Markup View

Author: WackyMeetsPractical

Apr 15th 2013 at 6:24:45 AM

I feel like this proposal is distinct from DesignatedVillain and VillainyFreeVillain in that those tropes deal with the morality of the villain, while this proposal seems to deal with the end result, the question of whether or not the world would really be worse off if the villain won. It's different than RootingForTheEmpire because it doesn't necessarily require the audience to sympathize with the villains. Here's what I think the differences are:

DesignatedVillain: A character treated as a villain by the story despite having no villainous qualities.
VillainyFreeVillain: A character with villainous qualities despite never committing villainous acts.
RootingForTheEmpire: The audience feels like the bad guys are more right than the good guys.
This Trope: The audience is left wondering whether or not the world would really be worse off if the bad guys won.

The reason why I said this should be an omnipresent trope is because a lot of times, the end result of the bad guy's plan is never really explored. The heroes never really stop to consider if maybe the bad guy has a point. Here, the actions of the bad guy doesn't matter as much as the end result. Maybe when the bad guy rules the world, he'd make it a better place. Maybe if the bad guy gets the {{Macguffin}}, he'd use it to cure diseases. Maybe if the bad guy gets the girl, they'll start a happy family. Maybe the bad guy's genocide plan would really be beneficial to the planet. We'll never know because we'll never get that far into the story.