Old Complete Monster cleanup thread
Welcome to the Complete Monster proposal thread! This is the thread where new Complete Monster examples are vetted, approved, and written up. If you're looking for the general cleanup thread (for cuts, rewrites, expansions, and the like), please go here
Important: Before suggesting any new examples, please read the Frequently Asked Questions and Common Requests List; if you have any questions, the odds are high they are answered there. Additionally, please check here for the earliest date a work can be discussed (usually two weeks from the U.S. release date) and whether the work has already been reserved by another user.
Here is how the process works:
- If you have a candidate to propose, you can simply come right in and propose them! If the character's run is brief, such as a single issue of a comic book, then a simple summary of their actions and any potential redeeming qualities will be enough; for longer-running candidates, an effortpost (EP) might be helpful for organizing the proposal. An EP is not outright required, but please be mindful that if a post becomes too clunky and unorganized, it can be very hard for other people to follow.
- After the proposal, there will be a 72-hour discussion and voting period, where people may ask questions and vote on the candidate. The number of upvotes must outnumber the downvotes by at least five for the character to be considered "approved".
- Three days after the proposal has been made, if the character has been approved, you may post the writeup (the text to be posted on the trope page itself) on the thread and send it to the drafts page. Your candidate will soon be added to the CM subpage. If the work has a page, you should add your candidate to the relevant YMMV page. Voila! It's that simple!
Outside of this process, we do have a few ground rules:
- To keep the thread moving at a reasonable pace, there are some restrictions on when a proposal can be made. There should only be a maximum of four EPs posted both per page and per hour to ensure that nothing gets lost in the shuffle; additionally, each individual troper should only be proposing or writing up characters from a maximum of three works at a time (from initial proposals to end of their voting period). If your proposal would fall outside of either of these guidelines, we'd like to ask you to please wait until they would fit within; feel free to type them up on an outside document, and then when the time comes, you can just copy, paste, and post!
- No plagiarism of any kind. This is a very serious matter site-wide, as the website could get in actual legal trouble over this; as a result, this can very quickly lead to mod intervention. This can take many different forms:
- Direct plagiarism, i.e. wholesale copying. This is not only the easiest to find, but is also the most likely to warrant quick moderator intervention. To be clear, quoting in some places is perfectly acceptable, but it has to be very clear you're quoting from something else and it cannot be anything longer than a sentence or two - if you're quoting an entire work summary from Wikipedia, no one is going to believe you've actually consumed the work, so even if you cite your source, your candidate will be downvoted anyway.
- Self-plagiarism. Even if you can prove that you wrote the same text in both places, the site itself can't contain any of the duplicated text. If you already wrote something once before, it's not too hard to write it a second time.
- Using another site's work as a template for a proposal. Just because you don't copy and paste something directly doesn't mean it's any harder to detect if you're basing parts or all of your proposal on text someone else wrote. To be clear, this doesn't violate site rules and won't lead to mod intervention, but just like if you directly plagiarize, no one will believe you've consumed the work if you're clearly basing your proposal on something else. This thread largely operates on the honor system, and tweaking someone else's work to pass it off as your own is one of the fastest ways to lose trust.
- Votes must be for specific candidates, meaning no blanket voting (i.e. "yes to everyone I missed").
- If you are the first person to downvote a candidate, please provide an explanation of why when you do so. We're here for discussions above all, and a hit-and-run downvote doesn't facilitate anything.
- If a work is already reserved by another user, please don't comment on the work or any potential characters worth discussion before the discussion date. We know how exciting it is when a work has a keeper that you're waiting to talk about, but it's not fair to the person who reserved the work who is just as excited to lead the discussion to see the discussion getting spoiled before they get to do it. On the other hand, if the reservation only has one name attached, shoot them a PM - they may be down for a collaboration, which will get you in on the fun as well!
