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
Here are the Fringe example from the actual page:
- Fringe:
- The unreformed Nazi in "The Bishop Revival" develops a toxin specifically to target and kill Holocaust survivors and their descendants. He tests his toxin on a bunch of random people in a coffee shop just to see if it'll kill everyone with the genetic traits that he picked and in the end tries to disrupt an international peace conference with a massacre just for the hell of it.
- The alternate universe's Brandon also qualifies. He takes cold and amoral scientific researcher to new standards. He coldly proposes killing Olivia just to observe it and proposes possibly fatal tests to be performed on children, something even his boss Walternate is strongly opposed to.
- Morgan Steig, from the pilot episode. He releases a flesh-melting toxin aboard a crowded airplane as a demonstration to potential buyers; worse still, the toxin arrived on the airplane through the insulin pen of his unsuspecting twin brother, who was chosen as a victim simply to show just how dedicated Steig was. Face it, the audience gave John Scott a round of applause for smothering him with a pillow.
- David Esterbrook from "The Cure" definitely qualifies as well. He's a pharmaceutical executive running a program turning young women suffering from a rare disease into radiation-emitting bioweapons and tested it out on a cafe of innocent people.
- David Robert Jones. He's a Well-Intentioned Extremist, but he's also a sadist who shows absolutely no remorse for killing innocent bystanders in nightmarish ways.
- Captain Windmark, the evil Observer. He Mind Rapes Walter (and probably countless others as well) and murders Etta, after finding out that she had a family who loved her. He's also a jerk to Broyles.
![[up]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/smiles/arrow_up.png "[up]"){kind=icon}
The Nazi: Possible Keep
Alternate Brandon: Cut, he just proposes things
Steig: Possible Keep
Esterbrook: What's with this show and killing pople in cafes? He doesn't sound as bad as the nazi, probably Cut.
Jones: What does it mean by "nightmarish ways"? Cut if that's all he does.
Windmark: Cut. He just kills one person.
edited 7th May '13 8:00:56 AM by Camberf
No, the other one.
Lex Luthor is one of those who has to have a Depending on the Writer disclaimer. Sometimes he fits, sometimes he doesn't. Are there any continuities where he fits all the time?
Not seen the series, but as far as the Fringe examples go:
- Nazi: Sounds like a keep, with one problem (see below).
- Alternate Brandon: Compared to others, he doesn't stand out.
- Morgan Steig: Sounds like a keep, with one problem (see below).
- David Esterbrook: I think it sound similar to the above, but somewhat weaker.
- David Robert Jones: If he's a Well-Intentioned Extremist I don't think he's comparable to some of the other examples here. Cut.
- Captain Windmark: Sounds too weak. While mindraping is unique compared to the others, the example suggests it's mostly offscreen. "Also a jerk" kind of sounds like the one who added it ran out of things to say, and having to resort to something like that makes him sound a lot less extreme.
The Nazi and Steig can potentially be kept. I don't know they compare to each other, though, but they do sound very similar in what they do, but for different reasons (genetics vs money). I do think Steig comes off as slightly worse, due to his brother, and that he's more indiscriminate, rather than doing it for the people of his (probably) race. For that reason, I think only Steig should remain.
edited 7th May '13 8:25:08 AM by AnotherDuck
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The problem with Steig is that he's just a cog in the machine. Plus, having just watched the pilot episode, I think the entry has his first name wrong.
No, the other one.
I dug up some more info about him, and I really don't think Steig counts. He barely appears, and while he was threatened after he did that plane deed, it does give the impression he's not playing entirely by his own notes.
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Keep the Nazi. Cut the rest, but leave discussion open for people to bring them up
Pretty sure he's working for David actually, the Big Bad of Season 1. I'm watching the show now and can hopefully fill in some gaps soon. In the meantime, cut all of them.
I really think we oughta keep the Nazi
Um, I am not trying to be impatiant but if you are going to say stuff like "Literature is mostly done" I would like to remind you that as far as I can tell there was no actual final decision made on Matron Malice. I counted more cuts than keeps, but the search function is less than ideal so maybe I missed something?
Also should we cross-post some of the tabletop game examples for Forgotten Realms to the literature section? I am not sure where the difference between to two breaks down because I have only read a handful of the novels and skimmed the sourcebooks.
Cleric of Banjo
Something I wondered about that example- although the hero of the series is a famous aversion, aren't the Drow the posterchild for an Always Chaotic Evil species?
Edit, edit, edit, edit the wiki
^ That is the main issue with it. Matron Malice is the drow with the least sympathatic potrayal and most onscreen awfulness, but the narrative constantly points out that everything she does is absolutely typical. I think she should be cut on those grounds, but there is some disagreement due to the fact that we never actually see a worse drow "onscreen".
Even then, Malice sometimes acts atypically due to being utterly stupid evil at points in favor of being crueler than necessary.
Does anyone else have thoughts on the Tabletop examples? If nobody else objects, I'm gonna make the cuts and do writeups of all the other examples.
