Or you get bad guys who are never even portrayed as villains...like the entire cast of Ocean's 11.
I think one of the taglines of the movie was "In any other city, they'd be the bad guys." Even more, the "villain" of the movie is the only legitimate businessman; his only wrongdoings include going overboard against people who try to cheat him, dating Ocean's ex-wife, and roughing up Ocean when he comes sniffing around (though at the end it's shown he cares most about money, but still).
At least in 13 (Ocean's 12 never happened), the villain is shown to be an arrogant asshole who's a jerk to his employees (in 11, Benedict knew every employee he came into contact with by name) and is actually a criminal (hacking into the federal fingerprint database).
At least in 13 (Ocean's 12 never happened), the villain is shown to be an arrogant asshole who's a jerk to his employees (in 11, Benedict knew every employee he came into contact with by name) and is actually a criminal (hacking into the federal fingerprint database).
The impetus in 13 was how Bank screwed Elliot Gould by threatening to kill him and cutting him out of his share of the very legal casino profits he had already bought into. Bank is very much a criminal, possibly a murderer.
And ease up on 12. It's a legitimately good movie.
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KalTorakOne way or another, they all end up inthe Undercity.Registered Userregular
edited May 2010
They had Julia Roberts pretend to be herself.
The only good part of 12 was that it let Eddie Izzard get his foot in the door so he could kick ass in 13.
I'm not sure if it's a broader part of the Western tradition, or maybe more of an American thing, but there is a sense of pride using brute force to overcome cunning.
Naturally, "good" versus "bad" is a very, very common theme. But the idea of using brute force as being the only "honorable" method, versus cunning as being "dishonorable", might be more a product of recent (by recent, I mean within a century or two) history.
As though cunning would cheapen the good.
As a sidenote, this is at least relatively modern. Have you read the Odyssey? Odysseus is quite a clever, tricky, manipulative person, and those traits were all seen as heroic by the audience of the time.
Anyway, I was reading the thread and came across the Wile E Coyote example, and was gonna say I always rooted for the Trix rabbit, but now that I think about it, that's not really rooting for the bad guy. The children are clearly the villains of that tale.
Remember Odysseus stands in mark contrast to brawn heroes such as Theseus, Achilles, and Heracules. The idea of brawn hero's and disdain for cunning is not a recent innovation. Of course niether are underhanded "cunning" hero's such as Odysseus.
Odysseus is one of the few if not the only of the Greek heroes that doesn't meet with a tragic end. He gets home, reunites with his son and kills his enemies that are trying to take his wife and throne.
edit: When I was a kid, my parents took me to see A Bridge Too Far when it came out. I thought the Nazis were good guys because they had awesome uniforms, classy digs, cool tanks and they gave their enemies chocolate and tried to show them mercy instead of slaughtering the Allies wholesale. To say this made my parents uncomfortable is an understatement.
It's not exactly a book with good or bad people. It's a book where people just continue to act in what they think is society's best interest. Any value statement put upon them is strictly a reflection of your own beliefs.
I know. That's why the last two words were in quotes.
Way I see it, Rorschach was no better than the Taliban. Loved him in the book, but I'd hate him eye-are-ell.
The author intended to portray Rorschach as a sociopath, and was mortified by all the comments that there should be heroes "like him."
I feel like this is quite common in media. We just love a good, intelligent, cunning villain. (who ever enjoys a truly evil, stupid, dull villain?) As people already mentioned, Dexter, Hannibal Lecter, most of the bank robbers in Heat, the Master from Dr Who, the Joker, the Bride from Kill Bill, all of the Watchmen depending on how you interpret them...these are all people who are "bad guys" but we root for them to varying degrees. Or you get bad guys who are never even portrayed as villains...like the entire cast of Ocean's 11.
One of the things I really liked about Casino Royale, was that it didn't portray Bond as a womanizing, charming, egotistic super spy. It showed him as a womanizing, cold, egotistic hitman who for whatever reason had enough of a moral code to ultimately be working for the government. His own boss views him as a somewhat untrustworthy thug. He's *not* a very good or nice person, but he's still the "protagonist".
I always thought most of the people you mentioned were the good guys. A character can do terrible illegal things and still be the intended protagonist, i.e. The Punisher.
And Dexter is just a dumb character. I'll admit I've only seen a few episodes but it just smacked of edginess by pandering to people's fetish for serial killers while simultaneously watering him down. It's like Twilight is to Dracula as Dexter is to Silence of the Lambs.
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ShivahnUnaware of her barrel shifter privilegeWestern coastal temptressRegistered User, Moderatormod
edited May 2010
Protagonists don't have to be good. They're just whoever's driving the story forward.
Just because somebody is the protagonist doesn't mean they're the "good guy." I'd probably argue in favor of The Bride being good, but the other characters mentioned (with the possible exception of certain characters from Watchmen) are generally "bad guys." Still, generally presentation as the protagonist goes a long way in winning audience sympathy.
As for Dexter, I generally adored it, although quality varies depending on the season and the episode. Being a loyal watcher makes it easier to get through the filler, as with most shows. The actual villains are all completely unlikable bastards, while Dexter has the villain-protagonist sympathy on his side. Although when you say watering him down, the fact is that from season 1 to season 4 the development of his character has been the gradual movement away from serial killing
although after the Season 4 finale this may reverse sharply.
