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
Knock knock knock knock, who could it be? Two potential candidates I see! (I'm so sorry).
What's the work?: Cut, Shoot, Kill is a 2017 horror film that tells the story of a film shoot for the feature film debut of antisocial director Alabama Chapman. A firm believer in giving people "the truth" in his films, Chapman's eccentric nature at first earns him the respect of actress Serena Brooks, but later her disdain, and eventually her horror.
You see, the reason the gore and acting in Chapman's films look so real... is because they fricking are. He's really killing off his actors, having his men torture and murder them for the sake of the perfect shot. He's been doing this for years, and he's going all out for his feature film.
Chapman is not who I'm discussing today.
No, Chapman has genuine redeemable qualities, like truly loving his former "star" Nicole Heally, and mourning the death of one of his crew halfway through the film. It turns out that Chapman is merely a pawn to the real Big Bad, who is the first monster from this work I'll discuss today.
Who is he?/What does he do?: Edward Shipman is a Corrupt Corporate Executive who's drowning in money, which he uses to personally finance Chapman's films. By his instigation, his actors are brutally tortured, murdered, and dismembered on camera. He does this out of love for horror films, and seeks to create the perfect film through the most depraved of methods. He keeps Chapman and his men on a puppet string, caring absolutely nothing about them, insulting the kind-hearted but slow "iBall" as a "useless nitwit" in his introductory scene, and showing nothing but cold hatred for Chapman himself. He passes himself off as jovial and kind to Serena, but behind the scenes, when the first murder of the film takes place, he's shown laughing at the footage, commenting how great it is.
The true depths of his petty evil, as well as the reason behind his feud with Chapman, are shown near the end of the film. You see, Shipman had a thing for Nicole Heally, Chapman's lover/leading lady. When Nicole rebuffed his advances, Shipman raped her, and then wrote a script that called for her to be tortured and killed on camera. Nicole ruined the film by killing herself, breaking Chapman's heart. Shipman keeps Chapman in line after this by threatening to reveal his activities to the police, as Shipman has "half the state" in his pocket, and thinks himself to be completely untouchable. Shipman also personally kidnaps the brainwashed actress Candice, and uses her as a personal Sex Slave.
I was worried at first that this douchebag was gonna be a Karma Houdini, but fortunately he gets a brutal and awesome death, with Chapman personally breaking his legs, and then filming as Serena, corrupted by the whole ordeal, slits his throat. Chapman effectively usurps his Bad Boss, and takes over the snuff film operation, with Serena as his new leading lady.
Oh the terror that will surely ensue.
Freudian Excuse?/Mitigating factors?: Ha ha ha... no. Shipman is simply a bored rich bastard who wants to create the perfect horror film, not caring who gets hurt along the way. While his crew are portrayed a bit more sympathetically (with the exception of the other candidate, but I'll get to him later), with all of them mourning the loss of one of their fellow crew when he's killed by a rebelling actor, and Chapman especially having genuine love for his dead lover, Shipman has no such mitigating standards.
Heinousness: As the Big Bad and the instigator of all the film's events, Shipman more than breaches the standard. With several short films under his belt, he has sent dozens to their grave, with the rape and abuse of his own cast and crew putting a cherry on top of the sundae of evil.
Conclusion: Shipman is an easy
for me, but I'll leave it to you guys to decide. I'll post the next baddie from this film shortly.
edited 3rd Feb '18 4:59:07 PM by JoeBlitz
"Now I have a machine gun. Ho ho ho."Alright, time for the second candidate from Cut, Shoot, Kill.
Who is he?/What does he do?: Walter is the Psycho for Hire that is responsible for the hands-on evil in Shipman's/Chapman's films. He's a cold-blooded, sadistic Serial Killer who personally murders the actors for the films, and has been doing so since the start of Chapman's career, clearly enjoying every second of it.
He starts off by murdering Chloe, taunting her with barely-concealed joy before stabbing her in the gut. He later kills an investigating policeman, cuts off the limbs of one of the actors, Francis, and leaves him to rot in an abandoned house, and forces the actress Candice to inject herself with a chemical (which he boasts is his "own special recipe") that makes her suggestible to whatever the director wants, lest he cut her open, slowly and painfully. This concoction is later used to brainwash Serena's boyfriend into attacking her, forcing her to kill him. Walter shoots another actor, Gordon, in the stomach with an arrow; Gordon kills the sound engineer in a desperate attempt to escape, and while the rest of the crew is genuinely upset by the death of their friend, Walter is completely indifferent, merely shrugging his shoulders when the editing guy calls him out on getting his friend killed.
