TVTropes Now available in the app store!
Open

Follow TV Tropes

Following

Subpages cleanup: Complete Monster

Go To

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:

     Previous Post 
Complete Monster Cleanup Thread

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. "[tup] 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

Krystoff Since: Jun, 2012
#2751: Aug 30th 2012 at 11:11:42 AM

[up] I actually wanted to talk about Transformers examples. I think Dylan is definitely a candidate, Laserbeak should be cut because he doesn't really do that much, while the Fallen sounds good too.

I also like your detailed description of this trope above, but I have to point out something;

But what if Word Of God declares the character a Complete Monster?: That is insufficient. While the author may have intended the character to qualify, this does not mean that they presented the character as a Complete Monster successfully.

The authors don't browse TV Tropes. So they may consider their character pure evil, but they aren't using the same criteria as we are. So their word is not just insufficient, but totally meangless. Is that what you meant Footsteps by the way?

edited 30th Aug '12 11:11:52 AM by Krystoff

DrPsyche Avatar by Leafsnake from Hawaii Since: May, 2012
Avatar by Leafsnake
#2752: Aug 30th 2012 at 11:20:33 AM

YMMV Transformers page: we need to decide what counts, then put it on the monster subpage for transformers, as well.

Should we delete the entry on the YMMV and put a link to the transformers Monster subpage in its place, like the Ensemble Dark Horse entry?

edited 30th Aug '12 11:21:11 AM by DrPsyche

OccasionalExister Since: Jul, 2012
#2753: Aug 30th 2012 at 11:22:13 AM

@32Footsteps: I agree with all of your decisions regarding the Final Fantasy Complete Monster page. I also agree that Kevin counts.

I hope I'm not piling things on, but I had a few proposed rewrites for the examples on the Complete Monster page. Just to eliminate Word Cruft and expand on the crimes of certain individuals:

