Harmless Villain: Difference between revisions

Basically, they aren't saddled with a bag of [[Villain Ball]]s so much as they're [[Evil Is Stylish|expert jugglers]], using them to entertain rather than as signs of stupidity [[Sugar Bowl|(it is a kid's show, after all).]] A few of them are even [[Genre Savvy]] enough to be aware of this, and are pretty easy-going about it. These amiable villains will more often than not show that [[Even Evil Has Standards]] when that [[Very Special Episode]] rolls around. Out of all the villains, they're the likeliest to enjoy a good time with [[Villains Out Shopping]], or even be [[Friendly Enemy|Friendly Enemies]] with the hero!

 

 

Their minions are as often as not [[Faceless Goons]] and [[Minion with an F In Evil|comically good]] [[Mauve Shirt]]s, both of which tend to do kooky and funny things when their boss isn't looking. These villains often have a degree of [[Karmic Protection]] because of the small scale of their "evil", especially when there are more [[Serious Business|serious]] villains around.

Keep in mind, though, that sometimes they become a [[Not-So-Harmless Villain]] later on. Even [[Team Rocket Wins]] every once in a while.

 

 

{{examples}}

* Most villains who appeared in the old McDonalds commercials - like Hamburglar, Captain Crook, and the Goblins - fit the description, easily outwitted by Ronald and his child-friends. Eventually, they were made "cuter" and [[Peek a Bogey Man| even less villainous.]]

 

* ACROSS from ''[[Excel Saga (anime)|Excel Saga]]'' is probably an example (until the [[Gainax Ending]]), although that's because it would lapse into [[Dead Baby Comedy]] if they seemed genuinely villainous, as opposed to any censorship keeping them that way.

** In [[Excel Saga (manga)|the manga]], Il Palazzo is genuinely villainous and is actually really creepy at points, particularly when he's suffering from multiple personality disorder or laughing weirdly, [[The Millstone|but Excel, Hyatt, and Elgala remain utterly useless at their villainous tasks]].

"Of course I do! It wouldn't be nice to separate them from their friends." }}

* [[Goldfish Poop Gang|Tom and Tab]] from ''[[Kimba the White Lion]]'' are too stupid to carry out orders and too weak to pose an actual threat to Kimba.

* In the pilot episode of ''[[Samurai Pizza Cats]]'', The [[Big Bad]] threatens to not invite his henchmen to his birthday party if they don't follow his orders (at least in the German dub).

* He may be more malicious in the anime than in the games, but King Dedede is still pretty much as harmless in ''[[Kirby Right Back At Ya]]'' as he is in the game franchise. The only time he does threaten to hurt someone (other than Kirby or Whispy Woods) is when he orders the [[Monster of the Week|Dedede Stone]] to stomp Tiff - which would've resulted in her death if it weren't for her knight in shining armor, [[Magnificent Bastard|Meta Knight]], coming to her rescue.

** Speaking of Meta Knight, some of Dedede's Demon Beasts / monsters actually managed to hurt him - which was not what Dedede wanted.

 

* The ''[[Hack Slash]]'' storyline ''Super Sidekick Sleepover Slaughter'' featured an entire "secret society" of them. Some members include:

** Doctor Devil, who has been stealing random bits of machinery from work with the intention of building "some kind of gun" that he will call The Devil Ray.

** Though a special prize has to go to Spidey villain the Spot, until he got a revamp to make him a major threat. During his first appearances, he was so pathetic that Spidey couldn't even be bothered to fight him, and instead, he falls over laughing at the mere sight of him.

*** He actually turned up in ''[[Spider-Man: The Animated Series]]'' and kicked seven shades out of Spider-Man, IIRC.

** The Stilt Man. The Leap Frog. In the early days of his comic, Daredevil was the [[Mystery Science Theater 3000]] of comic book super heroes.

** The Gladiator got turned into a [[Not-So-Harmless Villain]] when they started playing his early ramblings and characterization, which by more modern and mature standards sound silly and slightly delusional, very seriously and turned him into a violently unbalanced crazy person with an unhealthy love of buzz saws and ancient Roman culture.

* Baby Face Finlayson from ''[[The Beano]]'' was originally a harmless villain, with his uselessness being [[Played for Laughs]], but his later appearances in Kev F Sutherland's strips were as a [[Not-So-Harmless Villain]].

