Confessions of a D-List Supervillain

“Being a supervillain means never having to say you’re sorry … Unless it’s to the judge or the parole board. Even then, you don’t really have to. It’s not like it’s going to change the outcome or anything.”

Those are the words of Calvin Matthew Stringel, better known as Mechani-Cal. He’s a sarcastic, down-on-his-luck armored villain. Follow his exploits as he gets swept up in a world domination scheme gone wrong and ends up working for the weak-willed, mercy-loving heroes. Immerse yourself in his epic battles and see what it’s like to be an outsider looking in at a world that few have ever experienced.

Confessions of a D-List Supervillain is an independent superhero fiction novel by Jim Bernheimer. It chronicles the efforts of a minor armored supervillain in his efforts to save the world from mind-controlling bugs lest he join the ranks of the Evil Overlord's many slaves. At the end of the day, we have to ask, what is heroism?

Tropes used in Confessions of a D-List Supervillain include:

After the End: A typical supervillain mind-control plot goes horribly, horribly, horribly wrong.
- It gets better.
Aliens Made Them Do It: Wendy and Cal have sex under the influence of a psychic empath. This torpedoes any developing attraction between them... or so it seems.
Anti-Hero: Ultraweapon. The Olympians as a whole, it's soon obvious.
Anti-Villain: Mechani-Cal.
Badass Grandpa: The Bugler.
Betty and Veronica: Aphrodite and Wendy.
Big Bad: The Evil Overlord.
- For Cal, it's Ultraweapon.
Captain Ersatz: Ultraweapon is one of the 'Iron Dick' versions of Tony Stark.
- Mechani-Cal has some similarity to the Spiderman villain The Beetle. Who, coincidentally or not, became a hero in the Thunderbolts.
Deal with the Devil: Subverted. Cal's deal with the Evil Overlord turns out to have no consequences whatsoever.
Epic Fail: The accidental release of the mind-control bugs by Ultraweapon.
- Cal's first going as a supervillain.
Even Evil Has Loved Ones: Subverted. Ultraweapon doesn't love Stacy because he can only view her as a possession. Likewise, the same for Wendy's stalker.
Even Evil Has Standards: Subverted. Mechani-Cal is a villain but he's not evil by any stretch of the imagination.
First Girl Wins: Aphrodite and Mechani-Cal are together at the end of the book.
Heroic Sacrifice: Mechani-Cal seemingly gives his life to save the world from Ultraweapon.
- He gets better.
Good People Have Good Sex: Deconstructed. The sex is better when Cal and his lovers genuinely care about one another.
Karma Houdini: The Evil Overlord.
Kick the Dog: Ultraweapon gets one when he brainwipes Aphrodite of her romance with Cal.
Jerkass: Athena, Ultraweapon.
Law of Inverse Fertility: Cal and Wendy conceive a kid during their mind-control.
More Than Mind Control: A central premise of the book. The problem isn't the bugs which mind control people. It's the fact that the mind-control is more addictive than crack and heroin put together with great sex.
Pay Evil Unto Evil: Only in a superhero universe does Cal's execution of Wendy's stalker end up evil after the man used his superpoers to force Cal and her to have sex.
Pet the Dog: Mechani-Cal gets probably his single greatest moment of sympathy when he gives a starving mother some of his rations.
Physical God: Played with. The Olympians are essentially mortals empowered with the personality and powers of the deities they represent.
- Athena is a jerk.
Rich Bitch: Subverted by Wendy. Despite being richer than God, she's the sweetest character in the books.
- Oddly, this seems to have been Aphrodite's old personality.
Rich Idiot With No Day Job: Ultraweapon is apparently this. He made part of his original armor but used a corps of engineers to make the rest of it and now coasts on the profits from his work.