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
Cleric of Banjo
Oh look, this was just added to A Bug's Life:
- Complete Monster: apart from his loyaulty to his deceased mother, Hopper has absolutly no redeeming quality. He is a sociopathic dictator who bullies the ants even though he doesn't need, their food: he just loves dominating them. And even though the obey, he still plots to kill their queen.
- Thumper is a vicious child-abusing beast, that actually tried to kill Dot. Three times!
This must be a joke, right?
Edit, edit, edit, edit the wiki
Cut it. Cut it with relish. Make it so, Number One.
Wow that spelling. Yet another child left behind.
@Ambar: Yes, Mori has no redeeming qualities whatsoever unless you count taking in Kurei as one, but since there are other C Ms that do this and still count, he's a definite keep. I need to fix the entry a little seeing as I typed that all on an iPod touch. I'm not very familiar with the formatting of some of these entries, so some help would be appreciated.
Also shouldn't we have a note on A Bugs Life and the Disney pages not to add anyone without a really good reason? It seems people are using this willy nilly and even contradicting themselves in the process.
I'll work on Mokuren next, probably.
Lost in Space
If someone wants to add a comment on those articles, I'll endorse it.
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"
Cleric of Banjo
Cut the Bug's life ones.
Happened to see another "great" misogynistic example on The Whole Nine Yards:
- Complete Monster: Sophie is the only villain in the movie that has no redeeming values whatsoever, hiring a hitman to kill her husband, manipulating her husband into going to Chicago then ratting him out to Jimmy to try and hire him since the first hitter refused, then trying to hire a third hitman by seducing him. And through it all she never shows any hint of remorse, acting surly, selfish and smug. The only time she shows any hint of sympathy is when she's arrested and breaks down crying, blaming it all on the first hitter for not doing their job. Even Oz finds her more pathetic than sad at that point.
- The way she quickly glances up during her sobbing suggests she MAY have been faking it
Besides the problematic language (I've seen so many examples who seem to think being smug is the most evil thing a woman can possibly be), this is a dark comedy (thinking her behavior is played for laughs), and I'm not sure how she would be worse than the various professional killers in the film (she wants to kill one person; they have all killed lots of people).
Edit, edit, edit, edit the wiki
I don't consider taking in Kurei as a good quality, Klavice. He did it for Kurei's power. The only thing he loves related to Kurei? Hurting him. a lot.
![[up]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/smiles/arrow_up.png "[up]"){kind=icon}
Once again...cut. Cut away.
Let's not be too hard on spelling, though. Not everyone has the best education or English as their first language.
edited 1st Feb '13 1:26:14 PM by Lightysnake
Think of the mooks!
@7902 Hopper was already discussed multiple times. He's even on the list of "do not add under any circumstance" below the FAQ. Glad to see that you nuked it, then came here. Did you PM the two tropers who worked on said example to let them know it was a problem? I think AlvyFoster is new and can be given some slack, but Peteman's name looks very familiar.
@7905 I'd actually expand that, but qualified. For one, I think the problem extends to media for children across the board, not just Disney productions. I would favor that kind of note for each such production... however, as that's pretty far-reaching, and I don't know how well that would go over, I would want an official moderator stance on the subject before actually enacting it.
Reminder: Offscreen Villainy does not count towards Complete Monster.
Lost in Space
Hiring professional killers makes you a CM now? I guess that really is a Double Standard. Cut with prejudice.
AlvyFoster has been around for a while and has consistent issues with grammar and spelling. I'm pulling him in for a consultation.
I agree entirely that a general note about no CM's in children's media is apropos. With that in mind, I wonder that we even have a Monster.Disney page. Hang on.
edited 1st Feb '13 1:28:06 PM by Fighteer
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"
Sorry. I just can't figure out how they got 'sociopathic' and not 'absolutely' spelled right.
I can go through all the various Disney YMMV pages to make sure we don't have any additional surprises on C Ms?
edited 1st Feb '13 1:28:12 PM by LargoQuagmire
Lost in Space
I just skimmed Monster.Disney. What the hell? I mean, I guess some of those could apply, but I still think that Lotso from Toy Story 3 has got to be someone's idea of a sick joke, not to mention spoilered to hell and rife with bad indentation.
Also, Eddie gets mad at us for putting editor comments in the article text, and comments won't be read by anyone since it's locked. So I have no idea where to put such a note, unless we add it to the YMMV subpage of every kids' work.
edited 1st Feb '13 1:31:20 PM by Fighteer
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"
Far as it goes...The Hunchback of Notre Dame, the Black Cauldron, Gargoyles...these works are definitely dark enough...Percival Mc Leach seems nasty enough from the Rescuers, and I think we qualified Shan Yu and Sykes from Oliver Twist?