 

* ''[[Meet the Robinsons]]'' has Bowler Hat Guy, who isn't capable of actually committing much harm. {{spoiler|The robotic bowler hat, Doris, is [[The Dog Was the Mastermind|manipulating him]] for her own [[Evil Plan]]. And it turns out that he has a [[Freudian Excuse]] for his hatred of Lewis, the protagonist--he was Lewis' roommate back at the orphanage, and once lost a baseball game which was very important to him because Lewis' invention building kept him up all night.}}

* Gru and Vector from ''[[Despicable Me]]''.

* ''[[Repo! The Genetic Opera]]'' has Amber Sweet. She's just as nasty as her brothers, but she's usually too high on zydrate to be effectual.

** And Luigi and Pavi aren't much better, given that Luigi, despite his claims that only he's got brains enough, comes across as a simple minded [[Knife Nut]] and Pavi spends most of his time staring at his own face in the mirror he forever carries with him. That being said, Luigi is quite effective in the "stabbing people for no good reason" compartment, which makes him the least harmless of the Largo siblings.

* {{spoiler|William Bludworth}} in the ''[[Final Destination]]'' films only serves two functions: to play the part of Death's own personal janitor, and to give the protagonists cryptic clues on how to evade death for as long as they can. Even when {{spoiler|Peter}} takes his advice to "kill or be killed" way too far, that's a matter of responsibility on the part of he who hears the advice, and the other two who use the "kill or be killed" tip aren't nearly as monstrous as {{spoiler|Peter}} was: {{spoiler|Nathan}} uses the advice completely by accident when {{spoiler|Roy gets impaled by a hook during a confrontation over a rude remark directed at the former}}, and Sam uses Bludworth's words responsibly by {{spoiler|killing Peter to prevent him from murdering Molly}}.

 

* In the ''[[Discworld]]'' novel ''The Last Hero,'' Evil Harry Dread has such a strong sense of professional ethics that he always chooses his guards for stupidity and designs his dungeons for easy escape. Of course, following the same professional ethics, he betrays Cohen and the Silver Horde at the first opportunity, but they're not too fussed about it. [[Card-Carrying Villain|It's just what he does.]]

* In ''[[The Dresden Files]]'' short story ''Day Off'', Harry is confronted by "Darth Wannabee" and his gang of amateur dark wizards. He's angry because Harry removed a curse he'd laid on a woman who'd annoyed him. Normally, this would be black magic, an incredibly serious matter and something the White Council punishes with death; their treatment of warlocks is one of the things Harry agrees with the council on, even if he thinks that they are doing ridiculously little to stop people from becoming them. But the "curse" was so weak Harry thought it had been a result of ''bad feng shui''. They run away after, on telling Harry to defend himself, he pulls out his gun. Later, they chucked a smoke bomb through his window, which at least shows they had the sense not to confront him again.

 

* All of the ''[[Batman (TV series)|Batman]]'' villains from the 60s television series qualify for this trope. Very much so.

** Oddly, this is why minor villains from the comics were resurrected (Clock King, a Green Arrow villain, was actually made more competent on the TV show, and the Riddler only had two appearances in the comics, over a decade before the show). Characters from the comics were either too high budget to replicate (the comic having long since taken on sci-fi elements), or else were still too legitimately frightening to be turned camp, like Clayface and Two-Face. The bulk of the show's villains were created expressly for it.

* Nevel of ''[[iCarly]]''. Starts out trying to steal a kiss from Carly, then upgrades to...trying to destroy iCarly. [[Sarcasm Mode|Great villain.]]

 

 

* [[Gilbert and Sullivan]] enjoyed this. [[The Pirates of Penzance]] will only attack forces more powerful than they are. Ko-Ko in ''[[The Mikado]]'' has never killed anyone, although he's thinking of starting on small animals soon.

** Ko-Ko is, of course, The Lord High Executioner.

 

* Bowser in ''[[Super Mario Bros.]]'' sometimes falls into this trope, mainly in the [[RPG]]s and Party games. Even in the mainline games, he doesn't seem to be able to do anything other than [[Damsel in Distress|kidnap Peach]], though.

** His [[Super Mario Bros. (animation)|cartoon counterpart]], King Koopa, definitely does. He is regularly incapable of even capturing the princess, never mind taking care of Mario and his friends. The only times he is ever effective is when the plot demands it; the heroes [[Idiot Plot|suddenly fall for traps and get defeated by things that they could've easily taken care of before]]. They always break out and foil Koopa's ridiculous plots in the end, though.

