Stop Making me SYMPATHIZE with your VILLAINS

[@TauGeneration]

sympathetic villains were made because of the overwhelming amount of pure evil villains. now that the sympathetic villains are the majority, it's time for pure evil villains to come back

[@minho-g8f]

Hellsing depicts pure evil villian very well

[@Random66860]

but too many people are used to sympathetic villains, and many of those people find pure evil villains boring.

[@brixan...]

@@Random66860 but many currently find the sympathetic villains boring. “He’s evil!… Nvm, he’s misguided and just has trauma.” People are ready for a change

[@thecondescendinggoomba5552]

I think a pure evil villain can be talked down with a speech check if they're somewhat rational. Pure evil doesn't necessarily mean purely irrational.

[@cosmicspacething3474]

Honestly I think “pure evil” itself is a term that gets rid of the nuance.

[@theenderdestruction2362]

"Some men just want to watch the world burn" is a good quote for pure evil. It doesn't value your soul, your exstince, it hates you, lucifer may make a deal with you but that doesnt mean he values your soul, he wants you to suffer, he wants you to be away from God, he is pure evil in its most prideful form, the lich from adventure time is pure evil is its most deadly form, he wants all life to cease, thats his mission

[@darlalathan6143]

@@cosmicspacething3474 If any nuance exists.

[@alexcat6685]

@@darlalathan6143 It does usually, as everything has good in it, it's based on it to decide what to do with it. OFcourse people who chose to be terrible aren't terrible 100% of time, it's the reason they can actually make functional friendships. However I do need to mention there is a difference in Empahtize and Sympathize, that is forgiveness you emphatize with a struggle of a person however you don't sympathize because that person chose to become terrible Shen you can Emphatize with his fear of the Unknown and destiny, you can't Sympathize with what he was willing to do for it. I believe Pure Evil Villains are those who litterarly lack humanity like the lich, Lich doesn't commit evil exactly becuase it's fun, he does it because thats his purpose, Fun would make it a human thing because people sometimes jsut do things becuase the fun of it overides everything else, be it good or evil. Pure evil does evil because of it, thats it in the same way pure good does the oppisite in the same way. Both are heavily flawed due to being extremes, Pure evil prevents you from ever experincing anything better from life and Pure good is Ironically corruptable because it can't really guarantee what is evil, since it mentally can't comprehend it meaning it can be diluded into believing a Certain evil is good because it doesn't understand evil enough to go against it.

[@kiravatheargonian]

I usually go full insane villian (example: Joker)

[@nicholassgobero]

There's also cases where showing a tragic backstory elevates their villany, take Dio for example, he suffered a lot as a child, but one the Joestars adopt him he had a chance to be a good person, what does he do? Decide that he's gonna make Jonathan's life hell and kill his father to get an inheritence, then once that goes bad he decides to become a vampire and take over the world, having a tragic backstory doesn't make him sympathetic, it makes him an even bigger monster

[@someonenothim]

Another reason why I HAVE to watch Jojo ;-;

[@ORLY911]

"It was me, Dio!" and "It was me Barry!" Have that smug maliciousness you have to love in a villain. Fully acknowledged evil act, proud of it, going to do it again.

[@andrewmcloughlin330]

i think another good example would be dolfamingo

[@hondaaccord1399]

​@@someonenothim The villains are all A tier besides maybe one that's just B+

[@crissanti8206]

@@someonenothimi like your video and way you explain with a elocuent tone and yeah you should totally watch jojo many characters have such a remarkable charimas and good plot full of shenanigans.

[@LifeofSquidMann]

And then there's Palpatine, who is so unrepentantly evil he turns anyone he can get under his thumb into a tragic villain.

[@DustunColeman]

And he's a damn good villian

[@kaior1]

He has no sad backstory or truama at all he just does it because he can and loves being evil

[@QuiteFunnyIsnt1t]

Well he is a politician

[@redjirachi1]

@@QuiteFunnyIsnt1t Sheev is basically an analogy for corrupt politicians and dictators. That's a character archetype which is hurt by having a sympathetic element

[@enigmaticglo]

greatest villain to ever appear on the silver screen, no doubt.

[@seeleunit2000]

As said by Red from Overly sarcastic productions when it comes to pure evil villains to paraphrase: "you can have pure evil characters because good writing is what services the story as is necessary. " So, you can have pure evil villains and sympathetic villains and everything else in between as long as you make it work in the story

[@someonenothim]

And I stand by everything that they've said as gospels!

[@pietrolupo2717]

Puss in boots 2 its a Great example of that

[@NamelessKing1597]

In other words, If it's good it's good.

[@INLIGHTOFHISTORTYANDOTHE-px7mf]

@pietrolupo2717 Yes

[@UserAndSale]

Villains can have nuance without being redeemable. There is a difference

[@redjirachi1]

What they've done with Frieza in recent years demonstrates that a villain can get character development without actually becoming a better person. He's still as sociopathic as ever but he's become more pragmatic and has started to embrace the fighting spirit of the heroes.

[@orrorsaness5942]

Yup

[@adrianpaul1985]

he's just a useful force of nature rather than one of the good guys the only reason he works with the heroes is out of fear

[@NostraDavid2]

Frieza is such a petty asshole. I love him.

[@tenanaciouz]

Id argue Frieza was damaged by his expansion. He went from the most powerful being in the universe and a tyrant to a petty servant of a lazy god and has gone from a legit intimidating force to a joke half the time

[@bubalackgaming8892]

​@@tenanaciouz Frieza was always a joke half the time though. Before Goku went Super Saiyan half of their fight was just Frieza getting bamboozled by him

[@dagrumble]

Not to disagree, at all, but I feel like something even more important that so many people have forgotten is to treat your villains seriously.

[@Ze_N00B]

Pure evil villains are more relatable. They're petty, greedy, envious, wrathful, sadistic, narrow-minded, apathetic, prideful and in many ways encapsulate how people actual end up doing evil things.

[@Ultimabuster92]

Sure... but they are also uninteresting. The main antagonist of a story is often a very large part of said story, and if that large part of the story is uninteresting, the story often, not always, falls flat.

[@Ze_N00B]

@Ultimabuster92 Uninteresting? Malificient, Ursula, Scar, Gaston, to an extent Anton Ego, Hopper, Hal Stuart, Big Jack Horner, Death, Drago Bludvist, Grimmel the Grisly, Tai Lung, Shen, Fairy Godmother... All of these villains were "uninteresting" to you?