Code Geass was all about blurring that line; the writers made the protagonist really sympathetic but then had him do all this terrible bad guy stuff, and the antagonist was a painfully naive but heroic douche with a Thou Shalt Not Kill rule. One of the writers - or the director, can't remember - basically said that they could've switched antagonist-protagonist roles easily, because in many ways the protagonist was essentially a villain. However, as with Dexter and Hannibal Lecter and Rorschach, the writers manage to sometimes make him seem less villainous by putting even worse complete monsters next to him.
All this talk of cunning made me think of Lucifer by Neil Gaiman. Certainly a bad guy I was rooting for. However, as with Sandman, calling anyone in that universe "good" or "bad" is quite subjective—but considering I'm talking about Satan himself I think I can get away with calling him bad.
I think my favorite part was when he went to Izanami's hell (the House of Windowless Rooms) to get his wings back. It's important to note that during his stay he was completely mortal and stripped of his divine powers.
During his stay, he:
1) Upended a cauldron of molten lead over the gatekeeper's head when the gatekeeper wanted him to find a particular stone in the cauldron.
2) Converted a supremely powerful she-demon spider to his cause after calling her a whore.
3) Completely dodged the carefully lain death-traps at his welcoming dinner while simultaneously getting away with calling the host's son Kagutsuchi a rapist necrophile.
4) At the dinner also poisoned the normally flawless Kagutsuchi who wields the completely unstoppable Three-Named Sword, causing him to miss ever so slightly and kill his own brother instead of Lucifer right before Kagutsuchi died of poison himself in front of a smirking Lucifer.
5) Blackmailed the Goddess of Death and flew out of Hell.
Gaiman is awesome.
I don't think Gaiman wrote any of that. He wrote Lucifer in the Sandman and then someone else wrote the spin off.
Code geass made my head hurt when one episode would be loving high school drama and the next would be mass civilian murder. What was the death toll by the end of each season?
All this talk of cunning made me think of Lucifer by Neil Gaiman. Certainly a bad guy I was rooting for. However, as with Sandman, calling anyone in that universe "good" or "bad" is quite subjective—but considering I'm talking about Satan himself I think I can get away with calling him bad.
I think my favorite part was when he went to Izanami's hell (the House of Windowless Rooms) to get his wings back. It's important to note that during his stay he was completely mortal and stripped of his divine powers.
During his stay, he:
1) Upended a cauldron of molten lead over the gatekeeper's head when the gatekeeper wanted him to find a particular stone in the cauldron.
2) Converted a supremely powerful she-demon spider to his cause after calling her a whore.
3) Completely dodged the carefully lain death-traps at his welcoming dinner while simultaneously getting away with calling the host's son Kagutsuchi a rapist necrophile.
4) At the dinner also poisoned the normally flawless Kagutsuchi who wields the completely unstoppable Three-Named Sword, causing him to miss ever so slightly and kill his own brother instead of Lucifer right before Kagutsuchi died of poison himself in front of a smirking Lucifer.
5) Blackmailed the Goddess of Death and flew out of Hell.
Gaiman is awesome.
I don't think Gaiman wrote any of that. He wrote Lucifer in the Sandman and then someone else wrote the spin off.
Yup, Gaiman created the character and his background (based on Milton, then he leaves Hell, gets Dream to cut his wings off and gives him the key to Hell, sets up his nightclub on Earth), but the "Lucifer" run was written by Mike Carey. Awesome series, definitely worth looking into.
All this talk of cunning made me think of Lucifer by Neil Gaiman. Certainly a bad guy I was rooting for. However, as with Sandman, calling anyone in that universe "good" or "bad" is quite subjective—but considering I'm talking about Satan himself I think I can get away with calling him bad.
I think my favorite part was when he went to Izanami's hell (the House of Windowless Rooms) to get his wings back. It's important to note that during his stay he was completely mortal and stripped of his divine powers.
During his stay, he:
1) Upended a cauldron of molten lead over the gatekeeper's head when the gatekeeper wanted him to find a particular stone in the cauldron.
2) Converted a supremely powerful she-demon spider to his cause after calling her a whore.
3) Completely dodged the carefully lain death-traps at his welcoming dinner while simultaneously getting away with calling the host's son Kagutsuchi a rapist necrophile.
4) At the dinner also poisoned the normally flawless Kagutsuchi who wields the completely unstoppable Three-Named Sword, causing him to miss ever so slightly and kill his own brother instead of Lucifer right before Kagutsuchi died of poison himself in front of a smirking Lucifer.
5) Blackmailed the Goddess of Death and flew out of Hell.
Gaiman is awesome.
I don't think Gaiman wrote any of that. He wrote Lucifer in the Sandman and then someone else wrote the spin off.
Yup, Gaiman created the character and his background (based on Milton, then he leaves Hell, gets Dream to cut his wings off and gives him the key to Hell, sets up his nightclub on Earth), but the "Lucifer" run was written by Mike Carey. Awesome series, definitely worth looking into.
