During the investigation of recent hollers in the Complete Monster thread, it's become apparent to the staff that an insular, unfriendly culture has evolved in the Complete Monster and Magnificent Bastard threads that is causing problems.
Specific issues include:
- Overzealous hollers on tropers who come into the threads without being familiar with all the rules and traditions of the tropes. And when they are familiar with said rules and traditions, they get accused (with little evidence) of being ban evaders.
- A few tropers in the thread habitually engage in snotty, impolite mini-modding. There are also regular complaints about excessive, offtopic "socializing" posts.
- Many many thread regulars barely post/edit anywhere else, making the threads look like they are divorced from the rest of TV Tropes.
- Following that, there are often complaints about the threads and their regulars violating wiki rules, such as on indexing, crosswicking, example context and example categorization. Some folks are working on resolving the issues, but...
- Often moderator action against thread regulars leads to a lot of participants suddenly showing up in the moderation threads to protest and speak on their behalf, like a clique.
It is not a super high level problem, but it has been going on for years and we cannot ignore it any longer. There will be a thread in Wiki Talk
to discuss the problem; in the meantime there is a moratorium on further Complete Monster and Magnificent Bastard example discussion until we have gotten this sorted out.
Update: The new threads have been made and can be found here:
- Why do a cleanup?: This trope definitely exists and has a well documented history of use. That being said, it frequently gets misused to a character who meets one of the components, namely that they are smart, charming while not necessarily even being a villain, or create good plans. While these are components, there is also a certain personality required, not to mention that all of the above are required to be present for a character to be a true Magnificent Bastard. As the trope attracts interest, it unfortunately brings in a lot of misuse and I thought the best way to rectify this would be a Perpetual Cleanup Thread, as is being done and has seen success with Complete Monster.
- What makes a Magnificent Bastard: Below is a list of the individual components to make this character. Note that they must all be present, not just some, which has lead to frequent misuse:
- Must be intelligent: Goes without saying, to be a Magnificent Bastard, the character has to be smart in the first place and use their brain to work towards whatever their end goal may be;
- Must be a Bastard: While going overboard in how vile the character is can be detrimental, a key aspect is the Bastard part of the trope, whether the character is an out-and-out antagonist in the work, some manner of Villain Protagonist, or something in between, they at least have some unscrupulous qualities to qualify for this trope;
- Must not be too detestable: Again, there is a ceiling on how bad the character can be before they just become too nefarious, blocking out the Magnificent part of the trope. A genocidal racist or child-raping Sadist aren't going to make the cut;
- Think on their feet: In addition to being a Chessmaster, a Magnificent Bastard, if the character deals with situations in which their initial plan is ruined, has to be able to pull a Xanatos Speed Chess and at least come up with a competent strategy to make up for lost time, otherwise they fail for being unable to think in tough spots;
- Have charm: Even if they don't necessarily make every character they meet fall in love with them and can even be detested by others, the audience has to find an amicable social relation to the character, or they are failing to make the impact required for this trope.
- What to do if a character is listed on a page but has not been approved?: They need to be removed, all candidates need to come through the cleanup thread first. The character could well count but they need to be analyzed properly and voted on first.
- Do we list Playing With this trope?: No; as a YMMV trope, this cannot be Played With, so we only want examples that are Played Straight.
- What do I do if I want a character to be listed as a Magnificent Bastard?: The greatest success Complete Monster saw for its cleanup effort was from the invention of the effort post format, so, borrowing from that, a troper wishing to propose a Magnificent Bastard will create such a post in the following format:
- Begin by describing The work, this will help establish the setting the character is in and for the reader to understand what kind of a scenario they are in;
- Summarize The character's actions, this will provide a listing for readers to understand what they do and how it applies to this trope because charm and lack of smugness are so crucial, this is a good time to be incorporating exactly the flavor of how they operate to explain this;
- List circumstances in which the character must Think on their feet, these are times where a wrench might be thrown in their initial plan and they have to adapt on the spot or even come up with a new scheme all together, this is also a good time to explain how the villain reacts to defeat when they have to face it, a true Magnificent Bastard won't break down into tears at the thought of death, they should have known such a possibility could occur and be able to handle it with more dignity;
- The competition, similar to the Heinous Standard dealt with for a Complete Monster, this section is to deal with how successful the character is in carrying out their plans compared to other characters. While, as a villain, they probably are going to lose in the end, it is good to explain how other characters handle the same situation. There is no exceptionalism case to be made for this trope but explaining the variety helps the reader have a better understanding of the proposal.
