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
Onto the Nina Meyers argument again, a few points of contention:
- She didn't kill Jack's Wife for no reason, she was talking to someone in the phone who told her to go to Germany and asked why she was going to Germany in front of Jack's wife, and then at the end of the conversation was told to kill anyone who knew. I can't remember if she knew that Jack's wife was pregnant or not.
- Jamey Farrell wasn't accused of being the mole, she was the mole. She was also involved in covering up that Nena had almost been murdered, and is enabling the terrorists for the first half of the season, which leads to multiple innocent deaths and Mrs. Baurer getting kidnapped.
- She doesn't help the bombers bomb CTU; she was in prison at the time and gave the mastermind the floor plans to CTU years ago without knowing what the end game was (which was the nuking of LA). She's never shown as being onboard with the plan (since she's in LA and doesn't want to get nuked), she never has any interactions with any of the masterminds in the season, and is entirely self-serving in her appearances (trying to escape and only helping CTU for a pardon).
- "Attempting" is the key word, and we never learn who she's trying to buy it for or what reasons they want it. They could want to use it on orphanages, or just stockpile it. They could be terrorists or a rogue state. It's never revealed just who she was working for since she gets promptly shot in the face in what some of Jack's employers see as a blatant execution on his part and that plot line is disposed of.
- Kim by that point is no longer a teenager and is now a CTU agent who (if my memory of the game serves me well) has killed several people in the line of duty. I can't remember the scene in question though, but I don't recall Nina actually trying to kill Kim.
So my argument against her is that she doesn't actually do a whole lot, and even the actions that she knowingly assists in aren't truly henious by the shows standards (she's largely in the dark about the bomb blot in season 2, her main contribution for season 1 is killing another mole who had perviously aided in an attempt to do the same to her, giving Jack false information to lead him into a trap, and killing someone who knows too much which only happens three or four times per season, giving someone the plans to CTU without having any knowledge of what it was for, which ends up with CTU being bombed which is now practically just a fine in the 24 universe considering the amount of times it's been bombed, attacked, gassed or attacked again).
In a series that involves people whose plans are wiping out people by the tens of thousands as a bear minimum, torturing others to death or to complete insanity, merely acting as a middle-woman doesn't really compare to any of that. The worst she personally does is kill Jack's wife, everyone else she directly killed (to our knowledge) was some varity of mole or terrorist, the other mole in season 1 did literally everything she did (betrayed people to their death, conspired to kill the future-President, helping in killing and kidnapping people) except kill Jack's wife.
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Exactly. He seems to believe in his cause for most of the series, but in the end it becomes clear it's really all about him having a Dark Messiah complex and needing to have a sense of importance. What it really all boils down to is that he's a sociopathic Omnicidal Maniac.
If she enabled all of those "worse actions" that could've been prevented otherwise, then she's defenitely heinous, IMO.
edited 12th Apr '13 6:06:10 PM by ANewMan
- Complete Monster - Hugo is the most hated and irredeemable of the villains of the story.
- Even then, though, pay attention to his final speech when you beat him in the Alternate History — his faith was genuine, and he did actually think he was trying to save the world, even if he was lying and manipulating people to do it, though how much of that is a product of his madness is hard to tell.
The second column contradicts the entry.
- Complete Monster: Lady Kaede. Her Freudian Excuse doesn't even come close to justifying the brutal murder of Sue and destruction brought upon everyone.
- Hidetora in his Backstory - and he gets some Laser-Guided Karma.
No context for Hidetora.
- Slade even moreso. remember him? He was that guy who was introduced during King's start of darkness and died by the end of the flashback. Yeah. He's personally responsible for both King and Lucia's Big Bad status. In other words, for a promotion (which he doesn't even live to enjoy, thankfully) He screwed over a decent guy who happened to have turned to the wrong source, and a six year old child whose only crime was being the former's son.
- Shakuma. While, given that he's a Raregroove, he probably had a Freudian Excuse, we never got to hear it. Instead, all we know is that he's personally responsible for the destruction of Raregroove and Symphonia, as well as all the citizens. He also placed a curse on Haru's grandfather out of spite, a curse that to an unsuspecting victim is an incurable disease out of spite, and deeply enjoyed it, and the reason he went to war with the Symphonians is because it was a game. Like most of the later villains, he views the universe he lives in one that was created by the time warping of an apocalypse survivor who is ironically his ancestor to be false and must destroyed. Also, he was never there when King his own son was suffering, and you'd think he would be more protective of his family.