Fallout 2

  • Frank Horrigan, a CIA agent and The Dragon to President Dick Richardson. A psychopath even before his mutation, Horrigan delighted in killing whenever he could. His first onscreen appearance has him gunning down a family, including their child, for refusing his demands. Later, he gleefully kills Brotherhood of Steel agent, Matt, and wipes out the entire community of peaceful, talking deathclaws that the player had earlier befriended. Horrigan has a special hatred for “mutants”, humans and creatures that have been exposed to the FEV virus or even the slightest amount of radiation. This racism leads to him aiding in the Enclave’s plan to unleash a biological weapon which will wipe out all mutated life in North America, in order to make America “genetically pure.” He's also a Super Mutant himself, but he doesn't consider himself one because his mutation was altered by Enclave scientists.
  • Myron, a chemist who, in exchange for money and whores, invented the drug “Jet” for the Mordino crime family. He perfected the drug’s recipe by experimenting on hundreds of slaves with heart conditions, killing nearly all of them by inducing heart attacks. Not only does he take pride in how many lives have been ruined by his drug, but, if the Player Character is female and has low intelligence, he will also attempt to rape her by giving her a drugged drink.
Fallout 3
  • Mr. Burke, the right-hand man of Allistair Tenpenny. After Tenpenny decided he wanted the town of Megaton destroyed because it was an eyesore, he tasked Burke with setting off the undetonated nuke in the middle of the town. However, first he ordered Burke to evacuate the town and surrounding area of people. Burke instead decided set off the nuke with the town still occupied. What’s worse is that he will set off the nuke even if Tenpenny is dead and he has no reason to do so. Burke also has no loyalty to his boss, and, if Roy Phillips killed Tenpenny and every other resident in the hotel Burke will say that what Roy did was “inspired.”
  • Roy Phillips, a ghoul with severe hatred towards humans. If the Lone Wanderer negotiates with Tenpenny and his tenants to let the ghouls move in, eventually upon returning to Tenpenny Tower, all the human residents have vanished. If you check the basement, you'll find the corpses of the missing people stripped of all their possessions. Even Herbert Dashwood, who supported ghoul equality, is among the dead. If confronted, Roy tells you to fuck off before he adds you to the pile. Should Burke still be alive and nuke Megaton, Phillips will be ecstatic seeing “that smoothskin shithole” wiped out and offer Burke employment.
  • Dr. Stanislaus Braun, the Overseer of Vault 112 who controls the virtual reality simulation where he and the other vault members reside. For the past 200 years he’s been entertaining himself by torturing and killing every person inside the simulation, only to bring them back to life and torment and kill them over and over again. He specifically mentions that doing so is only fun because they are real people, and not computer simulations. Before Braun allows the Lone Wanderer to leave the simulation, he forces the player to do increasingly horrible things to the other Vault residents, culminating in the deaths of all inhabitants by the player’s hands. Braun was also involved in the development of the Vaults, which were advertised as safe havens for mankind but, in actuality, were twisted experiments conducted on unwilling participants For Science!. These experiments frequently resulted in the deaths, or worse, of everyone involved with them.
Fallout New Vegas
  • Cook-Cook. The Fiends themselves are always chaotic psychos who torture people for fun, but Cook-Cook is so bad that he is barely tolerated even by the other Fiends. He alternates between burning people alive and raping them, such as he did with Corporal Betsy and Pretty Sarah, the latter of whom he disfigured via burning. Two Westsider slavers, who only stopped raping their slaves because it lowered their value, were disgusted when Cook-Cook didn't even wait for them to turn around before enjoying a family he bought from them, starting with their son. One time, he bought some teenage slaves, 3 girls and a boy. The boy was burned alive and the girls made to watch. He is also implied to be a cannibal.
  • The Omerta leadership, with the exception of Cachino. Big Sal and Nero secretly working for Caesar's Legion to chlorine bomb New Vegas and massacre the city’s entire population as soon as the battle at Hoover Dam begins. They also get their prostitutes addicted to drugs to force them to be dependent upon their bosses, framed a man for murder to blackmail him into working for them, and give their hookers to Clanden to be raped, tortured and killed. All of this is done for money and power.
    • Clanden, at first he seems like a perfectly normal, friendly man, but investigation reveals him to be a Serial Killer who makes snuff films of himself raping and torturing women to death. In exchange for a constant supply of hookers to kill, he makes chlorine bombs for the Omertas to use in their attack on New Vegas. If the player blackmails him into leaving New Vegas he’ll be okay with it, saying he can always “find more girls to play with” elsewhere.
  • Father Elijah from Dead Money. The former elder of the Mojave Wasteland Brotherhood of Steel, his obsession with old world technology led to him getting his people slaughtered at the battle for HELIOS. After fleeing the battle, he sought out the fabled Sierra Madre Casino, a treasure-trove of lost technology which he wanted to use to "wipe the slate clean." In order to obtain the casino's treasures, he kidnapped dozens of people, attached slave collars to their necks, and blew their heads off unless they acted as cannon fodder for the Sierra Madre’s defenses. Once the Player Character reaches the Sierra Madre, Elijah orders him/her to kill off the allies that had helped them, and later tries to kill the Courier him/herself for outliving their usefulness. Elijah’s ultimate goal is to use the Sierra Madre’s technology to kill off every person in the Mojave, and then build a new nation where every person will be collared and forced to obey him.
  • Salt-Upon-Wounds, the leader of the White Legs from Honest Hearts. In order to join Caesar’s Legion, he was tasked with destroying the peaceful town of New Canaan. Being a Dirty Coward who knew he couldn’t defeat the Canaanites in a straight fight, Salt-Upon-Wounds and his men burned the surrounding communities to the ground, pretended to be refugees so the New Canaanites would let them into their town, and then killed everyone there. The old and sick were butchered as they tried to leave. Priests were burned alive in churches. The children were beaten to death with clubs as they slept.

EDIT: @Largo Quagmire: Wow, I agree with Henry's inclusion.

edited 30th Aug '12 12:23:09 PM by OccasionalExister

EarlOfSandvich Since: Jun, 2011
#2754: Aug 30th 2012 at 11:32:08 AM

[up] Looks good. I'll make sure to keep note of this on the sandbox. Oh, and is there anything else for Vulpes or is there a case against keeping him there?

