Evil Sounds Deep: Difference between revisions

 

May be justified if the evil character becomes a huge [[One-Winged Angel]] with longer vocal chords, since that would make their voice deeper.

 

[[I Thought It Meant|Has nothing to do with]] [[Fauxlosophic Narration]] or [[Sesquipedalian Loquaciousness]].

 

{{examples}}

* Anyone voiced by [[Norio Wakamoto]].

** Yes, including [[Azumanga Daioh|Chiyo's dad]].

* Lucy in ''[[Elfen Lied]]'' has a much deeper voice than her "good" personality, Nyu.

* Gauron, the [[Big Bad|main bad guy]] from the first season of ''[[Full Metal Panic!]]!'' has the deepest voice of all characters in the show. This is somewhat subverted in ''Full Metal Panic! The Second Raid'', where new villainous character [[White-Haired Pretty Boy|Leonard Testarossa]] has a voice almost as soft and gentle as a girl's -- though it's still deeper than that of [[White-Haired Pretty Girl|his sister]], who is naturally one of the good guys...

* Alucard from ''[[Hellsing]]'' is technically a good guy, but monstrous enough to freak out undead super-Nazis, and speaks in [[Joji Nakata]]'s ultra-deep drawl.

** Or [[Crispin Freeman]]'s wonderful low menace.

* In ''[[Bleach]]'', most of the main villains like Aizen have deep voices.

 

* According to [[Deadpool]] of [[Marvel Comics]], [[Genius Cripple]] [[MODOK]] makes Terrence Stamp sound like [[Michael Jackson]].

* It's often mentioned how deep the voice of the Gollywog is in ''[[The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen]]''. His balloons are typeset with a heavy bold. He's supposedly made of very dense non-baryonic matter. One of his best moves is causing an earthquake with a loud bellow. One more example of repurposing his ''very'' racist characterization and design into happy coincidences and heroic traits.

 

* The Kurgan, of ''[[Highlander]]'' fame.

* Obvious ''[[Star Wars]]'' example: Darth Vader. (Let's face it, this trope is pretty much the reason [[James Earl Jones]] gets hired so often.) Also, [[Knights of the Old Republic (video game)|Darth Malak]].

* Anton Chigurh in ''[[No Country for Old Men]]'' speaks with a grizzly, low voice, which essentially acts as a death rattle considering his character.

 

* Inverted with [[Harry Potter (novel)|Voldemort]], who is described as having a high, cold voice.

** Inverted again with [[Reverse Mole|Snape]], who has a deep, ominous voice; it doesn't really help either that he's portrayed by [[Alan Rickman]] in the films.

* Ma'el Koth from ''[[The Acts of Caine]]'' is usually described as rumbling.

 

* The [[Stargate Verse]] has the Goa'uld and the Wraith. The Asgard have a vocal effect, too (toned down in later seasons) but it's a lot friendlier-sounding than the ones used by the baddies. The Goa'uld, in fact, do this on purpose to sound more intimidating, and can turn it off at will when they want to blend in or just be more personable. By the end of the series, Ba'al almost always drops the voice effect when he's talking to the heroes.

** Ra in ''[[Stargate (film)|Stargate]]'' sounds a lot like [[300|Xerxes]], bordering on [[Voice of the Legion]] territory.

* On ''[[Game of Thrones]]'', Tywin Lannister is played by Charles Dance, and has a [[Badass Baritone]] voice that makes him sound twice as serious and menacing as he would be otherwise. [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=47MazYDnmaU See here].

* Red John from ''[[The Mentalist]]'' is a subversion of this trope in that even when his voice is seemingly manipulated, he ''still'' has an odd, higher sounding voice.

 

* Inversion: When [[Tom Waits]] wants to be creepy, he usually goes for a higher voice. Compare "Hold On" with "In the Coliseum".

* DMX's ''Damien'' songs occasionally fall in to this, especially when Damien reveals his evil nature-- "You sold me your soul when you didn't say 'no.' Just let a human with dark skin go? Well '''Give me what you owe!'''" If you listen closely, in the first song, Damien's voice even sometimes has a deep reverb to it.

{{quote|''All your friends are laughing behind your back.'' '''''[[Crowning Moment of Funny|KILL THEM.]]'''''}}

* Dimmu Borgir's song "The Sacrilegious Scorn" has [[Satan]] appearing as [[Hot as Hell|a beautiful woman]], who turns out to have a deep voice as she performs a spoken-word rendition of one verse.