How are they compared to Ogre?
Cut Hugo and cut Kaede and Hidetora as well
And my rebuttal re: Nina Meyers
Point 1: She killed Teri because Teri heard her taking in German. It was pointless as all hell and done solely to cover her own ass. It's questionable if Teri was even listening to that, or even recognized the language. And "I killed an innocent woman to cover my treason" doesn't mitigate her statu here
Point 2: Nina was the one, according to Day Zero, who turned Farrell. she also murdered her to keep her cover.
Point 3: The whole point about Nina and the bombers was she had turned traitor long before Day 1. She gave CTU's blueprints and floor plans to known terrorists. What did she THINK what gonna happen? She expected to have skipped out by the time they attacked.
Point 4: See, that's the thing. Nina doesn't care why they want it. Terrorist groups in 24 are satanic lunatics who attack the innocent on a daily basis and Nina is securing them a weapon to make it easier. why? They're paying her. Does she give a fuck if they use it on children or if they store it as long as they pay her? No. That's why she's so evil. You give her the cash, you can nuke a city as long as she's not there.
As for Kim, she was hardly a top agent there. Nina was raising her gun when Jack interfered, so she definitely intended to end her.
Nina intentionally facilitates terrorist actions for financial gain and displays no remorse. She kills innocent people who were her co-workers and the family of people who considered her their friend. She was on board with instigating a terrorist attack as a pretense for oil-mongers to have the Midle East invaded.
In a series where people torture others to death and plan to nuke cities, Nina is on board. Just give her the cash and a plane ride out and she'll give you a bio weapon to slaughter all the people you want. That's why she's so revolting and despicable. And who was the random CTU person she killed a mole for? she killed that one solely for convenience sake
edited 12th Apr '13 6:15:02 PM by Lightysnake
Point 1: No, she killed Teri because she loudly asked "Why are you sending me to Germany?" Teri also directly states when she enters the room "I didn't know you spoke German." She was also told by whoever she was talking to that she had to kill anyone who knew where she was going. My contention was that you insisted she killed Teri for no reason.
Point 2: Never read Day Zero, it also doesn't make that much sense since they're moles for different people and Farrell was covering up Nina's death (and framed her for being the mole initially at the end of the first episode).
Point 3: She probably could have guessed, but she didn't go up and say "hey, you should totally blow up this building and I'll help you plan it." She gave the plans to them and that was her involvement in the plot. What happened after that is on those terrorists.
Point 4: And my argument is that she's largely left out of the actual attacks themselves. She's essentially an arms dealer for most of her screenn time, and I don't like the idea of counting people for the actions of their bosses that said bosses took of their own free violition and were the master minds of. Hell in the third season we don't even know what her employer wanted the nerve gas for, yet simply trying to get it makes her more henious than the five or so villians who have actually used nerve gas in the series?
And as stated on several occassions, Villians kill Heroes. Listing villians for trying to kill heroes is ignoring that's what villians do. Kim wasn't a non-combatant, she was a trained CTU agent whose killed several people on her own and has more than enough reason to kill Nena even discounting the "murdered her mother" thing.
Throughout the series she killed one co-worker, who was the mole that had got two of her co-workers murdered, and aided in the kidnapping of Teri Baurer which directly led to her getting raped, yet you're not holding any of that against Farrell or insisting that her aiding in that makes her morally on the same level as the man who tried to kill Palmer.
She also only killed one innocent person throughout the series, and that was under orders from someone else. That puts her on hte low-end spectrum of moles in the 24 universe considering some other moles orchestrated the assasination of a former president and an innocent bystander.
So my argument remains; she's less henious compared to other villians, and most of what's been counted against her are the actiosn of her employers which they undertook of their own violiation. The people who tried to nuke LA were going to nuke LA with or without her, so why is she listed as the henious one for that act when she had the smallest role in that plot? She was one of two moles that aided in assassination attempts against Palmer, why is she the Complete Monster for lying to Jack to send him to his death and revealing that Palmer was still alive and the other one is left off the hook for organising Teri Baurer's kidnapping, betraying Nina to be executed by Jack and covering it up, and betraying two more coworkers?
edited 12th Apr '13 6:32:09 PM by Shaoken
Fair enough on point 1. that doesn't help matters as she still executed an unarmed pregnant woman on her own volition to cover tracks for her treason.