EDIT: Oh yes, and I can make a case for Mortimer. My fleshed-out description for him is in the subpage's discussion. The entry on him got removed earlier because the excerpt referred to (through paraphrasing) "he's a cannibal who kidnaps" and that's it.

edited 30th Aug '12 11:54:12 AM by EarlOfSandvich

I now go by Graf von Tirol.
OccasionalExister Since: Jul, 2012
#2755: Aug 30th 2012 at 11:48:28 AM

[up]Thanks man. The only other bad thing I can think of that Vulpes did was his betrayal of Ulysses's tribe, the Twisted Hairs. He used them, then, once they had outlived their usefulness, destroyed them and absorbed the remnants into the Legion. I don't know if that's heinous enough to worth mentioning though, since it's standard Legion operating procedure.

rmctagg09 The Wanderer from Brooklyn, NY (Before Recorded History) Relationship Status: I won't say I'm in love
The Wanderer
#2756: Aug 30th 2012 at 11:56:44 AM

You should also mention that Horrigan was a hypocrite as he's technically a Super Mutant himself.

edited 30th Aug '12 11:57:01 AM by rmctagg09

Hugging a Vanillite will give you frostbite.
OccasionalExister Since: Jul, 2012
#2757: Aug 30th 2012 at 12:10:12 PM

[up]Thanks, fixed in my original post.

32_Footsteps Think of the mooks! from Just north of Arkham Since: Jan, 2001 Relationship Status: THIS CONCEPT OF 'WUV' CONFUSES AND INFURIATES US!
Think of the mooks!
#2758: Aug 30th 2012 at 12:19:00 PM

@2751 I wouldn't say the author's commentary on the subject is totally meaningless. It doesn't affect how I vote when it comes time to weigh them; however, it can inspire me to take a look at the character in the first place.

Also, two things. One, while not all authors do visit this wiki, there are those that do. Second, when I say "Word of God calls the character a Complete Monster," I'm hoping that it's implicit that it doesn't have to be a specific cite to the trope name. Instead, it can be any reference by the original creator that the character is any number of synonyms for the trope name that we use here.

(Not that it's particularly valid for these purposes, but while I support the trope and continue to work on it, I positively hate the name "Complete Monster" for philosophical reasons. That said, it has plenty of penetration in the Troper Hive Mind and lots of reach outside of the wiki, so changing it would be detrimental to all involved.)

Anyhow, for weighing actual examples...

@2750 Ah... as we've said before, you can never assume familiarity amongst all people with the subject. I'm a little leery of what they claim to kill (concerns about false confessions and the like), but what can be provably traceable to him (such as the niece example) sounds like it'd be enough. That said, an entry should not mention that he was based on a real person, because that's when we start to dance on the line about No Real Life Examples Please.

@2752 That sounds like a great idea.

@2753 Going over what you've written:

  • Frank Horrigan - Mostly good, although you need to have a comma after his name. Also, being a hypocrite is really incidental compared to attempted genocide. It's the jaywalking in Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking, and the entry is perfectly strong without it.
  • Myron - Good.
  • Mr. Burke - Good (especially since I was leaning no at first).
  • Dr. Braun - The entry is well-written; however, I'm not so sure he counts as heinous compared to some of the others. Cold-Blooded Torture on its own isn't enough in the Fallout universe, and I'd need details about what he did with the Vaults that was so bad.
  • Cook-cook - Good.
  • Big Sal and Nero - I have concerns if they count as truly heinous, given the others.
  • Clanden - Good.
  • Father Elijah - Keep.
  • Salt-Upon-Wounds - Keep.

Mortimer is another where I don't think they meet the heinous standard. Look, we've got several cases of attempted genocide above. We have cases where someone was a rapist and a cannibal. Cannibalism alone just isn't going to cut it.

I think the Vulpes entry is fine as-is; betraying the Twisted Hairs sounds like a standard modus operandi rather than a qualifier in this universe.

edited 30th Aug '12 12:20:23 PM by 32_Footsteps

Reminder: Offscreen Villainy does not count towards Complete Monster.
LargoQuagmire Since: Jan, 2010 Relationship Status: YOU'RE TEARING ME APART LISA
#2759: Aug 30th 2012 at 1:17:51 PM

@32_Footsteps - I'll get a more elaborate example for Henry and Otis after class today, one that's more than their names. I'll be sure to omit any mention of the real-life inspirations. I was doing a quick rewatch of the first scene, and it might take me a bit of time to stomach a rewatch. For your sanity: one of the first opening pans shows a dead woman on a toilet with a bottle shoved down her throat, along with other of Henry's victims. If anyone's seen this recently, it'd be of great help to me if they could give me a run-down of Otis' dismemberment, because I couldn't even stomach that the first time.