It is later revealed that he is the one who was going to torture and kill Nicole Heally, taunting her like he did Chloe, before she attacked him and used his knife to kill herself. Ultimately, he tries to kill Serena and the lead actor Blake Stone; this ends with Stone personally killing Walter by stabbing him in the throat, before he is executed himself by Chapman.
Freudian Excuse?/Mitigating factors?: None whatsoever.
Heinousness: As the direct murderer of dozens, Walter manages to equal Shipman in heinousness. He is sadistic, completely relishing the murder, rape, and torture he commits, and doesn't care at all for his own allies.
Conclusion: Another keeper.
"Now I have a machine gun. Ho ho ho."
Joe's examples.
Found an unwanted pothole to this trope on Kaiserreich: Legacy of the Weltkrieg:
- A "Spooky Scary Skeletons" update for KR4, which gives Halloween-themed portraits for game leaders. For example, Wihlelm II gets vampire teeth, Hoover is replaced by the Marshmallow Man and Hirohito gets Alucard's attire. And Corneliu Codreanu gets... nothing
This pothole is used to describe Corneliu Codreanu, the leader of Fascist Romania in that mod, and a real piece of work in both the real world and inferred to be worse in Kaiserreich. As someone who played Kaiserreich.......this is a misuse because no one in Kaiserreich qualifies due to every possible qualifier(the leader of Fascist Romania, the potential leaders of Fascist Peru and Fascist Russia, the potential leader of Totalitarian Socialist Britain, the leader of Mongolia)'s actions either being offscreen villainy or inferred holocaust, nastiness being solely described via Informed Attribute, not matching up to the heinous standard of those who are offscreen villiany or their worst excesses could actually be prevented by player choice.
There is going to be a mod for Hearts of Iron 4 that has a qualifier, but that's a year away at the latest.
I suggest change the pothole from CM to A Nazi by Any Other Name or just change it to:
- A "Spooky Scary Skeletons" update for KR4, which gives Halloween-themed portraits for game leaders. For example, Wihlelm II gets vampire teeth, Hoover is replaced by the Marshmallow Man and Hirohito gets Alucard's attire
edited 3rd Feb '18 7:04:55 PM by xie323
Well I had people say they were interested in this effort post since it's an interesting candidate that may very well be a yes for some and a no for others. Anyways, the latest World of Warcraft expansion, Legion, wrapped up recently and it gave us a new entry in Archimonde the Defiler. Here I have his master, Sargeras, whose story was more or less been wrapped up for now.
Who is Sargeras?
Sargeras is the creator and leader of the omnicidal Burning Legion and God to the demons that make up its ranks. He is the Dark Titan, the Fel Titan, the Fallen Titan, the God of Fel and Flame, the Daemon Lord, the Destroyer of Worlds, the Ravager of Worlds, and the Great Enemy of all life. He is Warcraft's Satanic Archetype, its Greater-Scope Villain, and by far the most heinous character in the franchise. I'll give some back story before I move into his crimes and to show why exactly he's such a unique case.
Sargeras, like all Titans, was born from the world soul of a planet and formed the Titan Pantheon with his figurative brothers and sisters. The goal of the Titans was to bring order to the countless worlds in the universe and to find more of their kind. Their greatest enemies were the demons of the Twisting Nether who sought to undo their work and bring chaos to the universe. Sargeras was the Pantheon's greatest warrior and waged war on the demons, and managed to defeat them with ease as they were chaotic and unorganized. To his frustration, he discovered the demon souls were reformed in the Twisting Nether and would always be around to battle. Sargeras created the prison world of Mardum and banished the demons there so that they could not trouble the universe any further. He, along with his apprentice Aggramar, banished the demons and brought peace to the cosmos for a time.
In his travels afterwards, Sargeras came upon an even greater threat than the demons. He discovered the Void and the dark entities which ruled it. He came upon a world soul that had been corrupted by the Void Lords' servants, the Old Gods. The Old Gods were parasites that were turning the world soul into a Void Titan, a being that Sargeras feared none in the Pantheon would be able to match in power. Seeing no other option, Sargeras killed the corrupted world soul by cleaving the entire planet in half. He went to the Pantheon with this information, but they chastised him for what he did as they believed the world souls could have been cleansed of the void energies. Sargeras then proposed to them that they should cleanse the universe of all life as he feared that any other world could become just as corrupted. In his eyes, a lifeless universe could eventually be sparked with life on its own as it had before, but not if the void consumed it all. The Pantheon did not agree at all and Sargeras left them to begin his own plan: the Burning Crusade.