Farrell turned on Nina to cover herself. Not much an issue as she didn't expect Nina to survive.
As for point 3....c'mon. You give terrorists building plans to the Counter Terrorist Unit, what do you think they'll do, prank them by ordering lots of pizza? Nina made it possible for them to attack them and cripple the primary group responsible for stopping terrorists
Also, since when was Kim a field agent? She had an A.A. in computer science and worked behind a computer there as I recall. Kim isn't Jack, either. villains kill heroes. Killing a scared girl trying to stop you from escaping after you murdered her colleagues, her mother and helped pull off multiple terrorist attacks is not a point in Nina's favor.
You're ignoring how Nina assisted in allowing multiple terrorists to pull off grand plans. Did she care what they did as long as she was paid? No. You give bio weapons to terrorists and what do you think they're going to do?
And I think Farrell's total lack of screentime, and not enabling the amount of things Nina have help.
edited 12th Apr '13 6:36:53 PM by Lightysnake
With point 1 though, she had Teri prisoner for 30 minutes and made no effort to kill her, and from her reaction when she was ordered to kill anyone who knew she was heading to Germany was she wasn't anticipating having to kill Teri, since by that point she knew Jack knew she was a traitor and there was no cover left to save.
My point with #3 is that why do the Knight Templar terrorists get a free pass for doing literally everything from planning to executing the CTU bombing, but Nena gets that marked against her when her involvement was literally just giving them the plans and going on her way? Yes, she would have known what they intended, but she made no further effort to help them. So why are their actions that are entirely now removed from her counted as a mark against her and not against them?
And while Kim wasn't a field agent, in the 24 game (which is canon) she does kill several terrorists who attacked CTU (which has got to be the least secure government agency in the 24 universe considering the number of moles, leaks and sucessful attacks carried out against it).
A Nd again, my argument is that she's just the arms dealer, so why the fuck is she more henious than the people who actually use the weapons? Because not a one of those responsible for these acts were even considered for the trope, that's my main bone of contention; since when did we include lackies for the actions of their bosses, just because the lacky was the one who got them the superweapon?
For point 1, there's also the matter of leverage. It wasn't an explicit kill order. Just a "make sure there's nothing to tie you here". She tells Jack that she killed her because Teri was an inconvenience in season 2.
Those bombers aren't exactly fleshed out like Nina is. Yes, theyr'e bad people, but they're a dime a dozen on this show. Someone who enables them like Nina for nothing more than financial gain is relatively unique, and she's involved in multiple incidents.
Nina's not a 'lackey' either. She's a freelancer who chooses to work for these guys. She'd betray them, too, if she had a bigger bonus. Also someone who does the murder and someone who facilitates it are both guilty. Nina does it enough times to be quite low on the morality scale and is a fully realized character not subordinate to the wishes of others, but freely loans herself out for cash.
She spent her whole time after season 1 trying to get under Jack's skin and into his head, so I wouldn't take anything she said at face value.
"Nina's not a 'lackey' either. She's a freelancer who chooses to work for these guys. She'd betray them, too, if she had a bigger bonus."
That's some conjecture there, did at any point she betray any of her clients beyond the one responsible for the LA nuke plot? No, and she only betrayed that one because the alternative was "we'll keep you in LA so you die too." But she's loyal to Drazen up until he dies, she never turns on her employer in season 3, so I don't see where you're getting this "she'll betray them for money" line from since her only act of betrayal of a client is when her own life is at stake.
My argument stands; enablers who don't actively plot out other people's henious acts shouldn't count as Complete Monsters because they're not hte ones who come up with the idea to do these henious acts in the first place. These guys had the idea to bomb CTU and killed people to pull it off before they even got to the building, yet Nena is the one who gets all of that dumped on her? Someone else went through the effort of getting the nuclear bomb and organising the various strands to get it to LA, yet Nena is the one who is the Complete Monster for her relatively minor part in the whole plot?
