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
Berserk Button: misusing Berserk Button
![[tup]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/Thumbs_up_emoticon_3268.png "[thumb up]"){kind=small}
Evil Queen Grimhilde. Will wait for Sean before voting on Mark and Eliot.
Edited by MasterN on Jan 9th 2020 at 6:22:03 AM
One of these days, all of you will accept me as your supreme overlord.
Yes to Grimhilde and the fanfic examples.
I've got one I've been waiting for:
What's the work?
K. Arsenault Rivera's The Bright Ascendancy is a high fantasy set in a world inspired by East Asia...O-Shizuka is a princess of the Hokkaro Empire (Think imperial Japan)...as a child, Shizuka is introduced to Shefali, a shy, quiet girl who is the daughter of the leader of a steppe people known as the Qorin. The two are born to be gods, bound by an omen of twin pine needles marking them....the first novel is a series of letters and reminisces written from Shefali to Shizuka, who is by then her wife, and the story is an epic fantasy and equal parts love story between Shizuka and Shefali.
For the world? Is marked by the Wall of Flowers, a magical structure that keeps out a sinister being known as The Traitor God from the world, and his designs are indeed monstrous. Let's talk the Traitor God, Yamai.
Who is the Traitor God?
The Traitor God. Yamai. Shizuka's ancestor and the first emperor of Hokkaro. The Traitor ascended to godhood, becoming a vicious tyrant until he was sealed away, but has never forgotten his ambition to seize the world and take revenge...behind the Wall of Flowers, Yamai is ceaselessly plotting and intends to wear it down, while Shizuka and Shefali are destined to travel and face him.
Unwilling to simply sit by, Yamai crafts a number of afflictions for the world of mankind: he creates a horrific sort of viscera using his demon servitors, the blackblood, mixing demon viscera with humans and spreading it like an affliction along with the demons he sends into the world of the livin. They torment and kill plenty people, and the blackblood? The infected are tormented by demons for days before dying in agony and becoming deformed monsters. It's the worst affliction one can live with.
Now, at the end of book 1, Shefali is due to be executed by Shizuka's uncle, but the two end up marrying. As nothing says that marriages are only viable between men and women (same-sex marriage is legal in parts of the empire but rarely used), Shefali is a member of the royal famiyl and can't be executed, but Shizuka's uncle still sends her on a quest to find a phoenix feather before he'll allow her to be pardoned...as Shefali travels, she sees the rumblings of Yamai's ambitions and that he is close to bringing down the Wall of Flowers.
....and it gets worse. Yamai takes many others for his own personal, hellish dystopia and hollows out their minds, replacing it with himself. Beings there can only pray to him and repeat his praises, their minds utterly crushed and stolen by Yamai's power. Even tons of Qorin, Shefali's people are taken this way, souls held in thrall, and this is a nightmarish fate for the Qorin, whose souls are supposed to return to the sky. Shefali and Shizuka travel north by the end of book 2 to war against Yamai, who is by now ready to come to take what's his.
Yamai? Unleashes the demons and infected to sweep over the land and suppress it so he can reclaim Hokkaro for himself and from there the world, with no thought to the violence. At one point, he has an entire city attacked with a widespread massacre, until he takes on Shizuka herself. Unfortunately, Yamai is rather invincible, and decides to have fun by turning Shizuka's niece into a puppet to force Shizuka to have to kill her. Shizuka is left with no way to stop Yamai unless she knows his true name...by the end of the fight, however, she manages to figure it out and almost mortally wounded, she manages to draw it upon him, (The name 'Umigami', which she realizes as obvious from his affinity with the ocean to the point he bleeds seawater) stealing his power.
....with Shefali, whose divine power is turning into a massive wolf looming right behind Yamai before she devours him, ending the Traitor God.
Heinousness?
Yeah, nobody in series comes close to Yamai, not whatsoever. Mind rape on massive scales, the blackblood infection, widespread massacres. Pass.
Mitigating Qualities?
None. Yamai is greedy and ambitious, and no positive qualities are ever ascribed to him. Agency is no sisue, and he gives no damns whatsoever about Shizuka or their blood ties. He simply wishes to reclaim Hokkaro and dominate the world, while having people worship him endlessly, even if he has to lobotomize them for that to happen. We see plenty of Yamai and he's a sickening sadist throughout.
