Old Magnificent Bastard thread
Welcome to the Magnificent Bastard proposal thread! This is the thread where new Magnificent Bastard 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 mitigating features 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 MB 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 MB" 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 other 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 MB 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, their goals and methodology, 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 characters, we'd be here all day if that was the case — but it should include the highlights of their journey.
How are they Magnificent?
This is the point where you highlight the character's brilliance. How to they convey their intelligence and charm to the audience? What makes them stand out among the crowd? What are their goals and how do they go about accomplishing them? This part welcomes a lot of creative thinking — not everyone has to be a Machiavellian Diabolical Mastermind to be worth considering here! This is also the time to showcase how the character can think on their feet if it's necessary.
How are they a Bastard? How are they not too bad?
What kinds of moral lines is this character willing to cross for the sake of their goal? Are they willing to let innocents die? Start wars? Commit crimes? The character has to show some kind of unscrupulousness in order to count as a "Bastard". Notably, this character does not necessarily have to be the villain, and an Anti-Hero can cross the line if they're immoral enough, but they have to be immoral somehow.
This is also the section where you then state your case for why they're not too bad. Perhaps their good intentions help mitigate their crimes. Perhaps others are shown to be much worse than them. Perhaps they're prone to Pet the Dog moments or are even fighting on behalf of loved ones. Whatever the case, there are certain lines that an MB can't cross, but as long as their villainy is reasonable for their goal, they can be considered.
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.
And that's everything you need to know. Welcome to the thread!
Edited by Twiddler on Jan 17th 2024 at 5:40:56 AM
A Girl, Just One of Many Kinds
Well let’s do this
What’s The Work?
Crossed is a comic series created by Garth Ennis, which centers around the titular Virus, Crossed, which created a large unfettered apocalypse of the infected who are raging ax crazy monsters murdering, torturing and raping one another and the comic series shows the survivors in situations having to deal with the creatures
Adeline Pratt Is the main protagonist of the second installment, Family Values. She is the second eldest daughter of the Pratt family, a seemingly kind family of horse jockeys. However, it’s revealed that the father, Joseph Pratt Sr. is a pedophilic and abusive man who abused and taped his daughters, except for Adaline who he was afraid of.
Wen the C-Day Hit, Adaline was planning to kill her dad in order to end the abuse until a horde of crossed destroyed the family farm, killing Adaline’s Uncle Eli, along with 2 of her younger brothers and younger sister Emily before she flees with her family.
Adaline becomes a hardened survivor as well as a capable member of New Paradise under her father’s rule, who she believed had change for the better. However, Adaline figures out her father’s abuse is continuing when she remembers a bounded Crossed’s pyschotic ramblings and she abandons her post, discovering her youngest sister Kaylee, who committed suicide by getting herself infected.
After calling out her mother Joyce for her enablement, New Paradise gets destroyed by Crossed horde and Adaline’s father gets murdered by Joyce after infected herself, and Adaline becomes the De Facto leader of the remaining survivors most of whom are family, and spends the next months training them on horseback to be capable shooters and fighters, with the group almost easily killing a group of bandits, altho with some causalities.
Adaline and the group find a abandoned fortified duplex to live in, however tensions heighten as 2 new children are born and a broken Liza murders her baby brother Eli. And then the Crossrd Joyce comes in and invades the place. Adaline gets all her family in the sewers to hide, and some people, Adaline manages to save the rest of the family, chopping off her older brother Matthew’s leg right before Joyce bites it and kills Joyce to end her suffering, and at the end of the story, she manages to keep what left of her family alive, with her younger sisters Merrilyn and Hannah, her brother Matthew and the 2 infants, and even finds her horses after they fled earlier in the story, giving new hope to the family.
I’d say so. Once the C Day hit, Adaline established herself as a serious and calculating survivor. She manages to be an expert gunman with shooting Crossed at a distance as well as being an expert tracker. She is perceptive enough to figure out her Dad’s true nature again after remembering a random Crossed’s seemingly crazy talk being about Kaylee. She shows to be a capable leader, slaughtering crossed by the dozens while training her family, including the very young Merrilyn to be a sharpshooter, and she shows to be extremely empathetic person who is extremely sympathetic and likable unlike many of the assholish characters in Crossed. And at the end, she manages to evade the capture by the Crossed army and kill her infectrd mother, and saving her brother’s life in a split second choice at quick enough speed.
She shows to have no qualms getting her hands dirty. The most infamous one where she shoots an innocent person running so Crossed can be lured out and butcher him all so she can track how many they are, all without remorse. Altho given the series itself, this is far from vile.
Verdict?
