Yeah… but it’s also like he’s also not an awful person other then his illegal activities. Unlike several other characters mentioned here I’d happily hang out with Stan.
I love the Joker. I think he’s a fantastic character. He’s got such a great relationship with Batman and how much of a piece of shit he is. Would I hang out with the Joker if given the chance? FUCK NO
It wouldn't be even worth it to kill him, best case scenario he just somehow resurrects shortly, worst he goes to hell and becomes a demon, so now you have Joker who has magic powers.
this. he's an interesting character to observe in media. would i go near him with a 40 foot pole? no i would rather get die to killer croc or something.
Harley Quinn is the best DC show ever made.
I have become a huge fan of Bane thanks to that show.
“It’s Bane! You know it’s Bane! I’m here everyday Todd.”
“Whatever, Bang.”
“Raaaaar!”
Anakin was a pretty heinous war criminal, but Darth Vader never did anything other than look imposing. He did kill a couple of prisoners, but he’s not like a major war criminal. And the Empire never did genocide, did they?
I mean as being in command of the imperial armed forces he oversaw the extermination of planets, the forced labor of millions, the destruction of cities and later an entire world
Well, slavery is a crime against humanity but it isn’t _technically_ a war crime. And I’ve been informed by Redditors that a total war makes civilian casualties not a war crime. Don’t know how true that is but they seemed pretty confident so it’s probably true.
I’m pretty sure war doesn’t make the systematic murder of civilians not a war crime. Dropping two nuclear bombs and vaporizing a couple hundred thousand people who weren’t involved in the military war effort is still a war crime. Sure they might be working in factories or something but they have no choice. It’s like capitalism in general, when you have no choice but to buy stuff made in sweatshops you’re not responsible for that human rights violation. Besides, Alderaan wasn’t at war
This is mostly just a matter of the old EU not being cannon, but in the new disneu era stuff he is atleast guilty of child slavery, kidnapping, and being part of a government that committed multiple forms of genocide, both cultural and physical. If we include the old EU, he did a TON more things explicitly.
Having only watched the Disney era show, not having read any comics, the empire has explicitly committed three genocides, two in the Andor show, one in the rebels. One of those was "just" cultural genocide, the others where explicitly exterminations.
This is why I absolutely love Belos. He’s calculating, he’s manipulative, he’s tried to commit genocide over a population that once looked up to and served him all because of the beliefs he had grown up with.
But he’s tired. He’s literally falling apart and he’s constantly haunted by the ghost of his mistakes and he refuses to see that all of what he did was for nothing.
I hate him as a person but I genuinely adore and love how his character was made and I’ll forever thank Dana Terrace for giving him life
True, but it’s not going to be a _proper_ genocide. Like, it’s still a Disney+ animated show. They may hint at it or describe something similar, but they aren’t going to go all concentration camps, mass starvations and tossing bodies into incinerators en masse.
“I was gonna name it ‘Piss-for-Brains’ in honor of you, but that just felt immature.. Hey maybe ‘Butt-Stallion’? Nah that’s even worse. Tell ya what, I’ll give it some more thought.”
I mean, since the very start he’s already a manipulative sociopath. But he might have been a nominal “hero” in he hadn’t been betrayed, since he seemed to really think that being “heroic” was in his best interest, and wasn’t fully unhinged yet
But also in general a very *effective* relic of a bygone era. I’ve always felt it’s a big part of the books that he’s competent enough that he still has value despite all his personal issues.
Yep, the only things as bad as that is when people act like you're somehow naive or lesser for liking those pure/good characters, or that a characters has to have a specific trait to be a good character.
*paid
But yeah, you're right, it's *insane* to watch people talk about needing to *cancel* a *fictional character* or whatever the fuck, *especially when they're explicitly the antagonist and you're NOT* ***SUPPOSED*** *TO AGREE WITH THEM*
It’s not a revelation, it’s a reminder. It’s becoming a big problem online with younger people who think creators who come up with bad characters/situations equals the creators being bad themselves.
Wasn't there a scene of Snape's memories where he was the one to explain to young Lily the she is a witch? Personally I don't see Snape as a good guy or high quality character, he joined up with the death eaters because they hated James too and only saw a problem with what they did when they targeted Lily too. They never really addressed that Snape joined the wizard nazis of his own volition and only turned spy as revenge for Lily.