DrPsyche Avatar by Leafsnake from Hawaii Since: May, 2012
Avatar by Leafsnake
#2760: Aug 30th 2012 at 1:39:25 PM

Fallout 2 examples: never played it, so I have a fresh perspective again... (I need to get out moresad). They look good, you explain to me what they've done, and I don't need to know anymore to know how bad he was.

Transformers YMMV Examples:

Laserbeak: he's bad, murders numerous people on screen, and expresses a joy in doing so, but does he meet the heinous standard?

Shockwave: Cut. He shows up, has one line of dialogue, shoots at the hero and some buildings, and gets killed. In the comics, however, he was set up as a legitimate threat, and killed several autobots, and humans (remember the Jerkass government agent from the second movie, he was reduced to a charred skeleton). Despite this, I can't see him as especially bad, he kills the heroes, but he follows Megatron's direction and seeks to obtain the allspark to restore cybertron. He doesn't come off as anything more than a more competent villain (in the comics) or an over hyped Giant Mook (In the film).

Soundwave: Murdering a defenseless scientist is a moral event horizon. Sentinal Prime rained destruction down on a planet, and murdered the autobots who trusted him. The Fallen murdered his brothers, and sought to kill organic life. I don't see soundwave meeting the heinous standard. In the IDW comics, the Dinobots were known for murdering surrendering bots, but that's an alternate continuity and irrelevant. I move to cut.

I'll write arguments for the rest later.

edited 30th Aug '12 3:40:56 PM by DrPsyche

OccasionalExister Since: Jul, 2012
#2761: Aug 30th 2012 at 2:31:49 PM

[up]Fear not good Dr, you are among friends here! grin Thank you for your input. I agree with cutting Soundwave and Shockwave. Laserbeak I'm on the fence about because he does comes across as more sadistic in his actions than other Decepticons, particularly his killing of that one family.

@Largo Quagmire: Aaaaaand, here come the nightmares.

@32_Footsteps: As for Braun he was the Director of the Vault experiments, or the "Societal Preservation Program", which used the Vaults to gather unknowing, human guinea pigs to conduct horrific science and social experiments on. These experiments include forcibly turning people into Super Mutants, tricking people into sacrificing their fellow citizens, driving people insane via pumping hallucinogetic drugs into their ventilation system, and implanting posthypnotic combat suggestions into people's minds through white-noise, which also drove everyone insane. Most of the experiments resulted in the deaths of every Vault member involved. Overseers, such as the one in charge of Vault 101, got their orders directly from Braun. The stated goal of these experiments was finding out how humans would repopulate a nuclear war ravaged earth. Braun, however, simply seems to be a sadist who revells in his power over life and death. In Tranquility Lane he takes great pains to make his citizens' lives miserable on even the smallest of levels. There's also evidence that shows he was once very involved with activating and assigning Vaults, before becoming obsessed with his simulation and playing god with his citizens.

edited 30th Aug '12 2:44:04 PM by OccasionalExister

DrPsyche Avatar by Leafsnake from Hawaii Since: May, 2012
Avatar by Leafsnake
#2762: Aug 30th 2012 at 2:55:07 PM

[up] Thank you for the encouragement Occasional Exister.

Okay: Sentinal: His entry mentions Alternate Character Interpretation, and the Monster characterization comes from a theory. If the movie is taken on its own, Sentinel is a Well Intentioned Extremist, if one read the comics backing the movie, one would call him a fallen hero and Well Intentioned extremist. Point is, He's doing what he thinks is best for his race, restoring their planet even at the cost of another. Cut Him.

Flatline: Only one appearance (and a cameo or two), Messes with protoforms (The building blocks of transformer life), gives Skids and Mudflap Brain damage (Scrappy or not, they're children). He bonded Arcee to her sisters, intending to create a weapon and destroy her mind, when that fails he attempts to kill her, thinking she was a failed experiment. His Affable nature could be seems to be a Faux Affably Evil nature instead (he was polite, but I treat it as mocking her). I vote to keep.

edited 30th Aug '12 3:31:41 PM by DrPsyche

Krystoff Since: Jun, 2012
#2763: Aug 30th 2012 at 4:27:33 PM

I am also behind cutting Sentinel, Shockwave and Soundwave; the first is Well-Intentioned Extremist and the latter two don't reach the heinous standard.

