During the investigation of recent hollers in the Complete Monster thread, it's become apparent to the staff that an insular, unfriendly culture has evolved in the Complete Monster and Magnificent Bastard threads that is causing problems.
Specific issues include:
- Overzealous hollers on tropers who come into the threads without being familiar with all the rules and traditions of the tropes. And when they are familiar with said rules and traditions, they get accused (with little evidence) of being ban evaders.
- A few tropers in the thread habitually engage in snotty, impolite mini-modding. There are also regular complaints about excessive, offtopic "socializing" posts.
- Many many thread regulars barely post/edit anywhere else, making the threads look like they are divorced from the rest of TV Tropes.
- Following that, there are often complaints about the threads and their regulars violating wiki rules, such as on indexing, crosswicking, example context and example categorization. Some folks are working on resolving the issues, but...
- Often moderator action against thread regulars leads to a lot of participants suddenly showing up in the moderation threads to protest and speak on their behalf, like a clique.
It is not a super high level problem, but it has been going on for years and we cannot ignore it any longer. There will be a thread in Wiki Talk
to discuss the problem; in the meantime there is a moratorium on further Complete Monster and Magnificent Bastard example discussion until we have gotten this sorted out.
Update: The new threads have been made and can be found here:
Please see the Frequently Asked Questions and Common Requests List before suggesting any new entries for this trope.
IMPORTANT: To avoid a holler to the mods, please see here for the earliest date a work can be discussed, (usually two weeks from the US release), as well as who's reserved discussion.
When voting, you must specify the candidate(s). No blanket votes (i.e. "
to everyone I missed").
No plagiarism: It's fair to source things, but an effortpost must be your own work and not lifted wholesale from another source.
We don't care what other sites think about a character being a Complete Monster. We judge this trope by our own criteria. Repeatedly attempting to bring up other sites will earn a suspension.
What is the Work
Here you briefly describe the work in question and explain any important setting details. Don't assume that everyone is familiar with the work in question.
Who is the Candidate and What have they Done?
This will be the main portion of the Effort Post. Here you list all of the crimes committed by the candidate. For candidates with longer rap sheets, keep the list to their most important and heinous crimes, we don't need to hear about every time they decide to do something minor or petty.
Do they have any Mitigating Factors or Freudian Excuse?
Here you discuss any potential redeeming or sympathetic features the character has, the character's Freudian Excuse if they have one, as well as any other potential mitigating factors like Offscreen Villainy or questions of moral agency. Try to present these as objectively as possible by presenting any evidence that may support or refute the mitigating factors.
Do they meet the Heinousness Standard?
Here you compare the actions of the Candidate to other character actions in the story in order to determine if they stand out or not. Remember that all characters, not just other villains, contribute to the Heinousness Standard
Final Verdict?
Simply state whether or not you think the character counts or not.
Edited by GastonRabbit on Aug 31st 2023 at 4:14:10 AM
And then you remember this is Stephen King's work where crazy serial killers, occultist murderers, demonic entities and other nasties absolutely permeate nearly every region of the world.
Guys like Jim Rennie and Norman get on because they are ridiculously evil and accomplish crimes impressive to their position in the universe that shows them to be just as loathsomely evil as Randall Flagg and Pennywise/IT, whereas Chris is simply an overly nasty bully. She does not murder anyone, she does not rape anyone, she does not brutalize anyone into a coma. Billy is nastier given he just wants to hurt someone, but his only intended body count is a pig. Yes he's an abusive prick to Chris, but he's not a CM
They're not even the worst bullies in a Stephen King novel. Henry Bowers makes them look like amateurs, a guy who tried to carve his name into a kid's stomach because Henry disliked the kid being fat and because he didn't let Henry cheat off him in a test. Henry also has attempted murder, sexual assault and murder of a kid's dog under his belt, with the motivation of the latter being that the kid was black.
I'm letting ambar tackle this
edited 6th Jun '15 3:19:11 PM by Lightysnake
I remember Henry. Who knew a bully could be that dickish?
Here's a hypothetical question.
If someone purposefully manipulates a character into committing mass genocide, would they qualify even if it's argued the character has free will?
Edit: Oh right. Now that I think about it, Hojo could be an example of that.
edited 6th Jun '15 3:29:51 PM by Klavice
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Oh right, forgot they were all the same universe (man, in most other universes, Bowers himself seems like he'd count, if not for this one harboring the likes of Rennie, Norman, and Wharton). ![]()
If that's what they were attempting to do (or something similar). For example, Hitler. Obviously can't be a CM since it's real life. But a Hitler-like villain who doesn't commit any murders himself? Could DEFINITELY count.
edited 6th Jun '15 3:28:50 PM by ACW
I will say no to Munenori and Fortinbras.
