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
to Darus, and glad the whole Haman thing was solved.
to Darus.
For the Red King, I do feel that Wonderland's real enough for the trope, considering that the game at least treats it as its own dimension of sorts. Helps that I don't remember Red having a real world counterpart, he's exclusive to the realm.
My concern is just how much character he has. It doesn't sound like he's as powerful as the King or Dollmaker, and the whole genocide thing does sound unique. That said, do they give him any character or personality, or is he just there to justify a leader for the red pieces?
Edited by DoodSlayer136 on Jun 18th 2021 at 1:39:57 AM
Matriarch and Red King
- Captain America: The First Avenger and Captain America: The Winter Soldier: Dr. Arnim Zola debuts as a cowardly scientist who joins the Nazis so they'll fund his work. Gleefully making war machines as part of HYDRA, Zola deliberately lets a Super-Soldier experiment go wrong and mutate his boss Johann Schmidt into the Red Skull so a rival will be blamed and his family killed. When Schmidt lets Zola in on his plot to Take Over the World, the scientist enslaves and experiments on prisoners of war to build the superweapons necessary for the scheme before betraying his boss to the Allies when it's made clear failure is inevitable. Having become a true believer in totalitarianism, Zola joins the newly-formed SHIELD and goes about reforming HYDRA within its ranks, all the while masterminding global conflicts to make the people desperate for security. To do this, he abducts and brainwashes people into being "Winter Soldier" assassins, keeping them in stasis and torturously memory wiping them between missions. All of this culminates in a plot to launch Project Insight, which will trap the world in an eternal surveillance state and give HYDRA the ability to slaughter any dissidents, with it being explicitly stated that this will lead to tens of millions of deaths.
to the Red King on grounds of barely seeing him at all.
And @Powermaster 201: Hey, if she doesn't pass, she doesn't pass, just figured she might after the last time I listened to the albums. (The one that bugs me is Nil Spaar from Black Fleet Crisis being disqualified because of reportedly loving an offscreen mistress.)
Trust me, I'm an engineer!- The First Avenger & The Winter Soldier: Dr. Arnim Zola debuts as a cowardly scientist who joins the Nazis so they'll fund his work. Gleefully making war machines as part of HYDRA, Zola deliberately lets a Super-Soldier experiment go wrong and mutate his boss Johann Schmidt into the Red Skull so a rival will be blamed and his family killed. When Schmidt lets Zola in on his plot to Take Over the World, the scientist enslaves and experiments on prisoners of war to build the super weapons necessary for the scheme before betraying his boss to the Allies when it's made clear failure is inevitable. Having become a true believer in totalitarianism, Zola joins the newly-formed S.H.I.E.L.D. and goes about reforming HYDRA within its ranks, all the while masterminding global conflicts to make the people desperate for security. To do this, he abducts and brainwashes people into being "Winter Soldier" assassins, keeping them in stasis and torturously memory wiping them between missions. All of this culminates in a plot to launch Project Insight, which will trap the world in an eternal surveillance state and give HYDRA the ability to slaughter any dissidents, with it being explicitly stated that this will lead to tens of millions of deaths.
Here. I'll do Daedalus later since he was just ep'd.
- A Study in Crimson: Sherlock Holmes 1942 by Robert J. Harris: Karl Braun is a Nazi spy who took the alias of trusted British official Philip Raynor, planning to kill Winston Churchill and destabilize Britain. When an air raid of the Blitz leads to Karl injured and accidentally blurting his identity to a group of women, he decides to kill them to cover up his identity. Modeling his murders of these women after Jack the ripper himself, Karl takes the alias Crimson Jack to cover his crimes. Eventually picking off his victim one at a time, Karl is even willing to sell out his own country to save his own hide when captured.
Here's Leon's tweaked entry:
- The Fist of the Blue Sapphire: Leon Lowe is a respected businessman, criminal behavior psychologist, and former police officer who is responsible for keeping the jewel that to be the prize of a karate tournament in Singapore. Leon is a greedy man who, to keep the jewel to himself, kills numerous people, and plans to destroy the parts of Singapore that the tournament is in—including an entire populated hotel—and to create an city on top of the debris.