I would keep The Fallen and Gould though.

As for Laserbeak, while killing a poor family is certainly evil, but that doesn't compare to the actions committed The Fallen, Gould, or even Sentinel (disqualified for different reasons), so I lean towards cut.

edited 30th Aug '12 4:27:59 PM by Krystoff

DrPsyche Avatar by Leafsnake from Hawaii Since: May, 2012
Avatar by Leafsnake
#2764: Aug 30th 2012 at 5:44:30 PM

And now for Megatron. He was The Dreaded in the first movie, and the only competent Decepticon, capable of wiping the floor with Optimus. Second movie he's even more powerful, and promptly gets his ass handed to him, only killing Prime with a cheap shot. Third movie he's a hobo... Wow.

Does he pass the heinous standard... Well, one could argue him as a well intentioned extremist, especially in the 3rd movie, where he enacts a plan to re-energize their world at the cost of earth. By the third he's kind of pitiable in that he's failed so much, but that doesn't matter in terms of this trope, as he doesn't regret his actions. He does kill Jazz in the first movie, and Optimus in the second. He kills numerous humans, thinking them as insects.

Also from the page:

Sure he wants to restore Cybertron to its former glory, but is willing to kill anything and everything in his way in order to accomplish his goal.

That's from the page, that is the definition of Well intentioned Extremist. Doing evil actions does not make one a Complete monster if they do it for a cause they think is just. That sentence does not qualify Megatron as a CM, in fact it disqualifies him.

honestly, I can't find him more heinous than Flatline or the fallen, so I vote to cut, but I'm happy to hear a counter argument.

edited 30th Aug '12 5:45:00 PM by DrPsyche

OccasionalExister Since: Jul, 2012
#2765: Aug 30th 2012 at 6:11:12 PM

I agree with the removal of Sentinel Prime, he may have crossed the Moral Event Horizon, but he's a Well-Intentioned Extremist so that's moot. Now that I've thought about it more, I agree that Lazerbeak should be removed as well. He's sadistic but there's a strong enough doubt in my mind that he doesn't meet the heinous standard. Finally, Megatron, he's the Big Bad but he's become pretty pathetic by the time of the third movie, and even in the earlier movies he only did generic Big Bad villainy. I agree with removing him.

edited 30th Aug '12 6:11:54 PM by OccasionalExister

ChaoticQueen Since: Mar, 2011
#2766: Aug 30th 2012 at 7:04:50 PM

I deleted anything that calls Marx a Complete Monster since nobody argued with me.

DrPsyche Avatar by Leafsnake from Hawaii Since: May, 2012
Avatar by Leafsnake
#2767: Aug 30th 2012 at 8:14:49 PM

[up] Yeah, I don't think anyone objected.

EarlOfSandvich Since: Jun, 2011
#2768: Aug 30th 2012 at 8:25:22 PM

So any thoughts on Big Sal and Nero? I know that Clanden gets the spot without a doubt. The bosses do engage in illicit, exploitative activities and they do play a role in the chlorine bombing plot, but could that still be enough to keep them?

I now go by Graf von Tirol.
rmctagg09 The Wanderer from Brooklyn, NY (Before Recorded History) Relationship Status: I won't say I'm in love
The Wanderer
#2769: Aug 30th 2012 at 9:04:59 PM

I think Nero and Big Sal ought to be kept.

Hugging a Vanillite will give you frostbite.
32_Footsteps Think of the mooks! from Just north of Arkham Since: Jan, 2001 Relationship Status: THIS CONCEPT OF 'WUV' CONFUSES AND INFURIATES US!
Think of the mooks!
#2770: Aug 31st 2012 at 8:13:08 AM

Oops, forgot to comment on Marx. Well, you waited 6 days, that was more than fair. Also, in retrospect, I would have voted to cut as well, so I think that was all above board.

For Nero and Big Sal - as things are written, I'm not so sure they qualify. Again, keep in mind just how heinous someone in the Fallout universe must be. The above description doesn't state just how murderous they can be. Just how invested are they in the chlorine bombing plot? Is it a condition of getting some assistance from Caesar's Legion, or is it something that they've got a personal investment in?

For Braun... okay, that gives me a more complete picture of him. I vote to keep, although some of the info in @2761 needs to be added to the entry to give a better picture.

