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
Hmm... one act of bragging about an accidental killing, one murder, numerous count of reckless endangerment/ attempted murder, and one particularly brutal case of assault that continued after the match ended and could have easily ended in murder or manslaughter. Yeah, ![[tup]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/Thumbs_up_emoticon_3268.png "[thumb up]"){kind=small}
.
Doesn't even like this username
I'll add another to keeping Ox.
Leaning strongly towards a "no" on Ox Baker. The ghoulishness aspect aside, if he's as bad as a pro wrestling villain can get (which I can believe), that's more an argument for pro wrestling not being able to have CMs then it is for him qualifying.
![[up]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/smiles/arrow_up.png "[up]"){kind=icon}
What he said. I also just saw the film The Barber and I'm quite certain the killer of that film counts.
edited 31st Mar '15 7:24:26 PM by Lightysnake
That's also a good point. At the risk of strawmanning, I'd like to challenge the idea that we are somehow doing a disservice to the genre of Wrestling if we don't list any Complete Monster examples. Having a Complete Monster is not a badge of honor, so if there just aren't yet any in that genre, so be it.
edited 31st Mar '15 8:43:14 PM by Hodor2
The Merry Monarch of Darkness
![[tdown]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/Thumbs_down_emoticon_3571.png "[thumb down]"){kind=small}
Ox Baker. He seems too tongue-in-cheek to me. And the writers capitalizing on real people's deaths is a pretty huge dick move, though I don't blame Douglas Baker himself.
It gets worse, Doug was torn up about he deaths, worried he may have caused them, and was relieved when he learned that wasn't the case. Imagine what it must have been like for him to be forced to portray a character bragging about causing the deaths.
Anyway, it looks like he's going to be cut. Oh well. Maybe it is for the best and he can rest in peace without people acknowledging his character as the worst in pro wrestling. Pro wrestling is just fake sport anyway, s o it's not even the kind of place you would expect to have a CM. And like HT said, it's not a badge of honor.
Changing the subject, I would like to hear from Lighty about this "Barber" kill. Also, how is the Punisher page coming along?
edited 31st Mar '15 9:06:47 PM by bobg
jjj
Well the Punisher page is here:
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Monster/ThePunisher
I can see if any other 616 Punsiher villains count, though it might be tricky for most 616 Punisher's villains to qualify. Psycho for Hire villains are a dime a dozen in Punsiher books and your average Punsiher villain doesn't last long, so it can be hard for them to make an impact. 616 Punsiher is also far more comic booky then Punsiher Max. Garth Ennis Punshier books seemed far more satirical then his work on Punsiher Max. 616 Punisher can feature magic and cyborgs and other over the top stuff. Its not as gritty as the Max series, but its usually still serious despite this over the top stuff.
edited 31st Mar '15 10:26:56 PM by Overlord
Going to note that I have no issue with simply axing the whole pro-wrestling section.
The only Punisher run I'm particularly familiar with is Greg Rucka's (which is excellent, by the way) and it has no candidates. Not only are both members of the Big Bad Duumvirate not CMs, they actually drive into full-on antivillain territory, having little interest in violence and getting caught up in a mess caused by one of their subordinates going off the reservation. In the end you even end up feeling rather sorry for both Gerard and Poulsen.
In short, I won't be much help with this one.
edited 31st Mar '15 10:03:42 PM by AmbarSonofDeshar
The Barber is a psychological thriller. Now, the premise is a young man tracks down an elderly barber who lives in a small town with a rather big bombshell: he knows the barber is a retired serial killer whose real name is Francis Visser. The young man is there to learn from him and become a killer himself.
The old man constantly protests he's no killer and he was suspected for a rash of serial killings decades ago in a mistake. Eventually, the young man begins resorting to...extreme measures to gain his attention, even committing murder. Finally, the barber relents, only for it to later be revealed he's making the whole thing up so he can have some company. He tells a tearful story of how the arrest ruined his life and drove his family away, showing the photo album of his loved ones.
Then...well...