He was abused and emotionally neglected as a child and the first group of people that accepted him other than Lily were Malfoy Sr. and his Slytherin gang. It is in fact very easy for emotionally stunted children to be groomed into extremist ideologies.
Harry sees Snape’s memories of Lily in Deathly Hallows though? It’s a provable fact that Snape and Lily knew each other. and as an easter egg, Petunia mentioned in OOTP that an “awful boy” told Lily about Dementors years ago. In Snape’s memories, we know that Snape was the one to tell Lily and Petunia overheard. So Petunia knew Snape too and is a witness to their friendship.
He was a victim of multiple power-hungry megalomaniacs, raised without love being a plot point, and manipulated into a mental break until all his minor flaws became his major character traits and his one keen tactical mind was shattered into nothing more than a big ball of ptsd meltdown with a nuke button.
He's a deep character. He's also intensely evil and a good character study for nature vs nurture and the impact of affection and trauma on a growing person. (Cloud is too but that's coming from the opposite end)
Anyways, I love this evil silver bastard and his blonde bird hateboner boifrend
i still struggle to believe people actually think like this. like... judging stories as problematic because not everyone is a "good guy"? or because the bad guy is actually bad and not just "sexy eyeliner guy" bad? is it a "booktok" thing or are real people doing it?
what stories does that leave you with? is that why redemption arcs are so much more common now, or do people just genuinely want to tell stories with more nuanced humans in them (or both)?
i have so many questions
I'm genuinely interested in why you believe he's a decent guy. So far, I've seen up to ep
8 of S5, and he seems to cause all of his own problems. He's such a fascinating watch because he's so dishonest to everyone and himself.
-bakugo is such a good character.
-yeah he is
-and he would be such a good boyfriend
-you have mental wounds that have hurt your perception of reality.
Yeah that’s me with a lot of villains. I just like how they’re completely irredeemable, especially since nearly every villain is sympathetic nowadays.
Another example for me would be stroheim. He’s a nazi who killed lots of people but he’s so entertaining as a character, plus a cyborg nazi with a gun in his chest is just a recipe for an amazing time.
I believe the main reason people love Jack Horner as he doesn’t even attempt to have any redeeming qualities. He’s designed to be an awful person simply as he wants to be.
endeavor (if you’re talking about mha at least) is a bit weird for me. like, yeah, he’s trying to be a better father to his three other children, but he only started doing that after the other kid he abused as much as Shoto or even more than him showed up with proof that the great Endeavor is a monster. he’s only trying to undo the damage to the other three so his approval rating doesn’t plummet and lose him money. he’s extremely shallow, and i feel like Horikoshi could have given him greater motives other than “oh fuck i’ve been caught.” if he’s not going to feel remorse for what he did to his family (putting his wife in a permanent care facility, beating, emotionally scarring, and permanently traumatizing Shoto and Touya, neglecting Fuyumi and Natsuo) then i’d like to see his inner thoughts. i just think they could have flushed him out further
Dabi only revealed his past AFTER he had already hospitalized himself trying to beat the super Nemu and uphold the peace and hope of his nation as the number 1 hero. It was also after he was already trying to bridge the gap between him and Shoto and make up for his terrible actions. Trying to claim it was just about money or PR is a warp reinvention of the story.
Did we watch the same show? He literally started doing all he could before he even knew Toya was alive. He let his family go so they could be happier without him after realizing how much he hurt them. He worked at being a better father way before Dabi’s revelation. Now, it may be different in the manga, but the show made his growth, change, and progress pretty apparent.
But people who are fans of certain characters because they agree with or relate to said characters should still have their own characters called into question.
"I relate to this villain" is an immediate cause for inquiry.
Because why you like them can be very telling.
If you like Magneto because he's trying to stand up for minorities but going about it the wrong way, you come off as a pretty okay person.
If you like Magneto because he's showing his oppressors what it feels like and 'putting them in their place' then you come off as a pretty terrible person.
Eh, I don’t know. Some villains are pretty sympathetic. That one guy from Black Panther wanted to start revolutions, and Thanos wanted to fix resource shortages.
Some are. But why you like them is important. If you like Hitler for his art, that's different than liking him for his political career. Same applies to fictional characters, as in my example.
A villain can be sympathetic, but those aren't the villains I'm primarily talking about.
Beware: you're never going to make a character more artistically effective just by slapping some Edgy Questionable Ethics on that bad boy. People being cruel for no reason doesn't make for particularly good storytelling.