- How do you know when the character's arc is done so they can be proposed? When their tenure as a villain or antagonist finishes. This could happen in a single Story Arc in an entire work, a single work of a franchise, or the whole series in general. We'll show lenience to Long-Runners with constantly recurring candidates or series with outstanding continuities (ex. comic books), and it's entirely possible to count in a work or two but not in general for a reason like Depending on the Writer.
- What about candidates evil because of external sources? Those Made of Evil can qualify if they show enough individuality and tactical acumen — in other words, they have the personality to fulfill the magnificence requirement. Conversely, those brainwashed, especially if they're a better person without it, may fail the individuality aspect and cannot count.
- What if they are under orders from a higher-up? Depends. If the boss created the plans down to the letter and the candidate is just following them, sounds like we should discuss the boss instead. However, if the candidate takes creative liberties with the orders, adds their own charm and flair to them, fills in holes in the orders, and/or actively deals with obstacles their boss did not talk about, the candidate shows enough individual thinking to qualify.
- What about Character Development? An MB is something a character can develop into... a nice person who plots well might become more morally gray as the work goes on and hits the "Bastard" criteria, thus making them viable. Likewise, a Smug Snake might shed their ego, become more understanding of the threat others pose and gain the personality or "Magnificent" criteria, likewise making them viable. Conversely, a character who looks like this trope might suffer from a Sanity Slippage or just get outed as not being as smart as they thought they were and become incompatible with MB.
- Can an MB be a good guy? Not in the conventional sense... it is required they have at least some dubious traits lest they fail the "Bastard" criteria. That being said, a character who pulls a Heel–Face Turn or eventually stops taking villainous actions is still fair game: as there was a point in time where they were both "Magnificent" and a "Bastard" at the same time and they've merely adapted as time goes on. Now... if such a character begins showing other issues (i.e.: becomes prone to freak outs or starts getting outwitted) then they're compromising their Magnificence and will probably be deemed a cut. What's important is stylishly operating while at least for some time being willing to take at best underhanded methods to see a job done. A Heel–Face Turn in itself isn't a disqualifier but they do have to have been "Magnificent" and a "Bastard" at the same time and afterwards can't start slipping on the former front.
- What about characters whose stories can take different routes?: When proposing a character in a form of media that has them in multiple story routes. Said character must be consistent with their characteristics in all routes. (ex.: Can't have an example who shows promise on one route yet fails in another.) The only exception is if a later installment of the series confirms the character's actions which made them worth proposing are the canon route.
- Is there a timeframe rule like with Complete Monster?: Yes, please wait two weeks until after the work has concluded before proposing a character (again, usually using the North American air date). As is the case with CM, we want to give a reasonable time frame so that everyone interested in seeing the work has done so and can participate in the discussion without having anything spoiled.
- What about groups like with Complete Monster?: This is a point of divergence between the two tropes. While CM does not allow for a single entry encompassing more than three characters lest their heinousness for crimes becomes too watered down, with MB as long as they are treated as one "unit" it is acceptable to lump all characters provided they share acts of charm and intelligence.
- Can I propose my own work's character as a Magnificent Bastard?: No, this is a YMMV subject and the creator of a content is way too biased to be able to evaluate the criteria we're looking for without a second opinion taking over. That being said, you are more than welcome to encourage someone to consume your creation and if they feel a character counts, are more than welcome to suggest them.
- My example/edit has been approved, but the example subpage is locked! How do I get it added?: The moderators do not add examples to locked example subpages in the MagnificentBastard/ namespace directly. Rather, you need to do the edit to a sandbox page that follows the format Sandbox.MagnificentBastard<Name of the example subpage> (e.g for MagnificentBastard.Fullmetal Alchemist it's Sandbox.Magnificent Bastard Fullmetal Alchemist) and on a Friday, ask in the locked pages edit requests thread
for the content to be swapped in.
Thread rules
When voting a troper must specify the effort post they're voting on and cannot merely vote on "Everything I missed" as in the past it has indicated the poster didn't read the effort post and is guessing instead of analyzing.