Code geass made my head hurt when one episode would be loving high school drama and the next would be mass civilian murder. What was the death toll by the end of each season?
I actually really liked the high school shenanigans episodes (although I remember way-back-when I was watching R1 for the very first time, I was more likely to be going "dammit I want the plot to move forward this filler sucks." But by the time R2 rolled around I was more into the Ashford characters and I was enjoying the comedy.). The only time I hated the happy-serious whiplash in R2 was the episode where
Shirley died RIGHT AFTER she and Lelouch finally became an official couple and dammit it was adorable. Fuck that noise. God I hated Rolo so much after that, although somehow they actually did manage to make me sort-of-kind-of-a-little forgive him with his tragic and heroic death scene.
I don't know what the death toll was by the end of the show, but it was high. But it makes a huge, very important difference whether you include
the casualties of the nukes. It would take the death count out of the thousands or even tens of thousands into the hundreds of millions.
It also depends on interpretation of Lelouch's actions near the end
as Emperor. Somehow he makes himself out as some kind of dictator. Whether he actually committed any atrocities is unclear...it seems to me like it was mostly smoke and mirrors, but who knows. He really did create human slaves to fight for him.
Just because somebody is the protagonist doesn't mean they're the "good guy." I'd probably argue in favor of The Bride being good, but the other characters mentioned (with the possible exception of certain characters from Watchmen) are generally "bad guys." Still, generally presentation as the protagonist goes a long way in winning audience sympathy.
As for Dexter, I generally adored it, although quality varies depending on the season and the episode. Being a loyal watcher makes it easier to get through the filler, as with most shows. The actual villains are all completely unlikable bastards, while Dexter has the villain-protagonist sympathy on his side. Although when you say watering him down, the fact is that from season 1 to season 4 the development of his character has been the gradual movement away from serial killing
although after the Season 4 finale this may reverse sharply.
Code Geass was all about blurring that line; the writers made the protagonist really sympathetic but then had him do all this terrible bad guy stuff, and the antagonist was a painfully naive but heroic douche with a Thou Shalt Not Kill rule. One of the writers - or the director, can't remember - basically said that they could've switched antagonist-protagonist roles easily, because in many ways the protagonist was essentially a villain. However, as with Dexter and Hannibal Lecter and Rorschach, the writers manage to sometimes make him seem less villainous by putting even worse complete monsters next to him.
Well, the whole point of Code Geass was to have a series where Char was the hero, and Amuro the villain (or antagonist, at the very least.)
Just because somebody is the protagonist doesn't mean they're the "good guy." I'd probably argue in favor of The Bride being good, but the other characters mentioned (with the possible exception of certain characters from Watchmen) are generally "bad guys." Still, generally presentation as the protagonist goes a long way in winning audience sympathy.
As for Dexter, I generally adored it, although quality varies depending on the season and the episode. Being a loyal watcher makes it easier to get through the filler, as with most shows. The actual villains are all completely unlikable bastards, while Dexter has the villain-protagonist sympathy on his side. Although when you say watering him down, the fact is that from season 1 to season 4 the development of his character has been the gradual movement away from serial killing
although after the Season 4 finale this may reverse sharply.
Code Geass was all about blurring that line; the writers made the protagonist really sympathetic but then had him do all this terrible bad guy stuff, and the antagonist was a painfully naive but heroic douche with a Thou Shalt Not Kill rule. One of the writers - or the director, can't remember - basically said that they could've switched antagonist-protagonist roles easily, because in many ways the protagonist was essentially a villain. However, as with Dexter and Hannibal Lecter and Rorschach, the writers manage to sometimes make him seem less villainous by putting even worse complete monsters next to him.
The Bride I see is what Bill describes her as...she's a killer. She may have had no more motivation to kill when the movies finished, but it didn't change the fact that she was an extremely effective assassin who was the member of a group of assassins who presumably killed people for money. Who then went on a revenge based rampage. I felt like the last part of the 2nd movie did a great job of tempering her down from epic action star to something less black and white...you still don't like Bill in the end, and she still finishes what she started, but it definitely came as a bit of a shock to me that Bill's initial strategy when she finally tracks him down is to sit down and have (admittedly at gunpoint) a chat with her. Heck, it made him an awesome villain in that sense.
As for the Watchmen...you can argue them as "good guys" or "bad guys" equally well I think. They're just trying to protect society after all...but by eventually acting in defiance of society's law.
Titanic. After being forced to watch those two self-obsessed jerks run around for an hour, I wanted the iceberg to win. Sadly, it was only able to claim one of them.
The little wizard guy from Dragonball Z who created Buu. Babidi, I think. Sure he was evil, but he was just so happy when his plans were going well, you almost hated to see him disappointed.
And although it’s been a while since I read it, I remember thinking that the society in Brave New World wasn’t really that bad. But that may have been part of the point, that we're willing to give up a fair amount of self-determination for the sake of a pleasant lifestyle, etc. I should probably re-read it (I was in middle school the last time).
Just because somebody is the protagonist doesn't mean they're the "good guy." I'd probably argue in favor of The Bride being good, but the other characters mentioned (with the possible exception of certain characters from Watchmen) are generally "bad guys." Still, generally presentation as the protagonist goes a long way in winning audience sympathy.