- Please keep the thread on-topic. While discussing the trope is fun and we encourage people to enjoy it, questions like "who's your favorite CM" are off-topic and can lead to thumps. That's the kind of question to take to people's PMs if they're willing. Similarly, while we encourage friendliness and familiarity with other users, posts should always have some kind of thread-relevant purpose; for instance, if you want to wish someone a happy birthday, feel free to, but if it's the only thing in the post, it's off-topic and needs something else alongside it. Again, though, while we strive for a friendly atmosphere, this is not Facebook; life updates are fun, but unless they have some kind of impact on your thread participation, please do not bring it here - we have Yack Fest for that.
- Please refrain from asking anything along the lines of "How Did We Miss This One?" In almost every case, the answer is simply "No one thought about it before". This Is a Wiki where everyone has different interests, and the fact that people missed a particular candidate, even one that seems like a textbook example of a trope or a character who is particularly iconic in pop culture, means absolutely nothing. The question is disruptive, has a simple and consistent answer, and provides nothing to any discussion.
- If you are suspended from parts of the website, it is still possible to participate!
- For users who are suspended from editing the wiki, you still have full access to this thread. You can propose candidates and write them up with no issues whatsoever; while you will have to ask someone else to post the entry to the relevant pages once it is done, all write-ups are considered thread-approved - as in, done by consensus - and thus doing so does not violate any rules regarding meatpuppeting.
- If you are suspended from the forums, your participation is limited but not impossible. It is still possible for a forum-suspended user to assist in creating the write-up for a character who has already been approved; as previously mentioned, write-ups are inherently considered a consensus-based edit and thus not tied to any one particular user. However, you can not assist in the proposal of a character; as a proposal is based around the forum rather than the wiki, doing so with a forum suspension qualifies as meatpuppeting.
- Please keep all discussions "in-house".
- What other wikis use for CM equivalents is irrelevant here.
- Please be wary of using other wikis, Fandom or otherwise, as sources of information. They are just as fallible as a site like Wikipedia in regards to accuracy because they can be edited by any user, just as this site can.
- Do not attempt to force a communication with an author in an attempt to gather evidence or settle a debate; besides the fact that this is a YMMV trope and thus author intent has variable weight depending on the circumstance, doing so may cross the line into drama exportation, which is prohibited site-wide.
If you would like to use an EP for your candidate, here's the general format. This format does not have to be followed exactly, but these are the main topics that need to be covered:
What is the work?
This is a brief summary of the work you're going to discuss. We don't need a full plot summary here, just however much we need to understand going into the discussion — it can even be as simple as quoting the summary on the work's page.
Who is the candidate and what have they done?
This is essentially the character's biography — who they are, their story, the crimes they commit, and, preferably (though not required), what happens to the candidate at the end. It does not have to include every single thing they ever do — for some villains, we'd be here all day if that was the case — but it should include the highlights of their journey.
Any redeeming qualities? Freudian Excuse?
This is where any potential redeeming characteristics or tragic backstory should be discussed. Do they have a tragic past? Do they show that Even Evil Has Standards or Even Evil Has Loved Ones? Maybe a Pet the Dog moment or two? This is where these should be discussed in full. Not every potential redeeming moment is a clear-cut disqualifier, but we should hear of any potential issues to ensure the character is discussed in full.
Are they bad enough?
A Complete Monster has to be particularly vile by the standard of the work they appear in. Therefore, you should look at what the character does compared to similar characters in the same work. This takes into account things like:
- Their resource level (a human Serial Killer can't stand up to an alien Omnicidal Maniac, but they can be bad by the standard of other human serial killers)
- The amount of time they have to work with (such as a one-shot character versus long-running antagonists)
- The quantity vs. quality of their crimes compared to others (someone with a lower victim count but far more visceral and personal crimes could be considered as equally bad overall as someone with a higher body count but less horror involved)
Essentially, this section is an analysis of the kinds of villainy shown in the work and an explanation of why this particular character's villainy stands out within it.
Final verdict?
This is where you post your final conclusion on the character in question. You can continue elaborating on your reasons or even just say a simple "yes" or "no"; at this point, we've heard everything we need to hear.