[@Ultimabuster92]

@@Ze_N00B Excuse me, what? How are Malificent, Ursula, Scar or Gaston interesting...? In what way? What about these characters makes you want to know more about them...? I never sat there and thought to myself. "Man, i wonder what goes on in Scar's mind, how did he become like that?" I never sympathized with him nor did i feel the urge to look closer. Same with the other examples (i don't know all the characters you listed, btw.) These villains may be entertaining or iconic, but they're not interesting. Maybe our definition of the word "interesting" just varies, but no. Entertaining and interesting are two seperate things. That all being said, i'd like to point out, that i never said, that those villains are bad, they do, what they are supposed to do for the story, never said that a villain HAS to be interesting to work for the story, but they are still that, uninteresting. Nothing i will think about after i come out of the story, nothing that i will list as my favourite villains, nothing that i will analyze later on to learn from it, nothing that makes me question myself. They are simply forgettable

[@hunterkudo9832]

@@Ultimabuster92 They are interesting to watch. Maybe they are not interesting to you, but that doesn't apply to everyone. Others are interested in their psychology because its unlike things we see in reality.

[@Ultimabuster92]

@@hunterkudo9832 Huh... alright. Two types of people, i guess. If you find them interesting, that's fine. Then i will rephrase my earlier statement and instead say, that I find them uninteresting.

[@tylerlong5112]

I believe villains help teach a valuable lesson, sometimes you will face someone with no light in their eyes and you have to end it one way or another. “Some men just wanna watch the world burn.”

[@heavysbeltbuckle]

Villains should serve as warnings as to what we as the audience are and could mutate into further

[@music79075]

Lemme tell ya. Working a year in prison opened my eyes to that more than anything else.

[@vinteb7987]

I take sympathetic villain backstories as lessons on what you should not do and what are the right things to do when faced with a similar situation as they (the villains) did.

[@billcipher3180]

I think a tragic villain doesn't need to be sympathetic take DIO for example

[@Ratface0007]

Tragic would imply that he fell from grace. Bro was trash from the beginning

[@thatprofessorguy8316]

@@Ratface0007I think they meant his transformation into a vampire. They meant his rejection of humanity to become a monster

[@richardlionerheart1945]

​​​@@thatprofessorguy8316he could have gotten his life set for him if he just accepted being Jonathan's brother but he resented him for having the easy life compared to him and then set out to ruin jonathan's life, poison his adoptive father and get the entire joestar fortune for himself, because of his upbringing maybe his backstory was sympathethic but in his mind it enabled him to do far greater evil

[@SerimloMinder]

​@@thatprofessorguy8316 how is his transformation into a vampire tragic?

[@nicholaswhaling7233]

​@@thatprofessorguy8316 He was already a monster. Turning into a vampire doesn't change that, it just gives him more options to be monstrous.

[@clippers1731]

To me personally, Pure evil is like a ghost. At first you think it's just basic nonsense only children would believe. And you may be right in some regard to think that. But then you see something unnatural while you're alone in the woods at night. Making you think, and fear, that what if it wasn't nonsense after all.

[@anomitas]

I guess if you don't believe in childish stuff like ghosts then you can't enjoy these villains

[@clippers1731]

@@anomitas Or you just didn't get my point. There's a difference between pure evil that doesn't feel real and pure evil that feels real. I enjoy pure evil characters. I also fear pure evil characters that feel more real. But based on what you said, it's like you think you need to believe in childish thing's to enjoy pure evil characters. That sounds pretty condescending.

[@RoninCatholic]

Pure evil is actually an oxymoron. Purity is opposed to evil, as all of evil is impurity; it's like how if something was 100% hole in itself, it would not exist whereas being "full of holes" is a spectrum of how holey it is. It can be so moth-eaten and punctured that there's no hopes of ever repairing it, and that's what most people mean by "pure evil" Or how if your body was ever 100% diseased, you'd be made entirely of pathogenic microbes with no host to _be_ diseased. Even the baddest dude in reality (Satan) isn't without positive qualities like ambition, intelligence, willpower, and gumption.

[@CartoonistDave]

@@anomitas Atheist cringe.

[@thatoneundertalefanatic]

Isn't the "pure evil" you're describing just a type of evil you can't understand?

[@bubalackgaming8892]

To quote JoJo: "Evil that doesn't realize it's evil... Is the worst kind of evil there is!"

[@haixaldonix4945]

It just DEPENDS, every story needs different things if your story is that everyone is a good person inside then you need a villain who is sympathetic but if you tell the story that not everyone deserves redemption then you can make a pure evil villain

[@Battyj]

Not at all, if anything it's the opposite. Villains are usually supposed to challenge the protagonists worldview, look at batman and the joker, batman believes everyone can be redeemed, while the joker is completely irredeemable and everyone is just 1 bad day away from becoming like him. If you have a hero that from the start absolutely wants to redeem everyone, and the only villain is someone that can be redeemed, then you aren't going to have a very complex story. And it's the same the other way around.

[@haixaldonix4945]

@Battyj That's not what I said, you're talking about something on a character level, I said on a story level, if THE STORY is about us all having something good inside you can't make a completely evil villain, because you're shooting yourself in the foot

[@Devilelf]

@@Battyjyou seem to be missing a huge point and your example disproves you quite easily. An antagonist is the obstacle you are talking of, a villain is defined by their actions. Not every villain in batman is like the joker, and some absolutely can be redeemed, some not. But redemption and sympathy do not inherently go hand in hand. Mr Freeze, Twoface, and babydoll to name villains that are sympathetic, but widely looked at as some of batmans best villains, especially Mr Freeze, are not guaranteed redemption given characters, the only caveat is Mr Freeze and that depends on the story. Sympathy is not the breaker of challenging the worldview, but how depraved the villain can be in their actions, testing the hero’s morals. The hero can always best a physical challenge, the moral challenges are the hardest for them, and with batman it becomes a test of how depraved can a villain be to no longer be redeemable, but that doesn’t mean they are not sympathetic, only that they can’t be saved, at least by batman.

[@haixaldonix4945]

@@Devilelf oh hey

[@aidankeogh9994]

Sympathetic villains are tired. Give me pure bastards. Just absolute pieces of shit. Villains that are evil and _loving_ every second of it.

[@hunterkudo9832]

Yeah I feel like the sympathetic villain trope has been overused, probably because the writers nowadays lack creativity.

[@OrpheasVIPC]

If a villain with no relatability or redeeming qualities is bad writing, then Puss in Boots the last wish is a poorly written slop-fest Edit: I would like to explain that I am only talking about Jack Horner Edit 2: Lemme also add some other pieces of media who also have a character who's evil just because: The Blood Merridian, I have no mouth and I must scream

[@yeehowdy267]

Careful now, statements like that attract the contrarians

[@OrpheasVIPC]

@yeehowdy267 Let them come

[@alexcat6685]

@@OrpheasVIPC what makes it work is the variedness of each one, Goldilocks is Sympathetic due to the good she does want to achieve. Death is Empathic, because Puss basically pissing all over the love of his eternal existance is understandable to despise, however it doesn't excuse breaking his own position to justifiably hate on an idiot. Jack Horner is just a Pathetic Moron and we love how much he wouldn't have it any other way. Too much of something will ofcourse get boring, so the movie varying it's ideologies makes the hole thing better, Jack horner works well as the stories main threat against the Wishing star, Goldilocks somewhat was but she did learn the lesson later on to no longer be so and Death is a pesersonal Villain to puss working the main theme of valuing what you have.

