Subpages cleanup: Complete Monster

That's a terrible example. It's badly written, and self-contradictory. If you haven't already, please ditch it.

Regarding Eddie—what are the rest of the Silent Hill villains like? I've read over the trope page, and it's a pretty freaky game. Is he really as bad as the various monsters, zombies, and other freaks?

The monsters are semi imaginary and have no sapience. The few human villain are usually sympathetic. The main cult from parts 1 and 3 honestly thinks they are serving God. Walter from part 4 is delusional and remains sympathetic throughout, and even gets an Alas, Poor Villain moment in the endings where he dies. The town itself creates monsters to punish those that have sinned. James killed his wife, but actively seeks atonement. Angela killed her father, but was justified because he constantly raped her. Eddie feels no remorse for anything, is relatively sane, and knows exactly what he's doing.

Slenderman: I would say he's subject to Blue and Orange morality, but that's not why I'd cut the example, I'd cut it because It's just an interpretation, not set in stone.

Ghetis: More evil than the average Big Bad, Not a CM, but I would like to see what he does in Black and White 2 (Which haven't happened yet, so not adding)

Eddie: Well, Judge Holloway in Silent Hill Homecoming was pretty bad (possibly the worst human being in the series), having all those people kill their children for a god she may or may not believe in (She says that her section broke away from the order, and her Motive Rant is about her having control over the townsfolk rather than believing in a higher power). Eddie was bullied so he shot a dog and kneecapped the bully (Offstage Villainy). Does the murder of those people count as Offstage Villainy? We just find the corpses, and he admits to it, but we don't even see a Gory Discretion shot. I'd call him small potatoes and emotionally disturbed, but I'm on the fence about him.

EDIT: As for the town itself, I don't know if it punishes evil people, all I know is that it's an Eldrich Location which likes to dick around with all who enter (or forces to enter). I woudn't call it a CM because of the Blue and Orange Morality (I know we aren't arguing if the town counts, that's just my 2 cents).

edited 9th Sep '12 10:09:21 PM by DrPsyche

Here's an honest question I have regarding Complete Monsters. Why do their heinous actions need to be compared to other villains? If the person is pure evil, then he's pure evil. Just because someone else is even more monstrous, it doesn't make the first guy any less evil.

Here's a scenario: Mr. Big Bad is a serial killer who rapes his victims and mails their chopped up corpses to their families. That alone just screams "Complete Monster." Then Emperor Evulz comes along and blows up half of Africa just because he thinks it's fun. Now Emperor Evulz is the new Complete Monster and Mr. Big Bad is just some nobody.

Seriously, why? How is the one guy not a Complete Monster just because the other guy is worse?

It's because what classifies as "truly henious" is dependent on the standards of a work. For example, in a light-hearted cartoon series a villian who captures innocent people to horrifically torture them could be called a complete monster (provided all other criteria was met) because by the standard of that work it's impossible to top that. Take taht same villian, same actions, and throw him into the Warhammer40000 universe and suddenly he's not the peak of villiany anymore.

The trope is reserved for those who are 100% pure evil. Not 99.9%. If you can name a villian who is objectively leaps and bounds worse than them in the same work, they don't count because clearly they could be more evil.

EDIT: Just to complicate things more, actions can be considered less horrific the more commonplace it takes place in. A murder in a nice little town that no murders have ever happened in will get more of a response out of the locals than a murder in Gotham City, because murder is so common place in the latter that each individual one loses it's impact.

It also helps keep the list down. The trope is meant to be the most triumpth examples, but people were literally throwing every villian they could think of on them, which just devalued the trope.

edited 9th Sep '12 10:48:40 PM by Shaoken

Thank you for taking the time to explain that to me. I get it now.

@ Game Sorcerer, I reread the entire Necromancers Of China Saga from a viewer's perspective and... you're right. Jasmine does give the impression of a Complete Monster after all. Now the vote is 5 yes and 2 no. (I'm not counting myself since I co-wrote it.)