As for Dexter, I generally adored it, although quality varies depending on the season and the episode. Being a loyal watcher makes it easier to get through the filler, as with most shows. The actual villains are all completely unlikable bastards, while Dexter has the villain-protagonist sympathy on his side. Although when you say watering him down, the fact is that from season 1 to season 4 the development of his character has been the gradual movement away from serial killing
although after the Season 4 finale this may reverse sharply.
Code Geass was all about blurring that line; the writers made the protagonist really sympathetic but then had him do all this terrible bad guy stuff, and the antagonist was a painfully naive but heroic douche with a Thou Shalt Not Kill rule. One of the writers - or the director, can't remember - basically said that they could've switched antagonist-protagonist roles easily, because in many ways the protagonist was essentially a villain. However, as with Dexter and Hannibal Lecter and Rorschach, the writers manage to sometimes make him seem less villainous by putting even worse complete monsters next to him.
The Bride I see is what Bill describes her as...she's a killer. She may have had no more motivation to kill when the movies finished, but it didn't change the fact that she was an extremely effective assassin who was the member of a group of assassins who presumably killed people for money. Who then went on a revenge based rampage. I felt like the last part of the 2nd movie did a great job of tempering her down from epic action star to something less black and white...you still don't like Bill in the end, and she still finishes what she started, but it definitely came as a bit of a shock to me that Bill's initial strategy when she finally tracks him down is to sit down and have (admittedly at gunpoint) a chat with her. Heck, it made him an awesome villain in that sense.
As for the Watchmen...you can argue them as "good guys" or "bad guys" equally well I think. They're just trying to protect society after all...but by eventually acting in defiance of society's law.
Yeah, the Bride's past as an assassin makes it much harder to argue that she's a "good guy." Personally I think that her revenge quest was 100% justified and everybody involved got what was coming to them, so I think that her story was heroic even if she wasn't always. But it's not black and white either, you're right.
With the Watchmen, I feel like you can't judge them as a whole. Vigilantism itself isn't the only issue. Most of the original Minutemen, Dan Dreiberg, and Laurie Juspeczyk are presented as pretty much entirely heroic, and the cops seemed pretty happy to work with the original Minutemen. Dan was supposed to be the guy the audience liked; Moore was pretty shocked by all the love for Rorschach, who was supposed to be a pretty clear-cut psychopath. Ozymandias and Dr. Manhattan are in an entirely different league of their own. Don't even get me started on the Comedian. Anyway, each one is his/her own separate "good guy or bad guy" argument, and I think it's improper to lump them together.
Well, the whole point of Code Geass was to have a series where Char was the hero, and Amuro the villain (or antagonist, at the very least.)
Y'know, I knew there was a pretty decent probability that knowledge of Gundam would deepen some of the stuff in Geass, but I have a hard time with Gundam because it's just too much about the robots. I like some giant robot anime, but I need more than giant robots. Still, I might need to check that series out.
Regarding Death Note, despite their posturing it becomes clear that both Light and L don't really have any values outside of their massive egos. What made L the good guy was that he had good government contacts and didn't care about everyone else so long as he knew he was awesome.
For Watchman, on a surface reading Night Owl and Rorschach are the good guys, albeit extremely flawed ones, while
Ozy
is the villain. But, the villain is probably in the right without even being a protagonist.
The Watchmen movie did a good job of making the Specter and Night Owl not entirely likable. The gang fight was absolutely brutal, you quickly realized that these may be nice seeming people but holy shit they just punched someone's bones out of their arm
EDIT how can people say Rorschach was the good guy, he was fucking batty and regularly carried out extrajudicial executions
There weren't any good guys in Watchmen besides Dan, who still watched as Rorschach and Comedian did their thing, and Spectre, who didn't want to be there in the first place.
Rorschach can be kind of seen as the good guy because he was something of the primary protagonist, but he wasn't a villain protagonist. In the A-story, before looking into it, he is the one going after the mask killer and, eventually, the big bad.
whoever was currently trying to kill bugs bunny. I just don't understand anyone who likes that asshole.
I feel this way about Lost. Anyone who tries to hurt/kill/irritate Jack is cool in my book. Why hasn't that incredibly boring, conceited bastard been killed off yet.
Lieberkuhn on
While you eat, let's have a conversation about the nature of consent.
And although it’s been a while since I read it, I remember thinking that the society in Brave New World wasn’t really that bad. But that may have been part of the point, that we're willing to give up a fair amount of self-determination for the sake of a pleasant lifestyle, etc. I should probably re-read it (I was in middle school the last time).
they deliberately caused brain damage on most babies in that society. That's... pretty bad.
The Watchmen movie did a good job of making the Specter and Night Owl not entirely likable. The gang fight was absolutely brutal, you quickly realized that these may be nice seeming people but holy shit they just punched someone's bones out of their arm
EDIT how can people say Rorschach was the good guy, he was fucking batty and regularly carried out extrajudicial executions
The Watchmen movie did a good job of making the Specter and Night Owl not entirely likable. The gang fight was absolutely brutal, you quickly realized that these may be nice seeming people but holy shit they just punched someone's bones out of their arm
EDIT how can people say Rorschach was the good guy, he was fucking batty and regularly carried out extrajudicial executions
Because he fights for the side of good. I'm not saying Rorschach is good, but he's on the "good" side. Hell, that's how I feel about the Comedian, and he is a much more horrible human being than Rorschach. Pretty much everything he did was awful. Honestly I don't even get how he was a superhero; what did he do that was heroic? Like, EVER? Personally I would've liked to see more heroism from him - or at least something humanizing like what we see with Rorschach about the little girl - to give some contrast to the monstrosity.