That's what I cobbled using the Case Closed wiki and the original entry:
- Leon Lowe is an businessmen/Police who is responsible for keeping the Jewel that is kept to be the winning prize of the Karate Tournament in Singapore. Despite being well respected by the people of Singapore, He serves as an greedy and obsessed businessmen who is willing to keep the Jewel by himself but also to destroy the parts of singapore that the tournament is in, plotting to Destroy an entire Hotel with people in it and create an city on top of the debris. He also have killed numerous people due to his obsession on the Jewel, including an Japanese Sea Photographer which he later hired His Son, who knows nothing about his father's death as his bodyguard, all for his greed and power.
I have another Toy Story fanfic keeper to propose and this time I was extra careful.
What is the Work
Revenge of the Energy Vampire is a Buzz Lightyear of Star Command fanfic where after the death of Nos-4-A2 he returns and seeks revenge for his defeat, no prizes for guessing who we will be talking about.
Who is Nos-4-A2 and What Has He Done?
Brain Pod 172 discovered Nos's body and set to work repairing him. He eventually succeeded but Nos immediately abandoned him and got to work hunting. He displays blatant sadism when hunting his prey he also drained his robot victim slowly and painfully. He also seems to be doing this for the purpose of increasing his power, as he powers up when he consumes the robot. Nos would also plan out his revenge and continue searching for a bigger power source.
Nos would kidnap XR and take him to a lair where he would start experimenting on him. When XR woke up Nos told him how he planned to slowly and painfully drain all the energy out of his body through Vampiric Draining and then bring him back so he can do it all over again several times. He would do exactly that with XR suffering in agony while it was happening while Nos enjoyed every minute of it hungry for more and more power as well as revenge.
Nos would then continue hunting more and more prey being shown draining the soul of another robot and power up further now being at 94%. He however took it a step further and sent a video of him torturing XR to the Star Command which included XR's on brother XL out of pure sadism.
Nos would continue torturing and draining XR for a while eventually getting to 100% power. XR tried to convince him to back down but Nos was having none of that he started slowly and painfully draining all the energy out of XR. Nos would continue torturing XR and seemingly kills him though he manages to just survive. He would then go out to continue searching for more prey.
He would later be confronted by the Star Command but would end up escaping. Unfortunately, this is where the fic ends as it doesn't seem that the author ever completed it.
Does he have any Mitigating Factors or Freudian Excuse?
There are a few I should talk about. First of all, is the fact that Nos apparently felt some gratitude for the Brain Pod bringing him back. Though this is pretty shallow in my opinion he knows that the Brain-Pod wants to use him for his own purposes and Nos immediately abandons him without saying anything or showing any gratitude making this supposed gratitude an Informed Attribute at best, he also never brings up the Brain Pod nor is he ever mentioned again. Also, it seems to be more happiness at the fact he was brought back to life rather than anything genuine.
Now as for the tone yes this fic is darker than the show but it never gets to the point of being excessive or ridiculous. The tone remains mostly the same with the darkest it gets being Nos's torture of XR but it isn't super graphic even if it is described in some detail and this kind of stuff is something Nos apparently threatened to do in the actual show here he was just able to follow through with it. If anything Nos is actually less evil than in canon as he lacks his plan to devour all life in the galaxy.
Also, no the fic is just not a bad guy committing atrocities for no reason yeah Nos does play a large role to the point where he is basically the Villain Protagonist but there are some chapters like 2 and 4 that don't focus solely on him and focus on other characters.
As for him being different enough, this version of Nos has a completely different motive that being revenge instead of hunger and the crime of his brutal torture of XR is unique to the fic instead of being something carried over from the show.
Does he meet the Heinousness Standard?
I would say pretty easily as I said he is basically the Villain Protagonist so he doesn’t have much competition at all. While his crimes aren't the biggest in the world he makes up for it in sheer cruelty he hunted multiple robots brutally draining them of their energy while enjoying every single second of it. There is also his absolutely horrible torture of XR where he would painfully drain him and then constantly revive him only to do it over and over again.
Final Verdict?
I would personally say yes but if you want to make sure feel free to read the fic it's not super long anyway.
to Red King due to lacking characterization/onscreen presence.
Nice Zola writeup.
@miraculous: "Eventually picking off his victim one at a time[...]" victim should be plural, otherwise good writeup.
EDIT: ![]()
@ACW: Which of the two Lowe entries is the one to be kept? I noticed a few mistakes in each (sorry, when I say I'm a grammar Nazi I'm not kidding).
Edited by Paireon on Jun 18th 2021 at 6:15:03 AM
I know this: if life is illusion, then I am no less an illusion, and being thus, the illusion is real to me.