 

== [[Theatre]] ==

* Nathan Wallace in ''[[Repo! The Genetic Opera]]'' gets a deep, gravelly voice when he is the Repo Man.

** Rotti Largo and Graverobber are both baritones, but Luigi and Pavi are tenors.

 

=== Opera ===

* Scarpia in ''[[Tosca]]'' is a baritone, but lately, often sung by bass-baritones. He's an evil son of a bitch who wants to kill the tenor and rape the soprano.

** The rare case of this trope in Puccini's operas. His other low-voiced characters, like Colline in ''[[La Boheme]]'', Timur in ''[[Turandot]]'' and Sharpless in ''[[Madame Butterfly|Madama Butterfly]]'' are nice, or at least sympathetic, like Michele in ''Il Tabarro'' and Rance in ''La Fanciulla del West''. And Gianni Schicchi is a [[Loveable Rogue]].

* In oratorios, however (basically operas without sets or costumes and meant for church), the parts of God and Jesus were often sung by basses.

 

* The cyclops Gargarensis in ''[[Age of Mythology]]'' has a guttural voice.

* Somewhat subverted in ''[[Guilty Gear]]''. Potemkin has the voice of a [[TI 83]] running a voice module at quarter speed, and the extremely threatening looks to go with it ; he's also one of the nicest and most polite characters in the series.

* The Transcendent One from ''[[Planescape: Torment]]'' has a terrifically deep voice.

* Inverted in ''[[Fable (video game)|Fable I]]'' with Jack of Blades having a creepy, high-pitched voice. Played straight in The Lost Chapters expansion, where his voice has been artificially lowered to a more demonic tone.

 

== [[Web Comics]] ==

* Richard, the [[Token Evil Teammate]] of ''Waiting For Group'', has a rather deep voice if his singing voice in the "Slaughter Your World" video is any indication.

 

* Played for laughs in [[Ask That Guy With The Glasses|Ask That Guy]], where The Guy's voice will spontaneously drop a few octaves when he feels particularly evil.

** Also parodied with [[The Nostalgia Critic|N. Bison]] in [[Kickassia]].

* In [[All Your Base]] videos, CATS is usually voiced by Microsoft Sam at his lowest pitch setting. Other characters usually get higher-pitched, and less robotic sounding voices.

 

* Many characters voiced by [[Tony Jay]] are examples of both this and an [[Evil Brit]]: [[ReBoot|Megabyte]], [[The Hunchback of Notre Dame (Disney film)|Frollo]], [[Gargoyles|Anubis]] ({{spoiler|though not until he's merged with an evil avatar}}), [[The Mighty Ducks (animation)|Wraith]], [[Tom and Jerry: The Movie|Lickboot]], [[Spider-Man: The Animated Series|Baron Mordo]], etc.

* Scar in ''[[The Lion King]]''; though Mufasa's voice is deeper, Scar's voice is much deeper than the main hero (and tenor), Simba.

* In ''[[Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 2003]]'', [[Complete Monster|the Shredder]] has a nice deep voice with a Japanese accent, which, while wearing his armor, sounds like it echoes robotically. [[The Blob|Sh'Okanabo's]] voice in Fast Forward, of course, is surprisingly deeper than that of the Shredder. It even has an almost alien-like echo added to it (which is no surprise as [[Complete Monster|Black Doom]] from ''[[Sonic the Hedgehog|Shadow the Hedgehog]]'' sounds exactly like him).

** [[Smug Snake|Darius Dun]] has a nice deep voice as well, complete with a british accent.

 

== Other Media ==

* Any villainous character ever played by [[Christopher Lee]]. Thus automatically subverted whenever he plays a good guy, like {{spoiler|Ansem}} in ''[[Kingdom Hearts II]]'' or {{smallcaps|[[Don't Fear the Reaper|Death]]}} in the two [[Discworld]] animated miniseries.

* Inverted in ''[[The Adventures of Superman (radio)|The Adventures of Superman]]'', in which Superman's transformation from Clark Kent to Superman would be signalled by his voice going deeper, often mid-sentence: "This looks like a job... '''''for Superman'''''!"

* Any character played by [[Shozo Iizuka]], [[Ryuzaburo Ohtomo]], and [[Norio Wakamoto]].

* Inverted with [[Thurl Ravenscroft]]. Despite his incredibly deep voice and macabre name, the roles he took were usually sympathetic.

* Perennial [[The Three Stooges]] villain Kenneth MacDonald.

* Any villain played by [[Clancy Brown]]. Inverted whenever he plays a good guy.

 

{{reflist}}