Sorcerer in training
- "Yugi's powerful alter ego in Yu-Gi-Oh!, Yami Yugi, is not actually evil, but he is a lot less concerned for the well-being of his enemies. Yami Bakura and Yami Marik, on the other hand, are both gleefully, psychotically evil. (Regular Marik isn't exactly a nice guy either.) In the manga, however, Yami IS evil, at least initially. Word Of God stated in a Shonen Jump Q&A that Yami Yugi actually WAS evil at first, due to a few millennia of his soul being imprisoned, but that his experiences with Yugi and his friends gradually helped him regain his sense of righteousness. (Quite likely, the turning point occured during the first encounter with Shadi.) The plot point was revisited in the second anime in the "Waking the Dragons" arc. After Yugi's soul gets imprisoned, leaving Yami in control 24/7, he starts to regress back to his original evil nature, without Yugi's kind nature there to temper his drive for vengeance. Which makes him a more vulnerable target to Dartz's machinations.
- Dark Yugi seemed more like he was giving evildoers poetic justice for messing with Yugi and his friends rather than doing it for his own evil delights in the initial chapters of the manga. And while he looked pretty scary while doing so, that doesn't mean he was evil. He's more of a superpowered evil side that isn't actually "evil". I'd like to see this interview myself to see if this came directly from the author or the editors of the American Shonen Jump (Word of God matters more if it comes from the former). Also, his rage and desperate desire to win during the "Waking the Dragons" filler saga isn't anything like his calm and collected confidence in the original manga.
- Let's see. Sets man on fire for real, sends explosive vial sliding across the makeshift air hockey table (which goes boom on the loser, and it may or may not have been real), inflicting post traumatic stress disorder on Kaiba by turning him into a card (and inspiring him to be much more evil)... Yeah, Yami was evil. The only thing that made it acceptable is because every victim very definitely had it coming. That, and every shadow game he ran was a fair test of character.
- Dark Yugi had the intentions of keeping his other self, his family, and friends safe from harm though. If anything, he was sort of a Well-Intentioned Extremist, although his friends didn't seem to mind him dishing out Penalty Games to the assholes they faced. Would you call THEM evil? He stopped giving out Penalty Games on his own accord after hearing about the evil intelligence in the Millennium items. And unless Takahashi says it himself, no one should be claiming that the other Yugi was officially "evil". Viz has made many mistake while localizaing the manga, so we should take a Q&A from them with a grain of salt, not as Word of God."
- Dark Yugi seemed more like he was giving evildoers poetic justice for messing with Yugi and his friends rather than doing it for his own evil delights in the initial chapters of the manga. And while he looked pretty scary while doing so, that doesn't mean he was evil. He's more of a superpowered evil side that isn't actually "evil". I'd like to see this interview myself to see if this came directly from the author or the editors of the American Shonen Jump (Word of God matters more if it comes from the former). Also, his rage and desperate desire to win during the "Waking the Dragons" filler saga isn't anything like his calm and collected confidence in the original manga.
This is discussion on the main page. Ideas for cleanup, and can anyone locate that interview or whatever it was?
(I won't argue originally Yami Yugi was quite nasty, regardless of original intent. A lot of his effects were permanent.)
Edited by Candi Coming back to where you started is not the same as never leaving. -Terry Pratchett Hide / Show Replies
From the description: Interestingly, the name notwithstanding, this character isn't necessarily evil — they just seem like it because a superpowerful version of a normal person who has no compunctions about destroying things randomly objectively registers as "evil" on most people's scale. To be technically accurate, this is more of a Superpowered Alter Id — this personality is the physical manifestation of the character's basic drives, without having to deal with the inconvenience of higher thought process and morality. Although sometimes, this character will actually have traits of actually being evil or even worse.
Yami Yugi is a textbook example. I vote add it in as an example, and then comment that whether he's evil, amoral, or what-have-you is a up for debate.
Found a Youtube Channel with political stances you want to share? Hop on over to this page and add them.
So a description of what Yami Yugi is and then a note that what the implications are are up for debate, maybe with a blue link of Rule of Cautious Editing Judgement?
As for what Yami is: An ancient king (Pharaoh is referenced as a Greek term in some works) who gave his life to defeat an ancient evil, sealing it with his name. His spirit, imprinted memory self, consciousness, whatever, is locked in a fancy magic puzzle for a few thousand years. (I was never clear if he was conscious or not during that time. Eeep if he was.) The name sealing and time meant he had almost zero conscious memory when he awoke, once Yugi put the puzzle together. But he remembered the power of the Millennium Items/Shadow Powers, and apparently passing judgement on evildoers, if they proved to be rotten in their soul. Many of his tests were cruel -though fair if you were honest- and only laid on Asshole Victims. His punishments are plain nasty, and frequently permanent. Kaiba was an exception, possibly because of his brother needing him. If you're his friend, he'll go to incredible lengths to protect you, if an enemy, you'd better run.
It's Yugi wearing the pendant and Yami having to act through him (until the end) that makes Yami a superpowered evil/dark side.
Bakura and Marik's alter-egos do fall more on the evil side of the line. But the Ring's spirit is a psychotic thief who originally witnessed the massacre of his village to create the Items, and Marik's was born of pain, hate, and rage.