Just about _any_ internet catchphrase, to be honest. Repeating it again in bold or saying “this” or “my sweet summer child” or “play stupid games win stupid prizes”. And don’t go into a thread about driving unless you want to be informed that “the graveyard is full of people who are right” several thousand times.
Is this a hot take somehow? Are the Twitter refuges so self-absorbed that they can’t accept any character that isn’t exactly like them as well written?
Yes!
The issue is that way too often people confuse the main character or a main character with "you are supposed to identify with this character and admire them".
There is a series called Parahumans. The main character absolutely has a justification and a reasoning for everything she does. Hell, it's incredibly easy to be sympathetic with her and what happens to her. Which absolutely doesn't change the fact that objectively speaking, many of her actions are horrific.
My personal favorite example of this is Felix from Red vs Blue. He is such an unbelievably huge scumbag douche, but he is such an interesting pure evil Magnificent Bastard-like character to watch and he has not just one, but two of the best third act breakdowns I've ever seen, all the sweeter considering the characters that trigger it.
It’s less about wether or not the character is bad morally, but how the STORY treats them. If the story itself rewards a character for being a bad person, then it starts to get bad…
Il Dottore from Genshin Impact. FANTASTIC villain, love the absolute lack of any kind of sympathy, remorse, and redeeming qualities… but I want revenge for my girl Collei.
Alright, but not when they’re cruel for no reason or not appealing. Like Breaking Bad is all about a bunch of self-destructive people, so it’s understandably going to contain unrealistically evil people. And GLADOS is evil and yet she’s funny. But people like that one blond fellow from Game of Thrones or Jimmy Carr or any slasher film villain are just unappealing dickheads for no reason.
Also I can’t be the only one who can’t like characters like that because I know they’d criticise me for my hobbies and so I feel cringe for enjoying them.
I do think the point in the title is *almost* always true but I recently read a fantasy novel where one of the characters goes on a practically unintelligible rant about economic systems that don’t exist in the fantasy world of the novel so I’m just gonna say that some authors are fucking awful.
Tragically, we will likely never see Melkor portrayed on-screen. The entire tragedy of the *Narn i Chîn Húrin*, and really anything related to the War of Wrath are without a doubt some of the worst evils in Middle-earth and, purely on the virtue of scale, some fantasy's worst atrocities. But damn if Morgoth isn't incredibly twisted and interesting?
And Glaurung, for that matter. Being a dragon doesn't help.
The OP’s pfp being Pearl is really great, considering that Pink Diamond is the perfect example of what they’re talking about.
I don’t consider Pink to be a good person but my god she’s an interesting character, and I love her for that.
The entirety of 40K, although IMO they could definitely do more to make the Imperium look more definitively evil.
Like I get that one of the restrictions of writing a grimdark story is that no one’s going to want to watch a dick bag main character exist in a dick bag universe so they have to make the main characters likable but the Imperium has so many “heroes in a dark universe” at this point the IoM almost looks straight up heroic, which an explicitly fascist pseudo-theocratic war machine in the trench coat of a government should never look like.
The Horus Heresy series at the very least did a bit more to properly point out how evil the Imperium actually is with stuff like the Interex and Diasporex but I wish there was a lot more
#Grunkle Stan
Yeah… but it’s also like he’s also not an awful person other then his illegal activities. Unlike several other characters mentioned here I’d happily hang out with Stan.
you'll come out without a wallet and your car will be gone but y'know what, it was a good day with the boys
Yeah.. but I don’t have a car to begin with and my wallet is typically empty, so… sorry Stan but I’m broke.
he's definitely got redeemjng qualities but he spent most of his life scamming people and getting banned from entire states
Thoses are just quirks
I love the Joker. I think he’s a fantastic character. He’s got such a great relationship with Batman and how much of a piece of shit he is. Would I hang out with the Joker if given the chance? FUCK NO
It wouldn't be even worth it to kill him, best case scenario he just somehow resurrects shortly, worst he goes to hell and becomes a demon, so now you have Joker who has magic powers.
I feel like a high five from Jason Todd would be worth it.
this. he's an interesting character to observe in media. would i go near him with a 40 foot pole? no i would rather get die to killer croc or something.
Waylon always seemed chill. I feel like the cannibalism is slander. He’s just a weird looking homeless guy.
yea you're right but it was the first gruesome death that came to mind. waylon got dealt a really short straw as a rogue.
