Subpages cleanup: Complete Monster

That was my one hangup, given that we previously discarded Sideways and Xaviax for feeling that their own, albeit guilty, side in a war was wronged. But no, it's not played for sympathy, more for You're Insane! points.

edited 25th Mar '14 10:25:41 AM by HamburgerTime

Okay... I have to ask this question. What do we do if a work has multiple villains, which the characters in-universe and the readers hate just as much, but the consensus here is that only one of them counts as a Complete Monster? Can I leave a note somewhere (like on the work's YMMV tab) that they all are equally hated (and they most likely are supposed to be equally hated according to Word of God).

edited 25th Mar '14 10:34:25 AM by Furienna

From what I understand the heinous standard is pretty much just seeing that what a character did in their respective works is presented as heinous and if there isn't anything positive about the character in any way. Essentially, it's asking that is their actions really heinous and can they be redeemed in the end?

Might help if you give an example of what work/characters you have in mind.

Well, it has to be heinous in general AND for the work. What might be heinous in most universes might not be enough in, say Berserk. Conversely, something may be heinous in a kids' show, but not heinous enough in general.

I know I've been through this with you guys before, but I have created a work page for the novel since then, and I want to make sure that I don't break any policy.

We're not supposed to feel any sympathy for any of the villains, even if one of them might have a redeeming quality in that he kind of sort of cares for his kids. But he also has a history of abusing his kids, and his awful treatment of his niece (who he actually right out hates) is enough to consider him heinous (he once had her almost starved to death). And the second one probably only lost to the CM crown because some of his villainy is off-screen, and that a lot of what he did would only have made him a jerk in a more light-hearted story. The fact is though that he's a sociopath with many scenes, where we do see him abuse women. None of the villains ever showed any remorse for what they did either, as far as we know.

Hodor: The work is Överenskommelser by Simona Ahrnstedt. The characters I'm talking about are Wilhelm Löwenström and Edvard Löwenström. I'm not asking you to qualify them as Complete Monsters, unless you feel that they make the standard, but I would like to make a note somewhere about how they're equally hated as Rosenschiöld, who already has qualified, both in-universe and by the readers.

• Wilhelm has a history of abusing his own children and made his wife ill from unhappiness, and now he has moved on to see his niece Beatrice as his favorite victim. He forces her into betrothal to Carl-Jan Rosenschiöld, who... let's just say for now that he qualified as a Complete Monster. And yeah, let's not forget that Wilhelm did this AFTER Seth, her love interest, has asked for permission to marry her! But he doesn't tell Beatrice about this, because he would rather see her married to an old aristocrat, who treats women like dirt under his shoes, than to a younger self-made man. And oh, when we get to read his thoughts about his niece, who he actually hates her (and every other woman, who won't be subservient) and wants her to be crushed... Nausea fuel! Wilhelm once gives Beatrice no food for a whole week, almost letting her starve to death! We also get a scene, where he gives very sever beating. And if her love interest hadn't come into the house at the right moment, who knows what would have happened... He feels no remorse at the end of the story.

• Edvard joins Rosenschiöld in his abuse of different women, and he once started beating a maid while having sex with her, just because he suddenly got bored. He makes a fourteen-year-old girl pregnant, but abandons her anyway, not feeling any remorse even when she dies after an abortion. He also can't feel love even for his own family, only feeling boredom when his sister is seriously ill. And yeah, he makes sure that Beatrice was separated from her love interest Seth, giving her no other choice but to marry Rosenschiöld. And after she was raped and almost killed on her wedding night, Edvard's only response was that she had only herself to blame. But really, he had never warned Beatrice that Rosenschiöld would want to kill her unless she was a virgin! We don't get to see him after that, but I doubt he ever felt any remorse...

edited 25th Mar '14 11:38:31 AM by Furienna

The Sarris rewrite is very long, but decent. If I have to be really picky it's Sarris with two "r"'s but that can be easily fixed.

