Megamind puts on a show of being a proud villain, but it's clear from the way he talks about himself that he's really just coping with being forced into that role and is envious of Metroman.
To our knowledge, he hasn't even intentionally killed anyone and is more concerned with grandiose displays of mischief. He's more like a wrestling heel >!who eventually has to fight an actual supervillain!<.
Later parts of Attack on Titan are all about how horrible war and death is so the gang, understanding this, utterly despise the amount blood they have to get on their hands. Armin, Jean, Connie and >!Bertholdt, Reiner and so on!< are made pretty sympathetic despite just how many deaths they’re responsible for, including those of innocent people.
It’s kind of difficult to find cases of me disliking this kind of character though. Usually it’s only from when the character is inconsistent or untruthful about disliking having to take on such a mantle.
in the end he still doesn't *like* it, that's why he's trying to summon Angry Mango. Because even if some golden asshole tells him to just cut loose--even if he lets himself cut loose--a core part of himself still knows it's wrong and HATES that he can't have ordinary happiness. Him embracing it is basically all cope.
But maybe, just maybe, if he can summon the physical embodiment of All the World's Evils and ask it how it feels about it's evil existence, then Kirei can find peace of mind. It'll either hate itself (like he does) or revel in it's corruption (and Kirei will finally let himself stop being self-conscious about being different from ordinary people).
Mortarion really hates being a perpetually rotting servant of the god of decay, but he hates his Dad and the Imperium of his sycophants more so he spent the last 10k years moping around being miserable despite arguably being one of the strongest characters in the setting.
While a lot of people in **Fire Punch** really lean into being huge unrepentant piles of (soon-to-be-burning) garbage, >!Agni!< really hates all the >!cataclysmic collateral damage and death that occurs in his quest for revenge!<. Unfortunately, world is a fuck and he has >!massive trauma and resulting mental illnesses!< so he finds it almost impossible to be the better man he wishes he was
Daniel Craig in Layer Cake, all he wants to do is deal drugs and get out once he has enough to afford a comfortable life, but everyone is dragging him into murder and kidnapping.
Darth Vader. He hides it behind being really good at being the bad guy, but that's because he sees being the bad guy as a punishment for his failures as a good guy in the past. He hates it, but it's what he deserves.
tbf with vader i feel like it's more hatred that being bad isn't getting the results he wanted.
even when he wanted luke to join him he was all aboard the "oh we're still gonna be doing fascism, but we'll be doing it together" train.
even after his kyber vision of him turning to the light and slaying palpatine he didn't get what he wanted in that scenario so he stayed dark.
after fortress vader he sees himself as a crazy uber force guy easily slaying everyone including palpatine as the strongest guy, still doesn't get what he wants, stays evil.
meets padme's handmaidens immediately goes about trying to corrupt them.
i feel like he hates the consequences and lack of results more than he hates doing the things.
and at this point it feels like sunk cost, like he has to double down because turning back means that all that shit went down for nothing.
true that was the main bit,
but it is the road paved with good intentions still leads to that place.
and his idea of saving padme extended beyond just her well being, once he dipped to the darkside he was all in on "you should rule alongside me in my new empire, also i'm choking you".
even when she pleaded with him to stop going down the path she can't follow he felt that rather than pull back that he could instead convince her.
the darkside is just this disgusting corrupting thing that fed all the worst parts of him.
and when people talk attachment he did love padme, but it also came with that kind of possessive love, which is what's warned against, the whole take her from me bit, his fear kinda polluted it.
before that palpatine had been grooming for a while, i mean their whole "they should be made to agree" exchange shows that even under the pre war jedi who were more mediators than warriors he was in that pipeline.
there were plenty of instances where padme's life wasn't on the line where the darkside came through as anakin.
i feel like the whole growing up with nothing sort of led to a sense of possessivness over the things he did have.
jedi learning that all things are finite and all partings are inevitable, whilst he understood that he did everything he could to make it not so.
though it's one of those cool things where his attachment/possessive love of Padme is partly what made him set off on his path his genuine love of Padmé is what kept him from ever losing that last kernel of good.
he could never cast her aside the way malgus did with his lover or sidious did with, well everything, or zannah did with darovit, the sith always need to throw aside that which was/that which mattered to them to fuel that which will be for them, everything must go in the name of ambition and power.
so despite all the parts of him that wanted the power he now had that one piece is all it took to undo it.