[@Zythryl]

@@alexcat6685…So these guys just somehow don’t know what “sympathize” means, then? You just made the case that those villains are sympathetic villains. If it’s a villain who is being a villain in a way that you can understand why they are the way they are, then that means they’re sympathetic. You can understand them.

[@Zythryl]

Looks like somebody just made the case that those villains are relatable, actually. :P

[@ThePowat]

This is why antagonists like Ramsey Bolton and Prince Joffrey were so great, I miss love-to-hate villains

[@brandonnix7278]

14:20 while there are exceptions Kajiu for the most part aren't necessarily considered pure evil more so forces of nature like how we would view a hurricane or tsunami.

[@darlalathan6143]

Monsters are more like animals than natural disasters, because they do what they want to do, out of instincts, while hurricanes are gases and liquids moved by sunlight on the atmosphere. A tsunami is a wave caused by an earthquake.

[@michaelanuradha-khufu74]

Trying to artificially make sympathetic villains undermines the historical fact/concept that people go through bad things and then come out bad people who do bad things. Do I wish to invalidate the suffering of say... Stalin (his dad became abusive and forced him and family to leave)? No, but I can recognize and say whilst it is sad, it doesnt justify his wrongdoings.

[@valerianchole]

My man, couldn't you have used less ambigious example? Stalin was NOT evil (like many others, even Hitler wasn't). Pure evil does not exist in a real world, even psychopathic serial killers can be treated and redeemed (we just don't have resources to do so).

[@michaelanuradha-khufu74]

@valerianchole Stalin killed tens of millions, more than Hitler. Hitler killed millions and wanted to "cleanse" the world of anyone but the "pure" race. They were both very evil people who did evil things. Do not sympathize with or justify their behavior, I understand fheir pasts and the contexts of their historical situations but that is not an excuse or a valid reason

[@Leiliel1]

@@valerianchole -Red Fascist, Or Unacceptably Naive Child

[@BloodFeitan]

Characters in general don’t necessarily need to be relatable to be good character imo idk why so many people think that they have to

[@EbilDerp]

A good villain is a villain you hate so much that just seeing a bit of them makes your blood boil, thats when a villain becomes a good, heck even best villain.

[@Random66860]

Griffith from berserk, lol

[@thecod2345]

Something I will never understand from the people who insist that sympathetic villains are always is the insistence that the best villains are just people who need a couple months of therapy. Thing is though, they ignore the simple fact that people are often assholes. Everyone has their reasons and their sob stories but at the end of the day, many people act completely villainous and see no issues. Someone who pursues career success by sabotaging their peers probably has their reasons, but at the end of the day they’re not unaware of what it makes them, they’ve more than come to terms with what it means and they chose to do it anyway because it gets them what they want.

[@bubalackgaming8892]

Exactly. I remember back when Persona 5 came out and people complained the villains of that game were irredeemable, and I always thought it was a dumb criticism because many people genuinely ARE just as bad as Kamoshida, Shido, etc.

[@_nutcracker]

It's ironic that sympathetic villains are always good in a way, unlike people with only sympathy and no criticism in their lifes, no one stops them from turning into a beast

[@Zythryl]

It seems nobody knows that “pure evil” means “cannot be changed”. Or that “sympathy” does not mean “accept/approve”. All the whining I’m seeing is coming from pro-eye-candy, anti-thinking sentiments. You can have a good story where a hero overcomes an absolute evil, and a good story where a hero overcomes any other kind of evil by understanding why the evil is evil and not something else (aka, sympathy). But to say that stories with pure evil villains are somehow more worthwhile than stories without, seems to me like saying “Superhero movies where the heroes always know they’re right are better than superhero movies where they have to question themselves before being sure about tackling the villains”. It’s a sentiment that implies you aren’t watching media to think. Which isn’t a good look at all. Obviously what works best depends on what you are trying to tell in your story, but, come on. This video’s title and claim is synonymous, literally, yes literally, with “Stop making me wonder how villains become evil”. Not a good sentiment to have. At all. The only way you would have intended to mean something else, is if you mean something else when saying “sympathize” or “pure”. If a villain can have their mind changed, if they can recognize a mistake they’ve made, if they’ve become or are evil for an actual reason, and not just being a self-evident thing, then they aren’t “pure evil”. No, “pure evil” cannot be changed with persuasion, because that’s not what fucking “pure” means. “Pure” is synonymous here with “absolute”. Satan is pure evil. A guy who commits, say, mass genocide, for any reason at all that isn’t out of impulse, is not pure evil. Because the guy can, possibly, become something other than what he is. He can change. Satan can’t. Stories where the audience needs to think about why the hero is a hero, and/or why the villain is a villain, requires a villain whose evil is not absolute, and not self-evident. Satan can’t be used in a story like this because the hero’s reflection categorically can’t go deeper than identifying whether or not the hero is like Satan. There’s no “why”, only “is”. And yeah, frankly, the stories about “why” are way more interesting. “Christ must die” or even “Hitler must die” is way more compelling than “Satan must die”. You can have a story where a hero overcomes an absolute/pure/unchangeable evil, like a hero overcoming a drug addiction (the drugs being a cause of suffering is an axiom, unchangeable-so, “pure evil”). But that’s not a story about ideology. Neither is a story about, like, Finn having to destroy the Lich. Finn doesn’t need to question why he must do what he needs to. It’s just not about that. In that story, it’s about whether or not Finn is *capable* of victory, not about questioning whether or not it’s the right choice. I’m just saying, if I want stories about absolute evils, general doomerism, things that obviously must be dealt with but the capability of doing so is the question, I’ll go ahead and watch a documentary. But in a fictional story, yeah, I would prefer to have my ideologies challenged. This requires the absence of self-evident absolutes, and requires understanding of what is challenging me. If you want to reduce that to just trying to identify why everyone is having a bad day, if you want to reduce a desire to understand to a desire for cuddles, that makes you the selfish prick, not me.

[@shadowbladezorru2748]

Jack Horner is fun pure evil that comes to recent mind. Dude is an absolute monster trying to get all magic because he got less attention than Pinocchio, no tragic backstory and he had a well off pastry empire. He just wanted more and would even merk his own men and did by accident and with the human bridge to get what he wants.

[@imarock.7662]

This is exactly why I love the Villains in DB. Nearly all of them are just evil because they enjoy it. No bs, no "woe is me" nonesense, just pure, stylish, dasterdly-ness. Theyre the most fun, and most entertaining to watch imo. And in a way thats almost more realistic, relatively anyways. Some bad people in the world, such as those in big corperations and monopolies, just care about money, or power, or status, or just for the fun.