However, I still don't think that Dan and Laurie were less good because they could break bones. I don't want to really go off on a self-defense tangent and have it turn out like the self-defense thread, even though I still believe that if somebody comes at you with a knife their right to safety is entirely forfeit. Ultimately the only real argument against Dan and Laurie being good that I can think of is them breaking
Rorschach out of prison. They pretty much only beat up prison guards - y'know, the real world (arguably) good guys.
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Mercutio87So build that wall and build it strong causeWe'll be there before too longRegistered Userregular
There weren't any good guys in Watchmen besides Dan, who still watched as Rorschach and Comedian did their thing, and Spectre, who didn't want to be there in the first place.
Rorschach can be kind of seen as the good guy because he was something of the primary antagonist, but he wasn't a villain protagonist. In the A-story, before looking into it, he is the one going after the mask killer and, eventually, the big bad.
In a way I think that was one of the whole points of Watchmen...these guys aren't good. They aren't perfect people with the morals of a saint. They're just people, and that inherently means they can be both good and bad. And even Ozymandias and Rorschach you can't quite say were entirely bad..they weren't doing what they were doing out of evil, just a misguided desire to uphold what they though would help the greater good, at any cost. The fact that the folks who ended up being "masked heros" happened to have flaws just like everybody else was why I would hesitate to say there truly was any hero or villain in the story, they're all just various shades of grey.
And although it’s been a while since I read it, I remember thinking that the society in Brave New World wasn’t really that bad. But that may have been part of the point, that we're willing to give up a fair amount of self-determination for the sake of a pleasant lifestyle, etc. I should probably re-read it (I was in middle school the last time).
they deliberately caused brain damage on most babies in that society. That's... pretty bad.
Yeah the BNW society is not good. They deliberately create a labor caste by damaging their intelligence. It's only "good" in the sense that it's been so long since they institutionalized their systems that they don't need to do overly bad things in order to maintain the status quo.
And although it’s been a while since I read it, I remember thinking that the society in Brave New World wasn’t really that bad. But that may have been part of the point, that we're willing to give up a fair amount of self-determination for the sake of a pleasant lifestyle, etc. I should probably re-read it (I was in middle school the last time).
they deliberately caused brain damage on most babies in that society. That's... pretty bad.
Huh, I thought they just genetically engineered everyone to like their predefined roles in society (which isn’t really a subversion of free will per se). Like I said, it’s been a while.
Brave new world is a bit scarier than 1984 in that it's a lot more likely to happen.
I don’t know, North Korea is pretty much 1984: Asian Edition. And Hitler gave Eugenics enough of a bad name in the western world that I don’t see the most restrictive parts of Brave New World becoming widespread anytime soon.
The villains I usually sympathize with are those who are trying, ultimately, to build or discover something. I guess those are the motivations I can most easily sympathize with. Think along the lines of Dr. Frankenstein.
And although it’s been a while since I read it, I remember thinking that the society in Brave New World wasn’t really that bad. But that may have been part of the point, that we're willing to give up a fair amount of self-determination for the sake of a pleasant lifestyle, etc. I should probably re-read it (I was in middle school the last time).
they deliberately caused brain damage on most babies in that society. That's... pretty bad.
Huh, I thought they just genetically engineered everyone to like their predefined roles in society (which isn’t really a subversion of free will per se). Like I said, it’s been a while.
Brave new world is a bit scarier than 1984 in that it's a lot more likely to happen.
I don’t know, North Korea is pretty much 1984: Asian Edition. And Hitler gave Eugenics enough of a bad name in the western world that I don’t see the most restrictive parts of Brave New World becoming widespread anytime soon.
BNW isn't an example of eugenics but of dysgenics. Or were the alphas genetically engineered to be smarter than average in addition to the dumbing down of the lower castes? I can't remember anymore.
The society in BNW was loathesome to me because it was stagnant. If there's one thing that lets me sleep at night, it's the idea of progress—that humanity is advancing just a little bit further each day (or week, or year). That we know a little bit more, and maybe even that we're just a little bit better than we were before. I think I'd lose my mind in BNW, soma or no.
While I didn't watch the show very often, I always wanted to see Team Rocket win just once. Just fucking once have their snake guy, and rock guy, or floating dude with a bad cold guy, beat Ash and other dude and red haired dudettes' pokemans.
EWom on
Whether they find a life there or not, I think Jupiter should be called an enemy planet.
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ShivahnUnaware of her barrel shifter privilegeWestern coastal temptressRegistered User, Moderatormod
The villains I usually sympathize with are those who are trying, ultimately, to build or discover something. I guess those are the motivations I can most easily sympathize with. Think along the lines of Dr. Frankenstein.