Yep
Keep Fighting. Keep Loving.
Sounds like a yes
![[tup]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/thumbs_up_emote.png "[thumb up]"){kind=small}
to Adaline, glad to see more Crossed candidates being brought up.
Goku Black
pratt.
to Pratt
A Girl, Just One of Many Kinds
![[up]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/smiles/arrow_up.png "[up]"){kind=icon}
Well, enjoy cuz this is pretty much the last candidate in the series
Ultimate Moral Compass
Pratt
Adeline.
RIP Toriyama
Sure to Pratt
Have seen Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem, anyone who wants deets can hmu!
Tonight I dine on monkey soup.
Here's the writeups for the Good Wife gang:
- The Good Wife:
- Kalinda Sharma, born Leela Tahiri, is Lockhart/Gardner’s investigator and plays a vital role in the vast majority of the cases the firm wins. Kalinda excels in using her charm, sexuality and acting skills to gain access to crime scenes, uncover evidence and track down witnesses. While showing Undying Loyalty to her friends, Kalinda is absolutely ruthless towards her enemies. She frames Blake Calamar for having an affair with drug kingpin Lemond Bishop’s wife, and Damien Boyle for having betrayed his former clients in the mob, forcing both men to leave town or be killed, and she is heavily implied to have murdered her abusive husband Nick Savarese. When Alicia Florrick and Cary Agos leave Lockhart/Gardner to form their own firm, Kalinda expertly plays both sides, using Cary’s interest in hiring her to get a pay raise from Lockhart/Gardner, and manipulating Cary’s feelings for her to gain important information about Florrick/Agos. Kalinda brings about Bishop’s downfall by stealing the evidence needed to put him in prison from his computer, accomplishing in a matter of days what the authorities had failed to do for years, before calmly skipping town to avoid retribution. Unmatched in her field, Kalinda proves her worth time and time again as one of Lockhart/Gardner’s most valuable employees, arguably even more so than their lawyers.
- Lemond Bishop is Chicago’s top drug kingpin and a top client of Lockhart/Gardner and later Florrick/Agos. A suave and eloquent man, Bishop has used his charisma and intelligence to remain one step ahead of the authorities for years, while establishing a chain of successful legitimate businesses with his drug money and making plans to retire from the game altogether. When Bishop suspects that there is a leak in Florrick/Agos, he cunningly feeds the mole and correctly determines that Alicia’s phone is being tapped. Hiding a terrifying ruthlessness beneath his friendly demeanour, Bishop is implied to have ordered his wife’s death while making it look like a drug overdose to prevent her from gaining custody of their son in their divorce, intimidates witnesses, including his own sister, and is the only person shown to be capable of genuinely frightening Kalinda Sharma. When he is finally arrested, Bishop’s only concern is that his son would have to witness this, as Bishop has endeavoured to shield him from his criminal life.
- Louis Canning is one of Lockhart/Gardner’s most frequent and brilliant adversaries. Canning defends pharmaceutical corporations from lawsuits for developing unsafe medicines, and employs many dirty tactics in court, his favorite of which is to milk his tardive dyskinesia for sympathy from judges and juries. In his first appearance, despite being outargued in court, Canning gets the last laugh when he reveals that Lockhart/Gardner had underestimated the value of their case, allowing him to negotiate a settlement of less than half the lawsuit’s worth. Canning later teams up with Patti Nyholm to distract Lockhart/Gardner with a Frivolous Lawsuit and steal their top client, driving the firm into bankruptcy and almost putting them out of business altogether. Canning also schemes with David Lee to merge his firm with Lockhart/Gardner and ruin Diane’s attempts to merge with Florrick/Agos, ultimately driving Diane out of her own firm. Effortlessly charming and a loving family man outside of his work, Canning’s skill as an attorney is matched only by his wit and unfailing respect for Alicia’s own skills.
- Patti Nyholm is a devious and brilliant lawyer opposed to Lockhart/Gardner. A highly skilled advocate capable of going toe-to-toe with Will Gardner in court, Patti’s unsavory clients include insurance companies and hospitals refusing to provide desperately needed emergency medical care, and she often uses stall tactics to pressure the opposition in these time-sensitive cases. When fired by her firm, Patti uses Lockhart/Gardner to bring a lawsuit against them, illegally feeding Lockhart/Gardner inside information on active cases in order to force her firm to give her job back. She is then able to return armed with inside information on future cases against Lockhart/Gardner, which Will cannot call her out for illegally using without himself admitting to perjury and risking his own disbarment. Patti later teams up with Louis Canning to steal Lockhart/Gardner’s top client. Despite appearing in only five episodes, Patti remains one of Lockhart/Gardner’s most memorable and formidable opponents.