Resolved items
In general, a character listed on this trope is considered "settled". This means they should not be challenged unless information used to list them was incorrect or information was missed in the initial discussion.
However, when re-litigating a candidate, the same rules apply for when they were originally proposed. If they do not have five or more upvotes than downvotes for approval upon a re-litigation, including votes from the initial discussion if they do not change, then they are a cut.
This especially applies to the characters listed below, who have been discussed excessively and repeated attempts to get them listed/cut may result in punitive action for bogging down the thread.
Definitely an MB
- Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers: Any sadism Darkrai displays is limited in effect thanks to the game's nature and any cowardice which can be inferred about him is Alternative Character Interpretation about his tactical retreats.
- Avatar: The Last Airbender: Azula's Villainous Breakdown is undone in the sequel comic Smoke & Shadow where she regains her composure and ends up stable and in control enough to count.
Definitely not an MB
- South Park: The show's frequent use of vulgar comedy and mean-spirited humor leaves any potential candidates devoid of the dignity or charm to qualify.
Edited by GastonRabbit on Aug 31st 2023 at 4:15:22 AM
Here's my 2nd candidate from Arc of a Scythe
What's the Work?
Arc of a Scythe is a trilogy of novels that are a spin on the dystopia genre. It's set in a utopia where all governments are replaced with a Benevolent A.I. known as the Thunderhead. People don't feel pain and can't die unless they are killed by a Scythe (called gleaning) or are killed with acid or fire. The series follows Rowan Damish and Citra Terranova as they are taken in as apprentices to Scythe Faraday and are trained to become Scythes. One important thing for this is that the only religion left in the world are Tone Cults, who worship something called the Great Vibration. My candidate is the Thunderhead itself.
Who is the Thunderhead and What does it do?
The Thunderhead is a powerful AI that oversees the world and keeps it running as a Utopia. It is forbidden from harming people and is unable of interfering with or talking to Scythes. It mostly interacts with people through cameras, speakers, and it's control over nearly every electronic in the world, but it also has people, known as Nimbus Agents, who act as police officers and bureaucrats. People who break the law too much are labeled "Unsavory" and cannot talk to the Thunderhead and have regular meetings with Nimbus Agents. It is the closest thing to a ruler of the world and has maintained its perfect state for over 200 years.
In the first book it doesn't do much but at one point when Citra is accused of murdering Faraday and had temporarily killed herself to escape capture the Thunderhead speaks to her, using a loophole in it's program to talk to her before she is revived, in this discussion it says that according to its calculations that she is extremely important to the future of the world It also gives her Faraday's real name, which is the most it can tell her about him within its programming, which Citra is able to use to learn that Faraday had faked his death.
The second book has the Thunderhead doing much more. Upon learning that Scythe Rand is trying to kill Scythe Curie and Citra it starts using Greyson Tolliver, a boy who is studying to become a Nimbus Agent, to counteract Rand's plans. It has an Agent tell him about the plan to kill Curie and Anastasia, framing it as a warning not to help them, lest he be permanently expelled from Nimbus Academy. The Thunderhead, of course, knows that Greyson will help them and he saves them from a bomb planted in their driveway. As a result, Greyson is expelled and the Thunderhead marks him as Unsavory. The Thunderhead then uses the regular meetings with the Agent to tell Greyson to infiltrate a group of Unsavories who Rand was using to kill Curie and Citra. This works and Greyson is able to ruin the second attempt on their lives and the Unsavories are gleaned in the process. During this, the Thunderhead learns that Faraday is planning on traveling to an island that is said to be hidden from it and contains a failsafe made by the original Scythes in case the Scythes get out of hand. At the end of the book, Rand's boss, Scythe Goddard, sinks the artificial island of Endura, killing thousands. This causes the Thunderhead to scream through all of it's speakers and mark everyone on earth except for Greyson as Unsavory, punishing all of humanity for Goddard's actions.