That's not to say a work can't have more than one monster, if they have similar levels of evil, or are just so different that it's hard to compare them. In the example you gave, it would be possible for both the genocidal dictator and the Serial Killer to qualify, but the series would have to do a really good job of showing why the serial killer was just as evil as the dictator (preferrably by demonstrating that the only thing holding him back is a lack of opportunity). If that doesn't happen, then Shaoken put it best—the standards for heinous now mean the serial killer likely doesn't count.

I really seem to have missed out on the Jasmine discussion. Reading the entry over, I don't have a strong opinion either way.

edited 9th Sep '12 11:47:38 PM by AmbarSonofDeshar

That's actually something I've been wondering for the longest time, how to judge what's "heinous by the standards of the series." Personally, I see no reason why a rapist Serial Killer and a genocidal maniac can't both count for the trope. Just because one of them has more resources at his disposal than the Serial Killer does, that doesn't mean the Serial Killer is less evil than the other, just less "lucky." I think Ambar's put it into the best terms I can agree with. So long as the story hammers the point home that certain characters are Pure Evil but are being held back from acting on the full extent of their evil by circumstances beyond their control, then there's no reason for a "less accomplished monster" not to count.

Anyway, getting back to a current example, I'd say Eddie doesn't count. He doesn't strike me as a Complete Monster, just a guy who went nuts.

edited 10th Sep '12 12:49:11 AM by OccasionalExister

On the topic of the Dictator and the Serial Killer, there are different kinds of evil. The former is a Complete Monster on a large-scale, the latter is one on a small scale.

As for Eddie I vote that he doesn't count, simply put he has an on-screen evil count of one action.

Oh, I could have sworn that being surrounded by the bodies of the people you killed didn't count as Offscreen Villainy. I guess it does then.

@ Chaotic Queen, thank you for taking the time to wheigh the scales. Ib think everything that needs to be said about Jasmine, a literal wolf in sheep's clothing, has already been said. So, fellow tropers, what's the final judgment? An Unintentionally Unsympathetic Complete Monster, or a broken Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds?

EDIT: That first paragraph probably came off as sarcastic. It was sincere.

edited 10th Sep '12 5:26:44 AM by GameSorcerer

I don't remember Eddy being surronded by the bodies of people he'd killed. I remember there being dead monsters around there. But either way we don't actually see him kill them and considering the mindfuck-ness of the series (one of the corpses you come across in the room you meet Eddy is James' corpse, in the same pose he assumes after he finds out he murdered his wife).

Plus again the point wasn't that he was a Complete Monster, it was that he became insane from everything.

Just a little correction, Eddie is not in the same room where you find that body. He's not even on the same floor. The corpse near Eddie was lying down in a fridge.

So. I made a monster page for Redwall a while back.

I notice none of the entries have been dropped, so I'm presuming that cleanup hasn't quite reached that page yet.

Actually, main reason I added that page is that it was stretching the main monster page for Literature because there were so many.

Bit of a random question but skimming through the usage counts I came across a few examples that said Complete Monster with Played for Laughs in the descriptions. Isn't that just Card-Carrying Villain?

^Yes. A Complete Monster by definition is never Played for Laughs. Purge these examples.

It's literally impossible to play a monster for laughs. The fact that they aren't taken seriously means that they don't bring fear/disgust to the characters/audience. Perfect example: Black Mage.

But that doesn't mean a monster can't still be funny. Just look at The Joker and Kefka.

Or Xykon, for that matter. His villainy is treated extraordinarily seriously by the narrative; the comedy comes from his But for Me, It Was Tuesday approach to the whole matter, mixed with Crosses the Line Twice.

edited 10th Sep '12 6:49:42 AM by Fighteer

Even Jasmine serves as a source for comedy. Her actions are taken seriously, but the humor comes from her being a lot stupider than she let's on.

I think I'll add Jasmine now since most seem to agree she counts. If anyone wants to object, here's your chance.

Sorry, when I hear the name Jasmine, I think of the Love Interest from Disney's Aladdin, and calling her a Complete Monster sounds ridiculous. I have no opinion on this other one.