The twist? The young man is a former cop and the son of the cop who brought Visser in the first place before he became 'Eugene van Wingherdt', and is faking the entire thing so he can get close to Visser and bring him in. However, Visser knew who he was and was playing a role to entrap him as well. Visser is indeed a serial killer and a rather nasty and evil one. The 'murders' that the cop committed? He faked them. And that tearful story Visser told about his family and those photos? Those photos were purchased from an antique shop. They're completely fake.
I'll detail Visser's crimes:
- He was arrested originally for abducting and burying 17 young women alive in wooden boxes over the course of several years. We see a bit at the start of one of his victims trapped underground. They have only an hour of air. Two if they don't panic. After disappearing, Visser spends years tormenting the cop who brought him in and knew what he was until he's driven to shoot himself in despair.
- Besides this, Visser murders his former employee when the guy gets on his bad side. His friend, the town's police chief? Visser kills him as well by bashing his head with a rock when the cop starts convincing him
- Visser, knowing the hero is trying to fool him, ambushes and kills a 'victim' said cop spared and tries to frame him for the murder.
- Visser also imprisons the hero's partner in a box and buries her. He saves her just in time. Visser plans to frame said hero for everything while Visser himself skates free.
At the end, Visser gleefully brings up that even if he's caught? He'll get all the fame for his many, many victims and everyone will live knowing that a monster can be right next to them. The heroes opt to Pay Evil unto Evil and, to prevent him from achieving the fame he wants, bury him themselves and let him be forgotten. It's a pretty nasty move by the protagonists no doubt, but the SOB really, really had it coming. It's also indicated Visser kills every so often when he gets 'the itch,' and has no remorse over it. He plans to send the hero to the same despair he sent his father to, and all Visser's sympathetic qualities end up as a ridiculously good act and part of a ruthless and sadistic plan.
edited 31st Mar '15 10:03:55 PM by Lightysnake
In regards to Ox Baker, I just need to know one thing; how many other Professional Wrestling heels attempt murder in-show?
It's not common, but it's hardly unheard of.
The Merry Monarch of Darkness
Francis Visser.
I'd recommend it, too. Scott Glenn turns in a marvelous performance.
Only Jake "The Snake" Roberts has attempted murder under his belt. I too have no problem with the entire Pro Wrestling section being axed. I only waited this long to chime in on Baker in the first place because I remember Ambar saying Baker and Roberts were the only people worth considering at all when the Pro Wrestling section was discussed years ago and I wanted his opinion now.
One thing I will say on the subject of the 616!Punisher—since Christian Poulsen managed to wrack up a doubledigit bodycount in the space of less than an hour (actual time isn't given but it may well have only been a few minutes) while remaining sympathetic, any potential qualifiers are presumably going to have to top that (which Smith succeeds at doing admirably).
I stand by what I said back then—about them being the only two worth looking at—but if we think they don't meet minimum heinousness, I have no issue with cutting them.
edited 31st Mar '15 10:14:48 PM by AmbarSonofDeshar
I agree.
Yeah I'm not sure the average Psycho for Hire villain from the 80s or 90s featured in Punisher can top that, though they may have less resources then Poulsen, but then again, Psycho for Hire villains are quite common in the Punisher titles, so one would have to do something really nasty to count.
Also I find that 616 Punisher villains are just not as nasty as their Max counterparts, the main villain in the 90s series was a Mafia Princess who wanted to avenge her family after Punsiher killed her father and even some of the nasty psycho villains get little bits of humanity, one decided to kill Punisher's remaining family members just to piss him off, but he refused to cheat on his wife, which seems to indict he cared about her. Jigsaw is the most reoccurring villain and he goes from serious threat to a joke, Depending on the Writer.
edited 31st Mar '15 11:09:19 PM by Overlord
Poulsen's only resources were a modified nine-mil and a couple of grenades; not exactly difficult to top. He was originally a part of a larger organisation, The Exchange (made up of ex-Hydra and ex-AIM personnel turned criminals) and they got up to some fairly nasty stuff as a group, but during his final rampage it's just him, his handgun, and his SHIELD training. The end result, twenty-one dead in a firefight that, on reread, doesn't last more than a couple of minutes from start to finish.
