Special:Badtitle/NS90:Talk:Pokémon Diamond and Pearl/YMMV/The Great Big Cyrus Effort Post (2)

These games' Big Bad, Team Galactic boss Cyrus, was the first true Knight of Cerebus villain to appear in the main games series. Truly dark, truly depraved, truly evil. As such he's probably one of the most misunderstood characters in the entire franchise. And I don't mean "oh, he's not really a bad guy - he's just misunderstood", I mean people actually don't understand him and tend to misread his actions, motivations, and thought process. This led to Cyrus being the first main game villain (unless you count Giovanni's anime incarnation) to be given the label of Complete Monster from fans. And while the character as presented is certainly worthy of being called a monster, I wouldn't call him a COMPLETE Monster - he's a little more complicated than that, as well shall now see.

'''Who is Cyrus? What has he done?''' - Cyrus is the boss of Team Galactic, the criminal terrorist organization of the Sinnoh region. He's also the leader of an energy company that Team Galactic uses as a front. He is a man who has thrown aside his own heart and conscience, shut himself off from emotions, and broken his moral compass so that it's stuck pointing in the wrong direction, though he doesn't seem to care enough to recognize this. He is both an optimistic visionary in that he believes the world and humanity has the potential to be so much more than what it is were it only fixed enough, and a nihilist in that he believes that's not how things currently are and that the state of the universe is irrevocably rotten due to all the petty strife and self destruction brought about by what he calls "incomplete human spirit." In forming Team Galactic, his ultimate goal is summoning Dialga and Palkia in order to harness their powers and use those to destroy the existing universe so that he may start it again as its' god of space/time. With his new powers, he'll remove spirit from the world so that all living creatures become passionless zombies who live peacefully and work efficiently as how he sees fit. Though he harbors no compassion for others, Cyrus sincerely believes what he's doing is in everyone's best interest.

In Diamond or Pearl versions, the player first meets him in Mt. Coronet, but he does not battle, nor give his name - he just rambles philosophically about how the world has gone to heck since the times of it's creation, where time flowed and space expanded freely. He finds the current state of things to be deplorable and wishes to reset life itself in order to fix this. In Platinum, we first see him twice earlier - once at Lake Verity, and again at the Dialga and Palkia statues in Eterna City, both times talking to himself about the Sinnoh legends. Later on, he introduces himself after the player defeats a Galactic Grunt and investigates the ruins in Celestic Town. He states that he seeks to create a new world, one without strife, and believes everyone should look at the bigger picture and accept the destruction and recreation of the universe as both an inevitability and an act of providence. In Platinum he says more or less the same things but in different wording, and then tries to desecrate the ruins' paintings because he deems the old legend soon to be obsolete. The PC challenges him to battle and after defeating him, he graciously accepts defeat and leaves the ruins, off to continue his plans. He later orders Team Galactic to take their Galactic Bomb, which they had manufactured at the Fuego Iron Works and smuggled through the Pastoria Great marsh, and use it to bomb Lake Valor in order to draw out Azelf from it's cave - that way not only can it be captured, but the other two lake Pokemon will sense the trouble and come out of their caves only to be captured by Mars and Jupiter, who are posted at Lake Verity and Lake Acuity respectively. This act endangers several Magikarp in the lake, who are left on dry land to possibly die for dehydration. With the lake trio captured, Cyrus has Charon and his team of scientists extract their power in order to forge the Red Chain, a device made from the power of spirit itself - emotion, knowledge, and willpower acting as one - in order to shackle Dialga and Palkia and force them to use their powers for his purposes. In Platinum we witness Cyrus making a final Rousing Speech to his Team Galactic followers about how their hearts beat as one and together they can change this rotten world. Upon confronting Cyrus again, he admits to the PC that he actually has no place in his new world for Team Galactic - they are merely means to his ends. His reasons for seeking a new world are solely his own and only he will gain the power to determine the course of the universe from there on out. Team Galactic will have no say in it whatsoever, because Cyrus finds them to be unreliable fools. He then allows the PC a chance at setting the lake trio free, but not until after he battles him/her in order to prove why heeding the heart and showing compassion is faulty. Even after he's beaten he doesn't change his mindset and beliefs, but recognizes the PC's strength and out of respect gives him/her a Master Ball. He then leaves for Mt. Coronet to climb to the Spear Pillar, where he will tear the universe apart through the powers of time/space and start it anew, but devoid of spirit. In the Diamond and Pearl versions after he's thwarted there, an embittered and unrepentant Cyrus vows he will start the plan over and just walks away, not to be seen or heard from again. His assets and duties are left to Saturn. But in the Platinum version, since the lake trio cannot free Dialga and Palkia from two Red Chains, Giratina emerges from the distortion in time/space and pulls Cyrus into the Distortion World. Inside, Cyrus realizes that this world is the reflection of our own - if one were to collapse, so would the other. He tries to confront Giratina but the PC and Cynthia stand in his way. After a battle and loss, Cyrus, suffering further Sanity Slippage, encourages the PC to go defeat Giratina so that this world won't be sustained and all reality will crash - the PC would do Cyrus' work for him! But Cynthia reassures that this will not happen even if Giratina is defeated or captured, and she's right. Cyrus, outraged that the imperfect world and incomplete spirit will continue existing and that it's unlikely he can do anything about it, has a Villainous Breakdown in which he curses ugly emotions that create hardships for life in the world, even emotions inside of him. He promptly snaps back to his stoic facade and states to Cynthia that they'll never see eye to eye, and that he plans on unlocking the secrets of the Distortion World in order to find some new way to create his ideal world without spirit, and with that he walks away, not to be seen or heard from again. His assets and duties are left to Saturn, who determines that Team Galactic can still make a difference in the world without resorting to extremism.