[@ladahieno2382]

I like to say, there's 3 types of evil and 2 types of villains - You can be purely evil, you can be mostly evil and you can be making lots of mistakes that could be understood as evil. As for villains there's really only redeemable and the irredeemable villains

[@ripper8961]

14:56 That kind of reminds me of the character change of Eren Yeager from attack on Titan, where at first he is an ambitious young boy, so with pain and rage to fight against the Titans. But as soon as he finds out the reason why they’re all on that island and why there are Titans on it. He feels like he needs to have revenge against the world to gain freedom. So he puts all of his power and effort into destroying it. And to me, it just felt so weird how he had such a sharp change in character, all the way into becoming the villain of the story, where everybody needed to stop Eren in order to save the world.

[@morgant.dulaman8733]

One of my favorite villains is Tolkien's Morgoth. Where Sauron started off with good intentions in terms of imposing order on a chaotic world, Morgoth rebelled against Middle Earth's version of God simply because he could not indendently create, and therefore totally rule, anything for himself, and so sought to impose his will on his Creators works through corruption, and then eventual destruction. Nothing about that is sympathetic, but every part of that sentence makes sense in terms of motivation: absolute petty destruction on a cosmic scale. It's the kind of thing I suspect even Lovecraft's beings would be stunned by because while their goals and very being is supposed to be incomprehensible, they have agendas that entail some kind of mastery over the world rather than its absolute destruction, and I suspect even they would look at such petulance as outright insane. Another villain to make it into popular culture is Lord Dominator whose desire is to destroy every planet in the galaxy. Why? Because it's fun to watch people despair as their home is destroyed. It sounds cartoonish on paper, but it actually makes her a great foil to the main protagonist, who goes out of his way to be kind to everyone, even his enemies, because that's who he is and its something he takes joy in. It's altruism vs that casual childish sadism we like to forget we had when we squashed bugs for fun or teased and/or bullied each other in different turns, or got caught up in some drama or another when we were teenagers. That kind of cruelty in a villain isn't "relatable" (or at least I really hope not), but it is a good example of those worst impulses never being checked and taken to the worst heights imaginable when someone who gets a kick out of causing pain is given the power to destroy planets. These traits give her a psychotic streak that makes for a terrifying yet fun villain as she's laughing it up while being unapologetically evil. Oh, and she has a nice character design, and that always helps in terms of popularity. Anyways, with these two examples, I thought I'd just make my case that a villain doesn't need to be relatable or redeemable. What they need is an internal logic (IE, it makes sense to them within the story they're in) to be villainous as well as a way to be engaging, and one of the best ways to do that is to not only give them vices, but corrupted virtues. C.S. Lewis himself once noted that Attila the Hun wouldn't have left such a mark if it wasn't for his courage, and in the above, Morgoth let his desire for creative control become an obsession for dominion while using his creativity to twist reality so that all things had some form of his evil in it, with the worst example being his corrupting captured elves to create orcs. Meanwhile Lord Dominator used her ability to be empathetic in order to better inflict pain and misery on others for her own amusement. I think that also gives a pretty good idea on how to go for "pure" evil: not a complete absence of the ability to do good (at least at first), but to know what is good and then willfully choose what you know to be evil out of selfish motive.

[@PR1ME98]

Im writing a book that has both a pure villain and a sympathetic villain. My goal is to enlighten people that both archetypes are equally compelling.

[@someonenothim]

Hope to read it soon. Pure evil and sympathetic villains as foils to one another are my favorite~

[@graveslayer9666]

So villains can become more fascinating because of how evil they are. The best example of this are 3 evil villains from dark books, known by fans as „The Evil Trio”: Judge Holden from Blood Meridian Qu from All Tomorrow And AM from I have no mouth and I must scream. They are the worst of the worst, putting villains like Dio, Lich and even Griffif to shame

[@benderthepirate]

Judge Frollo and Lord Shen are both great examples of purely evil villains that are also complex.

[@CA_Unfezant]

What is a Lord Shen?

[@ThatGuyYama]

That’s why I love Aizen, he is pure evil because he never apologizes or seeks forgiveness from the people he’s hurt since it was all by design to show how futile it is to fight against him. He was blessed with near limitless strength and intellect so he abuses it, simply because he could and that was all the reason he needed.

[@KvngLeroy1]

What? Aizen isn’t evil for fun, he has a very clear plan and he actively wants to replace The soul king because he dislikes how the god of the bleach universe is nothing more than an spectator

[@ThatGuyYama]

@@KvngLeroy1 I never once said Aizen was evil for fun. I said that he is evil because he has immense power so he uses it for personal gain, which is true. I’m not making Aizen out to be evil for the sake of evil, I even say “all by design” in the original comment. So I’m well aware of what Aizen wanted to accomplish but he ruined his own plan trying to prove his superiority against Ichigo just to lose horribly and even before that he was trying to kill Ichigo’s friends which gave Ichigo the time he needed to train and defeat him. Aizen is incredibly intelligent but his fatal flaw is that flaunts and talks about his own power so much he tends to underestimate the strength of others, which was his undoing against Ichigo.

[@ConcavePgons]

@@ThatGuyYama Aizen is sympathetic villain by definition since we actually know why he's doing what he's doing. We don't have to feel empathy for him, but at least we have an idea of his thought process.

[@Монс-й1ь]

"Do you a villain because you have a sad backstory, or you have a sad backstory because you a villain?"

[@Bryan-px3kr]

I think it's more so their actions need to make sense. We don't have to really relate just understand how does a person self justify the actions they have done and sometime we empathize and fall in love with " villians

[@dragonsontv4412]

On this subject, I found All for One from My Hero Academia to be a breath of fresh air. The dude simply had power and wanted to use it to his end goals. He wanted to be evil, no sob story or the hero of their own story bs. All were tools and everything necessary was permitted.

[@cykablyat3680]

Villains always having a good reason to be bad doesnt work, like in real life, some poeople will do some herendous shit while being absolutelly aware of what they re doing and the consequences of their actions or maybe they just dont care, not everyone has a sob story

[@TamakiDamoismyhusbando]

This is why i love villains like Cell or Frieza

[@juniorjunior5884]

We're in a time now where fools are actually trying to humanize the demons from Frieren and is upset that the demons are treated as the malicous monsters they are. The whole 'sympathetic villain' trend has infected a generation into thinking everyone is secretly a cuddly person who just had a bad day.