The one who refused to cheat on his wife is The Saracen, right (at least according to the character sheet)? There was a discussion about him back when we were first discussing The Punisher examples, but none of us could find his full rapsheet. I got my hands on the entire eighties Punisher run, but even then, the only appearance of his I could find had he and Frank on the same side at some mercenary training camp, so the conversation petered out after that. Not that it much matters since his not wanting to cheat on his wife is either a) evidence that he loves her, b) evidence that he has moral standards, or c) both.
edited 31st Mar '15 11:40:07 PM by AmbarSonofDeshar
Unofficial Wiki Curator for Complete Monster
Visser. What happens to him BTW?
Weighing in on the Ox debate, he still gets a from me. In story, two deaths (I was under the impression that they had both deaths be deliberate) while actively bragging about it, and continuing to use a move that in-story could kill people with death as the main objective (comparable to a villain having a stun laser gun that turns out actually has a good chance of killing them and then going out intending to kill people with it), never redeemed or showed a redeeming quality, I fail to see how that doesn't meet the minimum heinous standard. He is basically a serial killer for the medium as a whole since you can anyone he attempted to hit with his finisher he was attempting to murder, the fact that it never happened (because it was purely fictional) is long established as being irrelevant.
So somebody please explain to me how he fails the base heinous standard despite being an unrepentant murderer and attempted serial murderer, in a medium where his character is unique)?
edited 1st Apr '15 3:18:09 AM by Shaoken
Techniccly, he was not a serial killer, serial killing involves intentionally killing up to 3 people, wheras Ox only intentionally killed one person. I am not entirely sure if he intended to kill all his following opponeants either, only that, according to Ambar, he intentionally used the move that previously killed two people, putting all of their lives at risk. There is a difference between carelessly putting someones life at risk, and deliberately trying to kill them. At most, you could call him a one time murderer and a serial reckless endangerer. The one time he caused a riot by repeatedly using the heart punch on a person even after the match had ended shows that he was still a very nasty person, however, I think we need to know something: Ambar, did Ox actually INTEND to kill all of his following opponents, or did he just continue to use the move in a case of reckless endangerment. Did he actually WANT to kill them, or did he just not care?
Sidenote: I am looking up the Gamera films to see how Onodera compares toother villains.
edited 1st Apr '15 5:13:18 AM by bobg
jjj
Unofficial Wiki Curator for Complete Monster
- Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (2003): Ch'rell was an Utrom criminal who was imprisoned by his people (who are generally peaceful) for his various crimes that we find out resulted in the deaths of millions of innocent beings. Ch'rell managed to force the transport ship he was being carried on to crash on Earth. Ch'rell escaped and took the guise of an Japanese crime boss named Oroku Saki, better known as the Shredder. Shredder wanted revenge on his people and went to great lengths to find the Utroms still marooned on Earth.
- In the series itself Shredder attacked Splinter's master, Hamato Yoshi, believing he worked for the Utroms. After having his minions work over Yoshi with torture, Shredder personally killed Yoshi, an act that would lead to Shredder becoming the Turtles' Arch-Enemy. Shredder's Foot Ninja also kidnapped innocent people and mutated them into monsters to use as slave labor to try a locate a possible Utrom base underground. Shredder has proven to be a very cruel boss, murdering one of his men who the Turtles stopped from delivering some stolen goods for him, and punishing Baxter Stockman for his failures, by grievously injuring him, until eventually Stockman was nothing more than a Brain in a Jar. Shredder also displayed a complete disregard for human life. After an Triceraton Invasion resulted in Beijing becoming a city floating in the sky, Shredder decides to steal the antigravity generator that is keeping the city in the air. When Karai objects that stealing the generator will result in the city crashing into the ground and killing millions in the process, Shredder overrules her and tells her to do it anyway. Later on, Donatello visits a Bad Future where Shredder is a dictator who controls the world. He has Secret Police on the streets to round up any dissenters and is using both Utrom and human slave labor (with humans having to work 18 hours a day) to build a giant teleportation device, so Shredder can conquer other planets. In this future, Shredder executes his former servant Hun, who is begging to be let back into the Shredder's service.
