Hate Sink cleanup

For me at least, the Goblin may be a split personality, but he’s still Norman Osborn, who as a whole is played sympathetically.

Ehh the entry was specifically about the Goblin personality. And he's different enough that I'm willing to take it as it's own thing. It's different from Spider-Man where while the personalities were distinct there was still a blurring between them.

Uh, yeah Goblin and Norman are separate entities and are treated as 2 differant charachters. That is not at all a concern.

It's just, through the movie he gets extremely personal, killing Aunt May and later mocking Peter, nearly stopping peter from Saving MJ, stabbing Tobey wich seems to only be in the movie to make the audience mad(As he turns out to be fine later) It, does kind of feel like he is meant to be a more personal, Under your skin villain(The fact he gets to more personal, down to earth evil rather then grandiose and over the top villainy, ironically being what keeps him from CM) atleast I can see the case.

But despite that it might not be enough, as that is just my impression.

Edited by Snoketrope on Dec 30th 2021 at 10:47:20 AM

I'm having doubts about whether the Toho version of King Ghidorah qualifies. Here's his entry:

• [[Ghidorah]] was never meant to be rooted for by anybody especially since he's a galactic destroyer that kills for his own entertainment; his psychotic cruelty makes it clear that we want Godzilla to put him in his place.
  The Official Godzilla Compendium p. 133: Thanks to the force of its evil personality, Ghidorah never engenders audience sympathy, coming across less as a pawn than merely the logical extension of its masters' hostile intentions.

In the Toho films, he seems meant to evoke Evil Is Cool (being a three-headed dragon that can shoot lightning), and is quite popular as a result. In order to qualify, those traits would need to be de-emphasized by the narrative, which is certainly not the case. The cited quote also isn't a Word of God statement, and saying that he was never meant to be rooted for is false, as GMK has him on the side of the heroes, while Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah has him pull a Heel–Face Turn after being freed from alien control.

I don't think so either. He's pure evil, but he's clearly framed in the "badass final boss" sort of way.

Can I cut him?

Yeah, do it.

I'm not so sure about Yazan's listing on Zeta Gundam... the other three I take no issue with but he's also shown to be arguably the best old type pilot in the work and his sexist remarks are said with the same hammy bravado as most of his lines. Most of his HS entry really just restates why he's a Complete Monster as well.

Additionally I'm really not sure about Gihren's listing either on Mobile Suit Gundam. He's an over the top monster and larger than life dictator and 99% of his villainy aligns with him being the Big Bad. Make no mistake that he's awful but there's still plenty of time for him to be driving the plot, making use of cool weapons and manipulating the population with his charming—albeit morally terrible—rhetoric.

I'll take a look at the rest of the page but I see too much overlap with the two just being villains. If we're talking Lord Djibril I can get behind it but otherwise larger villains are harder to list.

Thoughts?

Man this doesn't..really explain why he's an example.

• Yazan Gable is a sadistic warmonger who joined the Titans to be able to kill people legally. Uncaring about the rules of war, he participates in an attempted Colony Drop on a populated city and later, Yazan arranges the death of an officer trying to prevent unnecessary bloodshed. He alsokills many heroes from the Anti Earth Union Group—whom he considers "made of woman and children"—and even kills his own ally while showing no concern at the deaths of his most friendly subordinates. Defeated by Kamille, Yazan survives the battle and several days later, he persuades a group of poor teenagers to infiltrate the Argama to steal the Zeta Gundam, taking the opportunity to kill another AEUG soldier before failing. Pathetically trying several attempts to steal the Zeta Gundam, Yazan joins Neo Zeon's soldiers, betraying the very purpose of the Titans. A beast in the skin of a man, Yazan earns the hatred of both Kamille and Judeau. The audience however, dosen't seem to share in their hatred of him, and Yazan is generally ranked as one of the most popular villains from the Universal Century time period.

Isn't this just a list of deeds?

It ending with him becoming one of the most popular villains in the franchise isn't really a great sign either.

Isn’t Gihren supposed to be a Hitler substitute?

He is but you could say the same of Rudolf von Goldenbaum who's even worse because his bigotry is directed at the LGBT, minorities, women and the mentally and physically disabled rather than "We were born in space, that makes us superior to Earth folk" as there's no degree of separation from real life hatred. Likewise what's emphasized with him is how much of a horror show he is thanks to his power and genius-level intellect, far too much into The Dreaded territory for me to say visceral hatred is at the forefront of his character when Hate Sink is very much a trope a character should embody, it can't just be a slight fraction of who they are, it's something they have to encompass.