Are his actions heinous by the standards of the story? - DAMN RIGHT they are. In fact, his actions and ultimate goals are some of the most objectively heinous in the franchise. I'd say he's only behind Darkrai from Mystery Dungeon and Purple Eyes from Pokemon Ranger: Guardian Signs in terms of the objective heinous standard. The horrifyingly abusive Cipher leaders, the sadistically torturous and exploitative Ghetsis, and the mass homicidal Lysandre come in close after him. Cyrus wants to harness and exploit the powers of time/space in order to tear the entire universe apart, destroying every living thing in it, so that he can then remove spirit from the universe (presumably by shattering the Red Chain) and play God by recreating everything that he'd destroyed, but devoid of spirit in order to match his perfect vision of an ideal new world. To achieve this end, he has his organization committing acts of terrorism and crime that inconvenience many humans and Pokemon of Sinnoh, outright endangers Pokemon life through the Galactic Bomb plan, puts the lake trio through excruciating pain in order to have their powers extracted for the Red Chain's creation, was lying to his followers about his true intentions the whole time and would easily ditch them when it suited him, and was even mad enough to want to instigate a reality crash by fighting Giratina and ensuring that the worlds are unsustained. Not only are the means horrifying, so are the ends. While he thinks he's creating a utopia, if he removed spirit from life, what he'd actually be creating was a nightmarish perversion of the universe and all creation, where every living thing was an emotionless drone devoid of free will and free thought, only following what logic Cyrus dictates. It's a downright blasphemy that needed to be prevented.

Does he have any redeeming qualities? - With all those atrocities to his name, Cyrus has the makings of a Complete Monster, right? Well here's the thing - remember that a Complete Monster is the total package of both heinous atrocities committed within the scale that their resources allow, and no truly redeeming qualities - no remotely positive, sympathetic, humane, or redemptive characteristics. For all his horrible crimes, Cyrus does in fact showcase some very notable redeeming qualities.