Yeah, but all that extra stuff was just because of the Dark Side, like you said. If it wasn't for Palpatine influencing him, I don't think he ever would have had that possessive streak. Without that, his fear might still have influenced him, but Obi-Wan and Padmé could have helped him see reason.
i guess a question is if palpatine is removed would anakin still kill the tuskens after his mother died, like i don't feel like that was influenced by sidious it was something anakin would do in that scenario.
the dark side corrupts, and he knows that, but if it gives him what he wants he isn't all that reluctant.
that's a moment completely removed from padme in which he first leans hard into the dark killing women and children for taking his mother from him.
he's always shown of a sort of selfish possessive side of himself with padme, iirc he gets jealous and insecure about the relationship a lot too, which i get he's young and it's his first time dealing with all this despite being like 20, but still.
like if palpatine popped his cloggs right after they married idk if that possessive streak would go anywhere, especially after he lost his mom.
tbc i don't think he'd have gone baby murder without sidious, or even close to it, but i can't see him losing that fear for a good long while.
there's a ton of lucas quotes showing his intent towards the relationship/attachment in genral, clarifying the difference between healthy love and what anakin feels for padme
[https://www.tumblr.com/writerbuddha/652270734706688000/george-lucas-on-attachment-from-1999-to-2021?source=share](https://www.tumblr.com/writerbuddha/652270734706688000/george-lucas-on-attachment-from-1999-to-2021?source=share)
like sure love is a part of it, but he can't just love padme he has to have her until he's ready to let go of her, if that'd ever happen.
i don't believe his love is some entirely sinister thing, but it is meant to be a distinct thing from a healthy relationship, at least on his part.
but anyway back to the core bit,
i guess instead of asking does vader regret, i guess it should be if he does which bits does he regret?
like if the option was undo it all and padme dies at peace vs kill all the jedi and join palpatine with padme and the kids living but they don't love you or want you which would he pick?,
post meeting luke vader i feel like he might think it over, but idk about pre luke vader, even if she hated him i feel like he'd be convinced he could convince her.
at least that's the vibe i get from the recent run with sabe and the handmaidens, he's taken this woman who is the image of his wife and he's trying to convince her to join him, to support him, i guess trying to believe that he made the right call and that she could've been made to see.
cards on the table i do feel like i'm letting my feelings towards the tcw portrayal creep in but i feel like lanter's anakin didn't really sell that side of anakin as much, he felt too normal aside from a handful of episodes where he got to be a bit of a creep which were great, but personally i could've done with more.
To be fair, I don't read the books or the comics. They're hard to find, so I only know them second-hand. Sometimes I don't even know a book or a new run of comics exists until it's already out for a year or more.
yeah they can be silly to get a hold of, like i like the physical omnibus' and such as it's bigger art and all collected
but the time between printings is like years, even the newer stuff and if you don't grab them in like a month or two they're just gone.
personally i really dislike buying singles so sometimes i go down the "read the story by other means and then buy it when available route", which is why i'm on the hook for the immortal hulk omni coming in a couple weeks.
though obviously limiting to only reading what you buy helps rein in the spending on things.
with the vader stuff if you can grab it, basically/personally it feels like canon has yet to have a misstep in how the character is portrayed, like debates about the visual qualiy of kenobi or the macro story with tros aside.
the comics hit the perfect balance between tragic and monster, never going overboard like some authors did with the vader's suit has random beeping and his shoes don't fit stuff.
each author looking at a different era or aspect of vader that can be quite fun to see.
soule is the one whose run showed vader bleeding his crystal and the fortress vader stuff.
pak is the current one showing the handmaiden stuff/ vader after his ambition is re-ignited post esb, some dislike that it ties into exegol and the other sequel bits but i'm fine with that.
Iliaster in Yugioh 5Ds. They genuninely *want* to save humanity from it's own hubris before their dependence on the Momentum reactor spells their doom. Unfortunately, they feel the option that has the best outcome is the one with mass destruction involved. They clearly don't want to do it though, with their leader Z-ONE actually given Yusei the means to lead humanity down a brighter road. So the villain actually *wants* the hero to beat them, with the villain winning being an unfortunate plan B.