What has he done?
Knowing that he could never convince the other Titans to aid him, Sargeras needed an army to cleanse the universe of life and enact his Burning Crusade. He traveled to Mardum and released the demons by completely shattering the prison world, and the massive explosion of Fel energy turned him into the monstrous form he would ever after have. Sargeras empowered the demon hordes giving them greater strength and intelligence and gave them all the choice to either serve him or die. While the vast majority of the demons agreed, some did refuse. Sargeras responded by creating a scythe from the energies of the destroyed world and used it to devour the souls of all the demons that refused to be his slaves. He would later give this powerful weapon to his servants, not caring when the scythe inevitably consumed their souls upon their death.
Sargeras unleashed his hordes upon the first world they came upon, but this quickly drew the attention of Aggramar. After words failed, they clashed in single combat until both their blades shattered. An injured Aggramar went to the rest the Pantheon to warn them, and together they confronted Sargeras at the world of Nihilam. Aman'thul, the Pantheon's leader, told Sargeras of the nascent titan Azeroth who would one day be powerful enough to defeat the Void Lords. Sargeras listened but still refused to stop his crusade, and one last ditch attempt to sway him was made by Aggramar. Still injured from their earlier battle, Aggramar went to Sargeras unarmed and tried to reminisce about their earlier battles against the demons. Sargeras, however, was utterly unmoved and cleaved Aggramar in half. The furious Pantheon waged war upon the Burning Legion but were eventually destroyed by Sargeras as well, although, unbeknownst to Sargeras, they sent their souls to hide out on Azeroth.
Sargeras made it his personal goal to find Azeroth and corrupt this powerful titan to his side. More pressing matters were at hand, though, as much of the Legion was destroyed by the Pantheon. The demons were still chaotic and unorganized and so he needed great and intelligent tacticians to rule over the Legion. To accomplish this, he came to the world of Argus and made contact with the power hungry Archimonde. Through Archimode, Sargeras corrupted much of the Eredar race into the Man'ari with promises of ultimate power and infinite knowledge. He tasked Kil'jaeden with recruiting the darkest races in the cosmos into the Legion and tasked Archimonde to lead the Legion's forces as they invaded worlds. By this time, the Burning Crusade was in full swing and Sargeras's Burning Legion was responsible for the destruction of countless worlds and deaths of billions across the universe.
I never went into depth on how the Legion operated on planetary scale in Archimonde's write up but now is a good time. The Legion's goal is to literally kill all life on a planet. They do this in a myriad of ways ranging from subterfuge, corruption, to outright brute force. Regardless, every last organism in destroyed ranging from every plant and animal. Sadly, even death is no escape as the souls of the dead of stolen and fed into the Legion's war machines where they suffer in constant agony until they are obliterated. The Burning Crusade is over on a given world when the Fel has been spread over everything until no life can ever spring up there again.
Azeroth first came to Sargeras's attention 10,000 years in the past. Upon seeing Azeroth for the first time, his curiosity sprouted into full blown psychotic lust and he would stop at nothing to have Azeroth as his own. During the War of the Ancients, Sargeras called out to Queen Azshara and promised her power if she would use the Well of Eternity to create a portal to Azeroth for him. Azshara, wanting Sargeras in a physical sense as well, agreed. She created portals that allowed the Legion to come through if not Sargeras. Nevertheless, Sargeras was not idle. He tortured Xavius for his failures by tearing his body and soul to shreds and reshaping him into the first Satyr and tasked him with spreading that gift. In an attempt to turn the mage Illidan Stormrage to his side, he tried to overwhelm Illidan with despair by showing him images of the Legion's full might and burned his eyes out in the process. The Legion ultimately failed and Sargeras had to wait another ten millennia for his second chance, but he was not idle in his plans.
In the interim, Sargeras created one of his greatest tools: the Jeweled Scepter of Sargeras. Sargeras imbued countless portals into this artifacts, had it absorb energies from across the universe, and sacrificed countless demons that had failed in the invasion of Azeroth to bind their souls to the weapon and complete it. The power of this weapon came from the fact that it could open a rift to the Twisting Nether at will, but using such a weapon as that threatened to tear apart the very fabric of reality. Such an example is when Ner'zhul tore apart Draenor and it became Outland. Despite being such a risk to reality itself, Sargeras didn't care so long as it accomplished his goals.