[@QuiteFunnyIsnt1t]

what the fuck are you on about

[@Carlos-bz5oo]

Another weeb with a bad take. Yawn

[@U-PN-BI-IBW]

@@Carlos-bz5ooanother shit take tumbling out of tumblr. sigh

[@Zythryl]

I wouldn’t confuse sympathetic with being cuddly, as opposed to being more worth thinking about. In the same line of thought, don’t confuse empathization with exoneration. “Oh, I understand it” doesn’t make “Oh, I accept it”. If you have an impenetrably evil character that doesn’t give you a reason to think about them… why are they chosen to be the opposing ideology to whatever the hero is about. That would just be writing your hero as an ideological winner by default. You need a reason why your hero is a hero compared to your villain without having anything to do with the actions either/both take. The demons in Frieren didn’t seem to do anything for anything other than the sake of control and power… so, they’re not memorable. the actions the party took against them were about as interesting as walking around a “wet floor” sign. Sorry man, but yeah, they would have been better characters if they were sent by someone else, or didn’t want to be demons of their own volition, etc etc. The blood demon isn’t interesting because of his blood abilities, that’s just that character’s silhouette. What’s there to care about in Frieren anyway? Everything interesting happened in the first few episodes. The backstory was more interesting than Frieren’s new adventure. Frieren’s grief has already been resolved, and now it’s just a regular D&D adventure. Frieren isn’t interesting because she’s an elf, or a mage, those are just the silhouette. Her newfound feeling of grief was what made her character compelling. The only “pure evil” villains I’ve ever found compelling were villains that aren’t even sentient. In stories of drug addiction, it’s the compulsions of addiction, and the drugs themselves, that are the villains. The things that can’t change. If it’s a living thing that can’t, categorically can’t, be changed, then that’s not interesting-the only way to be rid of that villain would be to kill it. Stories about the process of killing a god aren’t as interesting as stories about why the god must die. Sorry man, but those Frieren demons have nothing on, say, Miquella from Elden Ring. Him being a compelling villain isn’t about how you get to kill him, it’s about why he is always killed no matter how much you loved him and what he wanted to do for the world. “Christ must die” is way more interesting than “Satan must die”. There’s your difference in interest between villain characters that are contextually evil versus categorically always evil/categorically can’t be understood/sympathized with. We already have enough absolute evils to deal with in life, like sadists-if I wanted to think about them, I’d just watch a documentary. Fiction is for thinking about how to deal with these things, not thinking about how those things are inescapable. You don’t need to be reminded of something that is self-evident. You don’t need elaboration for why absolute evil is absolute. For literally everything else, though, you do. Because if evil isn’t absolute, then it started at some point, and that starting point is what these stories we’re talking about, is about. A kid who kills puppies out of impulse is not as interesting as a kid who kills puppies because he deluded himself into thinking he has a reason to do it. What makes a villain good, or, better at being a villain than another villain, is how interesting and compelling they are as characters. Sorry man, but categorically, the latter kid belongs in stories more than the former kid. There’s more to do with the latter kid. More to think about. To think is the point, otherwise, why consume media at all? Surely not for eye candy…. This is also the same reason people are way, way more compelled by Griffith in Berserk than the Heart of Evil. Everyone loves to talk about that series. Isn’t the difference self evident? If sympathy isn’t what makes villains interesting, just substance and actions separated from reason, then wouldn’t the enormous literal root of all evil depicted in that series have more people interested in it than Griffith, who’s just some guy who made a silly decision? :P Like I said, a villain isn’t exonerated for their actions for having a “bad day”, but yeah the fact that they had a bad day at all, as opposed to “I was always this way”, is the whole point of a character’s inclusion in a story. You should have thought about that. I don’t like having to cite anime when talking about structure in stories, for obvious reasons, but since that might be all you understand, fight fire with fire I guess.

[@juniorjunior5884]

@Zythryl You miss one thing here. Even if something isn't interesting, it doesn't suddenly gain traits to make it more compelling. Especially since interest is subjective from person to person. I don't even care about Frieren since I only watch it sparingly with friends, but the example was to point out how even with a race created by the story to serve as occasional obstacles and nothing else is being fed more layers by people who need to believe there is more underneath. Sometimes, characters are actually one note and only serve a single purpose. If characters like that are boring to you, fine. But at least understand that it's dumb to try to argue against the lore of the story because you *want* something different. The villains aren't that intersting, the story is more about Frieren's group and their dynamic. Some people like that and some don't. I hear you on the idea of simple villains and devils being done to death, but if a story needs a straightforward malicious antagonist then it should be accepted as a writing tool like any other.

[@alseid8709]

One of my favorite "pure evil" villains is Makoto Shishio from the Manga/Anime Rurouni Kenshin. He IS the hero of his own story, and he HAS a personal moral philosophy and a justification for his actions. He's got a goal and a long-term reason to strive for it, and he won't be dissuaded, no matter what. For context, RK is a historical fiction story, set in the years after the civil war in the 1800's that brought Japan out of 200 years of feudal rule and isolation. The main character and hero of the story, Kenshin, was an assassin during that war, who killed hundreds (though always reluctantly) to pave the way to the new era of peace and prosperity. But after a personal tragedy during the war, he retired from the assassinations and joined the battlefield proper; the assassin position fell onto a much more willing swordsman, Shishio. After the war ends, Kenshin is offered positions of power, but refuses them, swears to never kill again, and wanders the country helping people, wielding a reverse-edge sword; Shishio, on the other hand, is ambushed by his own allies, knocked unconscious, and burned alive. Throughout the story, Kenshin fights all sorts of enemies, from psychopaths to warriors left behind by the times, and always manages to defeat them non-lethally, with the most impactful attacks often being through words rather than by the sword. Then comes Shishio. Covered in bandages, scarred head to toe by the flames, and leading a revolution that seeks to overthrow the government and install a regime where the strong rules the weak, because he sees the government that betrayed him as one that's ashamed of the blood they shed to rise to power, and that's wholly incapable of facing the fast approaching international conflicts of the era. Shishio is a ghost of the main character's past, a consequence of his actions, and a dark reflection of himself. He's threatening, entertaining, and has the strength and resources to pull off his plans. He's got followers who love him and fear him and would die for him. In his own "hero" quest, through his own philosophy, he has saved some of them, or given them a reason to live and believe. He IS pure evil, but he also has a point about the weakness and hypocrisy of the government. He's the one enemy Kenshin can't dismantle psychologically, and he's too strong, and more importantly, too determined, to be defeated non-lethally. He's not just a threat to the land, and to the lives of the heroes, but also to the very moral foundation of Kenshin's philosophy. I'm not gonna say how the story concludes, but I will say that Shishio stays true to himself to the very end, and beyond. So yeah, he's one of my favorite villains, and a prime example of what this video is about, done right.

[@auditect950]

0:42 Ironically, all three of them have Mark Hamill as part of their drive.

[@kczr35]

Whatever villain that's supposed to be sympathetic in and out of universe gets an in-universe Freudian Excuse is no Excuse.

[@kangruckus5939]

Let the villain be a villain. And let the hero be a hero. Play with the world that they are fighting over. Slide the scale slightly back and forth. Is it a world with letting it die? Or is it worth saving? And depending on which side you sit what does that say about you?