IMPORTANT NOTICE: This thread tackles very serious and dark matters on a daily basis. We will be discussing things like murder, rape, torture, human trafficking, crimes against children, and in particularly dark cases, several of these issues at the same time. We keep a lighthearted air, but all candidates carry the general assumption that these are awful individuals committing disgusting crimes. We ask that if you participate, you do so with the requisite seriousness such dark topics require; exclamations of how gross something is, whether serious or sarcastic, are disrespectful to the topics at hand, and if you cannot handle such topics, please do not participate.
And that's everything you need to know. Welcome to the thread!
Edited by Twiddler on Jan 17th 2024 at 5:42:49 AM
Caesar
Yeah just off the info presented I'm inclined to agree with Crow
WHAT A WONDERFUL DAY!
....Phenomenal
![[tup]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/thumbs_up_emote.png "[thumb up]"){kind=small}
for Carnage, Kreeg, Ethel, and tentatively Thumper.
Lord of Space
Tentative to Thumper.
How about this in Thumper's entry?
This is not a downvote, I just need to confirm this.
![[down]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/smiles/arrow_down.png "[down]"){kind=icon}
Oh
Edited by Mr-ex777 on Aug 29th 2023 at 3:38:59 AM
The Draftsman of Doom
Respectfully, Ravok addressed that:
Yes to Thumper & Ethel
Edited by PurpleEyedGuma on Aug 28th 2023 at 3:39:39 PM
Wild Child
I'm not quite sure I can upvote Thumper. You can argue he has agency, but for the most part, the movie effectively treats him more as an attack animal rather than an Ax-Crazy person. I sort of draw comparisons with, say, Roscoe and DeSoto, who have a similar function, but they're given explicit dialogue and personified. I'm also not quite sure terrorizing Dot and pummeling Flik is enough to breach the heinous standard. He's the most violent grasshopper, but never actually kills anyone, even when he's herding the ants into slavery.
Why so serious?
Lizzid people!
Sure for Thumper.
Tentative yes to Thumper, but absolute yes to Auntie Ethel.
Caesar
It's fine to feel different, but I'd maintain that Thumper is presented as Hopper's chief enforcer who doesn't just terrorize Dot but repeatedly is out to kill her with his own claws, and he's regularly held back from killing more ants on the spot by the other grasshoppers and his presence is repeatedly used by Hopper to intimidate the ants; he's the most active, enabling agent of Hopper's brutality on the ants, characterized as the most sadistic of them all and far surpassing the likes of Molt in what he gets up to and is shown overseeing. Pretty much anything Hopper does to the ants, Thumper is heavily responsible for.
Edited by Ravok on Aug 28th 2023 at 12:57:43 PM
WHAT A WONDERFUL DAY!
I'll have one final Baldur's Gate post upcoming, btw.
Likewise, I'm gonna abstain on Thumper, myself.
Edited by Lightysnake on Aug 28th 2023 at 1:03:19 AM
Absolute yes to Thumper... he cackles when he thinks he's killed Dot, there's a personality there. He's near feral but he's a low functioning psychopath in contrast to his scheming boss. There's no Even Evil Has Standards, I'm not even sure he's in that scene and if he is it's just his usual fear for his own safety. Great job Rav!
Goku Black
Abstain on Thumper
Also might as well pop mine out from baldurs gate 3. Lighty let me do this one. (Slightly jumped the gun a bit last time. Which mea culpa. But now is appropriate.)
Who is Dolor?
Dolor is an evil dwarf and Serial Killer with aims to be inducted as one of Bhaal's chosen ones. Bhaal's uh granddaughter /great granddaughter Orin the red is feuding with a chosen of Bane called Enver Gortash. So offers Dolor a shot at becoming a member of th r Bhaal cult if he kills 11 people for her and than frames the murders on the enver's group to start a conflict.
Dolor uses a poison that paralyses his victims who he than procedes to mutilate well their conscious and feel everything before taking their hands. By the time we've set on his trial he only has four victims remaining. Now confronting him well he's trying to poison his latest victim. Either she dies or you interrupt Dolor and he gives you a crappy boss fight and teleports away after failing.
We see him go after his next victim Fiogrim who he waxes about how he's going to mutilate him as he's paralysed and feeling it. Depending on how things go you either stop the attack and kill Dolor yourself (or if your playing an evil path you can kill Fiogrim yourself afterwards).
