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There’s a music video character I think you all may find interesting for discussion. It’s Linkin Park cofounder Mike Shinoda’s “fine”, released earlier this month. The song itself doesn’t have someone to discuss, but the video depicts a blatantly evil protagonist.

Shinoda in the video plays the role of a dystopian tyrant, using advanced technology aboard a spaceship to cause citywide power outages, shut a plane down midair, massive explosions in the city, and many civilians in the city to drop dead... or at least unconscious, with the flick of a wrist, all while smiling sadistically and lying to the people over PA that “everything is gonna be fine.”

What intrigued me is that, though I’m a big fan of and have seen many of the dark and edgy music videos Linkin Park members have been a part of, rarely have they created an outright VILLAIN in their videos, and Shinoda’s villain does not hold back.

It’s the end of the decade and my first proposal after reading the rules; do you folks give the green light to write up an EP? And it doesn’t have to be me either.

Edited by RoyalCharger on Dec 30th 2019 at 10:51:44 AM

Go for it.

Just a question, when Sum Dum Nerd was proposing the Snow White ride, there was a mention of Halloween Horror Nights, and I got to thinking "are there any other characters from there that could possibly be considered?" I was thinking about attempting to do some, but I'm no sure if there's any issues

Edited by nwotyzal on Dec 30th 2019 at 10:58:25 AM

There shouldn't be any problems unless the character's have already been proposed and downvoted.

There was Carnage.

I thought theme park carnage is up already

Alright, finally getting this out of the way. I present to you the true villain of The Shining, The Overlook Hotel. Mind you there is Before & After the Play, codas that King wrote for this book, but I am presenting what is shown in the novel rather than those two since they were deleted from the novel. Although I will add them in the future if Overlook is approved.

What's the work?

The Shining, Stephen King's third novel, centers on Jack Torrance, the off-season caretaker of the historic Overlook Hotel. Joining him are his wife Wendy and their young son Danny, who possesses "the shining" that allows him to see the hotel's horrific past. When they are trapped in the hotel during a never ending blizzard, Jack's sanity start to descend and his alcoholism becomes apparent again, leaving his wife and son in incredible danger. But, like the previous caretaker before him, it is cabin fever that is succumbing to Jack to all of this, right?

What is The Overlook Hotel?

Enter the entity or forces behind the Overlook Hotel. Nothing much is known about it, outside that it has been at the hotel for the longest time and was there, influencing ownership changes multiple times, from Horace Derwent to even being in the hands of the Las Vegas mafia. But anyone who owned the hotel ended up dead or their money was gone, like Derwent. The furthest Jack has learned about the hotel was from the 1920s, and even then, there was more to the history to this place that no one wants to uncover.

What has it done?

Right off the bat, the Overlook Hotel starts to taunt Danny by showing him a gangland slaying that happened in the hotel, and also finds out about his shining. Throughout the novel, it repeatably torments Danny with visions, attacking him with the ghosts of the past, including the woman in Room 217 which ends up causing him into go into a catatonic shock and having welts and bruises on his body, making Wendy think Jack has harmed him again.

The Overlook Hotel's forces also makes it clear that it can influence people's behavior making Jack appear he has become drunk enough to function, by offering him drink after drink until he was loaded. So, when Jack finally succumbs to the hotel, it appears that it is caused by his drinking and rage issues. When it reality, the hotel has already influenced him to the point where he is guided by it.

Freudian Excuse or other redeeming features?

HELL no. The Overlook is unbridled hatred personified. There is a reason why Danny gets a message called, "This inhuman place makes human monsters." It is also vilely racist, as numerous points, it refers to Dick Hallorann, the hotel's cook and whom has the shining as well, and calls him African American racist slang words.

Heinousness?

Whoo boy, this is a bit to unpack, but I'll try my best.

We have Danny's visions, like Redrum (getting Jack to kill his family), harming Danny not once by twice (including with the hotel's topiary animals), and causing him to go into catatonic shock.

When the Overlook Hotel finally does possesses Jack, forcing him to hunt down and kill his wife and son, it is relishing in the fact, it is hunting down people that have been a thorn in its side. Thanks to Danny's shining, however, Jack is able to power through the possession and tries to get Danny to run, only for the Overlook Hotel to possess Jack again and kill his body, by using the mallet it offered to kill the family with to smash his face in until nothing was left. Danny reminds that boiler has been unloaded, causing it to breakdown and go insane whilst it went to dump the boiler. In its final moments, before it blows up, the entity thinks it has won and states it will hunt down Danny again, just to take its power.

In a last ditch effort, Hallorann, who came to rescue the family, gets briefly possessed by the entity/forces to try and kill Wendy and Danny, but is able to fight it off, leaving the entity/forces to die into the night. Or so we thought.

Final Verdict?

Oh, yes. The entity/forces behind the hotel is one of King's vilest villains ever, considering this was his third book, and its staying power has a lasting affect on Danny even going in Doctor Sleep, which I have yet to read.

"The Overlook is unbridled hatred personified"

That's an issue...

Does this thing have a character ?

Mmmmm...I have concerns.

The Overlook as an entity is tough to pin down in origin and agency, much like Room 1408. The issue is, the Overlook is the site of a lot of evil, being unclear if it's the result or the cause of those incidents...The dark history and unclear agency gives me pause, as monstrous as the Overlook is

Yes, it does have a character, using the ghosts of the staff that has worked there as projections of itself. And I agree, the hotel's history is vague, which adds the mystery to it. Jack has this subplot that looks into it but is shot down by Al Shockley and Ullman, forcing him to abandon his book idea of exposing the hotel for what it is. At best, the idea is that they didn't want the hotel's past to be brought upon so they could keep business flowing, since in the past, the hotel has shut down numerous times.

