Subpages cleanup: Complete Monster

Well I just deleted Sundowner off of Metal Gear Rising Revengeance. I guess it was my own fault for not taking the initative to put a comment on that page, so I'm going to try and make that my standard practice when reviewing characters from a game before anyone else has the chance to throw the trope on there.

edited 18th Apr '13 1:02:49 AM by Shaoken

Should we add Scar and Maleficent to the never-again list?

Footsteps, hope you and your family and friends are safe

edited 18th Apr '13 3:49:54 AM by ACW

Actually, should we have a look at Sundowner? I'm not giving a hard yes or no on whether he qualifies, but he seems like he warrants an examination by the thread.

For reference, here's a rundown of the five villains in Metal Gear Rising Revengeance:

The primary antagonists of the game are Desperado Enforcement, a PMC (private military company, or mercenary band if you want to go old-fashioned) that is very enthusiastic about War for Fun and Profit. They like to stir shit up in conflict hotspots, pushing unstable political situations into outright wars in which one or both of the sides will require their services. Their recruitment strategies are also highly unethical - many of their recruits are war orphans, child soldiers, and similarly traumatised individuals who are easy to mould into killing machines, and they've recently taken it to the next level, abducting children off the streets, extracting their brains and plugging them into VR training environments modelled off the most horrific child-soldier programs of recent history, and then popping them into combat-cyborg bodies once they're suitably brainwashed. Their three top agents are the so-called 'Winds of Destruction', a trio of heavily modified Axe-Crazy cyborg killers who command Desperado's operations on a tactical and strategic level. They are:

• Sundowner: Our potential Complete Monster candidate. The de facto leader of Desperado Enforcement, Sundowner is thus responsible for all the atrocities it carries out. Admittedly, as a mercenary, he's always on someone's payroll, but he does the details and takes a disquieting amount of pleasure in them. The first time we see him, he's kidnapping and eviscerating the democratically-elected, reform-minded leader of a troubled third-world country with the aim of destabilising it all over again so Desperado can rake in the big bucks. He supervises the 'kidnap, mutilate, and brainwash children' recruitment scheme, and is personally responsible for picking the VR program used. His Freudian Excuse is that he was born into grinding poverty and made his fortune through war, resulting in it having somewhat more positive associations for him than it does for most.
• Mistral: French-Algerian born shortly before the Algerian civil war. Became a child soldier, saw her entire family die, learned from ripping apart her parents' killers that mercenary work was her ideal profession. First met supervising a brutal coup in Eastern Europe, but commits little on-screen villainy, seems to care for the leader of the coup, Dolzaev (though not nearly as much as he thinks she does), and is a Graceful Loser when the protagonist, Raiden, defeats her.
• Monsoon: Axe-Crazy Social Darwinist. Commits little onscreen villainy beyond submitting our hero to a bruising Hannibal Lecture, has the Freudian Excuse of living through the wrong end of the Khmer Rouge's reign of terror (and if you've read anything about that shit, you'll know it serves as an excuse for almost anything).

Other villains:

• Samuel 'Jetstream Sam' Rodriguez: South American freelancer who hangs out with Desperado in the hope of a worthy fight. He's a rather self-centred Blood Knight (as evidenced by the fact he works with Desperado), but an honourable one, and a Graceful Loser.
• Senator Steven Armstrong: The game's Big Bad and Desperado Enforcement's employer. A wannabe Well-Intentioned Extremist who failed the basic sanity exam, he wants to use the money Desperado and his other shady interests make him to mount a presidential bid. Once he's president, he plans to mount sweeping, rather vague, and very alarming reforms to the US - in his own words, to 'burn it all down'. Other than a commitment to fighting corruption, supporting personal freedom, and bashing celebrity culture, it's hard to say just what he wants to do - he's been so immersed in vapid political clichés for so long that they're the only way he can communicate. Also, his heart's been replaced with a nanomachine plant that turns him into the Incredible Hulk, which can't be good for your brain.