I will say yes to Whoreson and Rochefort.
I also looked at a play through of X-Men Legends 2 today, that was a game I played and beat ten years ago and I think the version of Apocalypse who appears in that game may count:
Who is Apocalypse? What has he done?
We know who Apocalypse is at this point, so I will just skip to what he has done. This game is a loose adaption of Age of Apocalypse, so Apocalypse in this game manages to conquer Genosha and NYC, as well as having several bases in Canada and the Savage Land. After conquering Genosha, Apocalypse has bombs placed on the Genoshan sea wall, a giant dam that keeps water from flooding the underground cities in Genosha and plans to set them off if the X-Men try to liberate Genosha, likely killing everyone in Genosha in the process.
After freeing Genosha, the X-Men locate Apocalypse's forces in the Savage Land, where they are trying to destroy the technology that keeps the Savage Land in a tropic climate, destroying this tech would send the Savage Land into a deep freeze and kill most of the inhabitants there. Apocalypse is doing that just to prevent the X-Men from foiling his plans, by forcing them to leave the Savage while he continues his plans. He also launches an attack on NYC, having air ships destroys buildings and drops a giant bomb on NYC, that leaves most of NYC intact, but likely flattened a couple of neighborhoods. Apocalypse is doing all of this, because he wants to capture mutants and test them to see if they have a certain type of DNA that he can use to increase his power.
Apocalypse is only keeping mutants alive to test them, in Genosha if mutants were found not to have the DNA he wants, they were given to Mr. Sinister, so he can conduct any experiment on them he liked. Apocalypse seems to have no regard for the humans he conquered, with one mission briefing mentioning Apocalypse's forces are trying to drive human refugees in NYC to the sea and Apocalypse has set up anti air craft guns to prevent any outside help to rescue them.
Is he heinious by the standards of the story?
In the second game, he really has no equal in terms of heinous standards, all the other villains are doing things on his orders and since he is in charge of his organization, he is the one who is guilty of the crimes his underlings commit.
Now the first game features General Kincaid, who was a pretty nasty guy in his own right, you can see his crimes in the Moral Event Horizon section of the game's YMMV section:
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/YMMV/XMenLegends
That being said, Apocalypse likely has a bigger attempted body count then Kincaid, with his plans to destroy Genohsa and the Savage Land to prevent the X-Men from stopping him, not mention he likely killed at least dozens, if not hundreds of people when he conquered NYC.
I'm not sure if this game is continuity with the Marvel Ultimate Alliance games, Nick Fury looks totally different in both series of games, so they may be separate. No one counts in Marvel Ultimate Alliance, Doom is the villain in the first game and he tries to steal the power of Odin to rule the universe. Doom's new powers are destroying the universe, but Doom is unaware of this, so Doom is destroying the universe by mistake, so he really doesn't count. Bullseye tries to nuke NYC in the first game, but he is a One-Scene Wonder, not very important to the story and the villain in the second game is a collection of sentient nanites, it seems unlikely they would count.
Even if the Marvel Ultimate Alliance games are in the same continuity as the X-Men Legends games (Which I have my doubts about considering Nick Fury is of a different race in each series of games), I think Apocalypse does enough to stand out.
Any redeeming factors or Freudian Excuse?
Nope, Apocalypse is just a power mad would be tyrant and a Social Darwinist in this game, he never shows any concern for his underlings.
Verdict?
I think he could count.
edited 6th Jun '15 4:12:51 PM by Overlord
Bowers wouldn't count anyways because he has a decent enough Freudian Excuse in his psycho, shell-shocked father having shaped him into a racist psychopath and because in later life he had enough to garner sympathy.
I'll give Rochefort a
. Also considering what Kyle Jacobs mentioned before, I decided to trim Picasso's writeup.
"Picasso" is a sadistic assassin hired to eliminate Giles Mercier and his associates Fan Yau Lee and Erich Nunemacher. After being invited to Fan Yau's house, he proceeds to sedate her with a paralyzing drug. Afterwards, he murders all of her bodyguards and tortures her to death by cutting off all of her fingers. He later goes after Nunemacher, but fails to kill him due to Alex Cross and his partners Monica and Tommy interfering. As punishment for their interference, Picasso breaks into Monica's apartment and tortures her to death, shortly before sending a photo of her body to Cross' cell phone. Picasso then murders Maria, Cross' pregnant wife, and later calls him after her funeral, telling Cross that the only reason why he killed her instead of him was so he could make him suffer. Picasso then goes after Giles Mercier, attacking his convoy with a rocket and killing several police officers, along with Nunemacher and Mercier's double. During Picasso's final confrontation with Cross, Picasso subdues Cross and attempts to inject him with the same paralyzing drug as well.