* {{spoiler|[[Goldfish Poop Gang|Mysterio]]}}, the ''Spider-Man 2'' game version. Sure, he's got like a million robots and can successfully kill people from time to time, but ''man,'' what a friggin' ''loser.'' And he's got a glass jaw.

* [[Kirby]]'s arch enemy, King Dedede, [[Depending on the Writer|depending on the game]]. The most evil deeds the king performed without being possessed by [[Cosmic Horror|Dark Matter]] was stealing the stars from the sky and stealing food from Dream Land for the hell of it.

* Duc de Puce, a.k.a. "[[Fail O'Suckyname|The Rat]]", from the ''[[Stronghold]]'' series. [[Too Dumb to Live]], [[General Failure]], [[Minion with an F In Evil]], [[Small Name, Big Ego]]. He's more of [[Narm|an entertainer]] than a real antagonist.

* The [[Fallout: New Vegas]] DLC ''Old World Blues'' has The Toaster, an [[Omnicidal Maniac]] obsessed with burning the world. He is limited in his evil quest by being a talking toaster (and that alas, unbeknownst to him, [[After the End|the world has already burned]]. He gets very upset when you point this out). About the worst he can do, should you not suffer an attack of stupid and [[Too Dumb to Live|stick your hand into his bread slot]], is ''threaten'' to set you on fire.

* ''[[Okage]]: Shadow King'' has Evil King Stanley Hihat Trinidad XIV, or Stan, the [[Sealed Evil in a Can]] who's taken over your shadow. He really likes proclaiming how evil and mighty he is, but with one of his first displays of his terrible might being to rescue a cat stuck in a tree, he is not that good at it. Especially with how a bunch of Fake Evil Kings have stolen his power while he was sealed away.

 

 

* As the page quote illustrates, Jokerella has the dubious distinction of being the least competent member of [[The Non-Adventures of Wonderella|Wonderella]]'s rogue's gallery. As Wonderella herself says on [http://nonadventures.com/cast/ the cast page]: "Jokerella would be The Little Villain Who Could if she could do anything."

* The Dark Warriors in ''[[8-Bit Theater]]''. Ostensibly the greatest adversaries to the cast, they are considerably less threatening than the Fiends, who have consistently proven themselves to be dangerous, or the Light Warriors, who are probably one of the worst things to befall their world (with the possible exception of King Steve).

* Wilson and Pickett from [https://web.archive.org/web/20131118145136/http://notfunnycartoons.com/main.html Notfunny Cartoons]. Sure, they sell a large variety of killbots and genetically engineered killer werewolves, but they all range from being harmless to actively doing good (case in point, one of the killbots works as a kindergartener). They ''did'' make a highly-efficient killer virus they regularly deploy through their time machine, but only to make sure [[It Makes Sense in Context|that the dinosaurs stay extinct]]. After a quick brainstorming session about what nefarious purposes they could use their time machine for, the best they can come up with is using it to sleep in on weekdays. It's not that they're [[Engineer Exploited For Evil|reluctant mad scientists]] - they're just [[Minion with an F In Evil|not very good at being evil]].

 

* Lee Phillips of ''[[Kate Modern]]'' attempts to take revenge on Gavin and Tariq by...forcing them to play a treasure hunt game to retrieve their stolen software. He still manages to be a serious threat because there are other, decidedly less harmless villains who are also after the software.

* Dr. Poque from ''[[Mega 64]]'' is arguably this, while he did kidnap and lock Rocko, Derek, and Sean in his basement, he's to much of a [[Butt Monkey]] to be a real threat. Episode six of Version 2 amps this up to [[Woobie]] status.

* Dr. Horrible is pretty much harmless for the first two acts of ''[[Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog]]''. Then, [[Smug Super]] Captain Hammer steals his would-be girlfriend and taunts him mercilessly about it. This drives Dr. Horrible to [[Not-So-Harmless Villain|get dangerous]], with tragic results.

* Although having a villainous outer appearance, [[Doctor Steel]]'s goals are really very positive and even kid-friendly. He just wants to make the world a better place (for himself).