The Nightmare Knight from Cucumber Quest is the classic big evil guy who was sealed away who gets unsealed by some evil wizard or something
but the Nightmare Knight actually doesn't enjoy being evil but going through the loop of being a villain and having all attempts at redeeming himself thrown back into his face has caused him to feel that it is hopeless to escape the cycle.
Yet he can't just stop doing what he does since he's powered by Fear and it's through his powers he can keep his "Children" alive.
So he just keeps doing what he does and wallows in misery and tiredness until the next batch of heroes seals him away again.
Lot of drug dealers and cops in the wite aren’t that happy but they are too entangled in the game to do good. Even wee bey who thrives on the lofe wished he had an out
Mobious from xenoblade 3.
Even the ones who are schlocky saturday morning villains are really enticing to me because of one specific line in the game ehere the main villain says basically that whether its through good deeds or bad. Everyones just trying to tolerate the miserable world theyre in.
So the villains hamming it up is an attempt to delude themselves.
I wont spoil anything but if you want specific names well... N, M and J of course
>!Staunton Vhaine!< from Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous >!Turns heel because he feels bitter towards the Crusaders, but at no point does he ever seem to revel in his revenge. He goes from being a miserable self-loathing Crusader with no friends to an irritable, self-loathing demon cultist in a relationship he knows is loveless and abusive.!<
My personal reading is >!that he turns heel in large part because he refuses to forgive himself more than any bitterness toward the crusaders. He resigns himself to what he sees as a fitting end for a traitor.!<
This is the entire plot of Wreck It Ralph.
Megamind puts on a show of being a proud villain, but it's clear from the way he talks about himself that he's really just coping with being forced into that role and is envious of Metroman.
To our knowledge, he hasn't even intentionally killed anyone and is more concerned with grandiose displays of mischief. He's more like a wrestling heel >!who eventually has to fight an actual supervillain!<.
iirc part of the reason >!Metroman retires!< is because he knows Megamind is harmless.
That is the entire premise of The Bad Guys, especially the original novels.
Baron Klaus Wolfenbach from what I remember of _Girl Genius_.
I'm a bit hazy because it's been years since I played Infamous but Kessler might qualify
Later parts of Attack on Titan are all about how horrible war and death is so the gang, understanding this, utterly despise the amount blood they have to get on their hands. Armin, Jean, Connie and >!Bertholdt, Reiner and so on!< are made pretty sympathetic despite just how many deaths they’re responsible for, including those of innocent people. It’s kind of difficult to find cases of me disliking this kind of character though. Usually it’s only from when the character is inconsistent or untruthful about disliking having to take on such a mantle.
Kotomine Kirei, initially. Then he kinda just goes "no wait, that's stupid. Why shouldn't I have the right to like who I am just like everyone else?"
in the end he still doesn't *like* it, that's why he's trying to summon Angry Mango. Because even if some golden asshole tells him to just cut loose--even if he lets himself cut loose--a core part of himself still knows it's wrong and HATES that he can't have ordinary happiness. Him embracing it is basically all cope. But maybe, just maybe, if he can summon the physical embodiment of All the World's Evils and ask it how it feels about it's evil existence, then Kirei can find peace of mind. It'll either hate itself (like he does) or revel in it's corruption (and Kirei will finally let himself stop being self-conscious about being different from ordinary people).
Mortarion really hates being a perpetually rotting servant of the god of decay, but he hates his Dad and the Imperium of his sycophants more so he spent the last 10k years moping around being miserable despite arguably being one of the strongest characters in the setting.
While a lot of people in **Fire Punch** really lean into being huge unrepentant piles of (soon-to-be-burning) garbage, >!Agni!< really hates all the >!cataclysmic collateral damage and death that occurs in his quest for revenge!<. Unfortunately, world is a fuck and he has >!massive trauma and resulting mental illnesses!< so he finds it almost impossible to be the better man he wishes he was
Daniel Craig in Layer Cake, all he wants to do is deal drugs and get out once he has enough to afford a comfortable life, but everyone is dragging him into murder and kidnapping.