Again, Gihren's job is to be the Big Bad, his role is to do awful dictator things to drive the plot. With Rudolf he's even been dead for so long the takeover, formation of the Empire, vicious purges and lasting impact of his deeds are all we get. Gihren's a character with many episodes engaged in the plot.

Earnestly I think it's time to start using those subtropes: Yazan fits Politically Incorrect Villain and Gihren A Nazi by Any Other Name far better. This one tries to capture a whole lot and for an objective trope we sure do seem to run into a lot of debate over when it is and isn't in play. Both respectively have entries for the aforementioned tropes and I think those get the point across just fine.

Edited by 43110 on Jan 20th 2022 at 2:17:58 PM

I think maybe we should rewrite the current entry for this man from The Night of the Hunter. It was so vague and undetailed, I had to have it commented out. I mean surely, such an iconic villain like this guy would have some more factors to jot down right?

Preacher Harry Powell is an overzealous, self-righteous hypocrite who is grossly misogynistic and has no qualms about murdering children.

Details, please?

Also, maybe I'll do an entry on Chinatown's Big Bad. He's definitely Hate Sink material.

Edited by SpaceProtagonist on Jan 20th 2022 at 10:19:00 AM

From his character page:

• Hate Sink: While neither the era that the movie was set in or released in were known for being a time of progressive values, Powell is much more violently misogynistic than would have been commonly accepted, and isn't above murdering children if he has to. It speaks volumes about his character that the director called him a "diabolical shit".

That's all you need Space.

Yeah, Goblin is hateful, but he's not this for the same reason he's not a CM: he's a manifestation of Norman's condition…unless the distinction is really not a problem, in which case I'd support an entry though.

Would Alex Goran count? You're supposed to hate her at the end of the movie for what she did, so I think she would. Tricky thing is that it's a twist ending that reveals she was using Ryan to cheat on her husband and put her family at risk just so she could "escape".

Edited by futuremoviewriter on Jan 26th 2022 at 9:05:10 AM

... That was a month ago Future, haven't seen Up in the Air, so can't comment.

Edited by jjjj2 on Jan 26th 2022 at 12:05:01 PM

I'm clearly behind. Haha.

Thoughts:

• Up in the Air: Alex Goran, much like Ryan Bingham, is a carefree frequent Flyer. The two hit it off for the whole movie and Ryan starts to fall for her until he eventually discovers Alex kept a huge secret from him: she has a husband and two young sons in Chicago. Dismissing Ryan as "someone who's lost," Alex also calls Ryan to tell him that "that's [her] real life" and that he's only "an escape" to her. She also condescendingly calls herself "a grown-up" and half-heartedly tells him to "give [her] a call," resulting in Ryan calmly hanging up.

Probably the most critically-praised Hate Sink we've ever had if she counts. Haha.

Edited by futuremoviewriter on Jan 27th 2022 at 12:39:11 PM

Can we have this trope invoked without being present?

There was an episode of Deep Space 9, where a Cardassian file clerk was pretending to be his boss, a mass murdering war criminal and was trying to be act as vile as possible, but really had sympathetic motives for his deception and his antagonistic behavior:

https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Recap/StarTrekDeepSpaceNineS01E19Duet

I think I have a Hate Sink from Grimm.

So about halfway through Season 3, in the episode "Red Menace", Juliette's college roommate Alicia comes looking for a place to stay, having gotten into a fight with her husband Joe. Joe is an abusive husband and follows his wife to Nick and Juliette's house, then stalks the latter. In the next episode "Eye of the Beholder", Joe attempts to force Alicia to come back home with him, sucker-punches Nick, and attacks the two women, but he is beaten down; he even tries to woge to intimidate Juliette, but she responds "I'm not impressed" and keeps fighting. Basically, the whole point of Joe is to show how much Juliette Took a Level in Badass.

Well, Marritza certainly employed a Zero-Approval Gambit.

I think it's probably more accurate to say that the writers make it very clear to the audience that Gul Darhe'el has no redeeming qualities, and got away with everything (just to rub it in further), which is why Marritza is driven to perform such an extreme act.