For starters, he may at first seem somewhat similar to Ghetsis from the next generation over in how he seems fairly affable and raises really good points about something wrong with the world that needs to be addressed and fixed. While with Ghetsis it was about the nature of Pokemon and human relationships, in Cyrus' case it's that we've let the world turn rotten due to strife and hardships, effectively destroying what nature created to begin with and thus not allowing the world to exist as is in a state of completion, order, and peace. And that the source of this problem is incomplete human spirit - how people will let their emotions overrule their knowledge of how to be a good human being and will to act upon it, knowledge overrule their emotions and will to act on them, or willpower to overrule common sense and feelings. Because human spirit can never be "complete", Cyrus deems it worthless and detrimental to people's progression and thus the bane of all existence. And truthfully, his beliefs are not unfounded, and he has logic and experience to back them up. Where he goes wrong is that he shoots too high to a cosmic scale in order to fix the problem by attacking it at what he believes to be it's heart (spirit), and operating in a ruthless way without soul, heart, compassion, moral compass or a sense of humanity. Not only is he messing with things that should never ever EVER be messed with, but in trying to fix things so that everyone can be what he deems 'good human beings', he's become a bad human being - he's become what he resents. The great irony of it all being that as much as he decries emotion and spirit, it's his own emotion and spirit that led him to pursuing the path he's on now, which makes him a huge Hypocrite. And also like Ghetsis, he conceals his true selfish intentions from his agents and even lies to them about it. However, here's what separates him from Ghetsis - he actually believes in everything he says. When Ghetsis raised his good points, he did so while never truly believing a word of what he was preaching to others, and was using it as a cover for his evil schemes. When Cyrus makes his points, he is 100% sincere - he truly believes that the world and it's living population has gone astray, that incomplete spirit is the source of it all, and that he's the only one who can fix things. And second of all, Ghetsis' true plan would benefit no one but himself and his select cohorts who'd been conspiring with him the whole time. While Cyrus' plan would screw the entire universe over, he again genuinely believes that he's doing this for the good of others. He's convinced himself in his warped, disturbed mind that he's acting altruistically and saving the world from itself. People tend to fixate on how Cyrus planned on killing everything, yet ignore the fact that he was also planning to resurrect everything he'd killed but stripped of spirit. They'd go on living in Cyrus' new world and in fact Cyrus himself would be the only one to NOT live in it because he'd be with Dialga and Palkia in the heavens, sustaining his new world as it's god. So from Cyrus' point of view, his plan is something of a self sacrifice. It's classic Messiah complex - he's sacrificing his humanity and place in the world in order to redeem the world of their sins. So while sane people can see Cyrus' madness for what it is, Cyrus himself simply cannot see that - he's bought into his own delusion of righteousness.

This brings us to his bizarre stoic version of being Affably Evil. In the earliest encounters with him, it's easy to note that he is both unemotional and very polite. When he leaves Lake Verity, he says "Allow me to pass. Step aside." and at Eterna City "Pardon me. Step aside." In the original versions of the Celestic Town ruins encounter, he argues his beliefs, states his name and goal, notes that he and the PC met before, and then says to the PC, whom he should know damn well is an enemy who's been fighting and defeating Team Galactic this whole time "If you discover any power derived from the legends of Sinnoh, inform me. For that power is what I need to create my new world." This suggests he sees such potential in the PC that he wants him/her to work together with him, hence the "inform me" bit. This is driven further in the Platinum version in which after you defeat him, he remarks "Impressive. Your prowess is notable. Remarkable." And then he backs down. At his Veilstone HQ, he calls the PC a "remarkable specimen" in how much good AND bad (from his perspective) he can see in him/her. During the battle when he's losing, he doesn't even get mad. He simply notes "I see...I may lose if this pace continues." After defeat, he compliments the PC's strength, only regretting that the basis of that strength is compassion, which he views as being an illogical fallacy brought about by the "illusions" of the weak and faulty human heart. But he acknowledges that the PC's perspective is different and unlikely to be changed, and as such it's unlikely he/she will ever come to recognize Cyrus' own position. But with that said, Cyrus still recognizes your strength, courage, potential, and good points, which is why he gives the PC a Master Ball as, in his own words, a reward. Now why would he do that even when it could risk the destruction of his plans? The PC could use this ball to capture Dialga or Palkia (and Giratina in Platinum), so Cyrus basically shot himself in the foot because he wanted to be nice. He wanted to show his respect for his enemy. A truly monstrous person typically doesn't ever do this.