Did the book even really have an antagonist? Or a villain? It strikes me as just a bunch of... stuff... that happened. I mean, it's a story, but I would hesitate to say that it has anyone in it who is worthy of being called a "villain."
The villains I usually sympathize with are those who are trying, ultimately, to build or discover something. I guess those are the motivations I can most easily sympathize with. Think along the lines of Dr. Frankenstein.
And although it’s been a while since I read it, I remember thinking that the society in Brave New World wasn’t really that bad. But that may have been part of the point, that we're willing to give up a fair amount of self-determination for the sake of a pleasant lifestyle, etc. I should probably re-read it (I was in middle school the last time).
they deliberately caused brain damage on most babies in that society. That's... pretty bad.
Huh, I thought they just genetically engineered everyone to like their predefined roles in society (which isn’t really a subversion of free will per se). Like I said, it’s been a while.
Brave new world is a bit scarier than 1984 in that it's a lot more likely to happen.
I don’t know, North Korea is pretty much 1984: Asian Edition. And Hitler gave Eugenics enough of a bad name in the western world that I don’t see the most restrictive parts of Brave New World becoming widespread anytime soon.
BNW isn't an example of eugenics but of dysgenics. Or were the alphas genetically engineered to be smarter than average in addition to the dumbing down of the lower castes? I can't remember anymore.
The society in BNW was loathesome to me because it was stagnant. If there's one thing that lets me sleep at night, it's the idea of progress—that humanity is advancing just a little bit further each day (or week, or year). That we know a little bit more, and maybe even that we're just a little bit better than we were before. I think I'd lose my mind in BNW, soma or no.
Ultimately the fact that a Utopia is inherently static is the only real problem I can see. I'm not swayed by authors who create some flawed supposedly-but-obviously-not-really-Utopian society in order to send the message "Utopias are inherently flawed/impossible for humanity," because I think it's a stupid argument. Some of them address the static issue; many do not. But to me that is indeed the biggest problem: once something has achieved true perfection, any change is the ruination of perfection. There is kind of no point to living in a Utopia: anything you do either has no meaning or destroys the perfection of your Utopia.
Now ultimately the reality is that steady progress is something of an illusion. Cracked recently had a couple ofpretty good articles that essentially sum it up, but basically they portray societies as cyclical and seasonal rather than strictly progressive.
Brave new world is a bit scarier than 1984 in that it's a lot more likely to happen.
I don’t know, North Korea is pretty much 1984: Asian Edition. And Hitler gave Eugenics enough of a bad name in the western world that I don’t see the most restrictive parts of Brave New World becoming widespread anytime soon.
The strongest case of me doing that would be in almost any movie where the Devil is a character and God isn't present. Devil's Advocate for example. After Al Pacino's incredible speech, I certainly wouldn't have shot myself.
And Dexter is just a dumb character. I'll admit I've only seen a few episodes but it just smacked of edginess by pandering to people's fetish for serial killers while simultaneously watering him down. It's like Twilight is to Dracula as Dexter is to Silence of the Lambs.
Brave new world is a bit scarier than 1984 in that it's a lot more likely to happen.
I don’t know, North Korea is pretty much 1984: Asian Edition. And Hitler gave Eugenics enough of a bad name in the western world that I don’t see the most restrictive parts of Brave New World becoming widespread anytime soon.
Hm. True.
Haha, no way BNW is scarier. 1984 is really close to being the worst possible world barring Armageddon. It's worse than the Matrix. Everyone's life is absurdly bad, war is eternal, you don't have a single moment of relief from surveillance, and even the ideas of freedom and happiness are being utterly murdered. They are rebuilding language so that people won't even be able to think and dream of a better world. If you so much as hint at dissension, they rape your mind so bad you end up loving Big Brother and you want to die for hurting him. The half-retarded workers in BNW (as evil as their creation is) don't fell too bad and aren't in such a shitty situation. The proles have it much worse.
Not only it's a horrendous world, but it's turning itself permanent. The only way out is the sheer end of civilization.
Brave new world is a bit scarier than 1984 in that it's a lot more likely to happen.
I don’t know, North Korea is pretty much 1984: Asian Edition. And Hitler gave Eugenics enough of a bad name in the western world that I don’t see the most restrictive parts of Brave New World becoming widespread anytime soon.
Hm. True.
Haha, no way BNW is scarier. 1984 is really close to being the worst possible world barring Armageddon. It's worse than the Matrix. Everyone's life is absurdly bad, war is eternal, you don't have a single moment of relief from surveillance, and even the ideas of freedom and happiness are being utterly murdered. They are rebuilding language so that people won't even be able to think and dream of a better world. If you so much as hint at dissension, they rape your mind so bad you end up loving Big Brother and you want to die for hurting him. The half-retarded workers in BNW (as evil as their creation is) don't fell too bad and aren't in such a shitty situation. The proles have it much worse.
Not only it's a horrendous world, but it's turning itself permanent. The only way out is the sheer end of civilization.
and room 101
Agreed. If something scary threatens you in BNW just pop some Soma and you'll be euphoric until the end. In 1984 your senses are all functioning normally while you endure the living hell. Going along with the thread though, I don't think I could root for O'Brien. But I haven't tried finding any redeeming qualities about him.