Running down that list, you may have noticed that Sundowner stands out in several ways. Compared to the horrific Freudian excuses of Mistral and Monsoon, his own is relatively weak and overlaps with greedy self-interest (as he says, 'there's nothing like a good atrocity to keep a war going'). His on-screen villainous acts are both more heinous and more frequent than anyone else's, with the exception of Armstrong. He's not a Well-Intentioned Extremist or Noble Demon, motivated more by greed and petty sadism than grand change-the-world ambition. Finally, he's a bit off in the head, but not nearly as flamboyantly insane as Monsoon or Armstrong, raising rather fewer questions about moral agency. Like I said, probably worth consideration, even if he's not a flat 'include now'.

Thoughts?

Does anyone have a writeup for Rourke (Atlantis: The Lost Empire) yet?

Armstrong DOES seem like a WEI, which would disqualify him. I'd like to say more, but they didn't release this for PC

edited 18th Apr '13 7:26:54 AM by ACW

You could do it yourself.

The Phalen example needs one more rewrite:

• Phelan, the ex-military mercenary turned crime lord from "Black Market", counts too. He runs the titular market and garrotes anyone who threatens his supremacy. When Apollo investigates the death of one of Phelan's competitors, the man pays him a visit, abducting the Hooker with a Heart of Gold Apollo had been seeing regularly and taking her daughter, warning Apollo that "I hear any more talk about Fisk I'm gonna send your whore back to you piece by piece, and then I'm gonna start on the little girl." As if that's not enough, in his headquarters he keeps a bunch of children locked in a cell. When Apollo confronts him and asks about that, he claims that some people are "demanding". When Apollo demands the kid back, Phelan replies "Sorry, the little girl's been paid for. No refunds.

The word some is italicized to make it stand out. Don't italicize it when you actually adding the example.

Got another likely bad example from Welcome to the Dollhouse:

• Complete Monster: Lolita is such a sociopath one can't help but feel disgust whenever she walks into frame. However, given the general air of nihilism that permeates through the film, everyone is a suspect.

This character isn't even mentioned in the work's description on Wikipedia, but from what I can glean from the trope page, this is a character who bullies the protagonist at school.

The troper who added it, Connnor Bible, has an issue with this kind of thing- I've noted in the past that in works that are like dark comedies, especially those dealing with someone growing up, they will add sterm parents and in this case bullies because of how they seem to over-react to the work.

I have two examples that I think needed discussion. Not sure if they where discussed already.

Michael Myers - I know Dr. Lommis's description of him fits the page qoute, and it implies he's Made of Evil. However, in Halloween 4 he sheds some tears when he takes his mask off infront of Jamie, and in Halloween 6, it says he is under the curse of thorn which drives him to kill. This implies he is killing against his will, to me that sounds like a reddeming trait.

Randall Flagg - He's a demon and probebly following his nature. He's also a Satan/Antichrist figure. If I recall the Gorog discussion, these types of characters cant count because they're beyond human judgement.

The first sounds like a Depending on the Writer kind of issue- like he was intended as a Complete Monster/"inhuman force of nature" in the first movie, but that characterization changed later one. That supernatural explanation is definitely not something conceived of originally.

Second one- from what I've heard of Flagg, he sounds like he's a fully sapient individual and not the type that would be disqualified for that reason

Michael Myers is an example Depending on the Writer.

@32_Footsteps: Thank you for all that info. That was very enlightening.

We can't force anyone to use our particular definition of Complete Monster outside of the wiki. But due to our work in strictly defining its meaning here, yes, on TV Tropes, we are deciding what is and is not a Complete Monster, and that anyone who wants to use the term within this wiki will need to listen to how we've defined it. This is actually how every trope works. It doesn't matter what you might think counts for a Magnificent Bastard, or a White-Haired Pretty Boy, or even a Big Bad. If you don't have the weight of the wiki as a whole behind your usage of it, it won't pass muster here.