Aside from this genuine affability and these Pet the Dog moments, there's the matter of his portrayal and of how others see him. A Complete Monster is never portrayed in a truly positive light and evokes fear, hatred, and revulsion from other characters. While Cyrus is most certainly played seriously and usually depicted in a negative light, there's the matter of how his three young commanders, Saturn, Mars, and Jupiter view him. This is similar to many Team Rocket agents' views on Giovanni and why he can never qualify. Saturn, as an idealistic young man who wants to change the world, is something of a kindred spirit to Cyrus - he's like the younger Cyrus who started out with pure ideals before he took them in the wrong direction, and thus has a higher shot at redemption. He was thus enthralled by Cyrus' charisma, confidence, and logical words, and so he became his loyal, fanatical follower. The interesting thing to note is that Saturn became well aware that Cyrus planned to destroy the universe and then recreate it upon becoming a god, and yet he didn't care - he still supported Cyrus because he wanted to see the new world he'd bring about, to see if Cyrus could actually pull it off and make it a reality, if he could become the deity that Saturn already seemed to worship him as. It's when Saturn heard about what transpired at the Spear Pillar and thus Cyrus' true motives that he drew a line. He was appalled that Cyrus would hate spirit so much that he'd seek to destroy it forever, and this is what got him to determine that extremism was never the solution to the world's issues. Now does this mean Saturn now hates Cyrus personally? Actually, no - nothing gives that impression. In the original version of his HQ scene, Saturn still notes Cyrus' positive traits, and in the Platinum version he still refers to him as "Master Cyrus" and almost seems to speak with pity when talking about how much Cyrus hated spirit and how he ironically relied on spirit for his plans to get moving. His most negative statement is "A world without spirit - who would want such a thing?", but that speaks more of Cyrus' insanity rather than his evilness. In other adaptions, Saturn keeps to his loyalty to Cyrus even when Cyrus isn't trying to destroy the world. That shows he sees a leader worth dedicating himself to. Mars seems to really care about Cyrus, and it's implied she has a crush on him too. As a girl who struggles with her own emotions, she seems on board with Cyrus purging the world of spirit because like him, she believes that will make things better. What she's unaware of is how he planned to literally decimate the old world and everything in it before making the new world, something even she finds horrific. And yet in the post-game quest at Stark Mountain, she still wants to know what happened to Master Cyrus and where he went. She ends up declaring she's calling it quits on Team Galactic, but still insists that she wants to go look for Cyrus in the Distortion World and rescue him. Not because she wants her boss back, seeing as she doesn't want to be in Team Galactic anymore, but because she has compassion for him. Jupiter has similar feelings for Cyrus, but she joined him to fill a void in her empty heart and was under the impression he just wanted to become a god so that he could rule Sinnoh and start bettering the world from there, unaware of his true goals. When she quits Team Galactic, she notes that it's "no fun anymore without Master Cyrus around", so clearly she still respects him. The sole commander to speak badly of Cyrus is Charon, who's a cynical, egocentric, greedy, power-hungry old sociopath of a Mad Scientist who's typically portrayed as the least redeemable member in Team Galactic. That should really say something about the capacity for good Cyrus had in addition to his evil. And how about the good guys? Do they show fear, hatred, and revulsion towards Cyrus? Surprisingly no. The PC can't say anything - it's up to the player how they feel about the man. But Looker outright compliments Cyrus' charisma and impressive persuasive, influential skills, especially for one as young as him. And Cynthia attempts to make a genuine argument for her beliefs against Cyrus', indicating she hopes he can listen and come to see reason. When he shuts her down and walks off, Cynthia states "Since there is sadness, we can also feel joy. When there is anger, compassion is born." as a rebuttal to Cyrus' sentiments about human spirit, since he sees only the dark side of emotions without considering the positives, and that last part is particularly telling: Cynthia might have been angered by Cyrus, but she doesn't hate him. She'd show compassion to him. If she didn't, it'd make her a hypocrite. *coughtheanimecough*

Lastly, while Cyrus expresses no remorse for his crimes and is not redeemed in the game's story, there are the two other things to consider. Is he completely devoid of altruistic qualities? Well, let's take a good look at some of his words.

