How evil should a super villain be?

The Overlord

Well-Known Member
Joined
Jun 4, 2005
Messages
2,464
A big question is, how evil should a villain be? People liked it when Purple Man became more depraved, but didn't like it when Dr. Light became a rapist. I guess its all a matter of context.

Likewise I always thought Mr. Hyde should be far more evil than he has been written in the past, but I think it would be weird if Shocker became a depraved serial killer.
 
Well, they should obviously be as evil as it makes sense for them to be(Shocker becoming a serial killer would be ridiculous, IMO, unless there was a long series of sensical reasons leading up to it).

My rule is that however evil they are, a big supervillain should never, ever be aware of or relish in their own evil. They should either:

a) Think they're doing good in some big-picture, ends-justifying-means way(Magneto, Ra's Al Ghul, Lex Luthor outside of the movies, etc), or

b) Think that the concepts of good and evil are either illusions or moot(Voldemort, Norman Osborn, etc), seeking power and not taking pleasure from killing, but not caring about it either, or

c) Some combination of the two of those(Eric Cartman)

Even my favourite villain, the Joker, often gets thrown into the "evil for the sake of evil" category, but from his perspective, the concepts of good and evil are just a big joke. It doesn't matter.

What I hate is stuff like Superman Returns' Lex, who claims to want power, but then also relishes in the death of "billions" for no established reason. It's just quick-fix villainy. Boring in a character that big.

There are rare exceptions to this rule that still work, though, like Emperor Palpatine, who would fall into category b) if his powers didn't come from deliberately tapping into his own human potential for hatred. It's an original, cool and context-reasonable enough situation that it works.
 
Last edited:
Well, they should obviously be as evil as it makes sense for them to be(Shocker becoming a serial killer would be ridiculous, IMO, unless there was a long series of sensical reasons leading up to it).

My rule is that however evil they are, a big supervillain should never, ever be aware of or relish in their own evil. They should either:

a) Think they're doing good in some big-picture, ends-justifying-means way(Magneto, Ra's Al Ghul, Lex Luthor outside of the movies, etc), or

b) Think that the concepts of good and evil are either illusions or moot(Voldemort, Norman Osborn, etc), seeking power and not taking pleasure from killing, but not caring about it either, or

c) Some combination of the two of those(Eric Cartman)

Even my favourite villain, the Joker, often gets thrown into the "evil for the sake of evil" category, but from his perspective, the concepts of good and evil are just a big joke. It doesn't matter.

What I hate is stuff like Superman Returns' Lex, who claims to want power, but then also relishes in the death of "billions" for no established reason. It's just quick-fix villainy. Boring in a character that big.

There are rare exceptions to this rule that still work, though, like Emperor Palpatine, who would fall into category b) if his powers didn't come from deliberately tapping into his own human potential for hatred. It's an original, cool and context-reasonable enough situation that it works.

That's a good arguemnt, but I do think some big villains do work as pure evil, like the red skull. The Skull was nazi, he can't be anything other than evil. Sure the Skull has an ideology, an ethos, but he is far from dispassionate about it. The fact that he enjoys inflicting pain and suffering on people just because they are members of a different race makes him a interesting contrast to noble villains like Doom and Magneto. plus the contrast between an almost pure good hero like Cap with a pure evil villain like the Skull works.

Heck in real life some people do evil things for petty and pointless reasons (ex: most serial kiillers).
 
Last edited:
I guess it depends on the villains.


Since most villains(or atleast the good ones) don't think themselves as evil and the view the hero as the bad guy, Like Doom and Reed richards dynamic.


Personaly, i love the B and C list guys that do evil deeds for money you know guys like Electro,Rhino, Taskmaster etc.

I guess theres different levels though i'm not against a pure evil character either .
Heck in real life some people do evil things for petty and pointless reasons (ex: most serial kiillers).

yup

And rich greedy people too
 
c) Some combination of the two of those(Eric Cartman)

:lol::lol::lol:

There are rare exceptions to this rule that still work, though, like Emperor Palpatine, who would fall into category b) if his powers didn't come from deliberately tapping into his own human potential for hatred. It's an original, cool and context-reasonable enough situation that it works.

I dunno. I think Palpatine still fits into those categories. He thinks he's doing good by creating the Empire.

Heck in real life some people do evil things for petty and pointless reasons (ex: most serial kiillers).

Serial killers aren't really a good example. Most aren't evil, but rather amoral, which is very different. People that do evil for evil's sake are incredibly rare, and supervillains should represent that.
 
Serial killers aren't really a good example. Most aren't evil, but rather amoral, which is very different. People that do evil for evil's sake are incredibly rare, and supervillains should represent that.

Not really, most serial killers kill people because they inflicting pain and suffering on people. Most serial killers are also serial rapists. If all they want was easy sex, they could hire a hooker, the punishment for that is far less then something like rape. Rape isn't even about sex, its about power, violence and dominance. Its pure evil act, its totally immoral, not just amoral. Then they kill their victims just to keep them quite. Most serial killers are immoral, not amoral.

What the hell kind of question is this?

A fun one!
 