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He may have good intentions but he is still cutting people up into wittle bitty pieces.
I think one of the taglines of the movie was "In any other city, they'd be the bad guys." Even more, the "villain" of the movie is the only legitimate businessman; his only wrongdoings include going overboard against people who try to cheat him, dating Ocean's ex-wife, and roughing up Ocean when he comes sniffing around (though at the end it's shown he cares most about money, but still).
At least in 13 (Ocean's 12 never happened), the villain is shown to be an arrogant asshole who's a jerk to his employees (in 11, Benedict knew every employee he came into contact with by name) and is actually a criminal (hacking into the federal fingerprint database).
The impetus in 13 was how Bank screwed Elliot Gould by threatening to kill him and cutting him out of his share of the very legal casino profits he had already bought into. Bank is very much a criminal, possibly a murderer.
And ease up on 12. It's a legitimately good movie.
The only good part of 12 was that it let Eddie Izzard get his foot in the door so he could kick ass in 13.
Odysseus is one of the few if not the only of the Greek heroes that doesn't meet with a tragic end. He gets home, reunites with his son and kills his enemies that are trying to take his wife and throne.
edit: When I was a kid, my parents took me to see A Bridge Too Far when it came out. I thought the Nazis were good guys because they had awesome uniforms, classy digs, cool tanks and they gave their enemies chocolate and tried to show them mercy instead of slaughtering the Allies wholesale. To say this made my parents uncomfortable is an understatement.
The author intended to portray Rorschach as a sociopath, and was mortified by all the comments that there should be heroes "like him."
I always thought most of the people you mentioned were the good guys. A character can do terrible illegal things and still be the intended protagonist, i.e. The Punisher.
And Dexter is just a dumb character. I'll admit I've only seen a few episodes but it just smacked of edginess by pandering to people's fetish for serial killers while simultaneously watering him down. It's like Twilight is to Dracula as Dexter is to Silence of the Lambs.
As for Dexter, I generally adored it, although quality varies depending on the season and the episode. Being a loyal watcher makes it easier to get through the filler, as with most shows. The actual villains are all completely unlikable bastards, while Dexter has the villain-protagonist sympathy on his side. Although when you say watering him down, the fact is that from season 1 to season 4 the development of his character has been the gradual movement away from serial killing
http://www.fallout3nexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=16534
Yup, Gaiman created the character and his background (based on Milton, then he leaves Hell, gets Dream to cut his wings off and gives him the key to Hell, sets up his nightclub on Earth), but the "Lucifer" run was written by Mike Carey. Awesome series, definitely worth looking into.
Ah, apologies, I stand corrected.
Kudos to Mike Carey as well, then.
I actually really liked the high school shenanigans episodes (although I remember way-back-when I was watching R1 for the very first time, I was more likely to be going "dammit I want the plot to move forward this filler sucks." But by the time R2 rolled around I was more into the Ashford characters and I was enjoying the comedy.). The only time I hated the happy-serious whiplash in R2 was the episode where
Well, the whole point of Code Geass was to have a series where Char was the hero, and Amuro the villain (or antagonist, at the very least.)
The Bride I see is what Bill describes her as...she's a killer. She may have had no more motivation to kill when the movies finished, but it didn't change the fact that she was an extremely effective assassin who was the member of a group of assassins who presumably killed people for money. Who then went on a revenge based rampage. I felt like the last part of the 2nd movie did a great job of tempering her down from epic action star to something less black and white...you still don't like Bill in the end, and she still finishes what she started, but it definitely came as a bit of a shock to me that Bill's initial strategy when she finally tracks him down is to sit down and have (admittedly at gunpoint) a chat with her. Heck, it made him an awesome villain in that sense.
As for the Watchmen...you can argue them as "good guys" or "bad guys" equally well I think. They're just trying to protect society after all...but by eventually acting in defiance of society's law.
The little wizard guy from Dragonball Z who created Buu. Babidi, I think. Sure he was evil, but he was just so happy when his plans were going well, you almost hated to see him disappointed.
And although it’s been a while since I read it, I remember thinking that the society in Brave New World wasn’t really that bad. But that may have been part of the point, that we're willing to give up a fair amount of self-determination for the sake of a pleasant lifestyle, etc. I should probably re-read it (I was in middle school the last time).
Yeah, the Bride's past as an assassin makes it much harder to argue that she's a "good guy." Personally I think that her revenge quest was 100% justified and everybody involved got what was coming to them, so I think that her story was heroic even if she wasn't always. But it's not black and white either, you're right.
With the Watchmen, I feel like you can't judge them as a whole. Vigilantism itself isn't the only issue. Most of the original Minutemen, Dan Dreiberg, and Laurie Juspeczyk are presented as pretty much entirely heroic, and the cops seemed pretty happy to work with the original Minutemen. Dan was supposed to be the guy the audience liked; Moore was pretty shocked by all the love for Rorschach, who was supposed to be a pretty clear-cut psychopath. Ozymandias and Dr. Manhattan are in an entirely different league of their own. Don't even get me started on the Comedian. Anyway, each one is his/her own separate "good guy or bad guy" argument, and I think it's improper to lump them together.