- Ch'rell returns in the movie Turtles Forever. After being rescued from imprisonment by 1987 Shredder and Krang, Utrom Shredder takes over their Technodrome and uses its technology to try and conquer The Multiverse. When Shredder discovered that the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles are in every alternative reality, he starts to lose it. Shredder decides to find the Prime Universe and kill the Turtles in that reality, which he believes will destroy the rest the multiverse. When Shredder discovers that he too will be destroyed along with the rest of the multiverse, Shredder still doesn't care, putting his desire for revenge above everything.
- Cross Ange:
- Prince Julio Ikaruga Mitsurugi, heroine Ange's evil brother, betrays her at a ceremony to expose her as a "Norma"; Normas are humans without magic who are shunned and sent to become glorified Cannon Fodder in a war against interdimensional DRAGONs (alien beings). This results in the death of their mother. Julio has their father arrested and promptly executed to seize the throne himself. He manipulates their crippled sister Sylvia into baiting a trap for the now battle-hardened Ange, so Julio can capture her, torture her and murder her himself. When she escapes, Julio decides to simply "purify" the Norma, regardless of age, and launches a brutal attack on their home of Arzenal to kill all of them, including Ange. When the mysterious Embryo proposes the destruction and rebirth of the world, Julio eagerly goes along with it to satisfy his ego.
- The aformantioned Embryo, the "Creator" of the world, was a scientist who grew tired of warfare and kidnapped the mighty DRAGON Aura to power the creation of a new world. Embryo creates a system where those without magic are oppressed and used as Cannonfodder to kill DRAGONs trying to recover Aura, while discarding and recreating humans when they fail to impress him. Embryo seduces many of the pilots to his side, using Salia sexually while lying about how he loves her. When Ange herself refuses his advances, Embryo tortures her by forcing her mind to undergo overwhelming pain and then physical need. When Ange tries to escape, Embryo shows his true colors by taking over the mind of her faithful maid Momoka and even tries to fatally shoot Momoka when she resists. Upon the final battle, Embryo simply decides to obliterate all of humanity again, coldly rebuking one of his subordinates for caring about others, and tries to sacrifice his loyal followers to buy himself time. When he is through trying to seduce Ange, Embryo tries to beat and rape her before trying to kill her for not "accepting his love." He even allows children to die. Any positive actions or qualities are all just an act.
- Northmen A Viking Saga: The vicious Hjorr is the sadistic second in command of The Wolf Pack under his older brother Bovarr. Hjorr's opening scene in the film is to seize a soldier Bovarr was chastising for leaving a battle alive and shove his head into an open pit of flames until he is dead. When they learn Vikings have kidnapped their patron's daughter, Hjorr, knowing her disfavor towards the Wolf Pack and wanting to keep his employment, comes up with the idea to simply murder her. Hjorr informs his soldiers the King's orders are to simply murder his daughter. When the Vikings and their warrior priest try to hold off the Wolf Pack with a wall of flames, Hjorr grabs one luckless soldier and shoves him through the fire to get to them. Hjorr constantly relishes dealing as much pain to his victims as he can before killing them and even when dealt a mortal wound, spends the final moments of life trying to drag the Viking leader to the grave with him.
edited 2nd Apr '15 3:36:30 AM by ACW
CM Dates; CM Pending; CM Drafts
Once again, ACW, it's best you refrain from real basic questions if you have no knowledge of the series. Ch'rell is indeed guilty of all his crimes. He committed most of them before he even went to earth and beacme the Shredder and we're shown them when the Utrom put him on trial for everything he's done. This is like asking "did Tarkin have Alderaan blown up? There are other Grand Moffs."
Any other thoughts on Visser, all?
edited 31st Mar '15 3:45:14 PM by ACW
CM Dates; CM Pending; CM Drafts