Subpages cleanup: Complete Monster

To answer the last question, not very. But since that's totally irrelevant to the trope, who cares? It's completely irrelevant to determining a heinous standard. The character is Played for Laughs in a show that's already a comedy. She hasn't killed anybody, raped anybody, beaten anybody to a pulp, or otherwise inflicted injuries that cannot be recovered from. We have cut, and will continue to cut, people who have done much worse things. Take a look at some of the people we cut from Buffy. Take a look at some of the examples that got axed from the Gundam subpage, or god forbid, the Berserk subpage. She doesn't meet the criteria of the trope.

Footsteps, my complaint is that you demand people take comments about your forum etiquette to PM, then criticise other people's forum etiquette in the forum. I'm asking you to be fair. As long as you are willing to do for others, what you ask them to do for you, we aren't going to have any problems with each other.

edited 4th Feb '13 10:15:43 AM by AmbarSonofDeshar

Footsteps, I will address the remainder when I get him but two things

1. You are aware that Cutler Beckett had a child hanged onscreen (albeit with Gory Discretion Shot for obvious reasons)? I think that counts as onscreen along with all the other people he had hanged in te same scene

2. Brass in The Gravel In Your Guts is seen being confronted and cheerily explains he has to unfetter himself. Cut to his bed where we see mutilated, handcuffed corpses. Shunka (one if the mobsters if you aren't familiar with the series) later elaborates on what he did to them. His exact words are "stabbing and fucking them to death at once" from where they Brass's DNA.

3. You'll see Pullman get worse. 'Use' also definitely indicates rape occurred and te scratch on his shoulder indicates she fought back. He also commits the most onscreen deaths and isn't subject to te conspiracy as they'd like

I'll do a new Archmage write up later as the current one is just a stub

edited 4th Feb '13 10:15:05 AM by Lightysnake

Well as Footsteps noted, "used her like cattle" could indicate rape or cannibalism. The key thing for me here, is who gives a damn which it is? He either went back and raped her, or went back and ate her. Not seeing much of a moral difference there.

Just one thing I wouldn't want to comment on. While it does make sense that Beckett would be involved with slavery (while the films are an Anachronism Stew, I'm pretty sure the East India Company was involved with slavery at some points during the late 1700's- early 1800's), there's no reference to it in the movies, and I wouldn't really consider those tie-in novels to necessarily be canon.

Also, I'm not really protesting it counting toward his inclusion, but I can't help but note that executing that child pirate (like the similar scene with a child being executed in the Sweeney Todd movie) would be completely legal during the time period.

edited 4th Feb '13 10:18:34 AM by Hodor

@8054: That it's "legal" doesn't matter for our purposes, the fact that it seems quite rational for a goverment representative is relevant.

How realistically do they portray the time period though? This is a film franchise that has genuine Loveable Rogue style pirates after all.

Anyway, I keep meaning to do write-ups for Gauron and Gates. With that in mind, here's one for Gates.

• Gates, aka Mister Kallium, is the head of Amalgam's Execution Squad, and has the personality to match. An absolute madman with a Hair-Trigger Temper, Gates' first appearance sees him throw one of his men out a helicopter for not agreeing with him strongly enough. He then slaughters his former clients—whilst singing Ave Maria—before shooting another one of his men, for reminding him that he was the one who gave the order to have their ex-clients killed. He stages a terrorist attack in Hong Kong to draw in Mithril so that he can kill them all, drowns one of his men in the pool for bringing him bad news, uses the corpse of a former ally in a puppet show to taunt her sister—whom he provokes into a rage and then kills as well—and generally finds any excuse that he can to kill people, regardless of whether they're on his side or not. That's all without touching on his sexual depravity, which includes ephebophilia, necrophilia, and implied beastiality, or the simple fact that he's the clean-up man for a company of terrorists for hire.

Will do one for Gauron later.

edited 4th Feb '13 10:25:57 AM by AmbarSonofDeshar

You know, I think I'm going to vote against Beckett, who doesn't strike me as being as evil as Blackbeard was.

Here's the start of his entry- "The second and third movie have a Complete Monster in Cutler Beckett, who goes so far as to order the deaths of anyone remotely associated with piracy, including the hanging of a 10-year-old boy. In a DISNEY film. Smug Snake, smug smile, smug everything...ugh."