Edited by Candi Coming back to where you started is not the same as never leaving. -Terry Pratchett
Removed these examples because they don't mention or even hint at the work they come from, making them useless. Please, somebody identify what books these are from so non-fans have a clue what they're talking about.
- Nearra. Technically the 'split personality' is the spirit of a long-dead sorceress implanted in her body, but it only takes over when she feels threatened (because, if the host dies, she is banished to the Abyss)
- Dandra has an issue with this, despite the fact that technically she was originally the non-superpowered good side of a perfectly normal superpowered person, but then they got switched so that Dandra is in control most of the time but has to draw on Tetkashtai's now-completely-insane remnant of a mind to use her powers effectively.
- Mogget. For most of the books he is a small white cat and a Deadpan Snarker to boot and in the second and third books he spends much of his time asleep, unless he thinks fish is in the offing. When you take off his collar...just don't take off his collar. REALLY don't, unless its that or die. This is because Mogget is actually Yrael, second most powerful of the 9 bright shiners, and has a 2000 year old vendetta against the Abhorsen's. Mind you, in the end his evil side turns out to be very, very useful. At the end it is less evil, more morally ambiguous, even good.
Also removed these Zero Context Examples:
- Etrigan
- Subverted in the comedy The Animal.
On humans and chimps:
1. The chimp's forward limbs are the size equivalents of a human's legs, not arms, which is why they're so damn strong. This concentrates their dexterity and top strength into one limb (the dominant arm), something generally unavailable to humans. Even most obese people can easily stand on one leg, if they have good balance.
2. The human has a weight advantage of about a third or even more (disregarding the small size imposed on previous generations and various ethnicities even today by overpopulation and food scarcity; many people are indeed as small as chimps, though, because of the legs, not as short as the females), but it is largely spent in the large brain, the large digestive system it needs and the postural muscles, notably the massive Gluteus Maximus; human and common chimp ribcages are about the same size (not proportional). The rest of the advantage is offset by the fact that chimp muscles are still about 10% better by default - one of the very few creatures to trump us in that regard, by the way.
3. Humans are not taught to rely on personal strength for their safety - even soldiers and criminals use numbers, tactics and guns to substitute. This is why so few people can dedicate themselves to the kind of training that prepares one to savage one-on-one or few-on-few brawling: we've evolved away from that shenanigans. And those of us who do are still better at it than chimps.
4. Even the case of Travis the Chimp's 2009 attack was one of a truly massive male in the prime of life (Travis' age and size would translate to something like a 270 pound 30-year old man) attacking an old female not at all used to violence and mauling her, then taking an ineffective knife wound and finally being killed by gunshots. All the fuss behind it was really caused by the Squick induced by the chimp's tactic of mauling; humans prefer to only strike and grapple when not using weapons, to the point where we're shocked when someone or something decides to pull something else out of the bag. Men and women smaller than Travis' 200 pounds routinely do worse to their targets, either with no weapons or with the same crude ones that a chimp might use, though we tend to inflict either outright lethal wounds, or wounds that it is possible to at least partially recover from.
Is there an opposite to Superpowered Evil Side? Like something being fueled by justice, rather than fueled by anger/revenge.
Edited by HyperCubed4 Hide / Show Replies
I've thought about this too, and if there is, I think they're much rarer. The only things I can think of are Lina when she's possessed by the Lord of Nightmares and Two-Face's alternate personality from the animated series, The Judge, though your mileage may vary on that one. The former isn't much better either, as Lina was simply possessed, and LON wasn't necessarily a part of her.
The only thing I can think of what that would be like is either a deus ex machina sort of possession or, possibly, a sort of ubermensch personality.
Is there such a thing as a Superpowered Well Intentioned Extremist Side?
Should there be?
Cleaned up one bit slightly. Poor phrasing made it look like the writer meant that higher-order thinking and morality were deemed "evil" by "Western Christianity".
Fan Fiction: Ace Sanchez's Pokemon Master, an old but classic dark fan fiction with LOTS of violence, had one of the creepiest examples of this and/or a few others. Ash would, on at least three or four occassions, become the cold, emotionless assassin he used to be with Glowing Red Eyes, becomes incredibly stronger and MUCH faster, his battle lust kicks in as if he'd had his Berserk Button pressed but not actually going berserk himself per se (more frightening because he was in perfect control). It was revealed in the end that this was due to his alternate personality formed by a splitting of his soul into good and evil. He retainrf the skill in his good form because he was Just That Awesome, but when the other side took over he was like a demon and even went by the name Ashura (his assassin name) which is the name of an Indian or Hindu god of death.
Deleted this for gross inaccuracy. First of all, what is described here is the Avatar State - the Avatar's Super Mode, not the Avatar him/herself. Second - the Avatar could always control the classic western elements, the Avatar State simply ramps up the power. Third, the out-of-control Avatar is only true for Aang because he had yet to fully master his powers ("Fully Realized", in the show's words). This is stated to be something all Avatars faced to some degree: Until full-mastery, the Avatar State was more of a defense mechanism that had to be reined in. Once Aang reaches full mastery, we see him using the Avatar State with full control. Aang's successor, Korra, never had this problem (She had completely different issues).
Edited by Freezer My name is Freezer and my anti-drug is porn.