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Magnificent Bastard Proposal Thread

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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:

    Process 

  1. 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.

  2. 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".

  3. 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:

    Ground Rules 

  1. 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!

  2. 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:
    1. 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.
    2. 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.
    3. 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.

  3. Don't delete an EP unless you intend to swiftly repost it. We know that there are reasons why you might want to delete an EP, especially if it's being downvoted - rejection is hard, even in a low-stakes environment like this. However, deleting it renders the current discussion null and void, makes it impossible to reference the discussion in the future and can confuse tropers who didn't read it before the deletion. If the issue is temporary (such as formatting problems or a post getting overlooked as the thread moves on), then deleting and quickly reposting the EP is a valid option, but to fully retract an EP, please use the [[strike:]] markup instead.

  4. Votes must be for specific candidates, meaning no blanket voting (i.e. "yes to everyone I missed").

  5. 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.

  6. 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!

  7. 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.

  8. 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.

  9. If you are suspended from other parts of the website, it is still possible to participate!
    1. 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.
    2. 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.

  10. Please keep all discussions "in-house".
    1. What other wikis use for MB equivalents is irrelevant here.
    2. 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.
    3. 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:

    Effortpost Template 

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 Mrph1 on Jul 12th 2024 at 3:34:22 PM

WetFlannels Classy, Refined, Unstable from Nearby, on a cosmological scale. Since: Oct, 2021 Relationship Status: Who needs love when you have waffles?
Classy, Refined, Unstable
#1401: Feb 7th 2023 at 1:07:47 PM

[up][up] I'd disagree about him being too much of a joke within the film's tone but his possibile care for the goose is too iffy especially when the timeline gets wiped he calls her out by name when she disappears.

Edited by WetFlannels on Feb 7th 2023 at 9:08:10 AM

What's wrong D-16? Rise up!
EmperorGeode from A Galaxy far, far away Since: Oct, 2022 Relationship Status: On the prowl
#1402: Feb 7th 2023 at 1:08:06 PM

Yeah, as much as i Enjoy her as a villain, her racism against Ogres is just to much.

futuremoviewriter Since: Jun, 2014
#1403: Feb 7th 2023 at 1:10:04 PM

[up][up]That moment was exactly what I was thinking of in a redemptive moment that probably is a redemptive moment for an otherwise very loathsome character.

Maybe that version of Fairy Godmother could count if the negative preconceptions on ogres doesn't hurt her.

LoreDeluxe Since: May, 2013
#1404: Feb 7th 2023 at 1:11:17 PM

I feel like a Fairy Godmother being "racist" against ugly people because she thinks only beautiful people deserve happiness endings is fantastical enough to separate her from any real world issues.

Think you're tough because you made it through Lord of the Rings? Real men survive The Silmarillion.
RyanPuffs She/Her from Big Bill Hell's Since: Jun, 2018 Relationship Status: Oh my word! I'm gay!
She/Her
#1405: Feb 7th 2023 at 1:16:09 PM

Though, something also to note about Fairy Godmother is that she refers to the cross-dressing Big Bad Wolf as “gender confused”, which I feel like does not help her case concerning being a MB due to how prejudiced that line was

And [tup] to Taw and Bourne

Profile picture by @BoxNazrin on Bluesky. Give her a follow!
futuremoviewriter Since: Jun, 2014
#1406: Feb 7th 2023 at 1:17:14 PM

[up]Was that in the video game though?

[down]I definitely remember the line in the movie. Was it also in the game though?

Edited by futuremoviewriter on Feb 7th 2023 at 1:19:36 AM

RyanPuffs She/Her from Big Bill Hell's Since: Jun, 2018 Relationship Status: Oh my word! I'm gay!
She/Her
#1407: Feb 7th 2023 at 1:18:46 PM

[up] In the movie. I haven’t played the video game but I was just concerned about the whole conversation really

Profile picture by @BoxNazrin on Bluesky. Give her a follow!
Ravok Son of Liberty from Big Shell Since: Jun, 2015 Relationship Status: Complex: I'm real, they are imaginary
Son of Liberty
#1408: Feb 7th 2023 at 1:19:35 PM

Even putting aside the prejudice she has—which I'd say is prominent enough to be likely disqualifying—Godmother is also just kind of dickish in a lot of her manipulations and threats. She's got her hammy awesome moments like the cover song, but she's also a stereotypical passive-aggressive, domineering, Control Freak matriarch who flies off the handle at Harold anytime he questions her orders and her entire plot revolves around the pretty skeevy "make Fiona think she's marrying Shrek when she's actually marrying my son". Plus her whole derogatory line towards the wolf being "gender-confused"...

There's a loooot of potential issues with her in the film that I think, on their own, could maybe be talked down, but altogether? I don't think she's there. I'm more than happy to hear out the video game one if it adjusts these aspects.

Edited by Ravok on Feb 7th 2023 at 1:19:53 AM

No! That is NOT Solid Snake! Stop impersonating him!
43110 (Striking Back) Relationship Status: Reincarnated romance
#1409: Feb 7th 2023 at 1:26:34 PM

Agreed on the video game version if she's changed enough there, anything can happen! No fucking way the original version of Dudley Smith would ever be coming near MB.