I'm talking about Jasmine from the Necromancers Of China Saga, a Kung Fu Panda fanfic.

A browser crash ate my previous post. Sigh.

So, Ghetsis. Let's go over what he actually does In-Universe on-screen. He leads an army that's trying to disarm everyone else so that he can be free to conquer Unova. Fairly basic villainy. He raises a kid to be a Tyke-Bomb and insults him when his plan fails. He tries to harness the power of a world-changing 'mon to help with previous world-conquering. Finally, he does try to kill the main character arguably.

Even if you take the latter to be true, that's what villains do - they try to kill their opposition. Everything else is cut-rate villainy with a strong veneer of Jerkass. Since Offscreen Villainy doesn't count, and Wild Mass Guessing about suggested atrocities is a good way to get laughed out of this thread, this means to me that Ghetsis doesn't qualify.

For that matter, on the Monster.Pokemon page, you can pretty much say the same thing about almost all of the Cipher admins mentioned (except they don't have the suggested child abuse on their heads). Plus, as mentioned on the page, they do apologize at the end and suggest that they'll turn over a new leaf. A true Complete Monster would never do that. Finally, the section on the Orre villains (Colosseum/XD Gale of Darkness) tries to include all of Cipher as a team. No groups, cut.

I would give credit to Pokemon Mystery Dungeon and Darkrai, as well as Purple Eyes of Pokemon Ranger. Those need rewriting, though - make it clear that Darkrai is performing Mind Rape and is an Omnicidal Maniac reaching beyond his own world. And I need to seriously trim down Purple Eyes - too much jaywalking in the middle of describing the arson and murder.

So I would move those latter two examples to the Video Games page and cut the Monster.Pokemon subpage.

The Slender Man should definitely be cut. The stories don't even make it clear if Slendy is actually malevolent at all; he's almost more of a force of nature. In fact, I think it'd ruin Slendy if he was truly defined as a Complete Monster. It'd ground him into reality too much, and he's much scarier as something almost totally unknown. Besides, there's also the reasonable theory that he just warps reality and breaks minds without intending it; it's not his fault.

Eddie from Silent Hill 2 - You know, the page for the game here says that pretty much everything assumed to be his fault happens off-screen. Plus, you also get into the Mind Screw of whether or not he was really there. Unless someone has misinformed me, it sounds like he hasn't done enough on-screen to count.

@3033 - Admittedly, the "by the standards of the series" part is one of the trickiest parts of dealing with this trope. It was the hardest issue I had with writing the FAQ. I typically look at it this way - is there some fashion in which this villain shines above all others in this series? Are they more bloody than anyone else? Are they more of a sexual predator than anyone else? Are they more sadistic than anyone else? Are they more pointlessly cruel than anyone else? I will award credit to both parties for ties, though.

Also, for the record, don't simply state a character's name and expect people to get it. Especially if there's a more well-known character by the same name (in terms of the name "Jasmine," I don't think I need to point out that a Disney animated movie is going to be more widely recognized than a fanfic). You may be able to get away with it if the name is unusual, fairly rare (if not unique), and fairly well-known (such as, well, Kefka and Xykon). But in general, not the best practice.

edited 10th Sep '12 7:54:44 AM by 32_Footsteps

Okay, I'll clarify it this time.

In regards to Jasmine Crescent, the Big, Badass Wolf antagonist from the Kung Fu Panda fanfic series, the Necromancers Of China Saga, most who gave their opinion agree that she's a monster. Do I have the all clear to offically label Jasmine Crescent as a Complete Monster?

This is somewhat embarassing to ask, but where do I go to get permission to switch out the DCAU Monster page with the sandbox then get the page locked?

Well, if the page isn't locked, you can switch yourself. Just cite to consensus in this thread in the edit reasons. From there, Frequently Asked Questions has a thread about editing locked pages; you can request a lock in that thread.

Guess I'll take note of the Monster.Pokemon examples and place these two on the sandbox then...

A write-up for both of them would be nice.

edited 10th Sep '12 10:09:18 AM by EarlOfSandvich