"Because the human spirit is weak and incomplete, strife has appeared... This world is being ruined by it...I find the state of things to be deplorable..." (This shows that Cyrus cares enough about the world that he and every other living being lives in enough to not want to see it fall into complete ruination, which is where he thinks it's headed and he finds that to be deplorable.)

"My name is Cyrus. I seek the power to create a new world, a world without strife. I want to put an end to pointless strife and hostility. I am seeking the power to create the ideal world." (Cyrus is basically seeking the ideal way to create world peace, to bring the world into the state of existence that he feels would be most ideal for everything that lives - where there's no more strife and hostility and nothing can be ruined or destroyed again. The world can go on existing in perfect stability and balance.)

"It has been, and always will be, a struggle to survive in this world. We humans and Pokémon are likewise incomplete. Because we are all so lacking, we fight, we maim... It is ugly. I hate the incompleteness. That we are all incomplete, I hate it with my entire body and being. The world should be complete. The world must change." (Cyrus acknowledges that nearly everyone in the world suffers in life, and they owe it all to incomplete spirit that makes the world lacking and incomplete due to the depletion of it's natural virtues brought about by strife that's caused and fueled by spirit. And keep in mind that this is the part of his speech that he admits is true, before he gets to the parts about Team Galactic that he lies about, so he really is thinking of others here.)

"You want to save them... I no longer have any need for them. I am finished with them. If your heart aches to save them, go right ahead, I couldn't care less. It will save me the trouble of disposing of them." (After all the torture and suffering he had the lake trio put through, he still allows you to simply save them and set them free. If he was truly heartless, he'd find the lives of three Pokemon who embody the thing he hates most to be worth nothing so he'd dispose of them without compromise.)

"But that doesn't matter. I doubt you will ever understand my position. That said, I recognize that you are strong and courageous to come alone. This is your reward." (I've covered this one already - this is mad respect from Cyrus here!)

"You've constantly interfered with my plans, but you will be forgiven. After all, there will remain no spirit for all time when I am done. All spirit will disappear. It will be ripped away... From you! From your Pokémon! From those precious to you...!" (That he's so willing to forgive his enemy who's been constantly interfering with his plans and making his operations risk total failure shows a sense of mercy and altruism on his part. But what about the claim he made about ripping spirit from everyone? Again, in his insane mind, this is an act of altruism too. Because he sincerely believes that the people he speaks of would be better adjusted and better off living without their ugly, incomplete spirit holding them back from their fullest potential.)

"My aim is to rid our world of the vague and incomplete thing we call spirit. By freeing ourselves of that, our world can be made complete. That is my justice! No one can interfere!" - (Again he speaks of "freeing" others from spirit, and since he sees spirit as a blight on the existence of life itself, he sees this as doing the greatest service to the universe - to other people living in it. This isn't "look at what I've done/am trying to do and WORSHIP ME!" Light Yagami talk - this is a serious belief and perspective on how to forever improve the world we live in and how to save all living creatures from self destruction, albeit a mentally disturbed and evil one that's rooted in self-centeredness and self destruction itself. Cyrus views this as justice. In his mind, he's the hero.)

"One day, you will awaken to a world of my creation. A world without spirit.". (While this is actually a horrifying line, it debunks the notion that Cyrus just wanted to kill everyone in the world and make a world for him alone like many people, including the anime writers, assumed. He wants other people living in his world. He wants there to be new life in the universe he reigns over. After all, what good is being a deity if there isn't?)