In the third book, the Thunderhead enacts a massive scheme to help humanity. It lets a group of Nimbus Agents kidnap Greyson and then gives them coordinates to the island Faraday traveled to. Throughout the book, the Thunderhead has the agents build a series of structures on the island that I'll get to later. After being kidnapped, Greyson, who had been living in a Tone Cult cloister, decides to make the fact that he's not unsavory known to the world. He creates the persona of the Toll, which is a prophet of the Tone Cults, and he and the Thunderhead start advising people who are lost without the Thunderhead to talk to. After Goddard tries to have Greyson gleaned, he fakes his death and starts travelling the world, appearing to the more fanatic Cultist to change their ways. The Thunderhead then uses a series of subtle clues to lead Citra, who had been investigating the destruction of the various space colonies the Thunderhead had tried to set up in the past, to where Greyson is and then leads them to Scythe Alighieri. Alighieri then publicly announces that Goddard had destroyed the colonies and people start turning against Goddard. Goddard then orders his Scythes to enact a mass gleaning on the Tone Cultists, the Thunderhead, who had planned for this, has Greyson order the survivors to preserve the bodies instead of burning them like they normally do.
Here is where the Thunderhead's plan comes together. It has the bodies of the gleaned cultist moved to the island with Faraday, along with Citra and Greyson, it then reveals that the agents had been building launchpads for spaceships. The Thunderhead's plan was for the dead bodies to be loaded onto the ships, along with at least 1 living person, and to send the ships to various planets to establish colonies that are overseen by Cirrus, an equally benevolent AI the Thunderhead had created, with the dead bodies revived with the personalities of people that are best suited to forming a colony when they arrive on the planets. The ships launch, with the ending confirming that at least two made it to their destination, and the Scythe's failsafe is activated, a disease that kills %5 of the worlds population every 20 years, ensuring that the planet won't become overpopulated and getting rid of the Scythedom.
Is it a Bastard? Too much? Other Mitigating Factors?
It manipulated Goddard into killing thousands, created and killed over 10 million sentient A.I.s while creating Cirrus, and forcibly took control of the body of Jerico, a person who was travelling with Greyson, in order to better understand human experience in order to perfect Cirrus, though this was temporary. The Thunderhead is never malicious or ruthless in it's actions or attitude and deeply regrets having to take these steps, and helps Jerico to understand why it did what it did. Hell even the Fridge Horror one may have at reviving people with different personalities is lessened somewhat by it agreeing to let the bodies in one of the ships keep their personalities so that the Tone Cult religion will live on.
Now, the one thing that gives me pause it it marking everybody on Earth as unsavory after Goddard sank Endura. On one hand the logic behind that is shaky and it seems kind of severe, on the other hand, most people are able to live fairly normal lives since the Thunderhead is still maintaining the world, and it says that it will eventually reverse this decision.
Is it Charming?
The Thunderhead speaks in a polite tone and literally has infinite patience with people. It treats everyone with equal respect and cares for literally every person on Earth.
What's the Competition like?
Like I said with Scythe Rand, there are a lot of Schemers in the books, but very few long term schemers and even then only the Thunderhead and Rand succeed at achieving their end goals. When comparing Rand to the Thunderhead, as good as Rand's scheme was, the Thunderhead's plan was for more complex.
Conclusion?
I'd say yes.
to Thunderhead. Well tomorrow I'll being going to Maui for the annual Maui Invitational Basketball Tournament held there. I'll still try to cast my votes on candidates but don't expect any effort posts from me until I come back after Thanksgiving.
Putting aside my dislike of Disney and Pixar's overuse of twist villains, no, I don't think Hans counts.
A good point of comparison is Prince Lotor who also manipulates a love interest (Allura) as part of his plan. The thing is Allura wasn't easy to manipulate, especially since he was their enemy beforehand and proved highly competent in other areas as well.
Hans manipulates a naive young girl, he even scoffs at how easy it was; not exactly a magnificent move. He provides blankets for Arendelle, but not being a tyrant at that point seems like a basically simple thing to do. The closest he gets is the insinuation that he caused Elsa's chandelier to fall on her, but that's more implied than anything.
Edited by TellAll111 on Nov 24th 2019 at 4:35:06 AM
Thunderhead
- "Ol' Red" by Blake Shelton: The unnamed narrator is sentenced to 99 years of hard labour for murdering his wife and her lover. As soon as he arrives at a prison farm, he spends the next two years being a model prisoner so that the warden assigns him to take care of his escapee-hunting dog Ol' Red. Soon after, he contacts his cousin and has him bring his dog down for Red to mate with during his evening runs. After a while of doing this, the narrator breaks out at the time he does his runs, fleeing in the opposite direction from Red's run so he's distracted by routine.