I know the movies suggest otherwise, but isn't it a good or at least reasonable decision to order the deaths of anyone remotely associated with piracy?

In regard to , as they go along, the movies tend to do more to present pirates as lovable rogues (which serves to make Beckett seem worse), but in the first movie, Barbossa and his crew were shown as being pretty frightening and violent in their raping pillaging, and burning- its just that they suffered from Villain Decay at the same time they became allies to the heroes.

edited 4th Feb '13 10:28:37 AM by Hodor

My problem with Beckett is that, in a universe where Barbossa led a zombified army to raze and destroy whole islands, a dude doing his job to get rid of the very real threat of piracy doesn't meet up. Blackbeard is demonstrably more heinous, I still think that the hanging the child is not a personal act of bile but rather a graphic demonstration of what Beckett's orders mean for our protagonists, and we don't see him murder Governor Swann.

EDIT: Basically agreeing with everything he said and somehow we posted at the same time!

edited 4th Feb '13 10:46:05 AM by LargoQuagmire

Killing a ten-year old is a bit much. That said, much as I loathe Beckett, I'm not sure he meets our criteria. His Alas, Poor Villain succeeds in being rather moving, which is an indicator we're probably not dealing with a full-on monster.

edited 4th Feb '13 10:46:42 AM by AmbarSonofDeshar

Basically that. I think that the movies do kind of want you to forget how bad Barbossa and co were in the first film (to support the idea that the end of the age of piracy is a bad thing), but in terms of the series as a whole, he's a bad guy, but not the worst.

Edit- Thanks

Yeah, that's kind of my problem with including it. Not that it is morally right to execute a child, but there isn't really an indication that the boy was some random innocent deliberately chosen as a scapegoat/to be extra cruel. While the movies do display some modern values, it is still pretty clear that a) the boy was a pirate and b) the punishment for piracy is death.

edited 4th Feb '13 10:50:55 AM by Hodor

Yeah, but he didn't personally go out, pluck a ten year old out of nowhere, and murder him for his own personal enjoyment.

edited 4th Feb '13 10:47:06 AM by LargoQuagmire

&Uh guys, I'm agreeing with you that he doesn't qualify. For different reasons (I still think hanging the ten-year old was played as a Moral Event Horizon) but agreeing none the less. Beckett's a bastard, but not totally devoid of sympathetic qualities, and the fact that guys like Barbossa and Davy Jones are out there, means his goals aren't totally unreasonable. He's a particularly dark Well-Intentioned Extremist.

edited 4th Feb '13 10:51:05 AM by AmbarSonofDeshar

I see. Sorry, being more verbose than I need to be- basically was trying to get at how unlike Mulan, this probably is a case where the character's actions should (at least to some extent) be judged by standards of the setting, because there are indications of their actions being the norm there.

Lol, sorry about that. I think we were all typing at the same time and it spilled out to look like I was arguing with you.

Ditto.

Although, with the above in mind, I might want to bring up Judge Turpin again...

edited 4th Feb '13 10:56:19 AM by Hodor

I don't "demand" that folks take issues with me to PM. I request it, and I do so after folks spend multiple posts on a given off-topic issue. I treat every such potential off-topic posting (whether it be questions about how I view Offscreen Villainy or just wanting to discuss someone's favorite Complete Monster example) the same way. If you think I'm treating you differently, you don't know what rules I place upon myself before I put in a request to take things to PM.

I couldn't even "force" people to do that anyway. I have no moderator power, and I've never reported anyone for not taking any off-topic issue to a different place.

Now, since all of that is also not really relevant, I don't see any need to go further into it.

@8052 I'm fully aware; I've watched the first three Pirates Of The Caribbean films a ridiculous number of times (I've yet to see the fourth due to Real Life interference, but that's not important when discussing Beckett). Yes, Gory Discretion Shot applies for the people who were hanged, and thus it is a qualifying action. There are a few too many issues for me to say it's cut-and-dried (particularly the part about it being the proper law of the time; that leads into trying to split the hair about whether the executioner should be blamed for how he swings his axe). I feel like that, with Beckett, there are too many ways to split that hair to comfortably say he qualifies.