Cyrus is clearly painted as a self-made psychopath who's straddling the fine line between Well Intentioned Extremist and Knight Templar. At his core, he has strong ideals on the existence of life, the universe, the world, and all that lives in it, and he truly means well with them. The problem is that he focused so much on the darkness in the world while turning away from the light that he unknowingly broke his own moral compass, which turned him towards extreme, ruthless, even despicably amoral actions and behavior, and that he defines what will be best for the world by what he feels would be best for the world: he decides what will be "perfect" by his warped standards of perfection. He cares about humankind and wants to save them, but he resents their humanity and thus has become misanthropic, shutting himself off from both his own humanity and from the humanity of others, shunning away the company of others, avoiding any personal relationships, and denying anyone any true consent in his plans to create a better world. He doesn't take others' perspectives on life and how others' view the world around them into consideration, because they'd likely disagree with his extremism and try to compromise something, and Cyrus won't allow himself to hear them out because that would require letting them in on plans he's convinced himself that he's best off carrying out on his own. Which leads us to two of the absolute saddest aspects of this character - that he is both altruistic and self centered to the point of viewing himself as the new Messiah who needs to become a god and destroy/recreate everything in order to change reality as we know it for the better, and that in a sense, he believes he's meant to always be alone. That he should be alone. That he can't live with others in his life, and should spend an eternity alone as the deity who will sustain the new world. For all his delusions of doing what's in everyone's best interest, beneath everything he really wants to take the path that best ends his own personal pain. It's selfish, yet all too understandable, pitiful, and tragic. Bringing us to...

Freudian Excuse or other mitigating factors? - I covered some of his excuse and big mitigating factors in the above paragraph, but wait, there's even more to it than that! See why this guy is one of the most complex characters in the franchise to date? I believe Cyrus has a genuine mental illness that makes him think, behave, and act the way he does. And how did this come about? Well after Cyrus' plans have been stopped and his arc concluded, we touch upon his backstory in Sunnyshore City. Apparently he used to live there and was an exceptionally bright yet exceptionally odd boy who never made any human or Pokemon friends, preferring to spend time around machines instead. OK, that was Cyrus' choice to make, but what influenced him into making it? In Platinum we're given the full story by Cyrus' own grandfather who lives near Stark Mountain. According to him, Cyrus' parents, upon noticing how gifted he was, were extremely pushy and constantly pressing him to be as perfect as he could manage to be. They raised high expectations and expected nothing short of nigh flawlessness from their genius child. It's indicated that because of this lifestyle, Cyrus had a rough childhood in which his interactions with both Pokemon and other people only ended in strife and hardship. His parents were constantly struggling to live, and by placing so much of their burdens and expectations onto him, they made him suffer. Being emotionally hurt like this at such a young age could not have been good for the kid, which is why as a coping mechanism, he took solace in spending time with machines and confiding in their functions. With machines Cyrus found that because they lacked heart, soul, brains, conscience, and willpower (basically, lacked spirit), they could only follow the programming that had been instilled into them and perform their functions with efficiency and perfection unless they were to malfunction. Because of this, Cyrus began to view life through "machine-like" lenses. He concluded that the entire world was a broken system and that every living thing, himself included, were faulty and malfunctioning. How to fix this? By rebooting the system of the universe and reprogramming the world and everything in it. As god of a new world, he could instill a new "programming" into humans and Pokemon in order to rid them of the faulty spirit that was causing their malfunction and enable them to perform their functions to the best of their abilities with efficiency and perfection, with no setbacks, no strife, no pain or heartbreak. And so Cyrus embarked on his quest to change the universe for the better, but the harder his life got as he grew older, the more this cycle repeated, and the more it repeated, the more Cyrus turned away from his own humanity and broke his own moral compass without even realizing what he'd lost. This childhood backstory effectively explains away two MAJOR things about Cyrus' psychology - one is the way in which he views life in the world: how he believes life is one big system that can be repaired were he to hit the proverbial restart button, and how he wishes people, himself included, were more like machines since that way they'd be perfect, efficient, and would feel no pain, as well as stop hurting one another. And two is a literal Freudian angle to his end goal. His parents were always pushing him to be as close to perfection that he as a gifted human being could manage, and that really messed him up. So what if he could become as perfect as any living being could manage - by becoming God? What in existence is more perfect than a divine celestial being? As a deity, he'd finally be at the height of perfection like mom and dad wanted. While none of this excuses any of Cyrus' horrible decisions and heinous crimes, it's not meant to. It's meant to explain why he is the way he is and justify what led him down the path to villainy, and what could possibly lead him away from it towards salvation one day.