'Mitigating factors?'
Nope. Psycho supporter for Bhaal.
Heinois standard?
Woah boy. So this is the hard part.
From the previous games we have:
- Neb whose a serial killer of children.
- Irenicus who manufacture a war through Badlurs gate, and ultimate plan through experimentation is to reach the heavens and wipe out the elf gods.
- Amellyesn who plans to throw the forbidden realms into war
- Redjiek who is a serial killer who flays his victims alive.
This game gives us:
- The Big Bad triumvirate (The chosen or the dead three aka Bane, muyrkul and bhaal). Who plans to unleashed the absolute under the ordered of their masters to assimilate the realm.
- Enver Gortash, a sociopathic manipulator planning to spark a false flag operation in Baldur gate.
- Orin the red, a psychopathic serial killer
- Ketheric who literally leeched the life of an entire countryside.
Other villains include
- Auntie ethel, a hag who specialises in screwing people over through horrible deal with the devil type deals.
- Raphael a cambion with plans to conquer the various realms and makes you his sex slave in one ending.
- Cardazon, sire of our vampire companion Astarion whose a creepy serial rapist and sex slaver.
The only guy he's comparable to is Redjiek but redjiek is also an actual supernatural monster and we never get an exact number of victims on him. Still I think Dolor's mo is depraved enough when you factor in he's only active for a short time of like a few weeks at most and doesn't have any major super powers. And unlike Redjiek, Dolor wants to ascend to the cult and is Just starting out. He paralysed people and mutilates them well their still conscious and plans to start a conflict across the city for Orin.
It also helps that serial killers in general are rare for Forbidden realms.
Conclusion?
I'd say yes.
"That's right mortal. By channeling my divine rage into power, I have forged a new instrument in which to destroy you."
Ultimate Moral Compass
Dolor
Yes to Dolor. Whoops, two remaining ones.
Weak Thumper
A Girl, Just One of Many Kinds
Def yes to Thumper
Now here’s another candidate with more thought I’m more confident in. From season 1 of Telltale’s The Walking Dead, which follows convicted killer Lee Everett trying to survive the apocalypse while taking care of the young girl Clementine. Today we’re gonna be speaking of the main antagonist of the first half of the series.
Who Is Jake? What Does He Do?
- Jake is the barbaric and hot headed leader of a group of bandits known as The Save Lots Bandits, former employees of the big box store before the apocalypse who took to committed raiding and murders. They confirmed to have completely decimated Ben’s school of Stone Mountain, killing many of the students and faculty and leading to Ben, Travis and Mr. Parker escaping. He also killed multiple of the St. John’s farm hands to force the St. John’s into trading.
- He’s shown to be a Bad Boss, spending his little screen time (comprised of about 3 scenes) belittling and yelling at his men, even killing one of his men for finding out he skimmed food, shooting at him multiple times while cursing at him.
- After a confrontation with another member Jolene, Jake is all but said (honestly outright said) to have taken and lead a gangraped Jolene’s very young daughter Danelle, and killed her, which lead to Jolene’s psychotic break and to be how we see her, being a psychotically Babbling woman talking about how they “took” their daughter like a can of beans (and the end of the second epsiode showing Jolene outright calling Jake, and two others Bart and Linda Rapists, so it’s made clear what happened).
- Leads an attack the dairy farm and leads to Mark getting shot in the shoulder with an arrow (and indirectly leads to him being killed by the St. John’s for food).
- Weeks after the second episode, Jake leads his bandits and attacks the Motor Inn, shooting at the walls and threatening the group for weeks. They then manage to blackmail and extort Ben into stealing from the Motor Inn, threatening to kill everyone if he doesn’t comply. Ben stealing the supplies directly leads to Lilly’s paranoia worsening as she starts seeing everyone as a suspect.