Last edited:
Not really, most serial killers kill people because they inflicting pain and suffering on people. Most serial killers are also serial rapists. If all they want was easy sex, they could hire a hooker, the punishment for that is far less then something like rape. Rape isn't even about sex, its about power, violence and dominance. Its pure evil act, its totally immoral, not just amoral. Then they kill their victims just to keep them quite. Most serial killers are immoral, not amoral.

I'm sorry, but from what I've seen, that's completely wrong. Yes, serial killers inflict pain, but not because it's immoral, but rather because they're fascinated by it. They aren't doing it because it's evil.

As for most serial killers being serial rapists, I've never heard of that. Some are, to be sure, but most? No. But, if you want to use rapists as an example, then yes, the vast majority of rapists are immoral. But, your original point was about serial killers, not rapists.
 
I'm sorry, but from what I've seen, that's completely wrong. Yes, serial killers inflict pain, but not because it's immoral, but rather because they're fascinated by it. They aren't doing it because it's evil.

As for most serial killers being serial rapists, I've never heard of that. Some are, to be sure, but most? No. But, if you want to use rapists as an example, then yes, the vast majority of rapists are immoral. But, your original point was about serial killers, not rapists.

Most serial killers I heard of are also rapists: The Boston strangler, Ted Bundy, Jeffery Damher, the Green River Killer, Paul Bernado, etc.


There are a few that aren't like Son of Sam and Ed Gains, but they were insane and Son of Sam actually did think he was evil.

The point is not whether serial killers are immoral, but whether there are purely immoral people in the world and I think almost everyone I just mentioned fits that bill, that's just off the top of my head, there are likely a tons of others.
 
Everyone should be as bad as they wanna be.

Got my Dennis Rodman joke out of the way.

I fully agree with Planet-Man. People don't do evil **** because they like evil. Even Hitler thought of himself as a stand up guy.

That said, I disagree that Palpatine is cool or that he works as a believable villain. He is a lame, cheesy hunchback who blathers on about how being evil is the shiznizzle. It's just poorly written and conceptualized.
 
Most Vampires and legitimate Devil-Worshiping characters, or you know, The Devil himself as a character, are Evil in the big "E" sense. They strive for doing the exact opposite of what is right for various reasons, but they are a valid sect of Villainy.

Mephisto isn't amoral or psychotic, he's just Evil.

Palpatine is along the same lines, if you view the light side of the force as something like Stephen King's theory of The White, its the ultimate good in the universe, and embracing the dark side of things is equivelent to Satanic characters.

Overall, I agree with Planet-Man though.
 
Most Vampires and legitimate Devil-Worshiping characters, or you know, The Devil himself as a character, are Evil in the big "E" sense. They strive for doing the exact opposite of what is right for various reasons, but they are a valid sect of Villainy.

E is a villain!
 
Most Vampires and legitimate Devil-Worshiping characters, or you know, The Devil himself as a character, are Evil in the big "E" sense. They strive for doing the exact opposite of what is right for various reasons, but they are a valid sect of Villainy.

Mephisto isn't amoral or psychotic, he's just Evil.

Palpatine is along the same lines, if you view the light side of the force as something like Stephen King's theory of The White, its the ultimate good in the universe, and embracing the dark side of things is equivelent to Satanic characters.

Overall, I agree with Planet-Man though.
The Devil as a corrupting force works because he is not human and therefore lacks the human capacity to choose between right and wrong himself. He is an elemental force with no needs or desires of his own. He is evil incarnate, not an evil guy.

Palpatine is just a dude. He doesn't lack any human capacities. He is not evil incarnate. He's a greedy guy who wanted control of the universe. The "Come to the Dark Side." crap is cheesy and overplayed. Who the **** would call their side dark? With the Jedi dead he could have renamed it the Sunny Rainbow Side if he wanted and no one would have known or cared. Only someone who recognizes that what they're doing is wrong and in direct opposition to good would choose to act the way he does. He lacks basic character fundamentals that make characters believable and engaging. No one is evil for evil's sake.
 
No, I think some people are Evil exactly for Evil's sake. Because they believe that evil will lead to power. Its the whole concept "Better to rule in hell than serve in heaven".

I'm not saying it should be used every day, but I disagree that it can't ever work well in a story.
 
Palpatine is just a dude. He doesn't lack any human capacities. He is not evil incarnate. He's a greedy guy who wanted control of the universe. The "Come to the Dark Side." crap is cheesy and overplayed. Who the **** would call their side dark? With the Jedi dead he could have renamed it the Sunny Rainbow Side if he wanted and no one would have known or cared. Only someone who recognizes that what they're doing is wrong and in direct opposition to good would choose to act the way he does. He lacks basic character fundamentals that make characters believable and engaging. No one is evil for evil's sake.

My stance on Palpatine is that he is amoral and greedy and wants as much power as he can grab, and he thinks that the easiest way to do this is to use the "Dark Side of the Force", which is fueled by hatred.

Basically, he thinks hate is the most powerful force in the universe and thus enjoys using it, but not because he gets pleasure from hate. He gets pleasure from ascending power.
 

Latest posts

Back
Top