Discussion Monster / ComicBooks

Apparently that comic really does exist. Huh.

But I'm sure that your proposal..errr, De Bekkentrekker's proposal is a joke, right?

That last line is of course a joke, but the Gilles de Geus comic really does exist (by Dutch cartoonists Hanco Kolk and Peter de Wit, published by Silvester), and De Bekkentrekker is a real character in them (he's the main villain in album 5 "Smeerenburg" and occurs as another villain's dragon in album 7 "De Batavia".) While he is played for laughs at times, it's very dark humor indeed, and the two albums in which he appears are very dark and edgy compared to the other albums.

And yes, he really does talk like that, my joke was a slight adaption of his retort to a Spanish captain demanding him to surrender. I wanted to give you all an impression of what he's like. In fact, a stunned "...he's joking, isn't he!?" is a common reaction to this character. And it's made very clear that no, he's not.

A short list of some of his atrocities:

• Brutally intimidates characters smaller and weaker than him.
• Savagely beats up his own minions when his plans fail- or succeed for that matter, in the latter case he just does it because it's fun.
• After being saved from drowning by the hero, nearly drowns the hero "so they'll be even".
• Subjects people who crossed him to the "Ice and Fire test": An unarmed fight with a polar bear, in an arena surrounded by fire.
• Decapitates some of his own minions just for laughs.
• Throws the hero overboard a ship in a storm immediately after reaching an Enemy Mine agreement, which he himself proposed.
• Fires guns at a minion at point blank range (a very near miss), just so they'll work harder.
• Uses a character as a living bridge to cross a hazard, and expresses regret that he didn't bring his spiked shoes.

During his second appearance, he (and many other characters) get possessed by an evil artifact - but said artifact is in the end revealed to be unable to actually turn someone evil (the hero gets possessed too, but remains a hero), it can only amplify the worst trait in a person. The worst trait of De Bekkentrekker is his boundless cruelty, which is already so strong that the artifact barely changes him at all.

"Shh, be quiet. I'm not gonna stab you to death.... I'll cut you open and strangle you with your own intestines... Death! DEATH! Ghah ghah ghah ghah!"

Insufficient heniousness level in the work. The work has to be dark enough to A) include something that is henious enough on a meta level to work (this rule basically being used to keep people from adding children's show's villians for the crime of being mean), B) The character has to do something above and beyond standard villian fare (and killing heroes is sort of what the villian is supposed to be doing), and C) The work itself has to be dark enough to make the character's redemption an absolute impossiblity, which wouldn't apply here since even if Blackheart never tried you can count the Disney works that make redemption impossible for some characters on one hand.

Some New Guy, if you suspect he might be a Complete Monster, then odds are he isn't. And really, nothing about him sounds that bad, and your use of italics does not serve your argument.

It's better if you ignore Chuck Austin. Because he had to invent a completely new history and personality for Cain to make his stint on the X-Men workable. It has since been undone. Cain kills for power, he kills for pleasure. He accepts a power that he knows compels him to destroy. And you don't think this person is a monster?

Yes, a monster. But not necessarily a complete one. A monster with a number sufficient of redeeming moments is not a complete one.

What a completely arbitrary justification. Should we say the Red Skull is not a "complete" monster because he can hold a conversation? Or the Joker because he is a riot at parties? Cain has no "redeeming" moments outside of long undone retcons. And liking pop music and having a buddy in Black Tom are not redeeming qualities.

Well, based in 75.121.0.40 and 69.179.153.177 posts, Juggernaut was not a Complete Monster only when in the hands of Chuck Austin, but was before and was after, right?

Well you have him doing things like using a bus full of people as a weapon against Thor. Thor even comments his utter disregard for human life. Or complaining about a wasted trip when he learns Madame Webb would die after removing her from her life support. He drops he like a sack and leaves.

Then you get Chuck Austin. And suddenly Cain had never intentionally killed anyone? And only did what he thought was right?

And after Austin you get Cain once again killing people as an afterthought. One of these things is not like the other.

The Juggernaut nearly cried when he thought he killed Dazzler (mainly because he liked her music, but still). He also didn't want to fight her, but she insisted. He more than once suffered humiliating defeat to save Black Tom Cassidy, for which he seemed to feel genuine friendship. (I don't know, for what I read in the Complete Monster description, genuine friendships seemed quite impossible.)

Honestly, I never saw him outside of X-books. And most of the "complete monster" examples seem to come from... well, other series. But in the X-books, in my memories, he is written like one of the less monstruous villains, if any. His villainy of choice consists in robbing banks. (Also, trying to kill Xavier, but you're not a Complete Monster for something so personal)

Except that whole Xavier recalling Cain had a dark aura around him from the day they first met. Oh and describing the power of the Juggernaut itself as evil. And that multiple attempted murder thing.

As for your first points? I'll just quote from above "liking pop music and having a buddy in Black Tom are not redeeming qualities".

I thought it was more that he was able to make genuine friendships and felt remorse for hurting someone.

Let's post the Magic Five again, shall we, since nobody ever seems to read them?

• The character must personally engage in a series of truly horrendous acts, and the story makes no attempt to gloss these over or present them in a positive light. Acts concealed behind a Villainy Discretion Shot or by a distant Mook don't count. The Complete Monster usually starts at the Moral Event Horizon and keeps on running, though nothing excludes them becoming one through Character Development.
• The character must evoke fear, revulsion and/or hatred from the other characters in the story. If there are other villains around, they are afraid of/dislike this person, too — Even Evil Has Standards, after all (in particularly disturbing stories, with particularly evil villains, even lesser Complete Monsters may fear such a character). If the other characters in the story treat the character as a joke or don't take them seriously, they fail to qualify.
• There is no adequate justification or Freudian Excuse to balance out the misdeeds.
• The character must show no regret or remorse for their actions, however terrible. It's better if they obviously enjoy it, but complete lack of emotion or caring will suffice.
• Most importantly, the character must have no chance of redemption without being considered a Karma Houdini. The only way the story could come to anything resembling a happy ending is if they die or are otherwise removed. A Heel–Face Turn is out of the question, and nobody would believe it if it happened. There can be no Redemption Equals Death for this character, and no Fate Worse than Death is too extreme.

Point Four. Juggy's out.

Woops, I mean Doctor Destiny, sorry.

Anything is better than a simple image of the Joker in which he is not doing anything that would illustrate him being a Complete Monster. I mean, the character is perfectly fine as an example, but there is a difference between an image showing a complete monster and an image illustrating a complete monster.

Either way, the examples you came up with are pretty good in my opinion. If you can find any of these scenes and put the image up, it would be appreciated, as long as it isn't Just A Face And A Caption.

He redeemed himself and was genuinely remorseful. NEXT!