The problem with Brass is that the specific deeds are informed by Shunka, rather than shown. I apply a simple rule of thumb for cases like Brass - when you already have enough information to qualify the character solely through what's unquestionably shown on the page, you can completely cut out all of the information that's implied or told through other characters without harming the entry. Brass' actions without that information qualifies on its own; that's all that's required.

For Pullman, I'll give him a deeper read later, but I still don't know enough to qualify him. Also, it occurs to me that everything regarding the Ancient Conspiracy is too poorly-defined. I saw enough to indicate that they aren't the kindest of groups, but I still don't have a grasp of its general morality to gauge how Pullman compares to its aims.

@8053 At the same time, a complete lack of ambiguity is what this trope needs. Like with Brass, if there's enough unambiguous actions that he qualifies, let's not muddy the waters by adding in ambiguous actions.

Simply put, if only unambiguous actions are listed, people will know that we're not interested in hosting the iffy examples.

Okay, back to work on Monster.Cartoon Network; will have my votes soon after getting over my distaste for Squidbillies.

What sells me on Beckett is that he isn't even loyal to the government he ostensibly fights for. After all, Swann sending the messenger to the king was perfectly legal, too.

Turpin from the movie? I vote

EDIT: For Buffy, was the reason First Evil was cut due to being Made of Evil? And thanks for explaining Angelus.

edited 4th Feb '13 11:16:08 AM by ACW

Film!Turpin's a yes for me, as he's easily the most despicable character in it. Bamford I'm not sure about though; he's a very similar character to Mercer, and we already decided he didn't count.

Stage!Turpin I'm also not sure about. He gets a song about how he hates himself for being such a pervert, but then at the end of it resolves to... become even more of a pervert. As well, the final scene in the stage version seems to paint Mrs. Lovett as the real villain, whereas she had a few Pet the Dog moments added in the film.

edited 4th Feb '13 11:27:05 AM by HamburgerTime

I'm inclined not to add anything from Sweeney Todd, both versions, because if that's not a Crapsack World, nothing is. I have a hard time making a distinction on who would be worse between a woman who enables cannibalism and lies through her teeth to cling to her obsession, a crazed mass murderer who enables the woman to sell her pies, a rapist-cum-pervert, his assistant, and the general filth of the world around them.

edited 4th Feb '13 11:32:58 AM by LargoQuagmire

Yeah, actually, I wouldn't really contest the film version- while the existence of the Bloody Code gives some context for the film only child hanging, he's overall less sympathetic in the film than in the stage version.

Although, as noted , almost everyone in the play is so bad, it's hard to draw a heinousness standard.

edited 4th Feb '13 11:33:52 AM by Hodor

@Footsteps

Of course I don't know what limits you put on yourself. I can only respond to what you post in the forum. And in the forum you have requested that people not criticise your forum etiquette, only to then criticise their forum etiquette. It sends a very mixed message and only contributes to the forum derailment that you yourself hate. Anyway, we've both made our points, so I'll drop it if you will*

On a more positive note, I would largely agree with your position on Brass.

@ACW

The First Evil was cut for a host of reasons. It's Made of Evil. It doesn't do anything itself. And most importantly, it's own dragon, Caleb, is demonstrably more sadistic, commits far more crimes, and pretty much outclasses it in every other way, shape, and form.

I have now removed those City Trilogy examples. No Zero Context Examples, please.

EDIT: I concur with Hodor and Jordan about Sweeney Todd. No one stands out, it's so relentlessly awful.

Anybody have any thoughts about the Gates write-up I posted, or the In Death examples?

And more crap from the literature page:

• Vlad Tepes of Count and Countess definitely doesn't start off as one, which makes his eventual change into a monstrous person bone-chilling. At one point, he's trying to lower the drafting age for young boys in his army - when the drafting age is already twelve.

I mean, really? One comparatively minor crime (this is the middle ages after all).

• Lord Loss from Darren Shan's The Demonata is a perfect example. He feeds off of humanity's sorrow and pain and has been known to torture people just for the hell of it.

Thanks for providing all that context whoever posted it. Sounds more like Made of Evil to me.