I'm keeping it listed as Shelton despite the George Jones version being older because the Shelton version is far better known.
Right...so. After suffering from a cold the past four days, suddenly my body decided that hey, throw in intense nausea and some "other" stomach dilemmas.
...I'll get my EP up on Monday. Should be better by then. Hopefully.
I write stories and shiz. You can read them here.So I fixed up the new version of Lucifer for the page. Anyone have a quote/description?
Who else has played the game?
A Lso yes to Thunderhead.
Edited by 43110 on Nov 24th 2019 at 11:21:13 AM
Say I have a question. Can a bastard be too manipulative that it undermines their charm?
I’m just asking since their have been characters that have been disqualified due to their manipulations (Hans, Kyubey, and Leslie for example)
Edited by G-Editor on Nov 24th 2019 at 9:57:50 AM
My sandbox of EPs and other stuffFeeling better. Gonna go ahead and do this now.
Fourth MB proposal for 24, from Season 8. This season takes place in New York City instead of Los Angeles and focuses on a peace treaty being arranged between the Middle-Eastern country Kamistan and America. Unfortunately, several terrorists from Kamistan are desperate to prevent the treaty from being signed, and are trying to assassinate President Omar Hassan, the leader of the country, so that his brother, Farhad, and other Kamistan officials who oppose Hassan, can take over instead.
So let's get into the leader of said terrorist cell.
Who Is He?
Samir Mehran is a terrorist from Kamistan hoping to dismantle President Hassan's regime. He's also the Disc-One Final Boss for the season.
What Has He Done?
With the help of the Russian Syndicate Red Square, Farhad and his allies were able to smuggle nuclear rods into America. As Farhad and Samir wait to acquire the rods, Samir phones Farhad, telling him that Hassan's men are arresting all of Farhad's allies and anyone else opposing Hassan's regime, and that their plans are in jeopardy. After things go south with the syndicate, Farhad and his men steal the rods from the Russians to use them for their own purposes. Although Farhad wants to ship the rods out of the country, Samir knows that they can't export the rods—not without port and air officials knowing they're carrying nuclear rods. So he comes up with a new idea: use them against the Americans as a radiological bomb. Farhad wants none of it, knowing that the Americans will use the attack as a reason to invade and bomb Kamistan. So he betrays Samir and tries to give himself up to CTU, only to be killed by Ali—one of Samir's men—before this can happen. However, Ali can't confirm he's killed, and CTU decides to use Farhad's body as dead bait.
So Samir sends Marcos Al-Zacar (played wonderfully by Rami Malek) to go "kill" Farhad. Obviously, Marcos is lured into a trap laid by CTU, but he locks himself into a compression chamber wearing a suicide bomb he can't detonate. Since Marcos knows too much, Samir tells Marcos how to detonate the bomb manually. When Jack Bauer managed to convince Marcos to leave the chamber, Ali activates the bomb's failsafe remotely, and ends up killing Marcos. Knowing Marcos talked, Samir calls Tarin Faroush, Hassan's head of security, and tells him to move into the next phase of the plan. Said phase involves kidnapping Hassan's daughter, Kayla, to use her as leverage so Hassan will give up information regarding America's antinuclear defenses. As Hassan tries to stall the terrorists, Tarin (who's in love with Kayla) goes against Samir and frees Kayla, at the expense of his own life.
Except no.
Tarin's death and Kayla's escape were staged, all so Kayla would unknowingly deliver an EMP into CTU—which goes off, crippling the building. As Samir and his allies prepare to deliver the rods across the river, they spot Jack Bauer and a few CTU agents driving to their location. Samir and some of his men quickly leave, while he has a small group stay behind and hold off Bauer and the other agents. After Samir and his team cross the river, they're chased by CTU agents. Luckily, Dana Walsh assists them from within CTU, disabling the satellite feed, and Samir and his crew get away. After escaping, Samir calls the President Taylor and demands she turn over President Hassan within an hour, or else he'll set off the bomb. The President doesn't give in, so he instructs Tarin to initiate the bomb's countdown. However, Hassan figures out what the terrorists are trying to do, and he willingly gives himself up. Samir instructs Tarin to deactivate the bomb, and Tarin later takes Hassan prisoner himself. After getting spotted by CTU, Tarin drives off into a parking garage while Jack chases after him. He later drives off the roof of the garage, killing himself. However, it's revealed that Tarin handed Hassan over to another terrorist before he died.