Yes to Taw and a happy one to Bourne, great work on a franchise-wide bro!

LoreDeluxe Since: May, 2013
#1410: Feb 7th 2023 at 1:28:09 PM

Video game adaptations can pullba 180 on characters. Look at what happened to Tony Montana.

Think you're tough because you made it through Lord of the Rings? Real men survive The Silmarillion.
Ravok Son of Liberty from Big Shell Since: Jun, 2015 Relationship Status: Complex: I'm real, they are imaginary
Son of Liberty
#1411: Feb 7th 2023 at 1:53:52 PM

@future: Yep, Heather counts just fine...as for CM, Abbott's only one I think, and I just threw him up over on that thread, lol.

No! That is NOT Solid Snake! Stop impersonating him!
HamburgerTime Since: Apr, 2010
#1412: Feb 7th 2023 at 2:21:12 PM

[tup] Taw and Jason "How Did We Miss Him" Bourne.

WetFlannels Classy, Refined, Unstable from Nearby, on a cosmological scale. Since: Oct, 2021 Relationship Status: Who needs love when you have waffles?
Classy, Refined, Unstable
#1413: Feb 7th 2023 at 2:35:03 PM

Speaking of CMs... how would folks be for an EP on Moriarty, too vile for a crossover?

[down] Ah fair enough.

Edited by WetFlannels on Feb 7th 2023 at 10:37:05 AM

What's wrong D-16? Rise up!
STARCRUSHER99 The Moron from one of my unhealthy obsessions (Captain) Relationship Status: Showing feelings of an almost human nature
The Moron
#1414: Feb 7th 2023 at 2:36:36 PM

He’s been proposed before, it was decided that he was too emotionally unstable - he almost flies off the handle just from Sherlock analyzing his psychology via his handwriting

Edited by STARCRUSHER99 on Feb 7th 2023 at 5:37:34 AM

Snowy66 Since: May, 2012
#1415: Feb 7th 2023 at 2:46:22 PM

Yes to Jason fucking Bourne!

I had considered Fairy God Mother myself before. While she's quite a good planner and does have a lot of charisma, she loses her shit too easily when things go south. While also her Faux Affably Evil is just a tad bit too faux with some of her more dickish moments like threatening Harold at wandpoint basically.

The prejudice doesn't help, but given the fantasy setting and the times when the movie came out, I could have overlooked that. I'm fairly certain the "gender confused wolf" line didn't intend to have transphobic connotations, as that sort of humor was very common back in those days.

futuremoviewriter Since: Jun, 2014
#1416: Feb 7th 2023 at 2:46:56 PM

[up][up]That and the implication that had it gotten to the point in the climax when he and Holmes had physically fought that he would've been the one unleashing his rage and instigating the fight. Yeah, his Tranquil Fury and inner voice indicate he was coherent enough to think, but Moriarty still would've been focused on doing nothing but torturing and killing Holmes to the point that it's still a Villainous Breakdown—even before they both plummet to the bottom of the waterfall. His wanting to torture and kill Watson and Mary yet again after he's dealt with Holmes also plays into his earlier outburst too.

[up]Again, the video game version would have to soften the edges enough for it to be forgiven.

Edited by futuremoviewriter on Feb 7th 2023 at 2:48:10 AM

miraculous Goku Black (Apprentice)
Goku Black
#1417: Feb 7th 2023 at 2:54:35 PM

Btw would anyone be cool with seeing an ep on Julius Caesar from Asterix?

I got kinda inspired thinking about with mom going up. He uh does have the occasional goofy moment got the unrelated stuff. But the man is able to keep his diginity for the main schemes.

"That's right mortal. By channeling my divine rage into power, I have forged a new instrument in which to destroy you."
EmperorGeode from A Galaxy far, far away Since: Oct, 2022 Relationship Status: On the prowl
TBNY (4 Score & 7 Years Ago)
#1419: Feb 7th 2023 at 3:14:08 PM

[tup] Bourne. This reminds me that I never got around to watching the last movie.

Melinda Since: Dec, 2019 Relationship Status: Puppy love
#1420: Feb 7th 2023 at 5:43:59 PM

[up] you didn’t miss much in my opinion (and incidentally I don’t know of any other Wayne potential MB’s besides Wake of the Red Witch and Red River neither of which I plan to see).

That being said, yes to Bourne.

papyru30 from Colorado for summer break Since: Aug, 2016 Relationship Status: Yes, I'm alone, but I'm alone and free
#1421: Feb 7th 2023 at 5:54:57 PM

Oh yeah, I threw Asterix on my to do list ages ago specifically for Caesar and didn't follow up on it very well (which unfortunately happens a lot for me). He honestly seems like good candidate for this.

Melinda Since: Dec, 2019 Relationship Status: Puppy love
#1422: Feb 7th 2023 at 6:31:27 PM

Work

Rollercoaster is a disaster move about an extortionist targeting Rollercoaster rides and clashing with a safety inspector and he may be a rare character who is both a Complete Monster (he already got voted for that) and an MB.