There's no consistency here, in all but one of the acts marked against her Nena was the one with the least involvement in them (even Jack did more to help with two assasination attempts, albiet against his will).
edited 12th Apr '13 6:59:54 PM by Shaoken
It is constantly pointed out how Nina has nothing resembling an ideology or loyalty. Even after she's granted some level of pardon in season 2, she betrays her country again.
No, Nina's not the one who comes up with the plans, but one who does that and one who enables them, depending on context can both be guilty. No, Nina didn't come up with the idea, but she'll gladly facilitate it, long as you give her the cash.
edited 12th Apr '13 7:05:55 PM by Lightysnake
Her name is Nina, not Nena. And though I haven't watched the show, from what I've seen/heard, I'm in favor of her inclusion. Being an enabler for all these horrific things to happen and actually contributing some horrific acts yourself without any adequate justification or cause besides lining your own pockets does sound like the most heinous thing she could do and be in her position.
edited 12th Apr '13 8:09:12 PM by ANewMan
About that Super Jail example, I saw the episode and figured he doesn't count at all. All he really does is murder (which is common place in Super Jail), have a Nightmare Fuel back story, and kill himself by mistake. Definitely not Complete Monster.
As for Hunter J of Pokemon, I would have brought her up, having the negatives of Ghetsis on a much lower, less horrifying scale with half the crimes. I'd say if Ghetsis is less heinous than Cyrus then she should be disqualified by default. I don't watch the anime after Ash's voice actor got replaced so I don't know what context there is.
@Anew: Aah, don't worry, would have found out about it eventually. Not your fault they went Full Retard. Thanks for the concern anyway.
@Super Saya: Thanks to you too. I'll get over it (but if I learn they fucked up Last Exile's sequel too...).
Hugo, Radiant Historia: Looks like he doesn't count, then. Unless more info damns him in spite of that, Cut.
Ran: Expand or Cut Hidetora. Expand Kaede while you're at it, just to be safe.
Rave Master: I'd say Slade counts. Unlike Ogre, who was a powerful demon, a Gold Claimer (explicitly stronger, individually at least, than Silver Claimers like Musika) and the head of a huge army/mafia of fellow demons, Slade was a nobody, a low-level army officer in the country where King had established Demon Card's headquarters (back then, Demon Card was kinda like an NGO/pseudo-knightly order dedicated to promoting justice and righteousness-its unfortunate name was due to a misspelling that underwent Memetic Mutation). As soon as Demon Card seemed like it was overstepping their bounds (i.e. potentially meddling in affairs the state would like to keep its sole prerogative), he arranged for trumped-up treason charges to be levied against the whole organisation (kinda like The Knights Templar), and personally led in a small army of soldiers to the compound, who he gleefully ordered to shoot down everybody when King protested. Most present were massacred, including King's wife and (he thought) his son. Slade treated the whole affair like combining the sadistic enjoyment he got out of ordering people's unnecessary deaths (he had quite the Slasher Smile for most of that part) with the pragmatism of not having to bother with due process (they can't defend themselves if they're all dead "resisting arrest"). This event caused both King's and Lucia's Start of Darkness via Despair Event Horizon, with the added trauma for Lucia of watching everyone he cared about be gunned down while still in single-digit years of age and being imprisonned on Slade's orders (again while still a child) for at least a decade in complete isolation, with zero human (or sentient) contact... save for that world's biggest, baddest sentient Artifact of Doom who knew a good prospective pupil when it saw one, and utterly corrupted Lucia over time into the Ax-Crazy sociopath he is by the time he appears. And Slade did all that for a promotion, with a large helping of For the Evulz as a fringe benefit.
tl;dr: Slade, through his petty, sadistic ambition and malice, is the root cause for at least 95% of the manga's bad stuff and both Big Bads, and he only was a lowbie both power- and influence-wise. Hell yeah he counts.
Shakuma I haven't gone that far into the series that I know him; he seems to be on a similar level power-wise to Ogre, but not sure if his MO and psychology distinguish him enough; his views on his universe (which aren't entirely false) go a long way towards explaining his behavior in any case, but would it be a qualifying or disqualifying factor? On the fence for now.
edited 12th Apr '13 8:22:22 PM by Paireon
I know this: if life is illusion, then I am no less an illusion, and being thus, the illusion is real to me.@Shaoken
I understand your concerns about precedent, but I think lightysnake is right on this one. If I sell a psychopath a gun, or a nuclear bomb, or a smallpox virus, knowing full well that he is a psychopath, then I am both legally and morally responsible for what he does with it.