[@patroclusilliad233]

I think the rise of sympathetic villains, probably stems from the fact that people forget villains/antagonists really only are supposed to exist to challenge the main character. Sometimes a sympathetic character works, sometimes a pure evil villain is the way to go. For example Darth Sidious and Darth Vader, the latter of whom, is only really redeemable because saving his soul, is the main goal of his son, Luke, the MC, is the last film. Meanwhile Sidious is introduce as the embodiment of Vader's past, and the darkness that holds him. Him being a sympathetic old man, just would not have worked.

[@Norn_Ambassador]

Godzilla does have a back story. It's the results of nuclear testing on the Bikini Atoll and represents natures wrath toward humanity. The Night of the Living dead was the same. Nuclear waste is dumped in a cemetery. George A. Romero chose zombies [ghouls] because "they are us". In Kaiju movies, humans are the monsters.

[@serpentinious7745]

Evil people can't stand for villains to be portrayed as anything other than sympathetic and justified.

[@orrorsaness5942]

Fair

[@tenanaciouz]

Came here to say this the rise of sympathetic villains is because of the rising tide of evil and real life. As we tolerate more and more sin and evil it demands to be seen as anything but, it demands we see it as right and justified instead of what it is, vile and to be brought down. Evil always weeks to life itself above good or at least subvert the true meaning of goodness

[@noahmontgomery3879]

I read the the title of this video and was instantly hooked; Thank you SO MUCH for making this video- I'm sick of the sympathetic villain SO MUCH.

[@thehourman37]

See, I agree malicious villains are good to have; not in every story. I just don't agree with selfishness being evil. I see evil as the opposite love, but also a selfless act. True evil is done even at the expense of making oneself miserable. Even if they hate it, they do harm regardless. Pure evil would be someone who sacrifices their own happiness in order to make someone else miserable. A singular, almost religious, dedication to malice. Beyond reasoning or compromise. No pleasure, no satisfaction, just death and destruction. Almost like they are an alien beyond our understanding. I think Micheal Myers in the original film fits this quite well. He displays no sign of pleasure or joy in what he does. This is a large part of what makes him scary. In the credits, he is listed as "the shape." A shape looming out of the darkness who exists only to inflict indifferent, uncaring, unfeeling death.

[@matiasosella3867]

9:23 Alright, I hear this out. Since you mentioned the characteristics of an pure evil villian I had been thinking of him. So, imagine my surprise when I heard his voice at that point of the video while I was listening without watching the footage. By the way, super great quality for such an small channel, instantly subscribed.

[@someonenothim]

Gary Oldman will always turn heads. Also thank you, I do my best :3

[@braydeno4189]

If nothing else there's a reason that pure evil villains are the most noteworthy and iconic villains in most cases, the ones that see massive fan demand - and that's because they're just so fun. Palpatine, Frieza, The Flood, Sauron, Voldemort, Mr. Hyde, Handsome Jack, Albert Wesker, the Chaos Gods, Ganondorf, Anton Chigurh...etc. etc. all unsurpassable villains and the only sympathetic villain I can think of at their level is MCU Thanos.

[@ORLY911]

I recently watched Kamen Rider Ryuki and it has a new favorite villain of mine, Ouja. He actually subverts the sympathetic villain trope pretty hard back into downright deplorable bastard. everyone can't get enough of his hijinks, an absolute joy to watch him be a menace. So much so he frequently comes back in other Rider series with the original actor who loves the role. Def recommend this series even if you haven't watched a Kamen rider before, it's on YT now I think.

[@fungustheturd4004]

We need more of the opposite of these villains: Those villains that only did horrible things in their life and still they believe they are doing the right thing I’m craving to see more villains like Judge Frello and Pucci that you don’t want anything but the absolute worst for them

[@twobearshighfiving]

A good villain doesn't have to be relatable, but they always have to be either an unstoppable force or an immovable object, because they need to motivate the hero to become the other

[@giulyanoviniciussanssilva2947]

For me, there is such a thing as a well-written villain. My vision is to stop writing bad villains. Something that I honestly don't feel in what I see, because I only see good things.

[@booleah6357]

I miss having pure evil villains they were so entertaining. Sure they are harder to do right and come off as flat if done wrong but when they are done right they become so memorable and even hit legendary status much easier than redeemable villains. People remember Jack Horner, Ursula, Aku, etc. why? Because they stand out. Their antics are so insane that its hard not to like them in a twisted sort of way. Lastly, there are people like this in real life I believe though rare there are people so devoid of any sympathy so lacking in even a crumb of altruism that they can't be called anything but villainous. Guess what their remembered in infamy.

[@someonenothim]

At the end of the day, both types of villains have their place. But here's hoping the scales even out and that we are given both flavors in equal measure!

[@booleah6357]

@someonenothim agreed. The whole push for sympathetic villains in the first place came from an oversaturation of pure evil villains in the first place. Now it's gone the other way but pendulums do be a swinging.

[@crfstewarje]

The "Fall" speech perfectly encapsulates what I love about The Lich.

[@DragonKing-te9wy]

Another benefit to pure evil villains is the showcase of how they all fall. Evil does not, and cannot last, for it is inherently self-destructive. Seeing a pure evil villain fall because of his evil, the hero of the story winning because of his virtue - that is a beautiful story! Take _The Lord of the Rings_ as a prime example.

[@douglasphillips5870]

I don't think it's a duality between redeemable, and pure evil. I think writers over use the redeemable trope. I only count Zuko, and maybe Magneto as actually redeemable. On the other hand villains who are evil just because is lazy. I prefer characters who are somewhere in between. They have reason for their villainy, but that doesn't mean they're redeemable. His motivation needs to be antithetical to the protagonists so they can never reach an understanding, but it needs to make sense from the villain's point of view.

[@FandangoVA]

Pure evil is effective when we are children, then when we think we are "grown" we begin to look for "relatability", but when we truly grow up, once we have seen enough of the world, we understand just how good true villains are. Truly evil. Sauron is the 🐐

[@P-Star7511]

Eddie Brock: I like being bad. It makes me happy.

[@alexxxanderarmstrong]

1:43 what did Carlos do? I'm ok with him being a magnificent bastard, just curious af now

[@Nolava0why7Because0yes]

Zelda is great in this way, cause the villains are never usually things that are misunderstood, theyre demons and monsters who just need to be stopped, and theyre great for it.

[@TrangleC]

Maybe something is wrong with me, but I always sympathized more with the villains, even as a little kid. When watching "Masters of the Universe" cartoons as a little kid in the 80s, I always found it lame and unfair when Skeletor came up with some big, elaborate plan to use some magical artifact to direct a asteroid to crash into Eternia and then He-Man just punched the asteroid back into space, or ripped the top of a mountain off to plug a volcano or any such nonsense. I always just found heroes rather lame and boring and wanted to be the villain. Strangely enough though, every time I try being a bad guy in a computer game that gives you moral choices, I end up being the lamest goody-good-shoes boy scout, almost against my will. I just can't bring it over me to harm innocent NPCs. I guess what I really like about the villains isn't so much the being evil thing, but the freedom to not have to be the good guy, if that makes any sense. I guess it is just an expression of my strong antisocial streak.