Character

The unnamed Young Man is the extortionist and is implied to be a military veteran and trained structural engineer and demolitions expet. He wants fast money and so he surveyors an amusement park, disguised as a worker to plant a small homage bomb on the tracks of s ride, then mingles around the pro, refusing to make small talk and throwing away a prize he wins. He emotionlesslt detonates the bomb to damage the track and derail a ride that includes teenaged passengers. Not everyone on the ride dies but several people do and others are injured as the bomber calmly leaves, with there being no evidence to prove it wasn’t just wear and tear. He sets a fire on another ride but no one is hurt.

He contacts amusement park owners to meet at a hotel room and listen to a tape with his demands. Posing as a polite waiter giving them complimentary room service, he plants a bug and listens to their reactions. His tape says they can call the cops if they want but it won’t matter. An inspector looking into the first accident, Harry Calder, arrives unexpectedly but hears the tape and discusses how skilled and serious the bomber clearly is, with the young man hearing to us and contacting Harry to be the ransom messenger. He is polite to a frustrate Harry during their calls. He also says he has another bomb in the park and so the cops need to pay attention to that some.

He knows the cops will follow Harry so he has a messenger deliver Harry a mobile phone and tells him to lose the earpiece the cops gave him. Everyone expects a switch of the briefcase, where Harry Wilson get a duplicate filled with newspapers or something. He has Harry go through the park doing random things to wear the cops down. Then once Harry boards a cable car ride, the young man reveals the bomb is in Harry’s phone and Harry can’t just throw it away because there are people in every direction. He makes Harry pretend the switch already happened to send the cops the wrong way and then had him leave behind the suitcase. Between the wild goose chase and disarming the bomb, the cops are distracted and the young man doesn’t take the money out of the park with him but audaciously tapes it to the bottom of a police surveillance van and retrieved it after dark. The money is marked but he learns this with a search and calls Harry to criticize the situation to origins and say he needs another demonstration.

The authorities are spread thin across multiple parks but Harry thinks the young man will destroy a big new Rollercoaster that Harry inspected during the Fourth of July grand opening and convinces the reluctant cops to focus on that. They find another bomb planted on a track. The young man he been mingling in the crowd and agrees to take a photo of a family but seizes the opportunity to look at the tracks with the camera lens and witness the bomb squad. In his frustration, he only photographs the family’s heads and not their whole bodies. Then he tries to detonate the bomb, but it is already disarmed. He heads out to his car and constructs another bomb, gambling finding the first will make his enemies complacent.

He offers a park guest $100 for a ticket to the first ride and when the man’s girlfriend says she wants to ride, the young man says that she can still ride and he just wants her boyfriends ticket. He slips to r bomb into the car during the ride and is about to slip away unnoticed and detonate it when a reporter approaches him and asks for comments on the ride. The loud microphone sends the man’s answer (he cryptically says he thinks the ride will be remembered) to a nearby Harry, who recognizes the man’s voice and tells the FBI. They manage to corner the Young Man but he pulls out his remote and says he’ll take out the Rollercoaster unless Harry becomes his hostage. However, the cops jam his frequency and announce this so he can’t ddetonate and announce this at the last second. The man tries to detonate anyway but fails and runs. He ends up on the track of the rollercoaster and sees that he is cornered from every side. He either freezes in shock or chooses to commit suicide (I think it is the latter but others disagree) as the rollercoaster he tried to sabotage approaches, and it hits and kills him.

Magnificent

He is polite to people like Harry, the vacationing family and the girlfriend of the man he buys the ticket from even if it is a bit superficial and pragmatic in some or all of those cases. He is a skilled bomber and planner who has a lot of audacity (spying on the ransom debate, hiding the money near the police and making a second bomb at the end). He only fails due to the marked money (which he quickly spots) and a reporter getting in his way with a loud microphone while Harry happens to be nearby.

Bastard

He remorselessly kills or endangers people and makes Harry go through a lot of stress, especially by targeting a rollercoaster Harry inspected. He smiles after planting his second bomb in the final act and shows other occasional satisfaction with his cleverness.

DoodSlayer136 It's Him from SAGE (Snick Amateur Game Expo) (Experienced, Not Yet Jaded) Relationship Status: Shipping fictional characters
It's Him
#1423: Feb 7th 2023 at 6:43:08 PM

I, er, don't think blowing up Rollercoasters and killing innocents out of spite for not getting paid is very good for this trope. Saying [tdown] to the Young Man.

Edited by DoodSlayer136 on Feb 7th 2023 at 6:43:26 AM

Libraryseraph uu~ from Canada (Handed A Sword) Relationship Status: Raising My Lily Rank With You
uu~
#1424: Feb 7th 2023 at 6:48:10 PM

Yeah, going to say [tdown] especially when all his magnificence of personality is entirely superficial

HAPPY HALLOWEEN FOR MARIA
Snowy66 Since: May, 2012
#1425: Feb 7th 2023 at 6:49:14 PM

[tdown]Rollercoaster dude. Too petty


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