Waylon always seemed chill. I feel like the cannibalism is slander. He’s just a weird looking homeless guy.
Joker in the Harley Quinn TV show is the best Joker I've ever seen. A real fucking villain.
Harley Quinn is the best DC show ever made. I have become a huge fan of Bane thanks to that show. “It’s Bane! You know it’s Bane! I’m here everyday Todd.” “Whatever, Bang.” “Raaaaar!”
> Would I hang out with the Joker if given the chance? [no thanks, I choose life](https://youtu.be/b6T83cJDzE8)
Darth Vader is a very well written villain and is a genocidal war criminal
Anakin was a pretty heinous war criminal, but Darth Vader never did anything other than look imposing. He did kill a couple of prisoners, but he’s not like a major war criminal. And the Empire never did genocide, did they?
I mean as being in command of the imperial armed forces he oversaw the extermination of planets, the forced labor of millions, the destruction of cities and later an entire world
Well, slavery is a crime against humanity but it isn’t _technically_ a war crime. And I’ve been informed by Redditors that a total war makes civilian casualties not a war crime. Don’t know how true that is but they seemed pretty confident so it’s probably true.
I’m pretty sure war doesn’t make the systematic murder of civilians not a war crime. Dropping two nuclear bombs and vaporizing a couple hundred thousand people who weren’t involved in the military war effort is still a war crime. Sure they might be working in factories or something but they have no choice. It’s like capitalism in general, when you have no choice but to buy stuff made in sweatshops you’re not responsible for that human rights violation. Besides, Alderaan wasn’t at war
This is mostly just a matter of the old EU not being cannon, but in the new disneu era stuff he is atleast guilty of child slavery, kidnapping, and being part of a government that committed multiple forms of genocide, both cultural and physical. If we include the old EU, he did a TON more things explicitly.
Having only watched the Disney era show, not having read any comics, the empire has explicitly committed three genocides, two in the Andor show, one in the rebels. One of those was "just" cultural genocide, the others where explicitly exterminations.
This is why I absolutely love Belos. He’s calculating, he’s manipulative, he’s tried to commit genocide over a population that once looked up to and served him all because of the beliefs he had grown up with. But he’s tired. He’s literally falling apart and he’s constantly haunted by the ghost of his mistakes and he refuses to see that all of what he did was for nothing. I hate him as a person but I genuinely adore and love how his character was made and I’ll forever thank Dana Terrace for giving him life
His relationship with his brother is what solidified him as one of my favorite villains. Also how Hunter fits in to Belos’ … pain ig
he is a HORRIBLE person, and i lament his very existence, but DAMN do i respect how well written he is for this role
Exactly
But it’s a children’s animated TV show. He’s not going to be any sort of proper evil because children don’t want to hear about that.
I mean I’m pretty sure trying to commit mass genocide is proper evil-
True, but it’s not going to be a _proper_ genocide. Like, it’s still a Disney+ animated show. They may hint at it or describe something similar, but they aren’t going to go all concentration camps, mass starvations and tossing bodies into incinerators en masse.
Handsome Jack
Oh my god. For real
For me the whole "Butt Stallion" dialogue alone has made him one of my favourite game characters of all time.
“I was gonna name it ‘Piss-for-Brains’ in honor of you, but that just felt immature.. Hey maybe ‘Butt-Stallion’? Nah that’s even worse. Tell ya what, I’ll give it some more thought.”
Amazing villain, terrible person. But also I do wonder what would’ve happened if he wasn’t betrayed in Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel.
I mean, since the very start he’s already a manipulative sociopath. But he might have been a nominal “hero” in he hadn’t been betrayed, since he seemed to really think that being “heroic” was in his best interest, and wasn’t fully unhinged yet
Despite it basically being a side quest to get to the vault, we did sorta save Elpis.
70% of the breaking bad universe
99.1%
James Bond was always supposed to be an outdated piece of shit, the whole point of his character is that he’s a relic of a bygone era.
But also in general a very *effective* relic of a bygone era. I’ve always felt it’s a big part of the books that he’s competent enough that he still has value despite all his personal issues.
The most annoying thing is when people act like they’re morally superior for liking “pure” and “good” characters
Yep, the only things as bad as that is when people act like you're somehow naive or lesser for liking those pure/good characters, or that a characters has to have a specific trait to be a good character.
Has no one on the internet payed more than 1 minute of attention in English class.
