Big "Big Bad" clean-up project

Honestly, if that fact is such a spoiler, and many other tropes depend on that, it should be marked as such. I just know I'll have none of it since I default to showing spoilers.

But the issue is that trope titles can't be marked since it creates a Self-Fulfilling Spoiler. At that point it really wouldn't matter if the rest of it is marked or not.

Ah, right. Well, I guess in that case, it'd be better to just say Spoilers Off.

Which is why, if the identity of the Big Bad is a spoiler, the main page version should make this clear. Like so:

• Big Bad: Spoily McSpoiler Villain is the one who is responsible for the conflict by doing x and y things.

Edited by MasterN on Oct 11th 2019 at 9:15:52 AM

Have found several examples on the Animated Films page of Big Bad that might be cutworthy. Link to page

Several of these seem to fall under Big Bad Duumvirate, where two or more such folks work together. Some even state this outright or in a pothole. Specifically:

• Ice Age 2: The Meltdown has Maelstrom and Cretaceous. While they'e Plot-Irrelevant Villains who only have two encounters with the Herd, they act as their most persistent and dangerous threat as the melting ice gives these sea monsters more water to hunt in.
• The Carnotaurs from Dinosaur, Super-Persistent Predators who are the biggest threat to Aladar and the other dinosaurs.
• "Bowler Hat Guy" and DOR-15 are the Big Bad Duumvirate in Meet the Robinsons. "Bowler Hat Guy" steals the Robinson's time machine, then stalk and try to capture Lewis, then uses stolen technology to drastically alter history, in the process making DOR-15 clones take over the Earth. It turns out DOR-15 is The Man Behind the Man and Bowler Hat Guy, originally a vengeful future incarnation of Lewis' roomate Mike Yagoobian who was angry that Lewis' inventing made him fall asleep in a baseball game and cause his team to lose, was only someone she used as a human host.
• Jack and Jill appear to be the main antagonists in Puss in Boots, as they guard the Magic Beans that Puss, Humpty, and Kitty are after, but they're really in cahoots with Humpty Dumpty, who was still angry at Puss for leaving him and planned to get him arrested while he came across as a hero. However, when he performs his Heel–Face Turn, they reveal that they were planning to betray him from the start, seeking to steal the Golden Goose, and end up being the real villains again before being crushed by the Great Terror.
• A major Big Bad Ensemble between Dwayne LaFontant, Gladys Sharp and Vincent in Over the Hedge, though Vincent is the one driving the plot for the most part. Vincent forces RJ to reclaim all the food for him, leading RJ to swindle the other main characters and eventually grow closer to them, while Gladys, as the head of the neighborhood, leads the strongest move to get rid of all the animals by hiring the exterminator Dwayne from VermTech to get rid of them.
• The farmers known as Boggis, Bunce and Bean form a three-way example in Fantastic Mr. Fox. They destroy the homes of the woodland creatures, and later try to hunt them down, in relatiation of Foxy Fox stealing their produce.
• Randall Boggs and Mr. Waternoose from Monsters, Inc., both of whom are willing to kidnap children and forcefully extract their screams to stop the energy crisis (the former for personal recognition, and the latter out of desperation to save his company).
• Dr. Schadenfreude and Malbert serve as a Big Bad Ensemble from Igor, the former a fraud who steals other inventions and seeks to steal Eva from Igor, while also desiring to take the title of King from the latter, who is desperate to maintain his rule and had caused the dark clouds so he could manipulate everyone into being evil to survive.

Here, there appear to be two villains who aren't working together. IOW, no one villain is causing all the trouble:

• Rio 2 has Big Boss, the leader of the illegal loggers who are deforesting the heroes' home of the Amazon. in addition, Nigel returns for revenge, now a flightless bird as a result of his injuries at the end of the first film, and working with a giant anteater and a poison dart frog to achieve this goal of revenge on Blu.
• The Macawnivore from The Croods is set up in advertising, given its active pursuit of Grug, but he's nothing compared to the world itself, as earthquakes and volcanoes drive the conflict of the Croods finding a new home when their cave is destroyed.
• Snowball and the Animal Control duo from The Secret Life of Pets. The former develops a vendetta on Max and Duke after they unintentionally kill one of his friends, while the latter are just doing their job, trying to nab the two because they think they're strays.
• Al McWhiggin from Toy Story 2, the Jerkass toy collector who wants to sell Woody to a museum in Japan to make money, is the main antagonist for most of the film. By the end of the film, this role has been usurped by Stinky Pete the Prospector, who tries to convince Woody to accept his fate as a museum exhibit, and after he changes his mind tries to take matters into his own hands.