The Live Actions might also manage it...no idea about american Dragon though
Lotso needs to go. ASAP.
However, ones I can see going in..
Frollo. Easy keep.
Mc Leach...attempted murdering of a child by dunking him in Crocodile infested water? I'll give a keep there.
The Black cauldron...from what I remember, the Horned King was nasty and evil enough.
Gargoyles...no issue keeping the Archmage at least, and Thailog.
Shan Yu was discussed ad nauseum.
Sykes...seems nasty enough with animal cruelty, brutality towards the helpless and being disturbingly hell bent on killing an innocent guy who failed a loan to him and a little girl as well using vicious doberman pinschers.
For live action...Cutler Beckett is a very simple keep.
edited 1st Feb '13 1:34:23 PM by Lightysnake
Cleric of Banjo
I cut the Whole Nine Yards example.
edited 1st Feb '13 1:33:17 PM by Hodor
Edit, edit, edit, edit the wiki
@7912: I almost think that such a note can actually be worked in into Monster.Disney, just so that it addresses readers as well as editors - take Legal Jailbait and how Eddie worked a reference to our Content Policy into its description as an example.
edited 1st Feb '13 1:34:20 PM by SeptimusHeap
"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard Feynman
Think of the mooks!
Fighteer, I think the proposal is actually a commented-out note that would go on the YMMV page for every piece of media that's oriented towards kids - so the YMMV pages for each Disney movie, for most Cartoon Network shows, and so on.
On one hand, given how often those pages are headaches for this entire thread, I like the idea.
On the other, I can see it being a pain to add everywhere, it's a bit presumptuous, it could be a slippery slope towards seeing tons of commented-out discussion everywhere, and probably a couple other things that I'm not thinking about.
One possible idea would actually be to have a note about the trope in the "Edit tip" box that appears when anyone goes to edit a wiki page. Although I have no idea how well those edit tips actually work, admittedly.
Reminder: Offscreen Villainy does not count towards Complete Monster.
Lost in Space
They work fairly well but there's only a small chance that someone adding a Complete Monster entry would see that particular tip at that particular time.
I guess we just have to be reactive about it.
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"
Unfortunately, we can't have a way to alert us when a new CM entry is added. Best we can do is check back at times and be vigilant.
Let's go through the Disney page soon as we've wrapped up the comics one. We seem to be drawing to a close on that.
edited 1st Feb '13 1:45:32 PM by Lightysnake
Edit tips work very well.
But:
"Kid's shows don't get CM examples" is a) way too narrow in purpose and b) it's a very hasty generalization.
"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard Feynman
Yeah, I agree with Septimus. Let's face it, DCAU had a bunch of 'kids' show, and look what they got away with. Nevermind Exosquad or AvatarTheLastAirbender, both of which featured racist, genocidal fascists.
Plus there's a big difference in Aladdin having Jaffar who's a pretty normal, bog standard villain with funny quirks...and TheHunchbackOfNotreDame having Frollo who wants to commit genocide on the gypsies and rape the heroine, or burn her at the stake if she refuses, and openly attempts to murder a baby on screen before being informed he'll go to hell if he doesn't stop.
both movies for kids, but...
edited 1st Feb '13 1:49:22 PM by Lightysnake
Largo went through every Disney Animated Canon YMMV page, for you! In all honesty, nothing that wasn't already on the Disney page had a YMMV entry, so all decisions made on that page would just need to be applied to the other films' respective YMMV pages.
And now I want to watch The Great Mouse Detective.
Also, considering some of the really disturbing things that have come out of older children's cartoons (the Ed, Edd n Eddy example we discussed earlier today, Courage the Cowardly Dog, Ren & Stimpy) and cartoons oriented towards family viewing (Avatar: The Last Airbender), I think a blanket ban is very stupid. Not to mention, how would we deal with live-action "children's" shows with C Ms, like Doctor Who?
edited 1st Feb '13 1:51:08 PM by LargoQuagmire
Did someone list Ratigan, dare I ask?
You totally should watch that one. It's quite fun and Vincent Price as a Disney villain cannot be missed
Thank you. Nevermind live action movies for younger viewers? Or hell, Shonen anime and manga?
edited 1st Feb '13 1:52:42 PM by Lightysnake
There was a remarkable amount of restraint on the Disney Animated Canon YMMV pages, so no. I haven't watched Great Mouse Detective in years, either, so I think after this post, I'll get to watching it.
Passing judgment on the Disney page -
Disney Animated Canon Examples:
- Frollo: Keep.