Buzz
Between Mr. Mosquito, Dusty McClean, and the Goose, it's clear that player characters can be Magnificent Bastard s
Which leads me to ask - is The Impostor discussible, since it's whole shtick is that it stealthily kills crewmates, manipulates survivors and tries to talk its way out of being ejected.
I think that the biggest issue with the Impostor is that it is very possible to make poor decisions. In that case, should future EP's for playable characters consider the ease with which one can make bad decisions, and their subsequent consequences? What bad decisions can be made in the above three games I mentioned (and other games with playable MB's) and what are their consequences?
Another issue (AFAIK because I haven't actually played any of these games) that comes to mind is that Among Us is more player-centric compared to the other games I mentioned because the "antagonists" (i.e. crewmates) are also played by actual people, and the chat feature can show how the impostor reacts to failure, which depends heavily on the player. However, the Polus map sees the impostor give a thumbs up as they are tossed in the lava, indicating the in-game character could be a Graceful Loser.
Edited by Paperfly on Jul 30th 2023 at 5:59:41 AM
Image Pickin' Backlog
Bye
Canon imposter has 0 personality and isn't really a character, it can't count. IIRC, we got fan adaptation of them up, since they are proper characters.
Pratt, Baryl and Colonel, IED, Ed, Mike, Margaret, Patti
Tombstone, Jango, Zam, Memphis, Belphegor, Gus, Descole, Bishop, Reimu, Patti, Margaret, Mike, Ed, IED, Baryl, Colonel and Adaline
![[tdown]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/thumbs_down_emote.png "[thumb down]"){kind=small}
Kendra and Pandora
RIP Toriyama
- Spider-Man (PS4):
- Lonnie Lincoln, known to all as "Tombstone", is a soft-spoken, ruthless chop shop operator and mobster. Tombstone has plagued New York for years as one of Spider-Man's most persistent foes, and despite their long history as enemies, Tombstone holds a mutual respect for the wallcrawler no matter how many times the hero foils him. Tricking out vehicles and tech to better serve the Inner Demons gang in exchange for profit, Tombstone brutally kills one of his minions as punishment for a sloppy job, taking too much pride in the work of his gang to allow laziness. On the side, Tombstone concocts a temporary inhalant that grants the users his invulnerability, using bribery and thefts to create the concoction while planning to become the city's sole supplier. Even when his powers are stripped, his arm busted and his plan ruined by Spider-Man, Tombstone cheerfully reiterates that he'll be back for more "thrills" against the hero in no time.
- Final Fantasy VI: Shadow is a deadly ninja who hires his immoral services out to those who can afford him, while harboring a secret nobility beneath his callousness. Once an infamous train robber named Clyde, he was forced into hiding after the apparent death of his best friend and partner in crime, and though he started a family with a woman he loved, Clyde ultimately left them behind to become the mercenary he is today. Shadow helps the party throughout the game in pulling off great deeds of heroics, yet also takes on a paying job as one of the evil empire's lieutenants. After Kefka plunges the world into chaos, Shadow saves the lives of the party at the risk of his own, and ultimately works with them to take down Kefka once and for all. Shadow then accepts that his life's purpose has been fulfilled, and dies content in his efforts to save the planet.
Yes to Pratt.
For the record, I will be handling discussion for the Venture Bros movie this Friday.
Think you're tough because you made it through Lord of the Rings? Real men survive The Silmarillion.
to Prospera Mercury, Hunter, Tina Daniels and Anne Sadikov, Aramis, Jikka, Spider-Punisher, Emile LaRoux, Gaap, Loki, Sabellian, Jerk Chicken, Louis Canning, Jason Todd, Henri Ducard, Nine, Yang Jian, Amran and Zelikman, Kalinda Sharma, Tombstone, Jango Fett and Zam Wesell, Memphis Raines, Belphegor, Gus Fring, Jean Descole, Lemond Bishop, Reimu, Patti Nyholm, Magaret Moonlight, Mike Ehrmantraunt, Ed Galbraith, IED, Baryl and Colonel.EXE and Adaline Pratt.
Edited by MGD107 on Jul 30th 2023 at 6:16:23 AM
And I think that's formally enough votes for me to write up Sabellian.
I thought I'd written this guy up, apparently not.