I'm not sold on these examples as actual examples of the trope:

• The Queen of Hearts from Alice in Wonderland, although she only gets involved at the very end of the film. She leads the charge against Alice after she accidentally (thanks to the mishaps of the Cheshire Cat) gets in trouble with her. She's only in the last part of the film, and it's not at all clear to me that she's the universal cause of Alice's issues.
• Captain Gantu from Lilo & Stitch. Though he's only an agent of the government, he's the brutish leader of the Galactic security force that does all the work to try and capture Stitch, acting as a direct threat against him and Lilo. Gantu is sent by The Grand Councilwoman to capture Stitch by any means necessary. If anyone counts, it's her. Or maybe no one qualifies.
• Te Ka the tatari-gami form of Te Fiti when her heart was stolen by Maui from Moana. Having caused Maui's disappearance and the lost of his hook, she is the biggest and last obstacle Moana and Maui face in returning Te Fiti's heart. Best I can remember, this character isn't an overriding force, just the last one encountered. See the Alice in Wonderland example above.

Not sure what's going on here. Two villains? Or did the troper mean "takes over?":

• Pharaoh Rameses II shares the antagonistic role from his predecessor Seti I from The Prince of Egypt, becoming the Cain in a Cain and Abel dynamic to Moses while Moses seeks to set free the Jewish people.

If this is okay (and it probably is), is it appropriate to add an example from the first film for Chernabog?

• The Firebird from Fantasia 2000. After the Spring Sprite accidentally awakens him, he causes chaos and destruction throughout the forest.

Would like to get some feedback on these. If none is forthcoming in a few days, I'll assume silence means assent and cut and/or reassign all but the last example.

Edited by BoltDMC on Nov 21st 2021 at 2:56:54 AM

ATT said to takes these here.

BigBad.Animated Films

• Bitch in Sheep's Clothing Prince Hans from Western Animation/Frozen. He fakes [1] with Anna, only to reveal he doesn't actually love her and leaves her to die and then tries to kill Elsa by claiming that Anna is already dead and striking her at her moment's weakness.

Besides the bad formatting at the time, ATT leans to cut as Hero Antagonist Elsa was the one driving most of the conflict, Hans only stepping up toward the end. Note his manipulations unwittingly set of the conflict with Elsa. Will cut them per ATT unless I hear anything.

Characters.My Little Pony A New Generation

• Big Bad: Downplayed. While [Sprout]'s the only character in the movie to legitimately antagonize and endanger the heroes, he only gets to do so in the finale and his actions and rise to power are more symptoms of the true conflict than the cause.

The ATT questioned if Big Bad can be downplayed. So should this be cut or kept? Moved (maybe to Downplayed No Antagonist / Plot-Irrelevant Villain)?

I had a trope idea, "Little Bad", for villains below the driving force of the conflict like Big Bad but more involved than Plot-Irrelevant Villain, that might cover these and other examples brought here. Thoughts?

I say cut them both. I'm good with your cases made.

Clean up finished, examples either deleted or moved to Big Bad Duumvirate trope page.

Bumping this in case anyone shares my concerns about the misc. images on the subpages, since I've started an IP thread for them.

I have two works where two characters are debated to which is the Big Bag. Terraria has the Moon Lord and the Lunatic Cultist. The Moon Lord is very important to the backstory and his missing body parts are bosses but has long since been sealed away and only appears for the Final Boss. The Lunatic Cultist is a far more immediate threat, cursing the dungeon, leading to the creation of several bosses, and summoning the Moon Lord but also only appears for one boss fight. Which is the Big Bad? Is the Moon Lord a Greater-Scope Villain? Silent Night, Deadly Night has Billy (the Villain Protagonist slasher killing people in the second half) and Mother Superior (the main villain of the first half who is responsible for Billy going insane to begin with but is relatively harmless in the latter half). Is Mother Superior the Big Bad (as she is currently listed) or is she the Greater-Scope Villain to Billy, who is the one causing the conflict in the latter half due to Mother Superior’s actions?

I feel that if you have to ask who the Big Bad is, the answer is that there is no Big Bad. Those two may be a Big Bad Duumvirate, though.