For the Transformers entries - Dr Psyche, you've done a yeoman's job on that. I agree with all of your suggestions.

Reminder: Offscreen Villainy does not count towards Complete Monster.
Krystoff Since: Jun, 2012
#2771: Aug 31st 2012 at 9:22:51 AM

[up] And what is you opinion on Dylan and Fallen; you didn't make it clear for me.

32_Footsteps Think of the mooks! from Just north of Arkham Since: Jan, 2001 Relationship Status: THIS CONCEPT OF 'WUV' CONFUSES AND INFURIATES US!
Think of the mooks!
#2772: Aug 31st 2012 at 9:25:00 AM

Those two, I discussed in @2747, as they were two of the three on the Film.Transformers page.

Reminder: Offscreen Villainy does not count towards Complete Monster.
OccasionalExister Since: Jul, 2012
#2773: Aug 31st 2012 at 9:30:59 AM

[up]Alright, how about this for Braun:

  • Dr. Stanislaus Braun, the Overseer of Vault 112 who controls the virtual reality simulation where he and the other vault members reside. A sadist with a god complex, for the past 200 years he’s been entertaining himself by torturing and killing every person inside the simulation, only to bring them back to life to torment and kill them over and over again. He specifically mentions that doing so is only fun because they are real people, and not computer simulations. Before Braun allows the Lone Wanderer to leave the simulation, he forces the player to do increasingly horrible things to the other Vault residents, culminating in the deaths of all inhabitants by the player’s hands. Braun was also the Director of the "Societal Preservation Program", better known as the Vault experiments. Advertised as providing civilians shelter from the expected nuclear war, in actuality the purpose of the Vaults was to gather unknowing, human guinea pigs to conduct horrific experiments on For Science! These experiments include forcibly turning Vault citizens into Super Mutants, tricking people into ritualistically sacrificing their fellow citizens, pumping hallucinogetic drugs into their ventilation system, and driving people insane by implanting posthypnotic combat suggestions into their minds through white-noise. Most of the Vault experiments resulted in the deaths, or worse, of everyone involved with them.

As for Nero and Big Sal, they do have a personal investment in the chlorine bombing. They've been promised control over New Vegas in exchange for their cooperation, and they hate Mr. House because they perceive him to be lording over them. The only rule the Omertas have is "don't go against the family," which is punishable by death, but that doesn't seem to be a virtue of loyalty, it just seems to be a way of keeping their people in line. For example, you can trick Big Sal into killing his boss Nero, realitvely easily, and Sal's dialogue implies that both of them were planning on killing each other anyway. I feel it's also important to note that they're selling out the rest of the Mojave to Caesar's Legion, which commonly practices slavery, crucifiction, rape, and cannibalism, not because they believe in Caesar's ideals, just because they want power. I don't know if I can call them sadistic, but, Big Sal at least, is incredibly callous and disdainful towards the people they'll be killing.

Big Sal: "First we're going to blow the embassy, then we're going to use soldiers to kill every last motherfucker on the Strip. Then we'll run this joint. That'll teach Not-At-Home what can go on while he sits in his fucking ivory tower lording down from on high."

edited 31st Aug '12 9:37:21 AM by OccasionalExister

DrPsyche Avatar by Leafsnake from Hawaii Since: May, 2012
Avatar by Leafsnake
#2774: Aug 31st 2012 at 10:01:13 AM

@ Footsteps: Thank you for the complement. I'm a big Transformers fan, so this comes easy.

@ Occasional Exister: Very good entry for Braun.

Okay, I'm going to delete Shockwave, Laserbeak, Soundwave, Megatron, and Sentinel Prime from the list, If anyone has an objection, voice it in twenty four hours, because this time tomorrow I'm deleting them. Thanks for your input.

edited 31st Aug '12 11:55:09 AM by DrPsyche

SeptimusHeap from Switzerland (Edited uphill both ways) Relationship Status: Mu
#2775: Aug 31st 2012 at 10:48:15 AM

Bringing up The Bible. For starters, a) that page should be locked and b) why are there so many entries in there?