• Jordan Krall's King Scratch includes a few nasty individuals:
  • Jim and Peggy take a ride from a Scary Black Man named Fred. He looks jovial, if odd at first, but with a little bit of conversation, both Jim and readers realize what a scumbag the guy is when he casually states he could rape Peggy (who is lying unconscious on the backseat). Then, while driving, he tries to strangle Jim with his other hand. Luckily, Jim keeps a knife with him just in case and stabs him in the chest before taking control of the car, driving to the side and kicking Fred off. However, when Jim is going to hide Fred's corpse in the trunk, he discovers dead babies with bite marks on them.
  • In Keith's moonshine-induced flashback, we meet General Entwistle, who, we're told, likes sending his troops into certain-death situations and pleasuring himself while watching them get slaughtered.

The General might count, but more context is needed. As for Fred, well, uh, is that entry uncomfortably racist, or is it just me? Do we really need to know he's a Scary Black Man? He doesn't actually rape the girl, and it doesn't sound like he even really threatened to. The baby thing also sounds like Offscreen Villainy, which would leave us with one attempted murder. Thoughts?

edited 4th Feb '13 12:18:50 PM by AmbarSonofDeshar

Okay, a run on Monster.Cartoon Network:

• All nominees from The Boondocks - This is a satirical work, and much of their acts are played for Dead Baby Comedy (feels like it'd be a bit... inappropriate for me to use the other name for that trope when discussing this work). I'm inclined to cut all three. I'm tempted to just cite "Eric Cartman precedent" when voting on works like this.
• All nominees from Metalocalypse - Again, a satirical work that piles on the Dead Baby Comedy (it wouldn't surprise me to discover actual dead babies at one point or another). It's so over-the-top that I'm again inclined to do a blanket cut. That said, it's certainly played more seriously than The Boondocks, so I may reconsider.
• All nominees from Robot Chicken - Basically, the exact same vein of humor as South Park. Cut with prejudice.
• Superjail - Again, strikes me as just like South Park. Cut with prejudice.
• Dan Halen from Squidbillies - Part of me wants to say that this is also like South Park... but it strikes me as so aggressively unfunny that I'm not sure it's Dead Baby Comedy or not. I might just be prejudiced against it, though. For now, I think I'll err on the side of saying that it happens to be just a bad comedy and should be cut.
• Early Cuyler from the same - Cut for the reasons above, plus having sympathetic moments.
• Professor Impossible from Venture Brothers - Well, first off, we once again hit my prejudices against Reed Richards and his Captain Ersatz clones. So let's put that out there immediately. Plus, we have a legit argument over just how much of the show is Played for Laughs... I'd argue that enough is played seriously that we could have a legit qualifier. But I could accept a reasonable argument otherwise. The problem is whether he really goes far enough - murder, coerced marriage, torture (both physical and psychological), attempting to turn children into murderers... all this has happened onscreen in this show by other characters. Prof. Impossible doesn't go quite as far as several other characters, I feel... though I could see him going that far in the future. Cut for now.
• The Lich from Adventure Time - Called to keep in @5177.
• Aggregor from Ben Ten - voted to cut in @3229.
• Grandfather from Codename Kids Next Door - I thought I voted on him; appears I haven't. I'd vote cut; he's certainly more serious than any other villain from the show, but I don't think he reaches the "heinous" bar.
• XANA from Code Lyoko - Hrm... XANA developed sentience on its own and came to the Kill All Humans conclusion independent of its programming. That said, while remarkably closer to succeeding compared to most villains, I don't think he tries anything different than what, for example, Mumm-Ra or Skeletor try. I'm inclined to cut.
• Courage The Cowardly Dog examples - I'm leaning towards saying that this indulges a tad in Black Comedy, to be honest. But I'm not totally sure; the right argument could persuade me to not cut all of these.
• Eddy's Brother from Ed Edd And Eddy - Spoiler tags bad, rrr! Thought I discussed him, but I can't find the post. Anyhow, this is probably the litmus test for me. He's actively shown physically and emotionally abusing his brother and one of his brother's friends, has a classic Motive Rant where he reveals an utter lack of redeeming features... but that's his limit. Do I consider that said abuse is much less dangerous in the boundaries of this cartoon? Do I consider just what affect that such violence could have on an audience that perhaps deals with this kind of material in their own lives? ... I think I have to vote keep. I watched the clip in question. It stops being funny. It's the point where I actually asked myself, "Holy shit, are they going to hospitalize two of the title characters? Couldn't that kill them?" I stopped thinking about how this is a cartoon where characters are seemingly made of rubber. That... that just ain't right. I'll grant that the entry needs a heavy rewrite... but I think he has to stay. Also, feel kinda unnerved that said example was ever animated.
• Generator Rex examples - Discussed in @4633, I'd keep both Van Kleiss and Branden Moses, with rewrites.
• Atrocitus from Green Lantern The Animated Series - I slightly favor cut, because he does get a Freudian Excuse from having basically the same backstory as the comic version. That said, he is more ruthless than his comic version, but the series is ongoing. If nothing else, cutting to see how things develop (especially since the Anti-Monitor has made an appearance) might be the most sensible option.
• Krytus from Hot Wheels Battle Force 5 - Sounds like a God of Evil case to me, which would be a cut.
• Dick Hardly from Powerpuff Girls - Well, the subbullet is Natter and should be cut regardless. That said, haven't other villains tried similar schemes to take out the girls? Finally, based on what I'm familiar with, nobody overshadows Him (apparently, actually the character's name). I'm inclined to cut, although what I hear about Him has me wondering if he qualifies.
• Night Owl from Regular Show - Cut, fails "heinous" standard (sounds more wacky than deadly).
• Truckers from the same - Cut, stub, plus it sounds like they were devoted to Muscle Man's dad.
• Machamish from Scaredy Squirrel - Cut, stub.
• The Snow Ghost (aka Mr. Greenway) from Scooby Doo - Well, here's to a childhood spent loving Scooby-Doo way too much. Anyhow, he's not the only villain who tried killing the gang. I'm inclined to say he fails the heinous standard, so cut.
• Zen Tuo (aka Mr. Fong) from the same - Cut for the same reason as above.
• Jacques from the same - I haven't specifically seen the Zombie Island movie, so I need clarification as to just how much they do eat souls (or at least attempt to) during the movie. I'd vote cut if it's just the Scooby gang, but I'd vote keep if they have multiple victims (or would-be victims).
• Fred Jones, Sr. from Scooby Doo Mystery Incorporated - Inclined to cut, since it does appear that he loves Freddy, despite what the entry says. Also, terrible use of spoiler tags.
• V. V. Argost from The Secret Saturdays - Spoiler tags bad, rrr! I'd need to look into this one more, but I believe that much of the indicated action is offscreen. Currently inclined to cut.
• Pong Krell from Star Wars: The Clone Wars - Seems a bit small-time for the series; inclined to cut.
• General Modula from Sym Bionic Titan - The entry itself seems to not be sure if he qualifies, based on the parenthetical. Also, the show is currently ongoing; I propose to cut until we know what's going on.
• Trigon from Teen Titans - Cut; Generic Doomsday Villain.
• Blackfire from the same - Given the amount of murder than some villains are willing to try, I'm inclined to say that merely taking over a planet, as she does, falls short on heinousness. Cut.
• Slade from the same - Keep, but rewrite. The creepy sexual subtext is just that - subtext. There's more than enough textual action to have him qualify.
• Helga Von Guggen from Totally Spies - I thought schemes like that were commonplace in the show. Unless someone cares to show me otherwise, I vote to cut.