OK, one more question about that. I'm fine with that being the way of the wiki for regular pages. But what about Sugar Wiki or Darth Wiki? Can the people who post there feel free to use the trope "incorrectly?" Like in "Most Triumphant Example", some people's entries were removed because the wiki declared them not examples. That doesn't really sit well with me 'cause it really seems like it's "forcing people how to think and what to say". Is there any place at all for the "less educated" people to have free speech in the usage of this trope?

(which requires, at minimum, rape, murder, a spectacularly brutal assault or the like).

What I question there is that the focus on that is all about actions, rather than the character. And this is a character trope. If I've got this right, a Complete Monster has to be the most heinous villain in the work by that work's standards, and then back it up through actions that are considered heinous by any standard. That's a good way to define it, rather than just "a villain who crosses the Moral Event Horizon in a heinous way."

Laughably Evil and Played for Laughs are two very different things, and both are well-defined on their own pages.

But a Complete Monster can be Laughably Evil, right? I was doublechecking there because I cannot count the number of times people have argued that "a CM can't be funny! Their heinousness has to be taken 100% seriously!", only for people to say "well then we oughta cut The Joker or Kefka, then!"

And again, we do not care that the fandom is in agreement about his being "pure evil". Most of the characters on the Never Again list, are agreed to be pure evil by their respective fandoms too. We don't care.

Kinda sounds like Protagonist-Centered Morality on the internet. "They think this, but they're not the wiki, so we don't care!" (Hey, you called me out for using this trope. I can do the same. )

Harry suffered a mild injury that he later recovered from. That doesn't stack with anything else that Osborn did.

It wasn't just that he injured Harry. It was that he did it as means of setting his own son up to cover his tracks. And that he was willing to take advantage of his kid's drug problem like that, even though he was originally just going to fake a limp and that would be it. Norman didn't need to do that to Harry, yet he did.

And of course Tombstone is responsible for the creation of numerous supervillains, eclipsing the Goblin's manipulation of Mark.

Most of the supervillains Tombstone created were willing participants. Even the one who initially didn't like it (Flint Marko) came to appreciate his new power. Octavius and Mark were completely unwilling or unready, and the Goblin turned them into monsters.

Tombstone and Doctor Octopus are damn near as bad in terms of supervillains created and willingness to tolerate collateral damage.

Doc Ock I'll give you. But Tombstone was at least never depraved enough to blow all his resources on a giant death trap for one guy.

I still stand by that the only way everyone would agree Norman's a Complete Monster would be if he killed Gwen Stacy.

IRRC, Michael was discussed and the original film's Michael did indeed count.

edited 18th Apr '13 9:10:12 AM by AnewMan

A CM CAN be Laughably Evil (Joker a prime example), but NOT Played for Laughs (why only Jeff from Family Guy remains).

Exactly. That's what I thought. We can laugh at a Complete Monster, but not at what they do because they're presented as terrible things with serious consequences in-universe.

You know, tossing around accusations of elitism and restricting "freedom" is not going to help you get your way. We want the trope cleaned up and the misuse gone, period. We have the permission and support of the moderators to do so. By using this forum, we are, I will note, doing so in a very democratic manner. Anyone who wants to can come in, make their case, and vote. But once the voting is done, and a character has been cut, we do not want to here them referred to as this trope again. If you have a problem with that, take it up with the mods.

"If I've got this right, a Complete Monster has to be the most heinous villain in the work by that work's standards, and then back it up through actions that are considered heinous by any standard."

Yes. And the focus is all about actions because there is no other way to define heinous by the standards of the story. Just as MB is about Chessmaster+Manipulative Bastard+Trickster, and is not, despite the best attempts of many, to turn it into a second Love to Hate page, so too is this trope about the very worst, of the very worst. And the only way to determine who is the very worst, is to look at what they do.