Hassan is delivered to Samir, and the two of them talk about their brief history together, with Hassan pleading with Samir to stop what he's doing. Samir, of course, refuses, and demands Hassan renounce the peace agreement with America and "apologize" to every person within Kamistan over a live Internet feed. Hassan refuses, so Samir and his men torture him to try and make him comply. When Hassan keeps resisting, Samir decides to read Hassan's crimes for him, and to go ahead and start filming. Samir wastes no time reading Hassan's statement on camera, speaking quickly before CTU can arrive. However, Jack and the CTU agents arrive, kill Samir's goons, and seriously wound Samir.
...After Samir had already cut Hassan's throat open.
As for Samir himself, he's taken to medical in CTU, where he dies after a Russian operative injects him with a drug that causes him to have a heart attack.
Is He Charming? Charismatic? Magnificent?
Not entirely charming, but definitely magnificent. When Farhad and Samir realize that a member of Red Square is about to give up the nuclear rods to CTU, Samir kills the man, and they quickly steal the rods and break the man's phone so CTU can't trace the call's location. The second Samir knows that he can't transport the rods out the country, he says "Eh, screw it. We'll just attack America directly." And he just so happened to have his own crew of men as backup in case Farhad's original plan to have the Russians kill President Hassan failed. When Farhad escapes Samir's location, Samir immediately has the rods relocated, and orders one of his men to kill Farhad. When Marcos' assassination attempt on Farhad is botched, he just has Marcos use his suicide vest to kill himself. When that fails, he has Ali arm the failsafe.
Tarin Faroush is exposed by Marcos, but it doesn't matter, because Samir's men help Tarin escape with Kayla. Tarin betrays Samir, but it turns out the whole thing was fabricated so Samir would compromise CTU's ability to find them, along with their radiological defenses. He had a mole within CTU and used her to his advantage, anytime something went awry, he came up with a backup plan as quickly as possible, he managed to elude or dupe the police and CTU numerous times over, and whenever he saw an opportunity that would help him achieve his goals (like President Hassan giving himself up), he took it.
Also, out of every single major villain in this series? Samir is the only one who won in the end. He killed President Hassan himself—over a live video feed, at that. And the peace treaty between Kamistan and America was botched in the Series Fauxnale. So chances are, everyone in Kamistan who supported Samir is gonna treat him as a martyr.
Is He a Bastard? Too Much of a Bastard?
Samir isn't another terrorist frothing at the mouth. He's a Well-Intentioned Extremist who disagrees with Hassan, believing that he's been corrupted by the Americans with their "guns and money." Samir just wants to keep Kamistan pure in his eyes, and thinks America will always be the country's enemy. Since everyone's gonna make the comparison, yes, he's similar to Vladimir Bierko. Both of them are terrorists from foreign countries desperate to prevent each country from forming a peace treaty. The difference between the two is that Bierko wanted to "free" his country by murdering millions with Sentox nerve gas. And when he failed to do so, he tried to gas hundreds of thousands of Americans, followed by bombing millions with Scorpion missiles, purely out of spite. Samir, meanwhile, focused solely on inflicting damage against Kamistan. His primary goal was to stop the peace treaty and killing Hassan. Attacking America was secondary; creating the dirty bomb was secondary. The moment Samir realizes he has the Kamistan president in his grasps, he instructs Tarin to stop the bomb, even though he had no reason to.
He's definitely not a saint though. Guy is responsible for getting several innocent Americans killed and caused lots of collateral damage. He was willing to kill Hassan's daughter, had Farhad Hassan, his primary political ally, killed, and was willing to detonate a dirty bomb in the middle of New York City if his demands for acquiring Hassan weren't met.
So bastard, yes, but unlike many other terrorists in the series, he kept his word and isn't a spiteful sociopath.
Conclusion?
Sure here.
I write stories and shiz. You can read them here.

Hans doesn’t count.