[@JonarLugoLugo]

I’m glad someone went over this topic, even with the characters like the lich and the white peacock how his backstory doesn’t make him not pure evil.

[@univeriseman8008]

People who keep doing this don't understand they are using the word villain and villain is a trope and tropes are shortcuts. Antagonist does not mean villian

[@chrislee797]

So leading in with that I absolutely love this video and agree, there needs to be villains who are just plain villains, who are evil, who aren't "They can be redeemed, they're understandable!", it's a rapidly dying art these days cause everyone wants to have a redeemable, sympathetic villain. But I will argue that Shen is sympathetic. Not because of his actions, his actions are what damn him through-out the entire movie and what make him a great villain, because he *chooses* those actions, everything he does is *his* choice, even as it leads him into his own self-fulfilling prophecy of the very thing he was trying to avoid. The sympathy comes from his motivations. His motivations are relatable through out the movie. His initial motivation at the very start of the movie is that he wants the love of his parents and to make them proud of him. The tragedy of that is his own actions rob him of that. Therefore, his motivations become that he wants to prove everyone wrong and to prove that he is the only one in charge of his destiny. The tragedy is that every action he takes then becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy, leading to the exact destiny that he feared. These are very easy to identify and sympathize with, even as you abhor the actions he takes. Would I love to make my parents proud? Absolutely! Would I proceed to genocide an entire people to try and earn their love and pride? Hell no xD but I can still understand the initial motivation. What makes Shen a great villain is the nuance of understandable motivations leading to absolutely abhorrent actions, combined with the fact that every step of the way he actively chooses it. He had every opportunity, from the moment he set out to kill the pandas, to the moment he sliced the ropes and brought the cannon down on himself, to turn from the path he was on. Instead, he chose not to, and never once questioned whether or not he was wrong in doing so, he simply held fast to his belief that he was making the right choices. He doesn't seek redemption because he does not believe he needs it, and that's what sets him apart from other sympathetic villains.

[@bittlesthecookieakacaitcat8798]

No no no no This you realize judge Holden exists

[@Quinnaka]

Then A.M walks in

[@ORLY911]

Also Nyarlathotep, Man in Black, chaotic evil sort of characters are always fun and terrifying. Though Holden might be a bit more neutral evil based on when he decided to hold back...but that makes him scarier. Unpredictable.

[@giulyanoviniciussanssilva2947]

I don't know if it's the coldness or the harsh image of Javier Barden's performance, but I think Anton Chigurri is much more of a villain than Holden. They're both Cormac McCarthy characters. But I have this unpopular opinion. I like the guy who's a cold, indifferent beast of nature who's going to hunt you down more than the super convincing, supernatural, and artistic guy that Holden is. I think he exemplifies the cruelty of Meridian Blood. But he doesn't bring me the threat of Anton's presence.

[@Bloxfruitsistrashlmaocope]

I swear if i see Judge holden one more time- Yea he’s evil but compared to some iconic villains, he’s nothing

[@elcatrinc1996]

This is what i loved the most about Puss in Boots 2, it had the unstoppable force of nature who isnt evil, a reddemable antagonist who we can relate to and the irredeemable monster who we want to see fail and be defeated by the hero

[@ajmolhussain7025]

For me it's Junko from Touhou, she become the icon of hate and anger due to the death of her son and went on a luanrian genocide (while the lunarians can be snobby at times they don't deserve to be killed in the cross fire )

[@BergmitetheBlueandPointy0712]

Especially with how only 2 lunarians are involved with her tragedy, yet she wants to kill every Lunarians in the capital even though they have nothing to do with them.

[@Zeron108]

Touhou mentioned 🔥🔥🗣️🗣️

[@Монс-й1ь]

Not really a genocide if i remember. The only lunarian she wants to kill is Chang'e

[@ajmolhussain7025]

@@Монс-й1ь And that escaladed into killing the lunarians

[@BergmitetheBlueandPointy0712]

@@ajmolhussain7025 And it’s funny how the Touhou community is aggressively defending her actions.

[@joelhiraldo7338]

criminally underrated (toke me a whole day to edit it)

[@zilin8564]

I wrote myself villains but they are completely unredeemable psychopaths

[@technoweb2873]

A great example of a villain who is just evil for the sake of being Evil is Kid buu/Super Buu from Dragon Ball Z, my favorite villain from all of Dragon Ball. There are no plans to take over, no sad backstory, and no reason to sympathize with them. They are just forces of nature, with Hands rated E for everyone. The same can be said about any DBZ movie villains except for Dr. Wheelo. Also the Same for Goku Black and Zamasu for just being a couple of villains who just want to end everyone that isn't a god like them

[@Hobster64]

I got jumpscared by that sub count, seriously how do you not have more??? I've only watched two of your videos and I'm already hooked

[@cheesewizard9656]

there's something so gutturally terrifying about that last frame with Ice King's skeleton, frozen in place. this intimate moment in his sad life mirrors when we first learned about the nuance of *his* character, between those embarrassing moments of him essentially pissing himself behaviorally completely shattered without any of the resolutions he might've had, any future happy moments, just death and nothing more. the lich doesn't care about the tragedy of the Ice King. he only cares about success.

[@connorshover9572]

Everyone deserves the chance to redeem themselves and having a redeemable villain who doesn’t care about the chances goven to him and squanders those chances in spite of it is in my opinion really fun. Like Megatron. Murderous warlord who breaks more war laws than there is paper to document them. He COULD redeem himself and Optimus has tried giving him multiple chances and he doesn’t care.

[@Bori.1776]

I just hate the constant forced tropes. Just make the characters as they serve the stories. If the story calls for a sympathetic character than do just that, if doesn’t it doesn’t. Write good stories. Heath Ledgers Joker is arguably one of the most iconic villains in modern cinema, yet he was absolutely psychotically evil; the direct antithesis to Batman. This worked because it served the themes of the story and we didn’t need no background etc. Look at Magneto in the latest x-men trilogy. Tragic villain with a tragic back story & an incredibly sympathetic villain, but ultimately we all recognize that his way and methods of going about things are evil; he has too much hatred and he has to be stopped. Great villain serving good stories because it served the themes of said story.

[@KathyHarrington]

To paraphrase the great Snoopy, if they're relatable, why are they villains?

[@nomus1172]

To be fair from what I’ve seen some series have both examples of the pure evil villain and the tragic villain. Look at Star Wars with Palpatine and Darth Vader While Darth Vader is evil he does have a little good inside himself. We see his fall and what led up to it . Meanwhile Palpatine . He’s just a scumbag literally no redeeming qualities whatsoever The same can be said for All for One and Shigaraki All for One is a manipulative powerful scumbag that thinks he is superior to everyone . Shigaraki was his victim who was molded to become the monster he was in the series

[@someonenothim]

Both archetypes of villains as each other's foils is what I love to see. A healthy balance between the two can make them shine so much brighter!