The big trouble with this is that, as stated, this backstory and Freudian Excuse is revealed to the player after Team Galactic's subplot is resolved and Cyrus has exited the story for good. By treating a backstory that's absolutely necessary to explain why Cyrus is the way he is now and what might have motivated him in his extreme actions as a side piece of information that you get well after the fact, the game developers disconnect it from Cyrus' arc and thus it comes off as irrelevant and insufficient to the character we'd seen beforehand, even if it does adequately explain away many things about his psychology and motivations. Many players would feel next to no sympathy for Cyrus during his subplot where he's out doing horrible things in the name of his goal, and thus any sympathy evoked for the troubled boy he was in his backstory is not present in the current plot of which Cyrus is the truly heinous Big Bad. With his backstory and justification not present, Cyrus comes off as a random psychotic, evil windbag and possible narcissist who spouts out philosophical waxing spammed with ill-defined terms, rambles about his A God Am I ambitions, and tries to tear the universe apart in order to destroy human spirit and then make a new world with him as it's supreme deity since he hates the existing world and human spirit because...reasons. So in an odd sense, Cyrus gets the Freudian Excuse criteria half right and half wrong. The excuse itself is valid - it's the presentation of that excuse within the context of the character and story that falters.

Other considerations? - A few things. First consider that, while Cyrus is indeed a very cruel man who commits several nasty crimes in pursuit of a truly twisted, horrific goal, he's never really outright malicious or sadistic in his cruelty. He never shows any signs that he enjoys being the evil man he is - it just comes naturally to him now and he just kinda is it and does bad stuff because of it. Not only is Ghetsis a far crueler person than he is, but so is Giovanni in many portrayals. Both of them shoot at a lower scale than Cyrus, yet they're both nastier on a personal level and get off on how evil they can be. Heck, Charon is crueler and meaner than Cyrus, which is likely what led to his portrayal as a Complete Monster in the Diamond and Pearl Adventure manga.

Another thing to consider - he never resorts to violence when he doesn't feel there's a need or provocation for it. He never sets out to hurt people with hurting them in mind. All the Magikarp at Lake Valor? Collateral damage. The lake trio getting put through torturous experiments? Done to extract something from them, after which case he'll make their pain stop. Killing everyone in the universe? He'll restore their lives but (in his view) better them by stripping their spirit from them. But by far the biggest indicator is how he handles himself when facing an opponent. After making his feelings known at the Celestic Ruins, he asks the PC "Am I wrong? If you feel that way, challenge me." He gives your character the option of instigating the battle, and then tells him/her that he intends to "make him/her see the error of his/her ways." Nothing about hurting them is even implied in that line - it's just a statement about what he hopes to accomplish through a good, old fashioned, by the book Pokemon Battle. After losing, he leaves the PC and the old lady behind, without attempting to do them any harm. When he battles the PC again, he states it's to "make him/her regret having heeded his/her heart." Again, no threat of death or serious harm there - he again wants to teach the PC a harsh lesson by bringing them down in a fair battle. Finally at the Spear Pillar, he's angered as he starts the battle, making his most extreme statement yet "I'm going to completely crush you!" There are several meanings and contexts to "crush", but in this case, it is a very typical trash talk about defeating someone in combat. This time he may very well harm the kid, but there's still no implication of any death threats in there. Cipher agents have actively assaulted and harmed human beings, and both Greevil and Ardos wanted to wipe out everyone and everything on an island when it seemed Cipher wasn't going to have it's way. Ghetsis wanted to "eliminate" the PC to keep him/her silent about N's defeat, and then attempted to have Kyurem directly assault and harm the PC of the sequel game, with the possibility of death being very real there. Many other villains in the franchise like Hunter J, the Iron Mask Marauder, Grings Kodai, Giovanni, Charon, and Lysandre have all attempted to either do the Kid Hero harm or even murder them. Cyrus never makes any such effort - he plays by the rules.