That a little better? So far the vote for him is 2
, 0
.
Picasso
I have a suggestion from the 2000 movie Frequency.
Background
Frequency is about John Sullivan, a cop in the year 1999 whose father, Frank, died in 1969 in a fire, being that he was a fireman. John finds a ham radio, and is able to speak to his father in the past and change the present. He manages to prevent his father’s death, but also inadvertently causes his mother to have saved Jack Shepard.
Who is he? What does he do?
Jack Shepard is a cop and serial killer of women known as the Nightingale Killer. He targets nurses for some unknown reason, strangling his victims to death and stealing their jewelry. By 1969, he had already murdered three women, and in the new timeline created by John, he survived past then and was able to continue the murders. By 1999 he had killed 7 more women, including, as it’s revealed, John’s mother, who saved Jack’s life in the new timeline, and Jack’s own mother. Frank and John try to prevent the murders from happening in the past, and after preventing one, Jack catches on to Frank appearing where his prospective victims are, and beats him up in a bathroom, stealing his driver’s license. After Frank and John figure out Jack’s identity, Frank is arrested in the past- Jack had placed Frank’s license with his latest victim in an attempt to frame him. Frank manages to escape custody and is pursued by Jack, who tries to shoot and later drown him, but Frank gets away, and Jack’s guilt is found out by the cops. After everything seems to have died down, and Frank and John are talking over the radio, Jack suddenly attacks them ‘simultaneously’ in both 1969 and 1999. He handcuffs Frank to a post and attempts to rape note Frank's wife before getting interrupted by a young John. When Frank gets free and aims a gun at Jack, Jack takes John hostage and threatens to snap the kid's neck. He’s ultimately stopped in the past and killed in the future, preventing him from murdering John.
Does he have a freudian excuse? How much is offscreen? Are there any other mitigating factors?
No freudian excuse- in fact, we meet his parents, and they seem like perfectly nice people who have no idea that their son is a killer. He appears to have had a fine upbringing, but still became a brutal murderer whose victims included his loving mother. Most of his murders are offscreen, but we see two of the bodies, and a few crime scene photos, as well as his actions near the end of the movie. There are no other mitigating factors.
edited 6th Jun '15 5:46:53 PM by Camberf
Reading tropes such as You Know What You Did
For Apocalypse in general. He sees himself as Above Good and Evil and a Well-Intentioned Extremist, but his acts go far and above the self inflated view he paints himself in, basically wanting to wipe out human and mutant kind and destroy the world because they could be a threat to his A God Am I complex.
So far, Cyprian "Whoreson Junior" Willey has 7
and 2
. Before I do a write up, it will worthwhile to get more votes and, more importantly, wait for Occasional Exister to do his effort post on The Concerned Citizen and see if that changes any of the current votes.
I will give a
to Picasso and Jack Shepard.
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Well Apocalypse is a monster in both the comics and the animated series from the 90s and I think he is a monster in the X-Men Legends games. Though I don't think Apocalypse is a monster in X-Men Evolution, in that cartoon he is less arrogant then usual and seems to think his plan will make the world a better place, despite the fact it would cause massive casualties. Also in some the X-Men games from the 90s, Apocalypse is not a monster, because censorship and technical limits at the time prevent him from doing anything really nasty. I think Apocalypse in other adaptions, is often written as a monster, but not always.
Reading tropes such as You Know What You Did
See Depending on the Writer. In Evolution he would be more a Generic Doomsday Villain, so in general. I'd place Hydra higher on the list simply because of the X-23 storyline, doubt they'd qualify but shown to be more monstrous in this iteration.
Currently reading up My Rule Fu Is Stronger than Yours

Oh right. Been awhile since I saw the movie or read the book.
PS: I wasn't going to mention Carrie. The only reason I brought up Chris and Billy was because someone mentioned them. I really have to stop bringing up old cases just because someone mentioned them.
Anyway, so I've been rereading Warrior Cats from the beginning and, as much as I hate to admit it, I think Tigerstar doesn't count. He genuinely cares for his kits (especially Brambleclaw) and seems hurt when he didn't join him. However, this doesn't stop him from attempting to kill him on several occasions, Tigerclaw's Fury goes into greater detail in that he did want to save his kits from the fire. Though this could be part of his act in making everyone believe he's a loving father, which to Hawkfrost and Mothwing, he is not.
edited 6th Jun '15 3:21:49 PM by Klavice