Conclusion?
An easy yes.
Wild Child
Yamai.
"The Juice is Loose."
Unofficial Wiki Curator for Complete Monster
Yamai. Isn't it Their Bright Ascendancy?
For those wondering, I looked it up; "Umigami" is "turtle". I Know Your True Name strikes again.
CM Dates; CM Pending; CM Drafts
Yami.
And now the third and final candidate, the Greater-Scope Villain of the game - Red Herring to Mark Jefferson - and this fics ultimate Big Bad; Sean Prescott himself.
Who is Sean Prescott ? What does he do ?
In the games, we knew Sean Prescott as the richest man in Arcadia Bay and seemingly the source of the troubles in the main game, before Jefferson's villain reveal. We don't find out the whole picture with Prescott because we never actually meet him face to face, save for a few cameos in Life Is Strange: Before the Storm, which just give us more of what we already know.
Like in canon, Prescott is responsible for running down Arcadia Bay's economy for his Pan Estate plans and described by everyone who has met him to be an elitist businessman and bully. We are told he is corrupt but the depths of his corruption isn't revealed in the game proper. However, we do know he is denying Nathan any help with his mental health issues and doing what he can to cover up any crimes or trouble Nathan gets caught in; in Before the Storm this can include breaking a girls ribs. He is also the benefactor behind Jefferson's Dark Room, having it built and funded in the first place. In this fic, after the bathroom shooting where Nathan is also shot and hospitalized, Prescott attempts to visit his son, and it's made immediately clear what a slimy c*mstain he is. He wastes no time in waving around his I Run This Town card before he is forced out to the hospital. He also attended uninvited to Rachel's funeral and did/said something that got him punched out by her James Amber.
Anyways, Prescott hears about what Nathan is being charged with besides the attempted shooting and does what he can to silence and intimidate witnesses, as well as having his men interfere with the investigation. He isn't doing this for Nathan's sake. Oh no, Prescott treats Nathan like an heir to groom, and beats him to keep in line as Nathan reveals in his later testimony. This is all to clear the Prescott name. Prescott has been telling the media an bogus cover story that Chloe shot Max and they have been trying to blackmail his son. Some of the media even promote that version of the story, leading to the girls being harassed at school by trespassing reporters.
Prescott later visits Max at the Price residence, and tries to bribe her into testifying his version of the story. Not only does Max refuse despite his intimidation tactics, but because David Madsen is one who keeps camera in his house, the encounter is caught and sent to James Amber (who is the DA), which briefly gets Prescott in trouble with the Feds for obstruction of justice.
It is here we get to the corruption and criminal activity Prescott has been up too; specifically he has been having hits called out onto people over the years that he considers a threat to him and his plans. A specific story ? When Max and Chloe were kids, just about everything that went wrong for Chloe was the vehicular manslaughter that killed her father William. Only it wasn't an accident. It turns out Willaim Price was an EPA agent, who interfered with Prescott's Pan Estate plans to build off of sacred grounds of an extinct Native American tribe, and refused to accept any bribes. To get rid of this problem, Prescott had it arranged that a large semi truck would plow into William's car. A few years down the line, Prescott made an offer to former Blackwell student Eliot Hampden to do some less than legal work for his family, effectively making the boy a contract killer; Eliot was such an effective killer, he became Prescott's regular hitman.
Back in the present, Prescott arranges Eliot to try to kill Max and Chloe on Christmas...which goes to shit and results in the two girls being briefly put back into the hospital, a few cops shot, and possibly the death of a trucker. When that fails, we eventually get to the trial this story has been building up too. Prescott's lawyer does what he can to try to discredit the girls testifying against Nathan, still trying to sell Prescott's version of the the story and attempting to get Chloe to snap on court...only its Nathan who snaps and willingly pleads guilty while telling off his father and lawyer. Nathan testifies about what Jefferson was up to in the Dark Room and accepts his punishment.
