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. "![[tup]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/thumbs_up_emote.png "[thumb up]"){kind=small}
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
Cut Norman's mom. Not nearly bad enough.
I am not sure if this disqualifies him, but I think Henry from Henry Portrate of a serial killer has a Freudian excuse: He states that his mother (likely his first murder victim) was abusive to him, granted that could have been a lie.
jjj
![[up]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/smiles/arrow_up.png "[up]"){kind=icon}
Most sociopaths have abusive parents and crappy childhoods. That doesn`t really come close to excusing all the terrible things he does in the film.
Lost in Space
The Freudian Excuse can establish whether a character is intended to be sympathetic. Beyond that, their mental state is important to establishing moral agency, as a clinically insane person may not be responsible for their own actions.
What's interesting is that, in fiction, sociopathy and psychopathy are typically not treated as mental illnesses that might establish an insanity defense. When they aren't blanket justifications for making a character evil ("Why does he murder people and laugh?" "He's a psychopath."), they are justifications for a hero violating Thou Shalt Not Kill ("They're a rabid dog that needs to be put down.")
edited 2nd Sep '13 6:13:02 PM by Fighteer
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"
That's because in real life psychopathy can't be used to establish an insanity defence. To qualify as "not guilty by reason of mental defect" (at least in Canada and the USA) you have to be either unaware of your actions, unable to control your actions, or unable to understand that what you are doing is wrong. As a result most of those who qualify are schizophrenic or otherwise psychotic, or suffer from truly debilitating mental illnesses like DID (wherein there are innocent personalities sharing headspace with the guilty party).
Psychopaths, in contrast, are cognizant of their actions and aware of their illegality and immorality, they simply don't care. They lack a conscience, but not higher reasoning faculties, and are thus ineligible for the insanity defence (unless of course their ASPD is comorbid with some other qualifying condition).
As for whether that should be the case...I admit that I sometimes wonder (I wrote a paper in Grade 11 arguing that the insanity defence should be extended to certain brands of psychopathy, if only because there are drug regimens that can reduce their hyperaggression and paranoia, even if it doesn't actually give them the ability to give a damn). The prison system in general just makes genuine psychopaths worse (see Clifford Olsen who became interested in killing kids after sharing a cell with a paedophile; it sounded like fun to him), but I'm not sure they belong in a mental ward either, given that they are more or less there mentally.
edited 2nd Sep '13 7:24:39 PM by AmbarSonofDeshar
True.
If anyone wants to give Henry a new writeup, you might want to include his actions in the second film (yeah there was a sequel), which as him taking on a new partner (not as bad as Henry himself or his last partner Otis but still a nasty piece of work), burning down buildings, killing children, killing his new partner, and getting away.
I think Otis can count too, he willingly aides Henry in his killings with no remorse and tries to rape his own sister. Plus, while even Henry as his questionable claim about his mother as a (dubious and disproportinate at best) Freudian Excuse, Otis as nothing.
Again, cut Mrs Bates.
jjj
Now, a few more for this week before I put my other writeups up, sans Benoit:
firstly, having seen TheConjuring, I think the Big Bad of the film, Bathsheba, can count. The film concerns her haunting a family. Bathsheba is a straight up Satanist who tried to sacrifice her baby in life and killed herself when caught. She proceeds to haunt the land and possess mothers to murder their own children and then kill themselves. She attempts this in the film with the Perron family. It should be noted that becoming a ghost has nothing to do with this: she's just straight up evil, and the fact that the other ghosts we see are benevolent and terrified of her indicate her agency isn't in question.
When the heroes, the Warrens investigate her and close in on a solution, Bathsheba attacks their home to try to murder their young daughter to get them away as well.
It's rare I think that we have a ghost who qualifies, but she's just a pure evil figure.
