Basic Trope: The villain directly causing the conflict of the story.
- Straight: Emperor Evulz, who rules the Evil Empire of Darkness with an iron fist, causes chaos and misery for all when he decides to expand his territory by kidnapping Princess Alice and forcing her to marry him. This forces the Five-Man Band to rise up and defeat him.
- Exaggerated:
- The Big Bad Wolf Emperor Evulz ends up being behind every single inconvenience in the history of the world, from power outages to traffic jams to the heroes’ coffeemaker breaking.
- Emperor Evulz is literally The Devil himself!
- There are exactly 25 Big Bads!
- Emperor Evulz is the Big Bad behind every story simultaneously.
- Downplayed:
- Emperor Evulz is part of a Big Bad Ensemble, but is the most dangerous member.
- Emperor Evulz is an Anti-Villain who rules the Empire of Evil with an Iron Fist, however he does it for a greater good.
- Emperor Evulz is The Heavy for a Greater-Scope Villain.
- The person who’s directly causing the main conflict of the story isn’t necessarily a villain, but rather a huge jerk.
- Justified: Evulz is dangerously savvy in politics, and combined with his dark sorcery, he's able to get himself into a leadership position with ease.
- Inverted:
- Bob is The Hero out to defeat Evulz. He’s the one (partially, occasionally) fixing the problems.
- Big Good
- Princess Alice of the Peaceful Republic of Light and Good, despite being a Damsel in Distress, is The Mentor to the heroes who accompanies them through a magical Fairy Companion avatar, and is the one who sent them on their quest to defeat Evulz.
- Subverted:
- Emperor Evulz is actually a figurehead or Puppet King for the true villain, King Bubba the First.
- Evulz is really a Well-Intentioned Extremist using his status to prepare the heroes to fight some greater evil in the future.
- Evulz is a Disc-One Final Boss.
- Evulz becomes a good guy after his Evil Plan is revealed.
- Evulz doesn't have what it takes to be an effective threat.
- Evulz was Good All Along.
- Evulz has a small name, but a big ego, and a very loud voice.
- Double Subverted:
- In reality, King Bubba the First is just an alias of the Emperor.
- Evulz betrays Bubba to become the ruler for real.
- Evulz wanted the greater evil gone so he could rule alone- and he was the one who created the greater evil that betrayed him.
- The Disc One Final Battle was only the first battle against Evulz. His second fight is the Final Boss, and the True Final Boss is his One-Winged Angel form.
- Parodied: Emperor Evulz is a total dunce who whines like a little baby when his Evil Plan goes south.
- Zig Zagged:
- Emperor Evulz turns out to be a lesser threat than some of the others around him. He gets into frequent Enemy Mine situations with the Five-Man Band, but by the end of the episode, it's back to business as usual.
- Emperor Evulz provides the main conflict in the story, but his main goal is to unleash a Sealed Evil in a Can Greater-Scope Villain that he will serve once achieving this goal.
- Averted:
- Emperor Evulz doesn't even last half the season.
- The show relies entirely on the Monster of the Week format.
- The conflict, great or small, has no one entity behind it. Even if there are villains in this setting, none are solely responsible for the mess or significantly more powerful than the others. Instead, the conflict(s) come from their combined efforts and/or pure bad luck.
- Emperor Evulz is a Plot-Irrelevant Villain.
- The show doesn't even have villains in it.
- Evulz is a Hero Antagonist in a Good Versus Good story.
- There is no villains as well as no heroes.
- Enforced:
- "We need a source of conflict, and nothing says conflict like an Evil Overlord."
- "You know what this story needs? A badass villain!"
- Lampshaded:
- "Why can't the guys with badass armies, big fortresses, skimpy seductive consorts, and infinite resources ever be on our side?"
- "I’m the bad guy here, you see."
- Invoked:
- "I'll get those five warriors, or my name isn't Emperor Evulz! And I know just how to do it: raise an evil army, and use my massive funds to rise through the political ranks as well!"
- Evulz intentionally plays the part of a villain to unite his fractured empire against him.
- Exploited: The heroes find a single antagonist with predictable goals to be much more manageable than last season's Monster of the Week format, so they convince Evulz to unite the monsters under his empire.
- Defied:
- Emperor Evulz is actually one of several Big Bads in the series, none of whom have much influence over the Myth Arc.
- Evulz goes out of his way to be as kind as possible and stops anyone who even seems like they might become a Big Bad.