No one in-story thinks The Joker or Kefka are funny. The viewers/players might, but in-story they are played entirely straight and treated like the deadly serious threats they are.

That's not what Protagonist-Centred Morality means. You know it, and I know that you know it. More to the point, I, wait for it, don't care. We are dealing with this wiki, and this wiki alone. What the rest of the Internet or the fandom does is beyond irrelevant.

Did Harry go to prison? No. Did he suffer long term effects? No. He got over it. I'll also note that you can't count Norman "turning Octavius into a monster" because that isn't what he was trying to do; he was trying to kill him and failed to do so. That Marko eventually came to like his new powers, does not change the fact that he did not like it at first, and that Tombstone and Hammerhead went ahead with it anyway. They also flatout lied to O'hirn about what becoming the rhino would do to him.

Tombstone deliberately created half the Sinister Six, assembled them as a team and turned them loose as a distraction for Spider-Man. Everything they do is on his head. Octavius leads the six, which means that all the property damage and lives they threaten is on him. You want to tally up all the damage the Six have inflicted, and all the people they've endangered over the course of the show? Because at the end of the day it's going to equal what Osborn did. He might be the worst in the show. But he isn't the worst by enough.

@Laculus

Sundowner sounds like he'd be damned close to the trope, if not full on in it.

If Sundowner ENJOYS what he does, he may count. Freudian Excuse doesn't disqualify him I don't think.

You know, tossing around accusations of elitism and restricting "freedom" is not going to help you get your way.

I wasn't meaning to make any accusations about the wiki's intentions. I was just letting you know how it might look like. And if it's not what it looks like, then what is it?

We want the trope cleaned up and the misuse gone, period. We have the permission and support of the moderators to do so. By using this forum, we are, I will note, doing so in a very democratic manner. Anyone who wants to can come in, make their case, and vote. But once the voting is done, and a character has been cut, we do not want to here them referred to as this trope again. If you have a problem with that, take it up with the mods.

That's easier said than done, though. "Misuse" will never, ever truly go away. Some characters will cease to be referred to as examples because it was always an ignorant minority who thought of them as such to begin with. But when a characters' status as a Complete Monster is agreed upon by everyone but the main wiki consenscious, you will not likely ever hear the end of the term used in association with them, and it'll be harder to fight those people off of the wiki. I agree with the democratic policies here and I don't have anything to take up with the mods now, but I'm just giving a head's up for possible troubles to come.

No one in-story thinks The Joker or Kefka are funny. The viewers/players might, but in-story they are played entirely straight and treated like the deadly serious threats they are.

Yes, that's exactly what I was getting at.

That's not what Protagonist Centred Morality means. You know it, and I know that you know it.

I do know it: it was a joke. As in "if you were to think of the TV Tropes wiki that we're helping as the protagonist of it's own story, with the rest of the internet and fandoms that goes against it as the rest of the cast, it would be this." But this aint a story: it's life. On the internet.

Did Harry go to prison? No. Did he suffer long term effects? No. He got over it.

Does this really make his dad's actions less reprehensible?

I can see your other points though, and I'll also add that while it's unclear if Norman loved his son or not, Harry certainly still loved his dad and was sad when he (seemingly) died. So if that's a disqualifyer...

edited 18th Apr '13 11:10:49 AM by AnewMan

Regardless of how bad trying to frame Harry was it was an action that, had it worked, harmed one person. That doesn't stack with what other villains have done.

EDIT: No use worrying about what might happen if large chunks of the internet disagree with the Tv Tropes classification of who is and isn't a Complete Monster. We will deal with problems as they arise

edited 18th Apr '13 9:55:50 AM by SophiaLonesoul

Gwen Stacy was just one person too. Look at how many people think of comic!Osborn as a Complete Monster just for that.

And he might not have even killed her, either! Spidey might've snapped her neck!

edited 18th Apr '13 9:58:19 AM by AnewMan

Protagonist-Centered Morality

@Anew Man

The rules have been explained to you, and the list of objections is getting old. There's nothing you've been told here that you couldn't have learned by reading the FAQ.