After Nathan is sentenced, the Prescott empire has all but toppled and Prescott is now under investigation for corruption and obstruction. With a Villainous Breakdown verging, Prescott bullies his way to access the gradation ceremony, where he intends Max and Chloe to be shot by Eliot. At said ceremony, Eliot manages to shoot Max but his riffle misfires and he injures himself. As everyone panics, Prescott decides to take matters into his own hands, and kill Chloe himself; taking out a gun of his own, Prescott gets into a standoff with David; he tells David to just let him kill Chloe, going on an I Own This Town rant. Prescott further warns David that if he shoots him than he will see to it that his wife Joyce becomes a prostitute to pay off the lawsuit he'll being on the Price - Madsen family. Prescott also threatens to shoot Kate for standing up to him, and murders a cop for getting in the way. In the ensuing gun fight, Prescott is shot and wounded, but survives.
During Max's near death experience, she meets Rachel learns that her powers were bestowed upon her by spirits of a now extinct tribe, whose sacred land Prescott has repeatedly defiled to the point they call him "The Darkness"and has brought so much corruption to the land that the Storm was meant to cleanse it. Due to Max's interference and Prescott's utter downfall, the Storm will not come to pass. Max ultimately survives the shot, and in the epilogue it's mentioned Prescott's now exposed crimes and corruption earned him three hundred years in prison.
Mitigating Qualities ?
Are you kidding me ? Are you kidding me ? Are you out of you miiiiind ?
Prescott has no care for anyone outside of himself, including his family. The only thing that he cares about his family is his name, image, power, reputation, etc. He is abusive as all hell to Nathan, and after the trial gives up all pretence of actually caring about him, denouncing him as a weak fool.
Prescott's narcissism and arrogance is through the roof, to the point he is personally offended that someone would talk back to him and is prone to losing his cool when things don't go his way. All the while insistently going I Run This Town, even into his Villainous Breakdown. His hubris is almost childish actually. It's like watching a spoiled brat through a tantrum over not getting what they want. As such he constantly snaps was his world keeps crumbling down.
If he was just a mere bad father and corrupt businessman, that would be one thing, but this guy is a strait up crime boss, who has had people killed for the sake of power and business operations, mainly Chloe's father, as well as personally killing a cop who tried to stop him from trying to kill Max, Chloe and Kate. The spirits in this story strait up tell Max that he is the source of the darkness in Arcadia Bay; while he did fund the Dark Room and Jefferson's operations, he angrily insists to his lawyer he had no idea what was actually happening in there...although doesn't actually care about what happened so long as he can get his family name out of trouble.
The short of it is, this fic sees Prescott as 90% the source of the chaos that occurs in this story.
"It's like...a cliff, and if I do it, I'm just gonna...fall." "I think we're already falling."
No to Prescott. That body count and attempted villainy seems completely paltry to the others. It seems to be confusing a despicable character with heinousness.
Sidenote: Might call Andy Muschetti's Howling for Netflix
Edited by Lightysnake on Jan 9th 2020 at 6:52:59 AM
Traitor God, Jefferson, Elliot, Megatron, Marlene / the immortal woman who eats people's brains, the slasher movie producer ("Dumbass" Faith)
Edit: tentative to Prescott for now.
Edit 2: to Caylor, the Thing and Sorcerer as well
Edited by captainmarkle on Jan 9th 2020 at 3:57:26 PM
Trans rights are human rights. If you don't think that, please leave.
As I explained above, Eliot's hitman carrer in this fic was working under Prescott. The lot of Eliot's crimes were an extension of Prescott's.
"It's like...a cliff, and if I do it, I'm just gonna...fall." "I think we're already falling."
That gives him how many? You spend more time talking about how personally despicable he is and the EP seems to just gloss over his actual body count and crimes.
He seems far too removed from the actual deeds for me to feel comfortable with him going up.
And on reread, I'm seeing the same problem with Elliot. The fact he's a serial killing hitman is glossed over in it. I'm now leaning no to him as well because none of these effortposts are giving me any clear idea of what they do to be considered a CM. They're stuffed full of extraneous and irrelevant information.
Edited by Lightysnake on Jan 9th 2020 at 7:05:30 AM
"The Juice is Loose."