Going into longer analysis of the Yogscast Minecraft Series, entry by entry. Even if any of them are kept, I feel that they could do with a rewrite, but we'll see if any of them do make it:

• Israphel. Killed both of Peculier's parents then continues to stalk him and make his life a living hell, orders Jock_Fireblast to burn down Mistral City and BBQ Bay, zombified Granny_Bacon and then tried blowing up the church in which her funeral was taking place, and would happily turn on Minecraftia to release the Sand God.

Israphel is an odd case and the only one I feel has a real case for staying as a CM. He's played dead seriously in canon, at least after the narrative actually starts, and he's easily the most vile villain in the show. Peculier is shown being stalked by Israphel many times and being haunted, we see him via flashback trying to kidnap Isabel and we see him apepar just as he kidnaps Peculier's mother. From here it gets more complicated. His zombifying of Granny_Bacon is played seriously but is not entirely onscreen- we see his and her name tags as he drags her away, but not the actual act, and blowing up the church is a weird one given how its canonical status is in dispute (not to mention he doesn't appear in person to do it). The releasing the Sand God stuff appears to be legit for now, though.

• Skylord Vitali, he killed most of the other skylords and kept their bodies inside of chests.

Vitali is easily the biggest Knight of Cerebus in the show compared to Israphel, but all that was offscreen. even the Skylord we see die was poisoned much earlier and before Lewis and Simon even got there.

• Jock Fireblast, one of Israphel's henchmen, who burns down Mistral City and would have done the same to Barbeque Bay if Simon and Lewis hadn't stopped him. Hell, on that last point he almost succeeded.

Jock doesn't live up to Israphel's level of vileness, and his burning down of Mistral City is offscreen enough for me to question if he belongs here (we see the city burning, but not him doing it personally). Ditto with Barbecue Bay, although the guys do catch him trying to light some of it alight this time.

• King_Finbar. Turns on Stoneholm and converts the majority of dwarves into zombies, even the ones who were helping him.

Again, all offscreen. Nasty, but not nasty enough. Anyone in favour of me cutting all but Israphel, and trying to rewrite the entry for him?

Sarris is slightly Wall of Text-y.

We have already discussed that work, Carl-Jan was the only one approved because the heinousness of his actions overshadows the other two candidates. He is the one who commits a rape that isn't off stage, that is why he counts, while Edvard and Wilhelm didn't do anything as bad as that. Plus didn't you say Wilhelm cared about Edvard, that is an immediate disqualification. In universe reactions are covered under "You Monster!" which is not a qualifer for a CM.

You have a work with several unsympathetic villains, but only have one who is heinous enough to count. In 12 Years a Slave, the guys who kidnap and sell Solomon into slavery are very unsympathetic, but they do not match the evil of Edwin Epps in that film.

If you a story where there are two killers, one killer kills an adult, while the other killer kills several people, including children and the elderly, the second killer will overshadow the first.

If you really want to detail Edvard and Wilhelm's crimes, put Wilhem's crimes under Abusive Parent and Edvard's crimes under Kick the Dog or Moral Event Horizon, a character can do bad things and still not be a CM.

Anyway, I'm going to post some videos of a Let's Play of Ratchet and Clank, which include when Drek is introduced and when his true motive is revealed, so people can judge whether he is too humorous to be included or not.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=syotrKCWmdw

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zLylJJvlTZw

In the second movie the motive reveal happens around the 4 minute mark.

Also in Ratchet and Clank's YMMV, I think the part where it mentions Gleeman Vox runs a network similar to Fox News should be removed, its a bit of political flame bait and has no real bearing on how evil he is.

https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/YMMV/RatchetAndClank

edited 25th Mar '14 12:05:24 PM by TheOverlord

Ugh, yeah, with stuff like that don't even ask; cut immediately. I took care of that on the Sandbox.

Slightly tweaked (thougn still Wall of Text) Sarris:

edited 25th Mar '14 12:35:32 PM by ACW

Tried to cut down on the Sarris entry by editing mine and combining it with ACW's changes. This better or still too long?