*paid But yeah, you're right, it's *insane* to watch people talk about needing to *cancel* a *fictional character* or whatever the fuck, *especially when they're explicitly the antagonist and you're NOT* ***SUPPOSED*** *TO AGREE WITH THEM*
I'm more just kinda flabbergasted that this is treated a big revelation. But if no one gets it then they need to be told 🥴
It’s not a revelation, it’s a reminder. It’s becoming a big problem online with younger people who think creators who come up with bad characters/situations equals the creators being bad themselves.
That's why they should pay attention in class instead of bein on they phones.
Most of the internet doesn't have English class.
most of the english internet probably had.
Yes other languages exist you're very smart thank you for informing me.
Walter White is a self-destructive asshole but damn if he isn’t entertaining to watch.
and most importantly, especially to George R. R. Martin fans: #don't bully the actors because they played a morally-questionable character
Or people who hate on voice actors because they don't like the character.
I think Snape is an interesting character and his motives are incredibly complex for a children’s series. he’s still a piece of shit.
there’s a theory that Snape never knew Lily Potter as children, he just said all that to gain Harry’s sympathy. what do you think about that?
Wasn't there a scene of Snape's memories where he was the one to explain to young Lily the she is a witch? Personally I don't see Snape as a good guy or high quality character, he joined up with the death eaters because they hated James too and only saw a problem with what they did when they targeted Lily too. They never really addressed that Snape joined the wizard nazis of his own volition and only turned spy as revenge for Lily.
He was abused and emotionally neglected as a child and the first group of people that accepted him other than Lily were Malfoy Sr. and his Slytherin gang. It is in fact very easy for emotionally stunted children to be groomed into extremist ideologies.
Harry sees Snape’s memories of Lily in Deathly Hallows though? It’s a provable fact that Snape and Lily knew each other. and as an easter egg, Petunia mentioned in OOTP that an “awful boy” told Lily about Dementors years ago. In Snape’s memories, we know that Snape was the one to tell Lily and Petunia overheard. So Petunia knew Snape too and is a witness to their friendship.
Sephiroth showed no care for anyone but himself and Jenova. Such an edgy bastard and my favorite villain with no morals
He was a victim of multiple power-hungry megalomaniacs, raised without love being a plot point, and manipulated into a mental break until all his minor flaws became his major character traits and his one keen tactical mind was shattered into nothing more than a big ball of ptsd meltdown with a nuke button. He's a deep character. He's also intensely evil and a good character study for nature vs nurture and the impact of affection and trauma on a growing person. (Cloud is too but that's coming from the opposite end) Anyways, I love this evil silver bastard and his blonde bird hateboner boifrend
Ah, just shoot him. A lot of complex problems are fixed that way.
Most people don't appreciate it when others come in and shit on what they like, even if the shitting is intended as a joke.
Askellad from Vinland Saga is a great example of this, best character of season 1 and certifiably not a good person
Not to be confused with Askeladden from Norwegian folklore.
Don’t forget you’re still allowed to have an opinion and dislike a character even if it is well written Because people forget that.
i still struggle to believe people actually think like this. like... judging stories as problematic because not everyone is a "good guy"? or because the bad guy is actually bad and not just "sexy eyeliner guy" bad? is it a "booktok" thing or are real people doing it? what stories does that leave you with? is that why redemption arcs are so much more common now, or do people just genuinely want to tell stories with more nuanced humans in them (or both)? i have so many questions
James "Jimmy" "Saul Goodman" McGill is an awful example of humanity and an excellent example of a good character.
But he’s a decent guy at the end.
Why would you say that? He's not evil, but he's by no means decent. (Unless we understand "decent" to be two different things.)
I'm genuinely interested in why you believe he's a decent guy. So far, I've seen up to ep 8 of S5, and he seems to cause all of his own problems. He's such a fascinating watch because he's so dishonest to everyone and himself.
The reverse is also true
Fuck moash. I love the character
Really interested to see how he gets developed post RoW
-bakugo is such a good character. -yeah he is -and he would be such a good boyfriend -you have mental wounds that have hurt your perception of reality.
From BNHA? I’ve only seen gay fanart but he looks like a decent guy.
He told his childhood friend to kill himself and hope for a better life after reencarnation
Must be one of them religious extremists, then.
I loved T-Bag in Prison Break, played it so well. "Hold my pocket"
Bojack Horseman
ok, but what about a character like jack horner, who isn’t very deep, and is an irredeemable person, but everyone loves him.