Also, there's the Cal Leandros series Ambar and I were discussing, particularly its villains: Darkling, Abbagor, Hob, Sawney Beane and Cherish. Five is a lot, but each villain is rather unique and nasty in their own way. Most are villains of their own book, with 8 books in series, but these guys all stand out in their own work. More on crimes to come.
edited 2nd Sep '13 8:00:56 PM by Lightysnake
Lightysnake and I have been discussing Cal Leandros a fair bit recently. It's a dark series, but some of the villains do go so far over the line that they might well qualify. The biggest problem is trying to figure out which ones of them go far enough.
From what I remember...all the villains we posted there are heinous in different ways.. Sawney is a serial killer, Abbagor a predator, Darkling a manipulator, Hob an egomaniac, controlling monster and Cherish someone who manipulates everyone around her into causing massive conflict.
I think David from The Last Of Us is ahead in votes now, too. Anyone want to weigh in on him and Bathsheba?
edited 2nd Sep '13 10:27:02 PM by Lightysnake
This is a title.
The Bleach page needs some cleanup. Shrieker's entry mentions Grand Fisher, who seems to have escaped the label and Szayel's entry contains alot of unnecessary information, particularly in reference to what he did to Nemu, about half of which barely makes sense in-context, and doesn't make any sense without it.
edited 3rd Sep '13 12:09:18 AM by Eagal
You fell victim to one of the classic blunders!
Party Crasher
De'londa Brice also qualifies given her willingness to condemn her only son to most likely either death before age 25 or life in prison just to maintain her comfortable lifestyle.
Kenard, as well.
Officer Walker. While other cops like Collichio have their moments under duress, it's clear that Walker's just dirty For the Evulz.
These examples are from The Wire YMMV page. Were they given the green light or they should be cut?
edited 3rd Sep '13 6:10:32 AM by LogoP
It is sometimes an appropriate response to reality to go insane.
Bathsheba sounds like a keep.
Can some more people chime in on the post I made about the Monster.Music page?
I agree that the guy from The Torture Never Stops should be cut if he never actually does anything. Also agree on the Creature Feature example. His entry needs a rewrite to better show what he does. What he does at 14 isn`t described, so even though it`s implied to be bad it can`t really be used as a qualifier. The guy from Avenged Sevenfold probably should be cut. The music video makes it look like his feelings at the end are genuine, dumb as that sounds. Lottie also needs a rewrite at least.
edited 3rd Sep '13 7:18:17 AM by TommyFresh
I'll try a rewrite on Lottie tonight.
Unofficial Wiki Curator for Complete Monster
Cut Hollister. Not sure about Alex, maybe cut. Who is Mot? I don`t remember him from your previous posts.
Unofficial Wiki Curator for Complete Monster
Hollister's gone. Mot from City of Heroes:
And now...there is Mot. What else can you call a being who Mind Rapes people into a Despair Event Horizon so he can eat them? He doesn't even need to do this either, he's just impatient about gathering strength.
CM Dates; CM Pending; CM Drafts
Well it does say he`s an Eldritch Abomination. However, that isn`t an instant disqualifier. The entry needs to be rewritten and his agency needs to ne clarified but he could be a keep.
edited 3rd Sep '13 8:49:38 AM by TommyFresh
That does not seem like an Eldritch Abomination to me.
"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard Feynman
The trope probably is being misused. A lot of people use it for any evil godlike being, even if they aren`t incomprehensible. Mot just sounds evil. So yeah, he sounds like a keep. Needs a rewrite though.
For The Wire, keep Marlo, the rest have to go.
Neither Marlo's YMMV entry nor his Monster.LiveActionTV entry go into what he does specifically.
edited 3rd Sep '13 11:00:08 AM by Camberf
Unofficial Wiki Curator for Complete Monster
Would Shuma-Gorath count as incomprehensible?
CM Dates; CM Pending; CM Drafts
It kind of depends. Shuma-Gorath is meant to be a Lovecraftian horror Eldritch Abomination, but it frequently shows (or showed) a rather...human personality in that sense with its drive of domination and cruelty
But if she deserves so much cutting and burning, then maybe she qualifies after all...
(No.)
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