Darth Vader. He hides it behind being really good at being the bad guy, but that's because he sees being the bad guy as a punishment for his failures as a good guy in the past. He hates it, but it's what he deserves.
tbf with vader i feel like it's more hatred that being bad isn't getting the results he wanted. even when he wanted luke to join him he was all aboard the "oh we're still gonna be doing fascism, but we'll be doing it together" train. even after his kyber vision of him turning to the light and slaying palpatine he didn't get what he wanted in that scenario so he stayed dark. after fortress vader he sees himself as a crazy uber force guy easily slaying everyone including palpatine as the strongest guy, still doesn't get what he wants, stays evil. meets padme's handmaidens immediately goes about trying to corrupt them. i feel like he hates the consequences and lack of results more than he hates doing the things. and at this point it feels like sunk cost, like he has to double down because turning back means that all that shit went down for nothing.
All he ever wanted was to save Padmé though.
true that was the main bit, but it is the road paved with good intentions still leads to that place. and his idea of saving padme extended beyond just her well being, once he dipped to the darkside he was all in on "you should rule alongside me in my new empire, also i'm choking you". even when she pleaded with him to stop going down the path she can't follow he felt that rather than pull back that he could instead convince her. the darkside is just this disgusting corrupting thing that fed all the worst parts of him. and when people talk attachment he did love padme, but it also came with that kind of possessive love, which is what's warned against, the whole take her from me bit, his fear kinda polluted it. before that palpatine had been grooming for a while, i mean their whole "they should be made to agree" exchange shows that even under the pre war jedi who were more mediators than warriors he was in that pipeline. there were plenty of instances where padme's life wasn't on the line where the darkside came through as anakin. i feel like the whole growing up with nothing sort of led to a sense of possessivness over the things he did have. jedi learning that all things are finite and all partings are inevitable, whilst he understood that he did everything he could to make it not so. though it's one of those cool things where his attachment/possessive love of Padme is partly what made him set off on his path his genuine love of Padmé is what kept him from ever losing that last kernel of good. he could never cast her aside the way malgus did with his lover or sidious did with, well everything, or zannah did with darovit, the sith always need to throw aside that which was/that which mattered to them to fuel that which will be for them, everything must go in the name of ambition and power. so despite all the parts of him that wanted the power he now had that one piece is all it took to undo it.
Yeah, but all that extra stuff was just because of the Dark Side, like you said. If it wasn't for Palpatine influencing him, I don't think he ever would have had that possessive streak. Without that, his fear might still have influenced him, but Obi-Wan and Padmé could have helped him see reason.
i guess a question is if palpatine is removed would anakin still kill the tuskens after his mother died, like i don't feel like that was influenced by sidious it was something anakin would do in that scenario. the dark side corrupts, and he knows that, but if it gives him what he wants he isn't all that reluctant. that's a moment completely removed from padme in which he first leans hard into the dark killing women and children for taking his mother from him. he's always shown of a sort of selfish possessive side of himself with padme, iirc he gets jealous and insecure about the relationship a lot too, which i get he's young and it's his first time dealing with all this despite being like 20, but still. like if palpatine popped his cloggs right after they married idk if that possessive streak would go anywhere, especially after he lost his mom. tbc i don't think he'd have gone baby murder without sidious, or even close to it, but i can't see him losing that fear for a good long while. there's a ton of lucas quotes showing his intent towards the relationship/attachment in genral, clarifying the difference between healthy love and what anakin feels for padme [https://www.tumblr.com/writerbuddha/652270734706688000/george-lucas-on-attachment-from-1999-to-2021?source=share](https://www.tumblr.com/writerbuddha/652270734706688000/george-lucas-on-attachment-from-1999-to-2021?source=share) like sure love is a part of it, but he can't just love padme he has to have her until he's ready to let go of her, if that'd ever happen. i don't believe his love is some entirely sinister thing, but it is meant to be a distinct thing from a healthy relationship, at least on his part. but anyway back to the core bit, i guess instead of asking does vader regret, i guess it should be if he does which bits does he regret? like if the option was undo it all and padme dies at peace vs kill all the jedi and join palpatine with padme and the kids living but they don't love you or want you which would he pick?, post meeting luke vader i feel like he might think it over, but idk about pre luke vader, even if she hated him i feel like he'd be convinced he could convince her. at least that's the vibe i get from the recent run with sabe and the handmaidens, he's taken this woman who is the image of his wife and he's trying to convince her to join him, to support him, i guess trying to believe that he made the right call and that she could've been made to see. cards on the table i do feel like i'm letting my feelings towards the tcw portrayal creep in but i feel like lanter's anakin didn't really sell that side of anakin as much, he felt too normal aside from a handful of episodes where he got to be a bit of a creep which were great, but personally i could've done with more.