  • Satan himself is known, through-out Western culture, as the ultimate example of evil. To most Christians, he is indeed pure evil and the source of all evil. In other interpretations, he's never directly described as being the creator of evil, even if he is the serpent that tempted Adam and Eve. He does become a true monster in Revelations, where he initiates The End of the World as We Know It, conquering the planet and scaring the pants off us so that he essentially rules as a god. That being said, he's also a variable character. It's never made clear whether he rebelled against God or tried to supplant Him himself. If you see a difference between those at all.
  • The Bible includes some other extremely ruthless, vile characters in human form, of which one of the most prominent would be the Pharaoh from Exodus. He oppresses the Israelites, forces them to work as slaves for him, sends men to kill their children and refuses to repent for any of this or let them go, even though he acknowledges God's existence and sees Moses perform miracles. The reasoning for this is his fear that the Israelites would grow to a number he couldn't contain. Later adaptations of the Exodus (not within the Bible, of course) tend to soften this somewhat, particularly The Prince Of Egypt, but nevertheless preserve the basic plot. As for the child murder spree bit, at least one official source (which was used for that particular moment of The Ten Commandments) has him do what Herod did (see below for more on that).
  • Haman, from the Purim Megilla, exceeds Pharaoh in moral depravity as arguably the worst villain in Biblical literature on par with Satan, being a Treacherous Advisor plotting the genocide of the Jewish people simply because he gets offended by one Jew's refusal to bow to him. His Xanatos Backfire at the gallows he had planned for Mordecai is also quite spectacular, especially after he went to King Ahasuerses to talk him into having Mordecai hanged, which Ahasuerses never gets around to due to an unrelated matter. Instead Haman winds up feting Mordecai for his heroism in saving the king's life from a couple of rebellious eunuchs. This leads to the point where even Haman's wife tells to his face that his obsession with killing the Jews would become self-destructive real soon.
  • Antioch from the Maccabees book. The terrible tortures he and his people subject a whole Jewish family to (seven teenage boys and their mother) are pure Nightmare Fuel, to the point where the author himself, after writing about how the family was boiled alive for their faith, actually said, "As for the rest of the martyrs who fell because of Antioch's killing spree against the Jews, need I say more?"
  • Herod the Great. We know from secular histories that he was a paranoid SOB who murdered his own sons when he suspected them of plotting against him and was, in fact, responsible for many massacres. Why do secular historians not cover the massacre of the infant boys in Bethelehem? For him, it was just another day, another possible threat dealt with. Or because there are no other records at all about this event - either because, like the census, that isn't mentioned by any Roman records, it was made up to add some glamour to Jesus' infancy or because Bethlehem was so small a village that very few children would have been killed in the event and not enough people wrote about it to provide us with surviving records. Herod knew that nobody would mourn his death after he killed every infant in Bethlehem with extreme prejudice, so he ordered every Jewish priest killed like those infants on the day he died just so there would be mourning in the land. This Thanatos Gambit was ultimately never carried out.
  • Jezebel wasn't a good customer either. She had most of God's prophets killed, tried to kill Elijah and crossed the Moral Event Horizon by having a righteous man stoned to death because her husband wanted his vineyard. Let's just say her Disney Villain Death was greatly deserved.
    • Her husband, Ahab, was the most wicked king of Israel, and yet how quickly he repented when he learned the end was near for his bloodline for his utterly enormous rap sheet actually led God to put off on making good his threat until his other son (his firstborn died from a fall for worshipping his father's god) was felled by one of his own men, who took the crown and made Baal worship anywhere in the nation of Israel a crime punishable by death (which led God to give him the longest-lasting dynasty of all Israelite kings despite his continued worshiping of Jeroboam's religion).
  • Some of the Romans that crucified Jesus beat him for no reason other then pure spiteful glee and humiliated his status as King of the Jews by sticking a crown of thorns onto his head.
  • The Pharisees were cruel, judgemental, Fundie religious authorities, who placed "heavy loads" on the backs of the Jews without lifting a finger to help. They rejected mercy and love in favor of being self-righteous and haughty. They condemned Jesus to Crucifixion, the cruelest, most humiliating, most barbaric method of execution employed by the Romans for the 'crime' of bringing hope and happiness to people and thus showing them up.

The Pharisees violate the "no group" rule.

The Romans, aprt from being a group, look more like Evil Is Petty.

Haman's entry both seems to disqualify the Pharaoh and violates Examples Are Not Arguable.

"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard Feynman

Total posts: 326,048
Top