"I'm not calling you elitist. But you are." That's essentially what you've just said there. Classy. Transitioning from mobocracy to democracy does not restrict anybody's "freedom". If Fast Eddie had wanted to, he could have asked a group of mods to clean up the pages with no input from the wiki as a whole. If enough people like you complain, that just might happen.

We don't have to fight anybody off of the wiki. We control what happens and is said here. If people want to misuse a phrase elsewhere, we do not care. When they bring it here, we'll crack down on them. Saying "misuse will never end" is not a valid reason to stop trying.

I know it was a joke. Still wasn't funny. Kind of insulting actually.

And none of us care that people consider Norman a CM for killing Gwen. As Sophia has so kindly pointed out to you, that is Protagonist-Centred Morality of the worst sort. Go to the comics page and read Norman's current entry to see what does get you listed.

Moving along, I am going to request that those Beyblade and Battle Royale examples be cut tonight, unless there are objections. I'm also going to axe that bad literature example I was talking about for having no context and PM the editor to come here and explain.

edited 18th Apr '13 10:37:48 AM by AmbarSonofDeshar

And we all know Fast Eddie has no problems unilaterally making decisions (see: Gorn)

Anyway, I had wondered at first about Norman, but here you go:

edited 18th Apr '13 10:37:55 AM by ACW

Precisely.

The rules have been explained to you, and the list of objections is getting old. There's nothing you've been told here that you couldn't have learned by reading the FAQ.

Maybe the FAQ still wasn't all that clear to me? The criteria seems numerous, strict, and even a bit contradictory at times. It's taken me a while to "get" it, but I think I am now. You just have to be patient with me, OK?

"I'm not calling you elitist. But you are." That's essentially what you've just said there. Classy.

No, I'm not calling anyone elitist. I'm only saying the truth of the matter: that others have, will, and are.

Transitioning from mobocracy to democracy does not restrict anybody's "freedom".

Not on the forums, yes. Not so sure about the wiki: my Sugar Wiki and Darth Wiki related questions have gone unanswered.

We don't have to fight anybody off of the wiki

The FAQ says: "If you bring these up or try to add them to the respective work page (or remove them, for validated C Ms), at best we'll Face Palm at you and at worst we'll outright ban you."

I know that's meant to be "not following the rules = banned forever." But it sounds like fighting people off of the wiki to me. Suppose the people were simply ignorant of the decisions made here?

If Fast Eddie had wanted to, he could have asked a group of mods to clean up the pages with no input from the wiki as a whole. If enough people like you complain, that just might happen.

And honestly I'm glad it hasn't happened, even though by all means it could and perhaps should seeing as this trope seems to be a major headache that eats up so much time and effort, even while there are other tropes out there suffering from misuse and decay. Personally, no matter what problems I might have with what goes down here, I think this democratic approach should be taken with more tropes more often. I'd be all for it.

If people want to misuse a phrase elsewhere, we do not care. When they bring it here, we'll crack down on them.

"Over there has to stand for itself, has to speak for itself, because it's only when over there becomes here that we can stop this once and for all." I'm sorry, you totally set me up for that!

Saying "misuse will never end" is not a valid reason to stop trying.

Did I say we should stop trying? No. I was basically asking And Then What?.

I know it was a joke. Still wasn't funny. Kind of insulting actually.

How was it insulting? You seem to be reading all of my intentions as insulting and reacting with hostility.

And none of us care that people consider Norman a CM for killing Gwen. As Sophia has so kindly pointed out to you, that is Protagonist Centred Morality of the worst sort.

I don't care either. I was mocking the people who think in that way.

edited 18th Apr '13 11:13:34 AM by AnewMan

There seems to be a majority for removing the Grandmother from "Profiling 101" from the Criminal Minds page. Unless there are strong objection in the next 24h I will request that it be removed.