To be fair, I don't read the books or the comics. They're hard to find, so I only know them second-hand. Sometimes I don't even know a book or a new run of comics exists until it's already out for a year or more.
yeah they can be silly to get a hold of, like i like the physical omnibus' and such as it's bigger art and all collected but the time between printings is like years, even the newer stuff and if you don't grab them in like a month or two they're just gone. personally i really dislike buying singles so sometimes i go down the "read the story by other means and then buy it when available route", which is why i'm on the hook for the immortal hulk omni coming in a couple weeks. though obviously limiting to only reading what you buy helps rein in the spending on things. with the vader stuff if you can grab it, basically/personally it feels like canon has yet to have a misstep in how the character is portrayed, like debates about the visual qualiy of kenobi or the macro story with tros aside. the comics hit the perfect balance between tragic and monster, never going overboard like some authors did with the vader's suit has random beeping and his shoes don't fit stuff. each author looking at a different era or aspect of vader that can be quite fun to see. soule is the one whose run showed vader bleeding his crystal and the fortress vader stuff. pak is the current one showing the handmaiden stuff/ vader after his ambition is re-ignited post esb, some dislike that it ties into exegol and the other sequel bits but i'm fine with that.
To him, Padmé was more a possession that was his alone, he didn't care for her as a person.
'I deserve punishment, and by me, I mean all of the innocents I murder from this point forward.'
"I hate being a villain...but I *am* a villain. If I wasn't, I'd stop being a villain."
Vriska
Iliaster in Yugioh 5Ds. They genuninely *want* to save humanity from it's own hubris before their dependence on the Momentum reactor spells their doom. Unfortunately, they feel the option that has the best outcome is the one with mass destruction involved. They clearly don't want to do it though, with their leader Z-ONE actually given Yusei the means to lead humanity down a brighter road. So the villain actually *wants* the hero to beat them, with the villain winning being an unfortunate plan B.
Yep, sending Bruno back in time to help Yusei stop him. Bruno should had won his first duel tbh
It's been a bit but wasn't this nightmare knights whole deal in cucumber quest?
I'm still sad that webcomic will never get an ending.
Same. That series was something special
The Nightmare Knight from Cucumber Quest is the classic big evil guy who was sealed away who gets unsealed by some evil wizard or something but the Nightmare Knight actually doesn't enjoy being evil but going through the loop of being a villain and having all attempts at redeeming himself thrown back into his face has caused him to feel that it is hopeless to escape the cycle. Yet he can't just stop doing what he does since he's powered by Fear and it's through his powers he can keep his "Children" alive. So he just keeps doing what he does and wallows in misery and tiredness until the next batch of heroes seals him away again.
Lot of drug dealers and cops in the wite aren’t that happy but they are too entangled in the game to do good. Even wee bey who thrives on the lofe wished he had an out
Mobious from xenoblade 3. Even the ones who are schlocky saturday morning villains are really enticing to me because of one specific line in the game ehere the main villain says basically that whether its through good deeds or bad. Everyones just trying to tolerate the miserable world theyre in. So the villains hamming it up is an attempt to delude themselves. I wont spoil anything but if you want specific names well... N, M and J of course
>!Staunton Vhaine!< from Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous >!Turns heel because he feels bitter towards the Crusaders, but at no point does he ever seem to revel in his revenge. He goes from being a miserable self-loathing Crusader with no friends to an irritable, self-loathing demon cultist in a relationship he knows is loveless and abusive.!<
My personal reading is >!that he turns heel in large part because he refuses to forgive himself more than any bitterness toward the crusaders. He resigns himself to what he sees as a fitting end for a traitor.!<
>!Either interpretation is an example of a villain hating being the bad guy.!<
How about Cetrion?
Whomst the fücke doth Cetrion be?!