Sargeras knew he had to use subtlety in the next invasion, so he found the perfect pawn in the humans sorceress Aegwynn. Sargeras sent his avatar to Azeroth to lure out Aegwynn. When she arrived to confront him, he allowed himself to be destroyed so that his soul could hide inside of her. Aegwynn hid the corpse and the Scepter inside a tomb and sealed it all away. Despite his best attempts at corrupting her, Aegwynn would not yield. He did manage to convince her to pass on her power to her son, and Sargeras successfully dominated the mage Medivh. Through Medivh, he worked with Kil'jaeden to bring the Horde into Azeroth, and constructed the Dark Portal that brought the orcs through. During the First War, Medivh would gain an apprentice named Khadgar who, along with others, would slay Medivh and forced Sargeras's spirit back into the Twisting Nether.
Eventually, after a lot of plot, we arrive at the Legion's third invasion which consists of the events of the current expansion. The Legion sought to use the corpse of Illidan Stormrage as a vessel for Sargeras and allow his return. Ultimately, they fail, but thanks to Illidan being such a dick, he opens a portal to Argus to push the forces of Azeroth into finishing off the Legion. On Argus, the full extent of Sargeras's depravity can be seen in full. For 25,000 years, Sargeras had tortured the world soul of Argus and used its corrupted soul to revive his demon armies even if they died in the Twisting Nether. He had also captured the souls of the Pantheon and had them tortured in an attempt to corrupt them to his side. He succeeded in turning Aggramar to his side, but the rest are freed in the final raid where they attempt to bind Sargeras into his own throne.
By this point, Sargeras had made his way to Azeroth through the portal Illidan made and was...well I'm not exaggerating when I say Blizzard, whether intentional or not, made it out like a rape allegory. In a cloudlike form, he was surrounding Azeroth and basically straddling her when the Patheon starting pulling him back to his prison. In one final act of spite, in a combination of Taking You with Me and If I Can't Have You…, he impales Azeroth with his sword nearly to the hilt in one final attempt to kill her and all life on the planet. She starts bleeding profusely in the form of Azerite, the MacGuffin of the next expansion. Regardless, Sargeras as an antagonist is basically over now along with the Burning Legion as a faction.
Any mitigating factors?
Ah, here is where we come to the primary issue. Sargeras did all of this because he believed it was better for the universe to die than to let it be consumed by the Void. The game never actually refutes that Sargeras still thought he was doing the right thing. Regardless, I will bring up a few noteworthy points against him. First, Sargeras has shown extreme personal sadism and cruelty throughout the games and expanded universe material. That certainly never helps to defend someone's motives. Second, he is arguably a hypocrite in regards to the Void as he not only allows but encourages his servants to enslave void beings to use in their omnicidal conquests. Third and final, his motives are there but his methods border on Insane Troll Logic at times. His fundamental argument that he gave to the Pantheon was that a lifeless universe could theoretically sprout life again as it did before. Besides his methods being unambiguously evil, the Legion corrupts planets with Fel specifically so that life can never sprout there again. Obviously, what's the fundamental difference between consuming all life with the Fel and the Void?
Final Verdict?
At this point, many of you may be shocked that I still ultimately lean no. Despite everything I've said above, Sargeras's intentions are never directly refuted and he likely still sees himself as doing the right thing. He is literally the border of Well-Intentioned Extremist and Knight Templar, but part of being a Complete Monster is that we have to be absolutely sure and we've disqualified other contenders for even the smallest things like that before.
edited 3rd Feb '18 7:50:53 PM by LoreDeluxe
Think you're tough because you made it through Lord of the Rings? Real men survive The Silmarillion.
to Sargeras. The guy thinks he is saving the universe from a fate worse than death, he just has an equally horrible way of stopping it. Also, the Void lords are stated to be more evil than him. So he dosent make it.
You left out the heinous standard.
The Void Lords were behind the Old Gods, with the Old Gods being their servants and minions.
edited 3rd Feb '18 8:07:51 PM by hopeshalllive
Cautious
to Sargeras. Sounds like this Greater-Scope Villain isn't the Greatest of them all. I take it the Void Lords/Old Gods were a recent reveal?

Wasn't Yami Marik his own being after a point?