- The Coachman: I've never really agreed with this one. Yeah, he's terrifying, but a lot of his monstrous actions are either Offscreen Villainy or implied Fate Worse than Death notations.
- Horned King: Keep.
- Percival Mc Leach: Jesus, I'm so glad I didn't see that movie as a kid, and Keep.
- Sykes: I'm waffling on this, mostly because Percival Mc Leach does "kidnap a child" so much more viciously. Leaning towards cut.
- Mulan: Keep. I already did a liveblog of Mulan for this thread.
Pixar:
- Lotso: I really feel like we talked about this, and I want to look up what I said before to see if it matches up with what I feel now. Hold.
TV Series:
I know nothing about any of these, honestly (I watched W.I.T.C.H.! But not these!). Just from reading the entries:
- Jackal: Needs to be rewritten if it's kept, because we don't need to hear about non-C Ms in his entry.
- Archmage: Zero Context Example; cut unless someone has an argument for him.
- Thailog: Merge subbullets together to give him one full example; he sounds like a good keep too.
- Proteus: I have no idea what this entry is telling me. So he tried to commit genocide, failed, and then tortured a cop? If that's true, not heinous enough compared to Thailog and Jackal. Cut.
- Taurus: Someone needs to tell me if this is Played for Laughs or not. The entry says he's not, but I'd like an outside confirmation.
- Huntsman: Is any of that Offscreen Villainy? And how strong is his Freudian Excuse? I'm inclined to cut.
- Dark Dragon: All I'm getting out of this is Generic Doomsday Villain.
Live-action:
- Andrei Strasser: Keep.
- Judge Doom: Keep.
- Cutler Beckett: I'm inclined to want to cut him. The child being sent to hang does happen on-screen, but it's not like Beckett personally wanted that particular child executed. Most of his other acts are no worse than any of the chaos Jack Sparrow's perpetuated. The slavery thing is meta-textual, and his murder of Governor Swann is Offscreen Villainy (you don't even know it happened until the Black Pearl passes ships of the dead and Elizabeth has a hysterical meltdown upon seeing him).
- Blackbeard: I'm waffling on him as well, but leaning towards keep, based on how he abuses Syrena/his daughter/women in general.
- The Holes entry: Man, I loved that movie as a kid. Anyways, gonna say this isn't nearly as heinous as half of the things on this page, even if his motivations are the most racist.
- Princess Mombi: Keep, with an entry fix.
Theme Parks:
- The Phantom: ...I seriously don't remember ANY of this on The Haunted Mansion? Is this some version of The Haunted Mansion not in America?
Let me chime in, Largo
Sykes Im not sure of. Sykes is nasty, and sics his two vicious dogs on the good guys to kill them, in addition to trying to run them down with his car and clearly planning to torture them. He goes to absolutely impressive lengths. Mc Leach is a sadist, but Sykes is an all too realistic New York mob guy. I'm thinking keep
The Archmage I need to write up for. This is responsible for so much misery and horror for over a thousand years and attempts to kill everyone in the Wyvern Clan, which is tantamount to genocide as they're some of the final Gargoyles in the world. He's also a sadist and eschews killing the hero, Goliath immediately because he wants to torture him first. Jackal..not sure. He might care for his sister, Hyena, albeit in a creepy, incestuous manner. I'm not sure if he reveals that isn't the case when he goes Omnicidal Maniac
Beckett is an easy keep. He is the one who had that kid executed. He's sitting back, watching the executions with a look of smug satisfaction on his face and is the one who suspended all their rights to expedite their executions. Beckett didn't care about that kid, but that's no better. He had a child executed simply for associating with pirates along with tons of other people to get the Brethren Court to convene. He has other people murdered onscreen and attempts far worse. I mean, Jack is limited onscreen. All he wants in movie 1? Get his ship back? Jack's a great example of a pirate who does no actual evil and he's a rather compassionate guy deep down...sure he uses people, but he won't kill his friends or innocents, or let them die.
Beckett treats the murder of a child as 'good business.' He could have stopped it, and allows it to happen after getting the trials going. It's not just that kid, we see a lot of people hanged. I mean, Infant Immortality being averted in a Disney film is a huge deal, and having a little boy murdered simply so you can lure out your enemies? Beckett's the worst that series has to offer. governor Swann I'm not sure of...he clearly tells his top aide that the Governor's net worth is outweighed by his trouble and we later see his ghost. So basically we see him give the order to kill Swann and see the results after the fact
edited 1st Feb '13 2:25:31 PM by Lightysnake
@7899 I doubt that Ambar correcting his mistake would confuse people too badly especially since he admits his error @ 7846.