- Veronica Mars: Clarence Wiedman is the head of security for Kane Enterprises and The Fixer for the Kane family in general. Wiedman helps the Kanes cover up the murder of Lily Kane when they believe their son Duncan to have accidentally killed his sister, tampering with the crime scene and paying off a terminaly ill Kane employee, Abel Koontz, to take the blame for the murder and repeatedly scuttling Veronica's private investigation into her friend's death. Wiedman also moonlights as an assassin for the Kanes, tracking down and killing the boyfriend who murdered Koontz's daughter after she tried to extort more money from the Kanes at the boyfriend's behest, and on Duncan's order, executing the despicable Aaron Echolls for his murder of Lily. A very dangerous man who is only loyal to his employers, Wiedman can easily match wits with Veronica herself.
"Cool. Coolcoolcool."
Yes to Pratt.
Here's Memphis' write up.
- Gone in 60 Seconds (2000): Randall "Memphis" Raines is a famous car thief who retired to prevent his brother from following in his footsteps. However, when his brother is threatened by Raymond Calitri, Memphis comes out of retirement to steal 50 cars for Calitri and save his brother. Plotting a near perfect of the theft of them in one night, Memphis has his team use multiple clever tactics to find each car, with Memphis disguising himself as a rich costumer in order to learn about a dealership's warehouse full of them. Upon discovering that the cops are staking out four of the cars, Memphis masterminds the theft of four other cars from the police impound, having one of his gang act as a distraction. Saving a car he failed to steal before for last, Memphis uses "Eleanor" to outrun and stay one step ahead of the cops before killing Calitri for betraying him. Giving the cops back the cars, Memphis ends the film going back into retirement.
Yes to Memphis, Mike, Ed, Adaline, Baryl, Colonel, Patty, Belphegor, and Adaline.
I used to have the username Melinda before I took some time off tv tropes and changed my account name to Alpinist when I came back. I notice that one character I have who got upvoted (getting at least 9 votes around April 7th) but isn't anywhere to be found in the live-action tv folder. Did he get downvoted later on, or did I just forget to post my write up from the get help with English thread?
Either way, I am posting him here and in the sandbox for you to either post later or delete.
- Ellery Queen: In "The Adventure of Caesar's Last Sleep." Benny Franks is a polite but ominous prominent organized crime figure who is being investigated by Glory Hound prosecutor Murphy. Franks and his close friend and lieutenant Ralph Caesar arrange for Caesar to get caught committing a crime and make a deal to testify against the mob in exchange for immunity from prosecution. They plan for Caesar to deny that Franks is his boss once he takes the stand and only incriminate minor criminals. When Caesar is murdered, Franks has Ellery kidnapped, questions him, and reveals his plan to humiliate Murphy, desire to avenge Caesar, and his suspicions that Murphy is the killer. While Murphy is innocent, Franks still engineers his downfall by pretending they are friends in front of reporters covering Caesar's murder, tarnishing Murphy's engineered reputation as an anti-crime crusader.
Edited by Alpinist on Jul 31st 2023 at 9:13:54 AM
Lies and Violence!
Pratt.
What's the work?
One more for the MCU before we get to Secret Invasion in a few weeks. To accompany the post on CM, I'm looking at Runaways, the sister show to Cloak & Dagger.
Long story short, the eponymous Runaways are a group of childhood friends who discover their parents are serial killers in a cult, the Pride, who have been forced into evil by a family of alien gods called the Gibborim. The Runaways discover they have superpowers and, naturally, run away to fight their schemes.
One of the Runaways is Alex Wilder; his father, Geoffrey, is a former gang leader who abandoned his community to run a wealthy construction company, while Alex's mother, Catherine, was Geoffrey's lawyer during his time in prison. Neither count here; the members of the Pride are either forced into their criminal activities or too much of a mess in their personal lives to be properly magnificent. So who do we have?
Who is Darius Davis?
Geoffrey's own childhood best friend, and second in command of his old gang. When in prison for murder, Geoffrey got an offer for a lucrative business offer beyond his wildest dreams from the Gibborim... one that required him being out of jail to see through. Though Darius was days away from getting out himself for an unrelated crime, Geoffrey convinced him to take the fall for his murder charge, promising to look out for his old neighborhood come hell or high water.
Geoffrey never kept to that promise; Darius was left to rot for years, and their community never improved. Taking over Geoffrey's gang upon getting out, Darius steered them to getting revenge on their old leader, arriving at one of his construction sites and threatening everyone into leaving unless he's given $50k. Geoff... instead arrives with a video feed of Darius' mother's house, threatening to kill her and sending him into retreat. Still, Darius gets what he wants. The entire thing was a ploy to get access to Geoff's phone, which one of his minions is able to clone. With that, they're able to track down and capture Alex (not yet a runaway), setting off his car alarm when he's in a restaurant so he'll come outside alone to be taken.