Last thing to consider is that not only does Cyrus have some redeeming qualities, have positive portrayals that don't earn the hatred of other characters, have a legit Freudian Excuse for his actions, behavior, and motives, and not be as horribly heinous as he could be in his circumstances, but in not one but TWO different manga adaptations of the Sinnoh games, Pokemon Special and Diamond and Pearl Adventure, Cyrus finds redemption. He finally gets where he went wrong, makes a Heel Face Turn, and disbands Team Galactic. And regardless of what one might feel of the execution of his redemption, the idea itself does not come across as something that doesn't gel with his game depiction or is an impossibility. Everyone has the power to change, and while some will refuse to change by their own choice because they're so devoid of decency that compassion cannot reach them (looking at you, Ghetsis!), others can and will change if they're shown compassion enough times to make them realize and understand that their way of thinking and view on life that inspired their worst actions was flawed and wrong all along. This happens to Cyrus in both manga - a key point in his Character Development in DPA is when Hareta, the protagonist, tells him outright "You're a very bad guy...but I don't hate you.", and another is when he realizes that a flawed, incomplete world is actually worth valuing and preferable to the alternative of no world at all, which was on the verge of happening when Dialga and Palkia clashed. Likewise in Special he realizes upon his defeat that while one's individual spirit may always remain faulty and incomplete, if people band together and unite their spirits, with each person making up for what another might lack, then perfect spirit that can better the world is possible, and he later comes to embrace the humanity he'd buried within him by interacting with Dia and his childish innocence - the innocence he lost long ago. He even gets a very cute Pet the Dog scene with a Shaymin! So clearly both Ihara and Kusaka did not view Cyrus as a Complete Monster, choosing to show him as redeemable instead. So how come the anime, which had an irredeemably evil Cyrus declaring that he wanted to create a new world "for him alone" and wiping himself from existence in a mad attempt to claim his new world, not do the same? Simply put, the anime writers misunderstood the character. They missed his motives, his logic, his psychology, his backstory, and the possibility for his redemption being left open, writing him off as a total psychopath who needed to be removed from the world forever, just as Team Galactic was portrayed as far less well meaning and more monstrous than they were in the games. And that's still just one continuity where Cyrus conclusively failed to redeem himself and was depicted as a Complete Monster. Compared to two redemptive manga arcs and open-ended games, it doesn't stack up when measuring his overall character.

Also, the obligatory Crobat reference. Which shows that even if he didn't love his Golbat (which he couldn't since he doesn't believe in compassion), he at least treated it very well and took good enough care of it to make it happy.

Final Verdict - Well with all that I just described, I hope it's now clear why Cyrus of the Gen IV games having the label of Complete Monster ought to be left pure YMMV. His goals and actions are truly heinous by both Pokemon standards and any objective moral standards, and he's most certainly an evil, amoral, psychopathic monster of a human being. But there are far too many factors that negate the "completeness" that is required to qualify for the trope and get an entry on the tropes' main pages, and they're some of the most absolving factors too, such as positive, altruistic, redeeming qualities, a lack of negative response from characters in-universe, a solid Freudian Excuse, and stories where he's redeemed, which indicates that even in the games he's been left with the possibility of redemption, and that's something a true Complete Monster never has. Overall I view Cyrus as a horrifying and evil yet genuinely mentally disturbed and ultimately pitiful Knight Templar who's more Gendo Ikari and Light Yagami pre-his decline into Complete Monster-dom rather than like Judge Frollo or Light Yagami post-his decline into Complete Monster-dom. If you want to see truly heinous and repugnant villainy, you'll get it in Cyrus. But if you're looking for the absolute worst of the worst, look elsewhere.