• The Galactic Warlord Sarris from Galaxy Quest, launches a campaign of genocide against the naïve and child-like Thermian race in order to get a powerful and mysterious device the Thermians have, the Omega 13, not knowing that the Omega 13, as well as the entire Thermian culture, is based on an old television show called "Galaxy Quest," and they've recruited the actors from the show to save them. In order to get the Omega 13, Sarris tortured the former Thermian commander for days, only killing him when he "grew tired of the noises" the old commander made. In his pursuit of the device, Sarris wiped out the entire Thermian race save for a crew of hundreds, tortured Mathesar in front of lead actor, Jason Nesmith, and prepares to torture Nesmith's Love Interest, Gwen, when Jason can't answer what the device does. Finding out the truth, Sarris forces Nesmith to tell Mathesar about the show in order to crush Mathesar completely, tries to have the actors thrown out the airlock, and tries to murder the last remnant of the Thermian race by slowly suffocating them to death precisely. Sarris also shows no empathy for the lives of those under his command, he decapitated his lieutenant for failing to get the ship's shields up in time and carried his head around on a spike, and doesn't care that his men on the Thermian ship will be killed in the upcoming core implosion so long as they kill the actors for him. His ship destroyed, Sarris disguises himself as a crewmember and teleports onto their ship, where he personally kills actor and Thermian alike, only failing due to the Omega 13 allowing for time travel. Through the movie, Sarris managed to be an utterly horrifying villain despite being in an otherwise funny movie.

MUCH better

Thanks!

@23103: Ah, sorry, missed that. Well I'd still say Yuriev having his moral agency affected in some way probably disqualifies him. Though I'll admit this is an odd case because he isn't made "evil" it sounds like, so much as he's made afraid, and then this fear causes him to do evil.

@23104: Good write-ups.

@23112: I'm kind of leaning towards cutting both Commando entries, honestly. They just seem like such generic action movie villains and I don't remember them ever doing anything especially heinous in my eyes. Destabilizing a country and trying to kill a little girl seems like regular villain fair. Maybe trying to kill the girl's a Moral Event Horizon but I just don't see them as bad enough to be Complete Monsters. Vote cut on both.

@23116: Normally I'd agree with you about characters Made of Evil not being able to qualify. However, based on the episodes Finn the Human and Jake the Dog, I think we have to question the exact nature of that bomb and the Lich itself. That bomb wasn't a regular nuke. When it exploded, it looked like a hurricane of the souls of the damned pouring out of it, not radiation. I'm operating under the assumption the Lich was a human that became a spirit, since Prismo, a god-like being, calls him a "ghost wearing a dead guy" after he meets the Lich in Billy's corpse. It's entirely possible the Lich was a regular person at some point and isn't just a monster made to kill. If it turns out he's a literal force of evil? I'll vote cut. But with what's known about him so far? I say keep.

@23135: Good entry for Rachid.

@23161: Cut all that, yo!

@23165: Good entry for Roulet.

@23166: I think I'll vote yes for Drax.

@23197: Due to the Pet the Dog moment mentioned later on in the forum, and the fact that he's got more of a "fluid" characterization than most Marvel CMs (Red Skull, Green Goblin, Sabretooth, etc.), I'll vote no on Mr. Hyde.

@23205: I'm actually inclined to agree. Makarov is the one definite keep, I'm fairly neutral on Al-Asad, but Zakhaev I think cut due to his outrage at the death of his son, and the ambiguity of whether it's feigned, and he's just using it as an excuse, or if it's genuine grief and vengeance he seeks.

@23219: Chairman Drek is the only villain from Ratchet & Clank I'd say counts. His plan is essentially to rip off pieces of multiple planets to make a Frankenstein patchwork for his race to live on, he kills those on the planets he's harvesting that get in his way, he tries to blow up Ratchet's planet entirely because it occupies the perfect orbit, and then he reveals in the end he doesn't give a shit about his race. He was the one who caused the pollution of his own planet, rendering it uninhabitable, and he did it all so he could make a new planet which he'd make tons of money off of by selling land. Then he says he's going to start the process all over again. He's damning his own people and innocent planets just for greed. I'd also say that the first Ratchet and Clank game was the "darkest," for a very loose definition of the word, of them all. There was more of a balance between drama and comedy in the first installment, whereas, starting with the second game, it's taking a turn for the more purely comedic. This may have changed on next-gen platforms as I only played the PS 2 games, but I think Drek is the only one heinous enough and played badly enough to count for the series.

edited 25th Mar '14 1:20:24 PM by OccasionalExister

I could go either way on Commando.
As for Al-Asad, what's the rule? If it's ambiguous, lean in favor of the factor being a disqualifier?

