's implied he does a lot of this just because he can, but Chalis herself is quite a ruthless, cold-hearted backstabber who may have been planning to betray her own partner, as well.
![[nja]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/user_ninja_2074.png "[nja]"){kind=small}
Morgen, don't know if it's a good enough reason, but it's a good point. I mean, only seven examples, while Star Wars has over 2 dozen.
edited 27th Oct '14 3:47:35 PM by ACW
CM Dates; CM Pending; CM Drafts
I don't see any reason to cut either of them.
edited 27th Oct '14 5:30:00 PM by Camberf
I'll give it my best, then.
- Golden Sun: Dark Dawn: Though Golden Sun has a villainous roster comprised by mostly villains with redeeming quirks, this cannot be said for Dark Dawn's Blados and Chalis. Agents of the military country Tuaparang, Blados starts by kidnapping a child and isolating him from his master, while Chalis secretly manipulates Kaocho's king from behind the scenes. The two partake in a scheme to activate the Grave Eclipse, shrouding most of the continent in darkness and unleashing dark beasts on the innocent populace, leading to the death of thousands. Once at the Apollo Lens, Blados and Chalis waste no time in betraying Alex and seizing the Apollo Lens for themselves. They proceed to turn Volechek into a horrific beast and attempt to use him to fire the Apollo Lens on their own allies, killing Volechek in the process. Both are nasty in their own right, with Blados doing it for fun, and Chalis seeking more personal motives, up to betraying her own partner. Cunning, manipulative, and seeing the deaths of thousands as a mere side-effect of the plan, Blados and Chalis were the worst villain twosome Golden Sun has.
As for Kodai...
- Pokémon: Zoroark: Master of Illusions: Grings Kodai is a powerful businessman who discovered one of Celebi's Time Ripples. Gaining its power at the price of annihilating the nearby city's plant life, Kodai used this power for his own greed. In the current, Kodai kidnapped a Zoroark's baby Zorua, importing the baby into another region and using blackmail to force Zoroark to terrorize innocents to make himself look good. He intended to renew his abilities by touching the Time Ripple again, at the threat of once again devastating the ecosystem solely for the money. Once Zoroark tracks Kodai down, Kodai threatens Zorua's life, electrocuting it with his gauntlet to almost fatal extents to prove he was serious. Upon being tricked by Zoroark, Kodai loses it and instead electrocutes Zoroark to death in his fury, just as the two were finally being reunited. An ambitious and selfish opportunist of the worst kind, Kodai managed to be one of the most despicable humans in the Pokémon anime.
edited 27th Oct '14 5:53:34 PM by Scraggle
Lizzid people!
Nice writeups, Scraggle.
A total has-been.
@Roxanne Of Love And Hate: Ozai's not being voted on, since he's a closed case. As for Turbo, I don't think that was stated on the Never Again list. I'd agree that's a bullshit reason since it was clearly his own moral agency overriding the Cy-Bug's, but I only recall "insufficiently heinous" being his reason for being on, which works.
On Umbridge: Seeing as Rowling herself calls her one of the most malicious HP characters and states she shares one thing in common with freaking Voldemort in how she permanently scarred Harry, I don't think the story will disqualify her. If anything, I would not be surprised if the opposite happened and it solidifies her place.
Also, oh dear lord the Dance Moms "example" was up there with the lions, the Camp Lazlo "example", and the Jessie example in absolute awfulness.
edited 27th Oct '14 7:42:29 PM by ANewMan
Vrak from Power Rangers Megaforce: First, we have the terrifying implication that the Loogies, the Mooks in the first half of the series, are innocent civilians that have been Brainwashed and Crazy. Then we have his Kick the Dog moment when a dying Metal Alice begs for his help, only for him to leave her to die. After disappearing for most of the second half of the season, he makes a return in Vrak is Back. When he learns that his older brother, Prince Vekar, has died in the previous episode, he is actually glad because opens him to be next in line for the throne. Even the Rangers, who killed Vekar, found that to be sickening. It doesn't stop there. We learn that he not only brainwashed Robo Knight, but he kidnapped Orion and put him through Cold-Blooded Torture to go forward with his plan. Vekar at least had the Freudian Excuse of being The Unfavorite. Vrak, on the other hand, was always put on a pedestal by his father.
Lizzid people!
@A New Man: It's gone now, so we can forget about it.
edited 27th Oct '14 7:46:44 PM by AustinDR
Is that a submission? He sounds pretty bad, but does he stack with Bansheera? Same universe.
For the uninitiated: Vrak is the PR counterpart of Bredoran, who's on the page, and a fairly close match from what I can tell.
edited 27th Oct '14 7:57:01 PM by HamburgerTime
My bad. Yeah, it was meant to be a submission. I'm not sure how Vrak compares to Bansheera, since it's been a while since I watched Lightspeed Rescue.
Bansheera is also abusive to her family, given that she leaves her son stuck in the Shadow World once he screws up too often, and is directly or indirectly responsible for the deaths of all but one of her minions, and the remaining one she tried to kill. She's one of the worst minion-abusers I've ever seen, and that includes in stuff aimed at adults.
Bansheera is the most evil character and horrific character in Power Rangers history. But yeah.
I think we should wait for the next episode since his arc isn't over before voting. I doubt it would change much.
You could probably make a case that the Machine King, Master Vile, and especially Dark Specter have implicitly greater crimes, but since we deal only in onscreen deeds, that's pretty accurate there.
Fair point. I did mean that we can directly see what they did, not just "maybe they did".
Anyway, since she is the onscreen highest standard(so far, things could change), it takes a bit to earn a CM rating. On the other hand, a lot of Villains earned it.
A total has-been.
I thought Bansheera and Venjinx were tied in the category of "most absolutely horrifyingly evil".
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/posts.php?discussion=6vic3f9h1cy5qivsenw8llok&page=1274#31841
Bringing her up again, because it seems like the post was overlooked.
If everyone were normal, the world would be a dull place. Like reality television.
Two things, semi-related. First, I've got a proposed rewrite for Zouken Matou.
- Zouken Matou, the Big Bad of the Heaven's Feel route, is an ancient mage who stays alive primarily by body-jacking people and instigates the entire plot in an effort to achieve immortality. Prior to the Fourth Holy Grail War, he adopted Tokiomi Tohsaka's younger daughter Sakura, ostensibly to carry on the magical legacy of the Matou family, then subjected her to ten years of constant violation by magic worms in order to control her and mold her into a vessel for the Holy Grail. To keep Sakura's budding dark side in check, Zouken had his "grandson" Shinji rape her regularly and fostered Shinji's descent into evil.
Second, can I suggest that we allow people to place spoiler tags on the YMMV page entries without having to run them by this thread? As I've complained about before, a lot of entries end up being complete summaries of the work, or at least giving away major twists. For the Complete Monster subpages, that's fine; there's a warning there. But I don't think we should just throw something up on a work page, where spoilers are allowed, without tagging it. And I definitely don't think we should be insisting that nobody is allowed to tag it on that page without a full proposal and vote.
Absolutely agree on Ozai.