- When Lee manages to usurp the latest rations and bring them to Lilly, Jake immediately organizes and breaks into the Motor Inn, rounding up the group and is ready to execute all 6 of them on the spot, including Duck and Clementine. Lee comes up and attempts to calm them down, but in the end, Lilly kills him with a Boom, Headshot!. The effects are long lasting however, as the Motor Inn is infested with raiders and walkers and forcing the group to flee, and Lily’s sanity snapping and causing her to kill either Doug or Carley, and also causing Duck’s death of getting bitten during the chaos.
Heinous Standard?
Okay, so the main issue is him passing the heinous standard, as tho the comic universe has lower heinous standard, we still got Brian Blake, Alpha, Negan, Carver, Oberson, Joan and Badger. I will admit this is where he may falter, however, I think a few mitigating circumstances may help. Like main one is the fact unlike those characters, who lead giant communities and have high amount of resources when leading and are the main focus, Jake himself is only the leader of a number of people who all we see is they have is guns, and he himself only appears for around 3 scenes in total, and with that is the complete driving force of the first half of the season, destroying Ben’s school and leading him to be where he is, and in epsiode 3 where he takes over and attempts to execute all of the group, two young children included and had been extorting Ben for weeks which lead to the group crumbling and Lily’s mental snap and Duck’s death (and indirectly Katjaa’s Suicide).
But even with that, I think Jake manages to pass simply with one crime he commits against Jolene’s daughter Danelle. Not only is it made pretty clear what happened (Jolene’s dialogue of taking Danelle into the woods while laughing, talking how disgusting it is they take and take, to OUTRIGHT calling Jake and the others rapists), Jake is pretty much the only actual child rapist in the comic universe (minus a random bandit who is quickly killed by Rick) and one who actually committed it and the effects on what happened with Jolene are made pretty clear how much sanity she lost. So I think that crime helps him push it, if only barely.
Mitigating Factors?
None. Is a simple hot headed and vicious raider who will kill his own men and extort people for his own gain. If Lee attempts to reason with Jake, he attempts to get more supplies out of them while saying they can “hash out terms” before getting killed, he only shows to be interested in what benefits him and to extort more supplies. Overall, nothing redeeming.
Verdict? Up to you, but I think he pushes it.
Keep Fighting. Keep Loving.
Not the Eye
The Draftsman of Doom
Unofficial Wiki Curator for Complete Monster
Weak yes to Dolor, if ONLY because he's bottom of the barrel, though only 11 makes me wary.
How common is And I Must Scream?
Unsure on Jake. Is it Offscreen Villainy?
EDIT: Oh, and trying to start a conflict makes Dolor a slightly easier keeper. If it were JUST that or JUST the killings, I'd hesitate, but combine both, with his limited resources, and he may just make it.
Edited by ACW on Aug 28th 2023 at 4:28:41 AM
CM Dates; CM Pending; CM Drafts
A Girl, Just One of Many Kinds
![[up]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/smiles/arrow_up.png "[up]"){kind=icon}
Nope, clear onscreen effects the way I see it, as we see the effects of his crimes through the characters
Edited by MermaidEyes15 on Aug 28th 2023 at 4:39:08 AM
Keep Fighting. Keep Loving.
Caesar
From what I recall I'll lean yea on Jake, good find, Mermaid.
Sure to Dolor as well.
Edited by Ravok on Aug 28th 2023 at 1:44:37 AM
WHAT A WONDERFUL DAY!
Gentle Laborer
Dolor
As for Jake... I don't know, there are so many raiders, marauders and mass-murdering psychos in the world of TWD that I'm inclined to downvote him. The Delta from Season 4—a bunch of militaristic nobodies cosplaying as soldiers—had a history of violence against kids, using brainwashed Child Soldiers and even threatened to slaughter the entirety of Ericson's Boarding School.
Edited by TheMadCr0w on Aug 28th 2023 at 5:52:14 AM
A Girl, Just One of Many Kinds
Yeah, although I’m pointing towards his lack of screen time and resources and I think what he does to Danelle makes him pass on his own imo
Edited by MermaidEyes15 on Aug 28th 2023 at 4:50:39 AM
Keep Fighting. Keep Loving.
@Rosewood I'm guessing the body part is just a twisted memento of his favorite kill, wouldn't call that redeeming.