Darius shows him around their old territory, telling him about the broken promise to turn Alex against his father, before calling up Geoff to now demand $1 million. Geoff... responds by taking a machine gun to attack Darius' gang. Which. Kind of works? Alex somehow isn't killed in the chaos, but Darius pretends to escape before doubling back as the Wilders relax, holding a gun to Alex's head so he can leave with his hostage. And then he's confronted by a bunch of teenagers with superpowers, who beat up his men and deflect all his bullets with magic. Darius wisely decides to drop the matter and flees.
Of course, he's not done with the Pride. Darius bribes security guards at the construction site to spy on what they're doing with the area (spoilers, it's where they're digging up the Gibborim's crashed ship) and takes to personally keeping tabs when the guards are all fired by the Gibborim. Around this time, Alex (having finally run away from home along with the rest of the kids) approaches him for help taking down his parents, to which Darius gladly decides to indulge. He gives him some money and a gun... only to take the gun back once Alex returns for more cash. He doesn't want Alex to get gunned down by some racist cop; the only reason he gave the gun to him in the first place was to get his prints on it. It's a murder weapon, and if Alex betrays Darius like his father did, he wants some insurance.
Still, the two get along well. Darius "hires" Alex to help out in his criminal activities—mostly delivering payments and such. He briefly trolls him into thinking he'll have to kill someone and dispose of the body, only to instead have him paint the nursery for his soon-to-be-born baby. ... And then he decides to betray Alex to Geoff, giving him one last apologetic reassurance that he wants him to win before tricking him into a trap. In exchange, Geoff gives him the deed to a strip mall that Darius can use to start up businesses and improve their old community like they always wanted to. They're not friends again, but the hatchet is buried—Geoff even buys him a room at a fancy hotel for his family to get their first taste at the rich life.
...Where he's meet by Catherine. Part of the Pride's plan to track down their kids was to frame them for murder, which they've only now realized was kind of stupid. To reverse course, they need someone else to take the fall. After hearing of the trouble he's caused their family, Catherine—unbeknownst to Geoff—decides it should be Darius. Though he briefly freaks when it becomes clear she also intends on killing him, Darius attempts to calmly explain—with some truth to it—that he only hurt her son by betraying him because he thought he would be safer with his family, but this does little to deter her, and she shoots him dead.
...Which turns out to be a horribly stupid idea. Geoff is livid that his "brother" is dead, Alex still considered him something akin to a "friend" and extra hates their guts now; he uses the same "prints on gun" trick Darius used on him to get his parents arrested, leading to Catherine being murdered in prison by Darius' vengeful widow.
Mitigating factors?
For just a small time gangster, he more than stands out as the most consistently cool, collected, and intelligent player between all the alien gods and serial killing parents and witches and teenagers who control fucking dinosaurs, the fuck was this show?
... To get back on track, Darius isn't infallible. For instance, he makes a big deal to Alex about how he used to always beat Geoff at domino games as a kid. When he's handing over Alex, the two get to reminiscing and Geoff reacts to the mention of those old games with this:
Maybe a bit of a crack in the wall, but it's clearly a jest, and Darius takes it in good humor. Aside from that, he's portrayed as always on top compared to the train wrecks that the Pride are with each other and their families. He's a smooth operator who is able to efficiently organize a hostage situation and keep it on the rails even when things go wrong, he plays Alex for a complete fool, and he's easily one of the most affable villains in the series. His failures only result from A) a bunch of fucking superpowered teenagers attacking him with fucking magic and a pet dinosaur and alien light powers and a bunch of other bullshit, and B) his best friend's wife going behind her husband's back to kill him, which turns out to be a bullheaded, recklessly moronic move that alienates her entire family. And even then, while he's clearly taken aback for a few seconds, he's able to quickly compose himself and calmly try to reason his way out of the situation.
I think he's got enough. What say you all?
I'm fully willing to chalk this up to character page shenanigans, but it lists Politically Incorrect Villain saying he refers to Geoffrey working for white folks, when the pact is far more diverse. Is it putting way too much weight on that statement?
You can only write so much in your forum signature. It's not fair that I want to write a piece of writing yet it will cut me off in the mid
Lies and Violence!
...Uh ... yeah, no, I have no idea what in the hell that's about. He's talking about Geoff abandoning them for the rich privileged life, and doesn't ever interact with the rest of the Pride in any way that could give that entry weight.
Edited by EmeraldEmperor on Jul 31st 2023 at 10:16:17 AM
That's what I thought. Thanks for the clarification, Darius.
I like the quotes
Hope your prepared for an unforgettable luncheon