- Discussed: "I just know there's someone behind all this."
- Conversed: "There's always some evil boss guy controlling all the littler evil guys."
- Implied: The calamities seem to be unconnected, but at the end of the story when all is solved, Evulz can be seen talking in a way that vaguely suggests he was the cause of everything. This may or may not be a Sequel Hook.
- Deconstructed:
- Evulz's evil is kept in check by the Omniscient Council of Vagueness; in fact, he's so impaired by them that he can't even Kick the Dog without their approval.
- Evulz is actually the setting's GOOD guy, and he's fighting for freedom against a totalitarian regime. The Five-Man Band may or may not be aware of this.
- Emperor Evulz VII seems like a scary and insane ruler, so everyone assumes he's singlehandedly responsible for turning The Good Kingdom into Mordor. After the Five-Man Band successfully kills him in combat, however, they realize that it was actually a complex combination of factors including a decade-long drought (that Evulz didn't cause) and the wasteful spending of Evulz I-VI (which VII had no control over) that have ravaged and bankrupted the land. Evulz merely lay in his bed, suffering from depression and too paralyzed with fear to do anything himself, and sent his servants to fix the problem. He previously tried solving the issue democratically, but his nobles and soldiers began abusing their power (but only because they’re trying to get by), and the Not-So-Omniscient Council of Bickering vetoed nearly every one of his decisions. His minions kidnapped the princess as a last resort, hoping the marriage will unite the two Lands and the Peaceful Republic of Good can aid them in the crisis. Ultimately, people are suffering and dying because the Empire of Darkness is becoming increasingly fractured, and the factions care more about their personal agendas than actually solving the crisis; meanwhile Evulz himself made his policies and did everything else he did with the best of intentions, even if the implementation was flawed at best. But the angry public wanted someone to blame- as a result, Evulz ended up becoming The Scapegoat, so he is ultimately nothing more than a Slave to PR. And La Résistance has committed horrible atrocities in the name of their cause- in fact, killing the rightful heir has only caused one thing: a Succession Crisis. Nice one, guys.
- The hero assumes that all of the world's problems are the fault of one singular villain, and his growing fixation on defeating that villain blinds him to the genuine problems of the society he lives in that exist with or without some madman with a god complex.
- The sudden appearance of a villain as powerful as a Big Bad that poses that much of a threat causes many different groups to ally against them, bringing the Big Bad's defeat and ensuring that the newfound alliance puts safeguards in place to prevent a similar thing from happening again, bringing about world peace and an eternal utopia.
- Reconstructed:
- Evulz solves the problem by killing them all.
- The Omniscient Council of Vagueness is the Big Bad; Evulz is only one member of an entire organization of Big Bads who coordinate their efforts and act as advisors towards each other to prevent Bond Villain Stupidity and other fallacies.
- The true Big Bad is the ruler of the Peaceful Republic of Light and Good’s regime that Evulz was fighting against: the Five-Man Band’s mentor, Princess Alice, who sent them on the quest in the first place.
- While Evulz was giving orders with a general direction, his chancellor, Prime Minister Mayhem, was the one who was creating and passing laws that caused the problems, and he ordered the kidnapping of Princess Alice. The eventual victor of the Succession Crisis, Princess Candace Evulz, actually ends up being a White Sheep, and kicks out Mayhem.
- The "hero", in pursuit of defeating the singular villain, winds up becoming the Big Bad he seeks when he proceeds to commit horrible atrocities in his quest to defeat the perceived villains, forcing everyone else into an alliance to stop the madman from destroying everything.
- The Alliance leaders become the new Big Bad themselves as they go too far in trying to clamp down on evil, becoming a tyrannical Knight Templar regime forcing a group of rebels to rise up against them.
- The supposed Big Bad who necessitated the rise of the Alliance was a tool of the alliance leaders themselves, who instigated the crisis to grab power and Take Over the World.
- Played For Laughs: Emperor Evulz is a Harmless Villain who does little more than Poke the Poodle.
- Played For Drama: Emperor Evulz is so powerful that there is no conceivable way he can be defeated. Much angst results.
- Plotted A Good Waste: The audience dislikes the addition of a villain, since the first season was a Slice of Life comedy with No Antagonist and Evulz is a Generic Doomsday Villain who disrupts the flow of the show. This was intentional, as Executive Meddling forced the author to add a villain to sell more toys, so they intentionally made Evulz The Scrappy to force the creators to change it back.
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