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Take this to the "is this example?" thread if you believe Eggman fits Faux Affably Evil better than Affably Evil.
THE GOLDEN AGE WILL RETURN AGAIN!Mind putting this in a folder? It's hard to scroll past it.
Currently Working On: Incorruptible Pure Pureness@Excessive-Menace I was told to come here to discuss the topic, but thanks for putting me in the right direction.
@War Jay 77 Just put it into a few different folders.
Sends me into hyperspace, when I see her pretty face…OP, I spot Chained Sinkholes in your post. I hope you don't do that when write an actual example.
Having read that, I think it's Depending on the Writer. In some cases, he is a Laughably Evil goof who easily gets his butt whooped by his Arch-Enemy like it's his job; in some cases, he's a Noble Demon Tragic Villain who uses Pragmatic Villainy to achieve his agenda, but not interested in harming people that aren't part of the plan and in Evil Versus Oblivion he'll take the hero's side in a heartbeat; in some cases, he's a full Mad Scientist set on Dystopia Justifies the Means, who won't stop until he fully mechanized all life on the planet.
I think as a general example, both Faux Affably Evil and Affably Evil can apply, but in the case-by-case scenario, it would be different. Bowser and Ganondorf kinda have the same deal, though their character sheets don't use these tropes (somebody may want to look into it). And Eggman Nega practically borders on Generic Doomsday Villain.
Edited by Amonimus TroperWall / WikiMagic Cleanup@Amonimus In that case, would you mind giving us some specific examples of Eggman being each of these things, game-by-game like I did so we can be clear?
Additionally, many people have often viewed Eggman's character through the lens of how he's portrayed in certain adaptations or otherwise dubiously canonical offshoots— Sonic X's portrayal of him being the most egregious example by far.
Edited by BlurryDawgo Sends me into hyperspace, when I see her pretty face…Agreeing that Eggman is not Affably Evil in the games. There are also many cutscenes in which Eggman's apparent politeness is used to highlight his villainy, so Faux Affably Evil is indeed a perfect fit.
(Very thorough post below, apologies for length)
Dear Ask the Tropers,
I want to discuss how Sonic the Hedgehog Big Bad Dr. Eggman might be better off as an example of Faux Affably Evil as opposed to Affably Evil, the latter of which is what most descriptions of him I've seen on this site describe him as (including some trope subpage-only cases, hence why I've come over to Ask the Tropers). Spoilers unmarked for ease of reading.
Here are the main entries regarding him:
Here's my counterargument.
He loves being what he thinks is the most civilized and enlightened guy in the room, plain and simple, and the trope subpages of quite a few different adaptations have already described their Robotniks/Eggmen as "Faux", despite how two of them (AoStH and the movie) were heavily comedy-focused.
Now, I'm sure there might be a couple cases out there of game-universe!Eggman being genuinely affable (maybe just during Olympic season or something, the Twitter Takeovers are more of a different kind of portrayal altogether), but these are too few and far between to be a defining trait.
Let's look at the alleged examples being most frequently cited:
- Sonic Adventure 2:
- The Misaimed Fandom entry I put on the game's YMMV page explains the "Gerald" bit in detail. Long story short, he looked up to his grandpa as a brilliant scientist rather than because of anything benevolent, and he's disappointed that Gerald went crazy trying to destroy the world since he takes pride in his own Pragmatic Villainy.
- The "admirable adversary" scene has him send Sonic to his death via explosive escape pod and then lowering his head out of respect… before immediately getting over it and pointing his gun back at Tails. His Dark Story recap also has him gleefully proclaim, "I finally did it! I've defeated Sonic! That annoying hedgehog is gone forever! He's nothing but floating chunks in space now!"
- He did get along with the heroes during the Last Story, but, y'know, no world means no empire so necessity and all that.
- The somber "you're right" response he gives to Tails' "we all did it together" was meant to fit with the equally somber tone of Shadow's death and Gerald's tainted legacy. As sincere as it sounds, it's just Eggman acknowledging the facts after being briefly lost in a moment of thought.
- Here's a Dummied Out exchange that was meant to happen after that, anyways:
Tails: "Where are you going?"
Eggman: "Next time, I will pull this off without anyone's help! I will use my own power to take over the world! Next time we meet, all bets are off! Tails: "Same here!"And considering how he's a very Opportunistic Bastard willing to pervert anything to get what he wants (e.g. Little Planet, Angel Island, an ancient pyramid, a planet, five planets, time and space, a guy's very reason to live, etc.), I think it's safe to say he'd even exploit a Draco in Leather Pants situation like this one if he existed in the real world.
Hence, why I think we should change this. My proposed plan here is to edit the main pages that matter and then edit those linked to it in some way. I'll deal with the latter once I've gotten the go-ahead for the former.
Thank you all for listening.
Many regards, Blurry