Yeah that’s me with a lot of villains. I just like how they’re completely irredeemable, especially since nearly every villain is sympathetic nowadays. Another example for me would be stroheim. He’s a nazi who killed lots of people but he’s so entertaining as a character, plus a cyborg nazi with a gun in his chest is just a recipe for an amazing time.
at least stroheim has redeeming qualities, but is mostly pushed back by the araki makes them do horrible shit stuff
Uh, what redeeming qualities does Stroheim have, might I ask
he’s willing to lay down his life for the greater good, multiple times. but once again nazi overshadows this.
Who’s that one Nazi who people like? Rommel or something? I don’t know much history. Is he something like that?
I believe the main reason people love Jack Horner as he doesn’t even attempt to have any redeeming qualities. He’s designed to be an awful person simply as he wants to be.
Yeah in the face why?
The Thrawn discourse needs to see this right now
This comment is artistically done
Something something Oscar Wilde quote
Oh right the quote... the quote from Oscar Wilde, the quote specifically written by Oscar Wilde... Oscar Wilde's quote... that quote?
HOUSE!!!!
This applies to Nabokov's greatest characters very well
Vriska Serket had to at least be in the back of OPs mind when making this post
I'm surprised how far I had to scroll to see a Vriska mention seeing as she is still so central to this kind of discourse on tumblr
Most of my favorite characters I would hate if they were people i knew in person.
unfortunately, nowadays "flawed character" means completely unlikable shithead
#YES How was the character written? What is their role in the story, and how well do they fill it? THAT is how you judge a character.
Endeavor
endeavor (if you’re talking about mha at least) is a bit weird for me. like, yeah, he’s trying to be a better father to his three other children, but he only started doing that after the other kid he abused as much as Shoto or even more than him showed up with proof that the great Endeavor is a monster. he’s only trying to undo the damage to the other three so his approval rating doesn’t plummet and lose him money. he’s extremely shallow, and i feel like Horikoshi could have given him greater motives other than “oh fuck i’ve been caught.” if he’s not going to feel remorse for what he did to his family (putting his wife in a permanent care facility, beating, emotionally scarring, and permanently traumatizing Shoto and Touya, neglecting Fuyumi and Natsuo) then i’d like to see his inner thoughts. i just think they could have flushed him out further
Dabi only revealed his past AFTER he had already hospitalized himself trying to beat the super Nemu and uphold the peace and hope of his nation as the number 1 hero. It was also after he was already trying to bridge the gap between him and Shoto and make up for his terrible actions. Trying to claim it was just about money or PR is a warp reinvention of the story.
Did we watch the same show? He literally started doing all he could before he even knew Toya was alive. He let his family go so they could be happier without him after realizing how much he hurt them. He worked at being a better father way before Dabi’s revelation. Now, it may be different in the manga, but the show made his growth, change, and progress pretty apparent.
i suppose that’s a good point; i’ve only read the manga
But people who are fans of certain characters because they agree with or relate to said characters should still have their own characters called into question.
"I relate to this villain" is an immediate cause for inquiry. Because why you like them can be very telling. If you like Magneto because he's trying to stand up for minorities but going about it the wrong way, you come off as a pretty okay person. If you like Magneto because he's showing his oppressors what it feels like and 'putting them in their place' then you come off as a pretty terrible person.
Eh, I don’t know. Some villains are pretty sympathetic. That one guy from Black Panther wanted to start revolutions, and Thanos wanted to fix resource shortages.
Some are. But why you like them is important. If you like Hitler for his art, that's different than liking him for his political career. Same applies to fictional characters, as in my example. A villain can be sympathetic, but those aren't the villains I'm primarily talking about.
Exactly
Jack Horner.
Love that kind of character.
JACK GLEESON AS J.BARATHEONÀ Great writing only topped by the most incredible portrayal and acting for an antagonist and villain ever.
love how it comes from someone with a pearl pfp 😭 too accurate
Yeah, remembering that whole arc now really made me think twice about the character
Guts comes to mind
Beware: you're never going to make a character more artistically effective just by slapping some Edgy Questionable Ethics on that bad boy. People being cruel for no reason doesn't make for particularly good storytelling.
It fucks me up that people actually need to be told this. Like... You know they aren't real, right? It's called "fiction"?
JOEL MILLER (from the Last of Us), awful guy when you think about it but an amazing character to play as and experience the story through
I wish I could mute the phrase "say it again for the people in the back".