Y'know, I knew there was a pretty decent probability that knowledge of Gundam would deepen some of the stuff in Geass, but I have a hard time with Gundam because it's just too much about the robots. I like some giant robot anime, but I need more than giant robots. Still, I might need to check that series out.
Couldn't wait for him to eat that rocket punch to oblivion.
For Watchman, on a surface reading Night Owl and Rorschach are the good guys, albeit extremely flawed ones, while
EDIT how can people say Rorschach was the good guy, he was fucking batty and regularly carried out extrajudicial executions
Rorschach can be kind of seen as the good guy because he was something of the primary protagonist, but he wasn't a villain protagonist. In the A-story, before looking into it, he is the one going after the mask killer and, eventually, the big bad.
I feel this way about Lost. Anyone who tries to hurt/kill/irritate Jack is cool in my book. Why hasn't that incredibly boring, conceited bastard been killed off yet.
they deliberately caused brain damage on most babies in that society. That's... pretty bad.
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So does Dexter, and I root for him.
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Because he fights for the side of good. I'm not saying Rorschach is good, but he's on the "good" side. Hell, that's how I feel about the Comedian, and he is a much more horrible human being than Rorschach. Pretty much everything he did was awful. Honestly I don't even get how he was a superhero; what did he do that was heroic? Like, EVER? Personally I would've liked to see more heroism from him - or at least something humanizing like what we see with Rorschach about the little girl - to give some contrast to the monstrosity.
However, I still don't think that Dan and Laurie were less good because they could break bones. I don't want to really go off on a self-defense tangent and have it turn out like the self-defense thread, even though I still believe that if somebody comes at you with a knife their right to safety is entirely forfeit. Ultimately the only real argument against Dan and Laurie being good that I can think of is them breaking
In a way I think that was one of the whole points of Watchmen...these guys aren't good. They aren't perfect people with the morals of a saint. They're just people, and that inherently means they can be both good and bad. And even Ozymandias and Rorschach you can't quite say were entirely bad..they weren't doing what they were doing out of evil, just a misguided desire to uphold what they though would help the greater good, at any cost. The fact that the folks who ended up being "masked heros" happened to have flaws just like everybody else was why I would hesitate to say there truly was any hero or villain in the story, they're all just various shades of grey.
Yeah the BNW society is not good. They deliberately create a labor caste by damaging their intelligence. It's only "good" in the sense that it's been so long since they institutionalized their systems that they don't need to do overly bad things in order to maintain the status quo.
Huh, I thought they just genetically engineered everyone to like their predefined roles in society (which isn’t really a subversion of free will per se). Like I said, it’s been a while.
I don’t know, North Korea is pretty much 1984: Asian Edition. And Hitler gave Eugenics enough of a bad name in the western world that I don’t see the most restrictive parts of Brave New World becoming widespread anytime soon.
BNW isn't an example of eugenics but of dysgenics. Or were the alphas genetically engineered to be smarter than average in addition to the dumbing down of the lower castes? I can't remember anymore.
The society in BNW was loathesome to me because it was stagnant. If there's one thing that lets me sleep at night, it's the idea of progress—that humanity is advancing just a little bit further each day (or week, or year). That we know a little bit more, and maybe even that we're just a little bit better than we were before. I think I'd lose my mind in BNW, soma or no.
Did the book even really have an antagonist? Or a villain? It strikes me as just a bunch of... stuff... that happened. I mean, it's a story, but I would hesitate to say that it has anyone in it who is worthy of being called a "villain."
Ultimately the fact that a Utopia is inherently static is the only real problem I can see. I'm not swayed by authors who create some flawed supposedly-but-obviously-not-really-Utopian society in order to send the message "Utopias are inherently flawed/impossible for humanity," because I think it's a stupid argument. Some of them address the static issue; many do not. But to me that is indeed the biggest problem: once something has achieved true perfection, any change is the ruination of perfection. There is kind of no point to living in a Utopia: anything you do either has no meaning or destroys the perfection of your Utopia.
Now ultimately the reality is that steady progress is something of an illusion. Cracked recently had a couple of pretty good articles that essentially sum it up, but basically they portray societies as cyclical and seasonal rather than strictly progressive.
Hm. True.
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You couldn't be any wronger than you are.
Haha, no way BNW is scarier. 1984 is really close to being the worst possible world barring Armageddon. It's worse than the Matrix. Everyone's life is absurdly bad, war is eternal, you don't have a single moment of relief from surveillance, and even the ideas of freedom and happiness are being utterly murdered. They are rebuilding language so that people won't even be able to think and dream of a better world. If you so much as hint at dissension, they rape your mind so bad you end up loving Big Brother and you want to die for hurting him. The half-retarded workers in BNW (as evil as their creation is) don't fell too bad and aren't in such a shitty situation. The proles have it much worse.
Not only it's a horrendous world, but it's turning itself permanent. The only way out is the sheer end of civilization.
and room 101
Agreed. If something scary threatens you in BNW just pop some Soma and you'll be euphoric until the end. In 1984 your senses are all functioning normally while you endure the living hell. Going along with the thread though, I don't think I could root for O'Brien. But I haven't tried finding any redeeming qualities about him.