It later turns out Eliot barely managed to get away and has fled across a few states before hiding out in Montana. Later into the story, Eliot is called by Prescott to assassinate Max and Chloe at their graduation out of spite when Nathan's trial brings about his downfall. Once again, Eliot accepts the job, secretly planning on killing Prescott too. Eliot waits in a snipers nest from across the football field where the ceremony is being held. After Max gives her speech, Eliot fires his rifle, which injured but doesn't kill Max, despite the close call. Eliot prepares to shoot Chloe, but his riffle misfires due to a miscalculation , and he ends up critically injuring himself. After the final showdown with Prescott, Eliot regains consciousness surrounded by cops. He is subsequently given life imprisonment with his injuries taken care of, in exchange for selling out Prescott.
Like...this? This is two entire huge paragraphs and almost none of it is relevant to how Elliot qualifies. It's too much to say "he tries to kill the heroes and maybe kills a trucker."
So I'm left with a guy who has one attempted rape and being a hitman seems like an afterthought to the EP so I can't say how seriously it's taken into the story.
Jefferson got a massive upgrade to a serial rapist and a worse torturer so I'm fine with him. Elliot and Sean seem like a lot of nothing in comparison
Edited by Lightysnake on Jan 9th 2020 at 7:13:10 AM
Berserk Button: misusing Berserk Button
Honestly? Mark himself does not seem to actually do anything different, aside from the Serial Rapist part- which, in itself, does not seem to be given much focus. So, gonna say ![[tdown]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/Thumbs_down_emoticon_3571.png "[thumb down]"){kind=small}
to all three of them.
Edited by MasterN on Jan 9th 2020 at 7:13:50 AM
One of these days, all of you will accept me as your supreme overlord.
Unofficial Wiki Curator for Complete Monster
I'll also cordially remind people I also have a recent EP so it doesn't get ignored in the shuffle
Berserk Button: misusing Berserk Button
I also pointed out that the rapist part is not given enough focus. Judging by the EP, it seems to be Offstage Villainy.
![[up]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/smiles/arrow_up.png "[up]"){kind=icon}
to Traitor God.
Edited by MasterN on Jan 9th 2020 at 7:23:05 AM
One of these days, all of you will accept me as your supreme overlord.
Unofficial Wiki Curator for Complete Monster
I gave a yes. This work?
Not given enough focus ? The rapist aspect is about all that's brought up when talking about Jefferson's crimes in this fic.
Edited by Beast on Jan 9th 2020 at 9:26:42 AM
"It's like...a cliff, and if I do it, I'm just gonna...fall." "I think we're already falling."
Berserk Button: misusing Berserk Button
Judging from the EP, I mean. If it is brought up enough, I may give a yes to Jefferson, but I honestly think I should read the fic myself to decide.
One of these days, all of you will accept me as your supreme overlord.
The Draftsman of Doom
I missed Grimhilde, so to her as well.
Showtime!
to Grimhilde, Yamai and Jefferson
Abstain on the other two fic candidates
Absolute destiny... apeachalypse?
The wifi here sucks
Yamai, are the books any good?
Also abstain on the fanfic candidates
Hope your prepared for an unforgettable luncheon
The Draftsman of Doom
Okay, It is time for the final round of effortposts on my end for Night Huntress, specifically for the main novel series. From here on in, miraculous is handling the spinoffs.
What is the work?
Up from the Grave is the seventh installment in the Night Huntress series of novels.Cat and Bones investigate the shady actions of Jason Madigan, the successor to Don Williams as the Director of the paranormal unit who replaced Don Williams in One Grave at a Time. They discover that Madigan has been abducting vampires and ghouls alike, and subjecting them to gruesome experimentation in order to breed super soldiers. His Mysterious Benefactor turns out to be one Richard Trove, a former Washington big shot who plans on reviving tensions for his own purposes.
Who is Jason Madigan, and what has he done?
Jason Madigan is the successor to Don Williams as the Director of the Paranormal Unit. Madigan initially presents himself as a smug, obstructive bureaucrat, but eventually shows his true colours as a cruel sadist who has experimented thousands of ghouls and vampires in the hopes of creating a hybrid super soldier. To this end, Madigan had misappropriated DNA from Cat, as well as from an unidentified soldier, forcibly impregnating a human woman with the embryo, the only embryo out of a hundred to survive pregnancy. Once the child, Katie, is born, Madigan had experimented on her and subjected her to brutal conditioning, successfully turning her into a ghoul/vampire hybrid and a ruthless child soldier. When Cat discovers that the Paranormal Unit is missing and arranges to meet up to discuss their disappearance, Madigan leads her into an ambush before taking her to his facility, where he attempts to experiment on her further. When Cat escapes, and confronts Madigan alongside the freed captives, Madigan vindictively swallows a cyanide pill in order to deprive Cat of the information leading to his backer.