So my first EP on the last week of the decade—and a music one at that. This character is the protagonist of the music video "fine" by Mike Shinoda. I'd post a link but I'm a new user and am not able to.

What's the Music Video's Setting? Shinoda wrote this song for a recently released Russian sci-fi film called "The Blackout," which takes place in some city in future Eastern Europe, when technology advanced but life on earth is reduced to people living in this small, devastated region. The music video uses clips from the movie. I haven't seen the movie itself for complete context, but movie details don't matter as much because the video gives enough characterization to the protagonist which I'll explain further.

Who is the Character? The protagonist played by Mike Shinoda starts off in the video seeming to be some loner on a spaceship hovering above the earth but then turns out to be a ruthless, sadistic tyrant. He sits down at a window overlooking earth, opens interactive screens detailing footage of the crapsack world that remains, then, with a single hand motion, shuts down the power in a certain region, causing a plane to lose power as well and start to fall. This causes the army and the rest of the world to go into a panic.

Morning comes, when the army sees a large portion of the city in rubble, with buildings demolished. The tyrant then calmly speaks to the masses over the PA that "everything is gonna be fine" when they see this frightening image on the news. Then the chorus ends, and immediately the tyrant, using his interactive screens again, causes a building to blow up with a soldier and a civilian inside. He does this several time throughout the video, escalating to causing explosions within larger groups of people, blowing up soldiers, able and wounded, with a sadistic smile on his face, obviously enjoying the fun he's having causing destruction. He then enforces a brutal suppression of a protest with the push of a hand and causes thousands of civilians to drop dead (or at least unconscious) with the flick of a wrist. Again, he wreaks all this havoc while lying on the PA to people that "everything will be just fine."

At the end of the video, after intense gunfire and a dismayed CO looking at a fiery mushroom cloud, the tyrant closes the windows without batting an eye, then does one final motion to shut off all power remaining on the planet, leaving earth in darkness.

Any Mitigating Factors? Zilch. There's no Freudian Excuse for the protagonist, no sign of any good intentions behind this mindless destruction, no sign of Blue and Orange morality being a human and showing sick emotion and pleasure toward causing the destruction, and the heinousness is established well. Now, Mike Shinoda is the co-founder of Linkin Park, and he and the band do not shy away from heavy, dark, and/or edgy topics in their songs or videos, but rarely do they ever write or show a single character, a VILLAIN, behind the scenes of depressing, devastating situations. And though I haven't seen the movie of which the video uses, treating this music video as its own work paints a dark tyrant in the character Shinoda plays.

Conclusion? Easy yes from me. Though I'm open to appropriate thoughts, disagreements, and criticisms as this is my first EP.

Edited by RoyalCharger on Dec 30th 2019 at 12:14:53 PM

Is there any reason the film Overlook Dosent count? I've heard that Doctor Sleep makes it clear it's sentinent.

I'll give a yes to the music video protagonist; sounds like he has enough personality (good first EP, by the way). Abstaining on the Hotel for now.

Wait, I'm confused. The music clip depicts scenes from a movie?

Also, guys, 2019 is not the end of the decade

Sure to the music video dude. Here's said video:

As with The Overlook, I will try and make this better-ish. Or at least read through Doctor Sleep and see what's what.

Tyrant, but Overlook because of agency issues.

Edited by SkyCat32 on Dec 30th 2019 at 4:39:34 AM

Gonna say to canon Overlook due to ambiguity and agency issues. We do have a fanfic version, at least.

By the way, I want to add some lines to the Genichi writeup to specify some of his crimes which were left out (added parts in bold):

• Norose Genichi, head of the NOZOMI Group, is a sneering, arrogant maniac who specializes in the Mind Rape of young girls. Operating as The Chessmaster to get the heroes, superpowered beings called Gigalomaniacs, to do what he wants to further his ends, Norose orchestrates the gruesome New Gen Murders specifically to destroy the protagonist Takumi's sense of self and make him break down. He previously experimented on Sena's family, using her mother as a test subject in creating matter from artificial delusions. He forced a woman who had lost her baby to have a new one from her delusions until he decided he'd gotten enough information and ended the experiment, causing the woman to lose her mind and stab her eyes out, which Norose found quite amusing. He later has Takumi's sister Nanami kidnapped to lure out Takumi. His ultimate goal is to extract Takumi's DNA and use it to power Noah II, which he will use to control all humanity. Finally, he causes a destructive earthquake with the device before betraying and killing his two co-conspirators so he can rule by himself. While Norose claims he has good intentions, he is nothing more than a petty tyrant with a god complex seeking to enact his designs on a world he sees as having no point by hurting those in his way.

On a side note, which is his first name? Norose, or Genichi? Should we have his name in Western order?

Edited by MasterN on Dec 30th 2019 at 2:59:30 AM

Problem with the Overlook is that is was built on "evil grounds," though that was briefly mentioned in the 1980 film. Going with a "no" because it leans toward it being Made of Evil.

Tyrant

So, this upcoming week, to kick off 2020, I'll be proposing up to 4 candidates from NUMB3RS. 1 Serial Killer, and possibly 3 Serial Rapists. Keep in mind, in nearly 120 eps, those were the ONLY 3 serial rapists; I think there may've only been 1 or 2 more rapists period, so it's still unique enough that all can count.

EDIT: N, is Genichi a CM in both the Visual Novel AND the AniManga?

Edited by ACW on Dec 30th 2019 at 4:49:09 AM

Yes to Tyrant.

Random tyrant

@ACW: Yes, Genichi is. His actions in both are pretty much the same. Having gone through both, I can confirm this.

Edited by MasterN on Dec 30th 2019 at 2:08:06 AM

Tyrant and Genichi's writeup