A lot of axing, but not a total list. Particularly as there are at least a couple of "let's get back to this when the show's over" examples.

Helga from Totally Spies!... there are other villains with similarly-evil plans, true, but IIRC she's the only one we actually see carrying it out; we watch the Petting-Zoo People being loaded into the horrible skinning machine thing. Nobody actually dies there, but she is the only villain on the show confirmed to have killed anyone, as she shows off one of her... special coats during her Evil Speech Of Evil. In her second appearance she makes a new line of clothes that strangle people to death when they're put on, but I've only seen that one once, forever ago, so I couldn't tell you more.

Jacques from Zombie Island, all the zombies we see, numbering in the dozens if not hundreds, were victims of the villains. We don't know which ones he personally did, but being the only one to be doing it willingly, puts him, at the very least, the darkest Scooby villain to date.

Re the Boondocks- Yeah, probably best to cut all of the examples. I was somewhat open to at least some of them counting because the tone is satirical rather than humorous, but yeah, those examples don't work for the same reasons the South Park ones don't.

Re the Eddie's brother one, I will take the word of others that he is a legitimate example. However, I think that the examples Hamburger Time mentioned get at why I was initially skeptical- there seems to be an urge to include examples that are unusually dark characters from otherwise light-hearted shows, and those are usually problematic.