Speaking of Monster.Webcomics, a few changes need to be done to the Goblins section. Myrorg needs to be cut for Offstage Villainy (As in he never appears in the comic itself, only here◊) and Kore needs a rewrite.

• Kore is a dwarf Paladin who makes Fantastic Racism his own personal crusade on his one-man genocidal rampage. He indiscriminately slaughters any members "monster" races, such as goblins, orcs, ogres, etc, which he views as Always Chaotic Evil in a world where it's clear for readers only demons and undead can be considered such. He doesn't even spare defenseless elders and those begging for mercy. When he is confronted with a small child from his own race who was raised by an orc to be a decent person who wouldn't be afflicted by the Fantastic Racism endemic to the setting, the said foster father begs him to spare with the boy with his dying breath. Kore monologues that even if the boy's been with the orc for about a year he's been hopelessly tainted and butchers the kid like any of the other humanoids he just massacred. When Chief attempts a You Shall Not Pass! on the much more poweful Kore so the rest of the goblin party can escape, Kore takes after down Chief, he heals him so he doesn't die. He then submits him to Cold-Blooded Torture so his screams of pain will lure back the rest of the group, hypocritically using his prey's basic moral decency against them while still considering them irredeemable Always Chaotic Evil scum. When Minmax and Forgath show up, he attacks them to despite the fact they were also fighting the Goblin Adventure Party. He has had zero Freudian Excuse revealed and there is a serious Fridge Horror of realizing that either he never used his Detect Evil, or ignores it when reveals that his prey aren't all evil by a longshot. This dovetails his twisted world view that anyone associating with what he considers evil monsters are tainted and worthy of nothing but pitiless extermination, no rehabilitation possible.

edited 26th Mar '14 4:18:00 AM by randomtroper89

I'm REALLY on the fence for Bennett. What do you all think?

I'm sorry, it seems more like typical villainy stuff. Also, during his whole breakdown, he throws his gun to the ground in a seemingly comedic way, and he sounds absolutely looney when he tells John: I'M GONNA KILL YOU NOW! in an almost comedic fashion. Overall, from that scene, I don't think he counts.

No need to apologize. Like I said, I could go either way. I'll cut Bennett for now.

What about Arius? He did have the living members of John's old unit killed, he did try to force John to kill that president, and he was planning to kill Jenny anyway.

The first is Offscreen Villainy; the rest doesn't stand out to me.

I don't think it was off screen villainy, I remember there was a scene at the beginning of the film, where a member of John's Unit was shot by hit men pretending to be garbage men. Though its been a while since I saw that film.

edited 25th Mar '14 4:33:41 PM by TheOverlord

Well, at the beginning we do see one of them being killed by his men when they drive up in a garbage truck, then again, I'm not sure if that one death could make that much of a difference.

For Bennett, what gets me is the fact that he wanted to kill John's daughter just to get his petty revenge all because John kicked him out of his unit, which is not only extremely disproportionate, but theres also the fact that he didn't care if aRIUS KILLED ALL HIS OLD TEAMMATES OR IF AN ENTIRE COUNTRY WAS RUINED JUST SO LONG AS HE GOT WHAT HE WANTED.

ps sorry about the caps loc, my finger slipped.

edited 25th Mar '14 4:31:15 PM by bobg

Oh, I didn't know about that part. I only saw the clip that ACW provided. If he was trying to murder the protagonist's daughter JUST BECAUSE HE WAS FIRED FROM THE SQUAD then I'd rather say for him.

I don't remember; I know that's why he had the grudge against Matrix, but is that why he tried to kill Jenny?