[@masterzombie161]

Light Yagami is a great villain that can be considered tragic when you look at it from a certain point of view. He started off just a bored dude with his whole life ahead of him. He was popular, he was respected and he came from a loving family. Unfortunately one day he found the death note and he threw his entire life away just to become a God. Sadly even if he were to stop using the death note after his first kill he would already be doomed to go to purgatory for all eternity. Light Knowing this possibility definitely gave him the “no turning back” mindset. He knew there will be no happy ending for him so of course he became evil thinking that his lasting legacy will be enough. Yea I know he’s still evil and a bastard for what he did, but at the end of the day he was just a Normal dude living his life till that notebook came to his life.

[@gilgeaschwithkerk2344]

Hisoka from HxH is such a good pure evil villain. He wants fights, good fights and everything that gives him that is fair game. He could save the world and kill every child in the nation ten seconds later and it never breaks the character.

[@RoninCatholic]

I love strictly evil villains, villains operating from lofty ambitions, stubborn pride, gluttony, lust, etc. and fully embrace their wickedness. I also love heroes who are simply righteous and virtuous and strong, opposing these villains with equally little nuance. Sometimes what you need isn't the fiction to be more grounded and realistic, but to be more epic and inspiring!

[@jay_utopia2651]

Another type of villain I’m starting to like a lot is a villain with what would seem like a tragic backstory, but who is still an irredeemable monster who rejects any pity for their backstory. The example I can think of best is Sukuna from JJK, but I’m sure there are others.

[@CatBxtchNami]

I love Sukuna's last conversation with Yuji, he essentially gets hit with the Talk-no-Jutsu and then tells Yuji to "f%$k off!"

[@marshalbarachieloftheblack9697]

To put it in my own words, Villains these days have what I called, the 'Robin Hood Complex'. Simply due to them needing some sort of justification as to why they were the way they are.

[@rudics8908]

You forget Am from i have no mouth and i have to scream, avatar of hate

[@TheTacticalApe]

The perfect pure evil villain is probably Anton Chigruh from no country for old men

[@TBiscut74]

THANK YOU for making this video!!! My favorite type of villains are complete monsters, pure evil villains. My all time favorite villain is Tarantulas from Beast Wars and he was Pure Evil! There has only been one interpretation after the original show that did him justice was the 2021 Beast Wars comic book. But his portrayal in Transformers Earthspark is AWFUL!!! God I HATE that version of the character SO MUCH! With all my heart. I love Transformers and these days the way they present the Decepticons in a sympathetic light has been awful. They just don't feel threatening anymore. The last time they felt properly threating is in Transformers Animated. They were indisputably evil with no sympathetic qualities and they were still fun as hell! They basically stole every scene they were in and were also still threating! So yeah I want the pure evil villain back.

[@ericm.8110]

I would say the Decepticons are irredeemable in the Bayverse and the Bumblebee movie to. But I agree. I really don't like the „The Decepticons are oppressed victims" trope, which IDW started.

[@TBiscut74]

@ericm.8110 Exactly! I actually love the Bayverse/live action decepticons. I Should have made that distinction. Yeah I don't like how they keep going back to what IDW started. I'm hopeful about the Skybound's treatment of them. I'm loving that comic series.

[@ericm.8110]

@@TBiscut74, Megatron from the Unicron Trilogy was awesome too. He just becomes more and more cold hearted from show to show and is absolutely evil and has a god complex. There's just nothing good in this version of Megatron. He is just evil, and I love it.

[@TBiscut74]

@ericm.8110 Yeah! While I do have some problems with the Unicron Trilogy, I do love Megatron in Transformers Cybertron, which I believe is the best of the trilogy. My all time favorite versions of Megatron is Beast Wars Megatron, Animated Megatron, and Megatron from the War for Cybertron Games. I love those games depiction of the Decepticons more then the Prime version because they didn't really go into the oppressed people backstory and more just portray them as bloodthirsty warmongering conquerors. At least that was the feeling I got when I played the games.

[@don-comedyxd7673]

this is an "old man yells at clouds" video

[@JokerFan-hj4iv]

I always thought the irredeemable villains to be the most entertaining. 90% of the time they’re charisma and entertainment factor is off the charts and it seems the actors playing them are having the most fun. I can listen to mark Hamill laugh maniacally as the joker and make fun of Batman all day and Palpatine is the most hammy part of the Star Wars prequels and I wouldn’t have it any other way.

[@KindaNameless]

Regarding Shen... Even a pure psychopath can have a painful backstory. They often do, it is partly hereditary after all, and serial killers usually have pasts of being abused.

[@graveslayer9666]

One of the best showcases of Irredeemable villain with a tragic backstory is Walter Sullivan from Silent Hill 4 „The Room”. That man went through so much, I feel bad for him, but he commits so much evil you gotta hate him. By killing him, he’s granted mercy

[@augie1272]

Porky and Giygas are in between the whole sympathize and pure evil thing

[@Ave_Christus_Rex3777]

Variety is the spice of life.

[@tylerlong5112]

There’s a show on hbo max called Gomorrah about the organized crime in Naples Italy and pretty much every character there is a villain in their own right, no one gets a redemption arc as they continue to commit unforgivable acts for money and power. It shows that villains are still interesting when put in the spotlight without needing to redeem them.

[@someonenothim]

Added to the bucket list!

[@anomitas]

Such a good show

[@mikeyrambo2742]

One name to rule them all (Griffith.)

[@wispywhiskers3502]

My favorite pure evil villain is probably Betelgeuse from Re:Zero. He's threatening, uncompromising, an incredible foil for the main character and strangely entertaining, if you can look past the obvious grossness.

[@gabrieldjatienza6971]

Villains should be interesting ...not sympathetic...they get the most interesting dialogue..... the juicy dialogue. And they enjoy being consummate schemers.

[@darlalathan6143]

I think a villain with a tragic backstory, who's a Well-Intentioned Extremist, who Has a Point, a family, and opposes worse single, childfree villains should just be a hero or antihero. I also do not think serial killers or war criminals such as Angel or Xena can realistically be reformed.

[@HeavyShores]

Tbh, Carnage from Marvel can get in cause even when he tries to do good, he does so in such a way where he just does the same shit he’s always done. Like I’m not sure if there’s ever been an adaptation where Carnage has ever been redeemed in any way

[@matianlong7907]

The problem is that, broadly and generally speaking, in this particular period of time Western media are afraid to show pure evil villains and all the stories try to give a way for the audience to sympathize with them with tragic backstories to let us say “of course they’re evil, look what they’ve been through ”;

[@Nostripe361]

I’ll admit I love sympathetic villains. However the cliche has been overplayed. Every once in a while I just want a villain who is just a horrible person that enjoys evil.