As for why we feel she's worse than the terrorists, they at least have an ideology. They think they are doing the right thing, and that their actions are helping their ethnic group, coreligionists, whatever. Nina doesn't. All she's doing is lining her own pockets at a massive cost in human lives. Not to mention that she has a personality, and most of the bombers do not (the masterminds are another story).
If she only did this kind of thing once, that'd be one thing. But Nina makes a career out of enabling mass murderers to up their bodycounts. She's not some guy with a gun store, she's a traitor, a murderer, and a dealer in WMDs. That's a solid rapsheet.
And before anybody else cries misogyny, I'd want a male character who commits the same crimes listed. If you consistently find new and inventive ways to help terrorists murder as many people as possible, all in the name of your pocketbook, you are an irredeemable wretch.
edited 12th Apr '13 8:33:08 PM by AmbarSonofDeshar
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Yeah, we need to come to a decision about Giovanni, Hunter J, and the Iron Mask Marauder. As well as sort out the inconsistent logic that could enable Gh...the Pokemon Black And White Big Bad. With J, again I'd still say that by the standards of the show, she totally counts.
Oh, and the whole cast got replaced. Which is not entirely a bad thing, but Ash's voice was the worst offender.
edited 12th Apr '13 8:27:12 PM by AnewMan
To me, personally, I'd say keep Hunter J. She's never been given any redeeming facors, and pretty much all the characters, Ash included, hate her guts. I don't really remember that much from the Iron-Masked Marauder though fill me in on him, and probably cut Giovanni because he seems more like a Magnificent Bastard to me than a CM.
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Pretty much agree with Ambar there. Being too stupid to anticipate your actions can come back to bite you in the ass when dealing with terrorists because you didn't scope out their plans enough beforehand is a mark against your intelligence, not your heinousness, and being an enabler means you're as guilty as the masterminds since the masterminds' plans couldn't work without you. And when the masterminds do it for a cause they believe is just (even if they're wrong), but you as enabler do it purely for money, you're the worse asshat. Shooting a civilian woman who thought you were a friend once in cold blood under orders isn't a mark against CM status if you don't give a shit or enjoy it on some level. And while torture, rape and high body counts are good criteria to watch out for in a CM contender, none are strictly necessary.
While I maintain some skepticism concerning Giovanni's CM status, being a Magnificent Bastard is not an auto-disqualifier. Like Knight Templar, it's a relatively rare CM trait, but it happens (a few versions of The Joker for example).
edited 12th Apr '13 8:42:35 PM by Paireon
I know this: if life is illusion, then I am no less an illusion, and being thus, the illusion is real to me.I'm unfamiliar with the show, but from people's descriptions I'll give
to Nina. Being a psychopath is one thing. Being sane, working with psychopaths to fatten your pocketbook, and not caring in the slightest is, IMO, quite another.
Her entry will need to be rewritten, though, as it seems to mostly focus on her wrongs to the protagonists at present (and has been pointed out numerous times in discussing to the qualifications for monsterhood, if you're not doing wrong by the protagonists, you're a pretty crappy villain).
edited 12th Apr '13 8:50:49 PM by HamburgerTime
being a Magnificent Bastard is not an auto-disqualifier. Like Knight Templar, it's a relatively rare CM trait, but it happens.
There are a good few C Ms who are also a Magnificent Bastard. The Joker, Xehanort, Myotismon, Medusa Gorgon, Johan Leibert, the previously mentioned Dewey Novak, the list goes on. Giovanni, on the other hand, never quite goes that far in any parts of the franchise he's featured in.
edited 12th Apr '13 8:54:51 PM by AnewMan

I'm not sure you can even classify Dewey as a Knight Templar. He wanted to wipe everything out, regardless if they were Human or Scub Coral to appease his own ego.
Edit: And Paireon, I feel your pain. Big time.
edited 12th Apr '13 5:45:10 PM by SuperSaiyaMan