I think a Hate Sink entry is probably best approached from that angle: that the writers want the audience to understand just how awful Darhe'el was, and just awful it is that he got away with it. Marritza is vehicle used to help convey that through his Zero-Approval Gambit to assauge his own guilt and give Bajor someone to punish. The truth is, it's not Marritza's portrayal of Darhe'el that brings home the Hate Sink, it's what happens after he's unmasked as the real Marritza — just how broken he is by what happened, the fact he did nothing to stop it, and Darhe'el got away with it all. At that point, we're in full-blown sympathy mode for Marritza (as is even Kira), but that helps drive home how horrible an individual Darhe'el must have been — because we know that Marritza is carrying all the atonement for a man that was clearly The Unapologetic (another sub-trope of Hate Sink).

Yeah, I'd say he's meant to be a Hate Sink. We're told from the outset that he's been abusing Alicia for some time, and it'll keep happening if she goes back to him. When the confrontation happens, he only expresses any "remorse" because he's scared of Nick — but only upon realising Nick's a Grimm. So, it's not even real remorse, it's just fear of Grimm.

Edited by Wyldchyld on Jan 30th 2022 at 4:13:22 AM

Can't say much for most of these, but I can see Gihren and Yazan going. Gihren I'm a bit iffier on considering it does sound like Tomino wanted audiences to hate him, but I'll concede that he gets a lot of time in the spotlight and is less "Hate Sink" and more "Complete Monster" with a side of false charm.

Gihren's got way too much time and villainy that's actually pivotal to the plot for me to be comfortable with him staying. The "CM Jr." writeup doesn't help sell him much either.

Also from Stranger Things, glancing at it and going by memory:

• Billy blatantly has a Redemption Equals Death moment, I don't see keeping him;
• The Mind Flayer's entry just talks about its crimes and as the Big Bad... that's kind of its job. Yes it's vindictive but we're going to need a lot more to slap this label on it;
• Ozerov I don't recall but Grigori is basically a terminator going after the heroes: it's his job to hunt them down and intimidate people like the Mayor so that's what he does. He's not particularly loathsome for a villain, especially with so many characters who just exist to be bullies and nothing more.

It looks like back from the effort post days when people would do lengthy posts to "sell" someone as this trope, which always spells trouble for non-YMMV stuff. Motioning we cut all this and if anyone's got a problem with the others to bring forward svp.

@Future

Yeah that isn't a problem, I already don't think he has Agency issues and that isn't relevant to this thread. The issue is Goblin still being more on the 'Cool' side of Pure evil psycho.

Found this on Lucifers sheet for Supernatural

"* Hate Sink: Regardless of alignment, all the major characters — Sam, Dean, Castiel, Crowley, Rowena, the surviving angels, Gabriel — loath him for many, many reasons. In fairness, he deserves pretty much all of it."

This is Hated by All, as for if he counts...I can see a case, From what I recall, aside from being a CM he is on the More personal side and is characterized as an egotistical Psychopathic Manchild with a raging Never My Fault complex who cruelly pisses on anything redeeming....But also he gets really damn Funny, like, with scenes like this (https://youtu.be/SyONR-TrfZ0) I'm not totally sure if 'Designed to be Hated above all else' was definitely the intention

I dont think those guys were part of that...I should point out not all, or even most of the Misuse came from the effort post days, Weeding out misuse was sort of the point of those days

Cut everyone but Maybe Billy? The entry lists that hes only this in season 2 before being portrayed more sympathetically in the next season.

Mind Flayer is textbook 'He's super evil' and Grigori is....A Villain?

Edited by Snoketrope on Feb 6th 2022 at 6:40:46 AM

I'm on a kinda TMNT binge and so decided to check the entries..

• Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (2003):
  • Drako. Among other things, he blatantly cheats in the Battle Nexus tournament, resorts to murder upon losing, betrays the Ultimate Ninja, his partner in crime, and is generally antagonistic toward everyone. To drive the point home, while the Ultimate Ninja was found to have enough potential for good for Lord Simultaneous to resurrect him as a child, he doesn't even bother to do the same for Drako.
  • Even before he took on the identity of Oroku Saki, Ch'rell is responsible for claiming millions of lives across the universe in his quest for being an intergalactic conqueror. As the Shredder, he murdered Hamato Yoshi, mutated innocent people into monsters to dig for the Utroms' hideout then choose to abandon them when they find nothing, killed a member of the Purple Dragons for failure and eventually assaulting his adopted daughter for refusing to let him kill the Turtles. And when it came to his revenge in "Turtles Forever", he was willing to let all of creation die if it meant killing off every Ninja Turtle in the multiverses. There's a reason, even during his absence, he was the Turtles' most hated foe.
• Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (2012) displays this trope perfectly with the Shredder; he's one of the worst incarnations of the character, barring perhaps Ch'rell, and goes out of his way to be as despicable as possible. From the minute he's introduced, all he cares about is getting revenge on Yoshi/Splinter no matter what, to the extent that literally nothing else matters to him. The night Tang Shen died, he took Splinter's baby daughter Miwa for his own and raised her specifically to hate her true father, and openly gloats about doing so to Splinter's face in the first season finale; later, when Karai is mutated into a snake as a result of Shredder's own poorly-thought out trap, Shredder refuses any blame and declares it's all Splinter's fault. He voluntarily jumps at any opportunity he can get to pursue his revenge plans, up to and including supporting the Kraang invasion, and during the second season finale, he gangs up on Leo with his Footbots and beats him into a coma, before beating Splinter up as well and tossing him down a septic tank to his apparent death. During Season 3, when Splinter turns up alive but feral, Shredder refuses to let Tiger Claw Mercy Kill him and sends him to Stockman's lab to have his sanity restored, all because he wants Splinter to be fully aware of his surroundings and what's going on before he kills him, and when the mutated Karai is captured, Shredder resorts to using brain worms created by Stockman to brainwash her and keep her on his side. During the Season 3 finale, he agrees to an Enemy Mine with the Turtles for Karai's sake... but at the last second, he chooses to backstab Splinter before he can stop the Triceratons' machine, gloating that he doesn't care if the world is doomed because of his actions; now that he's finally killed Splinter, it's Worth It. When that is undone and Splinter beats him up, leaving him bedridden and in intensive care, Shredder undergoes mutagen treatment and becomes Super-Shredder, and the last remnants of his sanity and humanity slip away. It culminates when he attacks Karai in the penultimate episode of Season 4 with intent to kill; despite the fact that it was his love for Tang Shen that drove him to villainy to begin with, Shredder's fallen so far that he has absolutely no qualms against mocking Shen's death to Karai's face, declaring that it's fitting that Karai should die in the same manner of her mother.

Okay so fine with Drako.

But I really don't think Chrell and 2012 shredder count as this. Like these being CM entries 2.0 aside.

Chre'll has lots of cool moments throughout the entire run. (Heck the writers wanted to bring him back multiple times).

And okay so theirs a lot of ambiguity with 2012 shredder. It's implied he does realise what he did was wrong at the end and he does help the heroes drag Kavaxxas back to the underworld. I just don't think hateble prick is what the writers were going for. (plus most of his worst actions here are after he started to lose it).

Edited by miraculous on Feb 7th 2022 at 10:51:14 AM

I’ve said my piece on the effort post stuff and I staunchly stand by it. Cut mir’s suggestions.

Alright, so I'm popping back in to talk about the Berserk gents I did back during the EP days. These are... shit, to be blunt, and I did them as "CM Lite" so let's run 'em down.

• Donovan can stay. He's just a child rapist whose main role is to traumatize Guts forever. Similarly, Gennon isn't listed yet but absolutely will be, he's a serial pedophile with a deranged attachment to Griffith.
• Gambino I'm getting rid of. I listed him, but while he's absolutely fucking loathsome there's a considerable amount of time spent on his mourning the woman he loved and showing that, while an abusive bastard, he's capable of kind moments too. He's meant to be a nuanced Troubled Abuser, not this by any means.
• Wyald can proooobably stay, he's treated as evil even by Apostle standards and Zodd even drops in to take the sicko out.
• Ganishka is harder to determine. On the one hand, beyond his absolute vileness he's pretty by the numbers for Berserk baddies, with nothing especially pointing to him being any worse than a CM and there even being a brief dive into his past. On the other, he's a cruel idiot with a cowardly streak a mile wide, and he is dropped into the story to give Guts a bigger obstacle than Griffith at that moment.