Honestly, we may need a sandbox now
edited 7th May '13 1:05:18 PM by Lightysnake
I asked this before, but does anyone know anything about the person listed at Sky High as both a CM and a Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds? The manga, not the better known film of the same name that takes up most of the page; you'll need to scroll down to see it. I'm going with "doesn't" since another point on the page mentions one of his victims forgives him and lets him come to Heaven with her, but I'd like more information.
As a sidenote, as probably the biggest fan of the film on these boards, if anyone tries to add a CM example for that in the future you have my official permission to shoot them; all the antagonists are spoofs of ridiculous Silver Age villain tropes, and as such nobody's even close to qualifying. Not saying it'll happen, but given that a character whose greatest crime was popping a football was listed I'm just trying to be prepared.
edited 7th May '13 2:11:27 PM by HamburgerTime
The Wanderer
Having watched the Sky High film as well, I have to agree that no one there counts for CM status.
Eating a Vanilluxe will give you frostbite.
Have a proposed rewrite for Randall Flagg from Monster.Stephen King since his current entry is a stub. Here's the proposed new entry. Not too familiar with Stephen King's work so any input would be helpful:
- Randall Flagg is a demonic, quasi-immortal being who frequently appears throughout the works of Stephen King as an embodiment of evil. Living through different lives in different worlds, the one constant about Flagg is that he is always working to sow the seeds of chaos and despair wherever he goes. Flagg was part of the Vietnam War, Klu Klux Klan lynching, police murders, and race riots, and each time he was part of a violent experience it would ultimately serve to empower the evil within him. In The Stand, Flagg appears as a Dark Messiah in a post-apocalyptic, plague ravaged United States. Here he builds a new civilization in Las Vegas, calling to him those with penchants for destruction, power and fascism. Flagg has people publicly crucified for opposing or failing him, murders his pregnant girlfriend for enraging him, and plans on destroying the peaceful "Free Zone" settlement just so his civilization can be the dominant one. In The Eyes of The Dragon, Flagg is an Evil Sorcerer in the medieval country of Delain. Here, Flagg has Queen Sasha murdered, poisons King Roland, frames Prince Peter for the crime, and then plunges Delain into a new Dark Age by manipulating the remaining heir, Thomas. In The Dark Tower series it is revealed that Flagg has lived for so long and accumulated so much power that he has become the emissary for the Crimson King. Flagg earns Roland Deschain's undying hatred for beating and sleeping with Roland’s mother, and for aiding the revolutionary, John Farson, in causing the destruction of the city of Gilead. Flagg also forces Roland to let his preteen companion, Jake Chambers, die, and drives a girl insane by telling her the trigger phrase which causes a formerly dead man to recount the afterlife to her. Corruptive, treacherous and sadistic, Flagg's ultimate goal was to betray his master and climb to the top of the Dark Tower in order to become God of all.
edited 9th May '13 11:35:47 AM by OccasionalExister
There re ton of examples listed on the ymmv page of a game called Anaksha Female Assassin. I have never played it or heard of it, but the eexamples look good, athough I think some could count while other couldn,t. Too many to list follow the link.
What happened to the star wars page we were working on?
jjj
I think we can post Star Wars now.
I'll research the one you posted
Unofficial Wiki Curator for Complete Monster
Do we wanna add more? Or would that be Wall of Text-y?
No, just an observation.
We might want to add to it some of the more obscure things he had the Empire do though. Like leaving the planet N'Zoth (home of the Yevetha, who while they had a violent and strange culture hadn't actually bothered anybody else at that point) to a governor who routinely raped Yevetha females and gave their husbands to his troops as living target practice, or the absolutely brutal subjugation of the Iskalon system as detailed in the Marvel comics.
edited 7th May '13 4:58:02 PM by HamburgerTime
Unofficial Wiki Curator for Complete Monster
Lovely fellow. Any more on Tarkin?
CM Dates; CM Pending; CM Drafts
Takin's two big atrocities are the destruction of Alderaan and landing his ship on a peaceful protest. If we can cover those in enough detail I think we're okay. Might also want to add that he was basically Palpatine's strategy-writer, and the one who came up with the idea of making everyone in the Galaxy absolutely terrified of the Empire as the best way to control them.
edited 7th May '13 5:04:11 PM by HamburgerTime
The Wanderer
When Vader said Palpatine was far less merciful than he was, he wasn't kidding. Vader will just kill you, Palpatine will kill you and then revive you several times just for kicks. (Seriously, he did that.)
Eating a Vanilluxe will give you frostbite.
He had a legit reason for killing the guy the first time to be fair (he left that exhaust port on the Death Star).
That said, he had him eaten alive by carnivorous beetles and revived him to keep finding new excuses to murder him even more horribly later on for kicks in addition to the You Have Failed Me stuff.
I swear, Palpatine goes the extra mile sometimes.
Oh, and great work on Flagg there
edited 7th May '13 5:45:17 PM by Lightysnake
To discredt Nova (or whatever his name was) under the mistaken impression he was Superman he granted people superpowers then one day switched all of them off while every flier was currently flying, causing them to all fall to their deaths. Also a few odd murders he ordered.
I'd go into more detail but truthfully I'm against him being listed as a CM for that story so I'm not the best person to talk about on this. But he was soundly voted as counting if only for this story irrelevant of his status in the rest of continutity.