Heinousness?
You are probably sick of hearing me say this, but this series is no stranger to violence. The heroes themselves are pretty ruthless, and the following is a selection of the worst they have had to deal with.- A vampire involved in Human Trafficking as well as the politician in league with him (Hennessey and Governor Ethan Oliver).
- A demon who possesses people and forces them to commit murder, and has repeated the process over thousands of years (Xaphan)
- A Ghoul cult leader who tries to start wars between species (Apollyon)
- A demon king who consumes souls (Dagon).
- Cultists (Fenkir and Rani) who worship the aforementioned demon, force people to choose between worship and death, keep sex slaves, perform human sacrifice, and have a major body count.
- Dr. Louis and Mrs. Delphine LaLaurie, cannibalistic slavers.
- Mihaly Szilagyi, an aristocrat who subjected Vlad Tepsch to various mistreatments, and betrayed romania, causing countless deaths.
- Radjedef, Archnemesis of Bones' grandsire Mencheres, who spends thousands of years trying to get to the latter by attacking his loved ones.
- Inquisitor Heinrich Kramer, responsible for centuries of witch hunts, and a prolific serial rapist.
However, Madigan subjects vampires and ghouls to such treatments as bloodletting, forcible crossbreeding, and splicing, not to mention conditioning the resulting child into being a cold blooded killer at the tender age of seven, all in the name of creating super-soldiers. Madigan may not have been the one who came up with the idea, but Madigan was the one who carried out the experiments, and he was the one who decided how the experimentation would be carried out.
Mitigating Factors?
In a previous book, Madigan blames Cat and Bones for the deaths of his crewmen when they had confronted approved candidate Inquisitor Heinrich Kramer; however, it does not come off as if he cares about his men, so much as wanting to shift the blame for his incompetence in that situation onto someone else.
Madigan is strongly suggested not to know that his actions would possibly start a war between vampires and ghouls, but there is no indication that he would care at all.
Madigan's conditioning of Katie is described as seen through footage, the captives in his facility are shown to be in poor condition, and his attempt at experimentation on Cat is on full display, all of which establishes a pattern.
One concern that could be raised is that after Madigan is raised as a ghoul in order to extract information, he is reduced to a childlike state, and does not retain his original personality. However, there have been Monsters approved who have had their original personalities altered, whether they came back wrong or they were brainwashed. One could argue that Madigan as a ghoul has had his personality altered beyond recognition, but that before the alteration, his original state of mind would make him a contender.
Verdict?
I think that Madigan is a viable contender.
Who is Richard Trove, and what has he done?
Richard Trove, the former White House chief of staff, is Madigan's shadow backer, and a power draining demon who wants to start a war between vampires and ghouls so that his species may reign supreme once more. To this end, Trove had encouraged Madigan to perform genetic experimentation on both species, supervising the conditioning of the resulting test subject, Katie. When confronted by Cat and Bones, Trove taunts Cat with the knowledge that Katie is her daughter. During the final confrontation, Trove attempts to incite the ghoul population by reminding them of Apollyon's rhetoric. Trove proceeds to attempt to drain Cat of her energy, only to be stabbed in the face with a demon bone knife.
Heinousness?
Inciting violence a between species has been done before in the series, courtesy of Apollyon. However, whereas Apollyon used rhetoric and incitement, Trove plants the idea for inhumane crossbreeding and experimentation in Madigan's head, so his methods stand out as particularly cruel. Trove may not be as directly involved in the experiments as Madigan, but the idea was his to begin with, and he funded and guided the experiments.
Mitigating Factors?
No. Trove's charm is superficial, and he is not shown to care about anyone other than himself. Furthermore, Trove freely admits to what exactly he put Madigan up to, so, offscreen villainy isn't really a concern.
Verdict?
I'd say he makes it right between the eyes.
Edited by SkyCat32 on Jan 26th 2020 at 11:23:32 AM
Your friendly neighbourhood Spider-Man.
Yes to Eliot.
Fan-Preferred Couple cleanup thread