I axed Flowey since Flowey has nothing to do with the Protagonist’s journey to escape the Underground and only becomes a prominent antagonist in two of the three routes and only for the Final Boss. Asgore might fit better as, despite him not being evil and an extremely reluctant antagonist, the enemies you fight are following his orders, making him the biggest obstacle to escaping the Underground.

What defines the difference between an Arc Villain and a Big Bad in literature that is split up into multiple series with different protagonists, that work as stand-alone stories, where do you draw the line between a Story Arc and a Sequel Series that counts as a separate work? I.e series like Warrior Cats, Wings of Fire, and Percy Jackson and the Olympians and its sequels. So would the overarching villain/cause of conflict for one of such series count as a Big Bad or Arc Villain?

The Family Guy Antagonist page is split between Big Bads and Jerks and Bullies. The thing is, the Big Bad section seems to cover any character who is a villain, with many being one-off characters.

Unless having side stories cannot count or a work that has multiple stories doesn't work(I.E. Goosebumps the Show), I could see that working if and only if they're extra stories(usually parodies of another work).

Though I could see that feeling like it loses all meaning if it works that way. I'm not sure how it should be handled in the case of, say, 40 episodes with at least 30 unique stories(Goosebumps being a good example. Numbers aren't exact, but the idea is there), as some are sequel pieces.

If I missed that part from earlier on the thread, my bad.

I have a suggestion. How about we split the page as such:

• Major Antagonists: Carter Pewterschmidt; James Woods; Ernie the Giant Chicken; Patrick Pewterschmidt; Bertram; Connie D'Amico.
• Minor Villains (or One-Shot Villains): Everyone else.
• Move Evil Monkey to Family Guy - Recurring Characters, since he becomes an ally in later seasons (and even before then, he was barely an inconvenience).

Edited by TantaMonty on Apr 5th 2023 at 4:46:31 AM

I think that already sounds better.

If a character is a big bad in a story in itself, it might be worth noting on their folder... and unlike a lot of others, actually naming the episode and with real context. Axing the usage right now sounds good since I only read it as purely ZCE.

I went ahead and made those changes.

Is this example from Characters.Record Of Ragnarok The Heavens correct?

• Big Bad: (Zeus) As the leader of the Gods, he acts as the main antagonist of the series. Unlike other examples, however, his fight happens early in the series, though he keeps the position as the main antagonist since he wins the battle.

It's sort of lacking context. In what way does he cause the conflict, assuming he does?

Is this example from Literature.Animal Farm correct?

• Big Bad: Napoleon is the leader of the pigs and the one responsible for corrupting the ideals of the revolution.

I'm pretty sure it is.

I've seen several examples of Big Bad that boil down to "Character X is the only truly evil antagonist, when the other antagonists are just jerks". I'm pretty sure that's misuse. For example, on Characters.Martha Speaks, Weaselgraft and Pablum are listed under Big Bad because they're the only recurring villains; the other recurring antagonists (Granny Flo, Mr. Stern, Mrs. Demson, Ronald Boxwood, Nelson, Reginald Steinglass, Carolina, Tiffany Blatsky, and Bob) are just mean but not villainous.

However, Weaselgraft and Pablum are just bumbling conmen, they don't appear in every episode, and they're far from the only causes of bad happenings in the show.

Yeah, it's misuse alright. A Big Bad doesn't even necessarily have to be a villain — they just incite the conflict.

Edited by WarJay77 on Aug 12th 2023 at 1:59:00 PM

Pushing this thread: I added the following entry to Sasuke Uchiha's Character page

• Big Bad Wannabe: While he does become a genuine threat at several points throughout the story, he is always overshadowed by even greater ones. Even Naruto's final fight against him is a Post-Climax Confrontation compared to the climactic battle against Kaguya beforehand.

Somebody removed it, citing Trope Misuse. Since I don't wanna edit war, I'm bringing it up here. What do you think? Should the entry be expanded maybe?

Edited by Forenperser on Dec 13th 2023 at 10:12:20 AM

BBW is for when a villain fails to live up to the hype, usually by being overshadowed by a more powerful and/or more evil villain.

Sasuke...is not that. He never really becomes an out and out villain, and throughout the story he consistently becomes more powerful, not less.

Your entry is basically "he's a threat but not the Big Bad" which is accurate, but it takes more than that to make a character the Big Bad Wannabe.