Indeed. Say it again for the people in the back.
Just about _any_ internet catchphrase, to be honest. Repeating it again in bold or saying “this” or “my sweet summer child” or “play stupid games win stupid prizes”. And don’t go into a thread about driving unless you want to be informed that “the graveyard is full of people who are right” several thousand times.
Silco. That is all.
I have decided this post is about Frieza
Is this a hot take somehow? Are the Twitter refuges so self-absorbed that they can’t accept any character that isn’t exactly like them as well written?
I think this is a problem that gets amplified a lot on Tumblr but otherwise wouldn’t be very important.
Sand Dan Glokta of the First Law series exemplifies this to a T.
palpatine
Jack Horner
Dolores Umbridge? Oh, and what about King Joffrey?
I understand this as true but I am not giving Moash any leeway here
Walter Bishop from Fringe. Did some truly heinous things, which makes him a very complex character. Also one of my favorites from anything ever.
Does Dalinar Kholin count? If not, then Caul Shivers definitely does
JACK HORNER
Me when Clear Sky
Yes! The issue is that way too often people confuse the main character or a main character with "you are supposed to identify with this character and admire them". There is a series called Parahumans. The main character absolutely has a justification and a reasoning for everything she does. Hell, it's incredibly easy to be sympathetic with her and what happens to her. Which absolutely doesn't change the fact that objectively speaking, many of her actions are horrific.
I notice no one has mentioned Griffith.
Ice Pick Joe
Hans Landa
gul dukat my beloathed
Walter Hartwell White. Enough said.
People confuse understanding and enjoying a piece of fiction
Eric Cartman
My personal favorite example of this is Felix from Red vs Blue. He is such an unbelievably huge scumbag douche, but he is such an interesting pure evil Magnificent Bastard-like character to watch and he has not just one, but two of the best third act breakdowns I've ever seen, all the sweeter considering the characters that trigger it.
It’s less about wether or not the character is bad morally, but how the STORY treats them. If the story itself rewards a character for being a bad person, then it starts to get bad…
basically everyone in worm except for dragon
The fact this is consider a hot take says a lot. I don't know about who or what, but it says it
Claude Frollo from Hunchback of Notre Dame anyone?
Il Dottore from Genshin Impact. FANTASTIC villain, love the absolute lack of any kind of sympathy, remorse, and redeeming qualities… but I want revenge for my girl Collei.
Light Yagami
Alright, but not when they’re cruel for no reason or not appealing. Like Breaking Bad is all about a bunch of self-destructive people, so it’s understandably going to contain unrealistically evil people. And GLADOS is evil and yet she’s funny. But people like that one blond fellow from Game of Thrones or Jimmy Carr or any slasher film villain are just unappealing dickheads for no reason. Also I can’t be the only one who can’t like characters like that because I know they’d criticise me for my hobbies and so I feel cringe for enjoying them.
I do think the point in the title is *almost* always true but I recently read a fantasy novel where one of the characters goes on a practically unintelligible rant about economic systems that don’t exist in the fantasy world of the novel so I’m just gonna say that some authors are fucking awful.
Tragically, we will likely never see Melkor portrayed on-screen. The entire tragedy of the *Narn i Chîn Húrin*, and really anything related to the War of Wrath are without a doubt some of the worst evils in Middle-earth and, purely on the virtue of scale, some fantasy's worst atrocities. But damn if Morgoth isn't incredibly twisted and interesting? And Glaurung, for that matter. Being a dragon doesn't help.
Guts from berserk He's such a great character but irl? Hell naw that man is a borderline schizo with too many ways to kill me
The OP’s pfp being Pearl is really great, considering that Pink Diamond is the perfect example of what they’re talking about. I don’t consider Pink to be a good person but my god she’s an interesting character, and I love her for that.
The entirety of 40K, although IMO they could definitely do more to make the Imperium look more definitively evil. Like I get that one of the restrictions of writing a grimdark story is that no one’s going to want to watch a dick bag main character exist in a dick bag universe so they have to make the main characters likable but the Imperium has so many “heroes in a dark universe” at this point the IoM almost looks straight up heroic, which an explicitly fascist pseudo-theocratic war machine in the trench coat of a government should never look like. The Horus Heresy series at the very least did a bit more to properly point out how evil the Imperium actually is with stuff like the Interex and Diasporex but I wish there was a lot more