** During his first appearances in the Marik's Evil Council Videos, Dartz manages to be even more pathetic. Then, he suddenly becomes an [[Expy]] of [[Perfect Hair Forever|Coiffio]] whose [[The Unintelligible|unfortunate accent]] causes both his henchmen and the audience to not be sure of whether his plans are the standard card game shenanigans or [[Squick|something much worse]].

 

* Dr. Robotnik on the ''[[Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog]]'' version of the show makes incredibly inept robots, repeatedly has crying fits, and is sometimes too distracted with himself to notice that his plan isn't working.

** Granted a lot of Robotnik's harmless streak is implied to be solely because of [[Invincible Hero|Sonic]]. Many episodes show Sonic encountering civilians that have been [[Beware the Silly Ones|successfully terrorized or enslaved by Robotnik without his help]], while in other episodes he actually manages to pull off [[Dangerously Genre Savvy]] plans that temporarily [[Not-So-Harmless Villain|despose of his foe]]. His henchbots Scratch and Grounder however, were definitely incompetant, [[Nice Job Fixing It, Villain|often destroying their own schemes]] before Sonic even got the chance to stop them.

* Dr. Drakken in ''[[Kim Possible]]'' is pretty much the mascot of this trope, if only because that show's [[Periphery Demographic]] makes it so self-aware. You get the feeling that he and Shego aren't even trying to harm Kim, just keep her occupied. He becomes a [[Not-So-Harmless Villain]] in some cases, especially in [[The Movie]] "So the Drama". (In fact, being the most recurring villain, he's all over the scale; sometimes he's so ridiculous that Kim hardly needs to bother, but he's also the one who occasionally comes closest to his [[Take Over the World]] goal.)

** This is because Drakken is an [[Expy]] of [[Austin Powers|Doctor Evil]], with Shego taking Scott's place as the more competent one who points out the other's ineffectiveness with snarky remarks.

* Glowface from ''[[The Xs]]'' is one such villain, he even gets upset when his monologues are interrupted, and is perfectly willing to put off villain chores [[Villains Out Shopping|to play video games]].

* The Monarch in ''[[The Venture Brothers]]'' almost qualifies. When he isn't psychologically damaged, being pushed around by the higher-ups in the Guild of Calamitous Intent, and being inept at commanding his henchmen, he can, in fact, be quite deadly. The trouble is, he's so bad at arching that his nemesis, Dr. Venture, doesn't even consider him a real threat. Later seasons show, however, that The Monarch can, indeed, be a very threatening villain, if he bothered to extend his goals beyond being a pain in the ass to Dr. Venture.

** His [[Future Badass]] self from [[The Movie]] on the other hand...

{{quote|'''Future Box Ghost:''' ''Beware.''}}

* In [[Disney Animated Canon|Disney's]] ''[[Aladdin (Disney film)|Aladdin]]'' sequel ''Return of Jafar'' and the TV series, there's [[Punny Name|Abis Mal]]. His patheticness is particularly compounded by being an [[Expy]] of the legendary loser, George Costanza, on ''[[Seinfeld]]'', since Jason Alexander plays both roles.

** He does get at least one [[Not-So-Harmless Villain]] moment in [[Recycled: the Series|the series]], in which he gets a hold of another lamp and wishes that the protagonists get smashed like bugs. When told that genies can't kill, he has a moment of brilliance and asks for the protagonists to be turned into bugs so that ''he'' can smash them like bugs.

** All of that said, "Phineas and Ferb's Quantum Boogaloo" shows us that without Perry to oppose him, he can be much more dangerous. (Granted, that was a unique situation, since it's implied that the citizens of Danville ''asked'' him to rule them out of fear of their own children.)

** One Episode had him cloning himself not to make it easier to take over the Tri-State Area, but so he could get errands done quicker such as standing in line.

** There was one episode where they unmasked the villain and were all like "You're going to jail!" only for a police officer to inform them that, seeing as she was on her own property, not actually hurting or threatening anyone, and not covering up for any sort of criminal operation, she hadn't actually broken any laws and so she wasn't going to jail.

** On the original series, they weren't out to hurt anybody; almost every one of them was involved in some kind of ludicrous real estate scheme where they really, really wanted to have the rights to some particular land/house, and thought the best way to do that was to put on a monster costume.

* Grizzle from ''[[Care Bears|Adventures in Care-a-Lot]]'' is rarely seen as a real threat by the Care Bears, and usually just considered a nuisance or misguided.

** There have actually been several episodes that show that he isn't so harmless, it's just that he really isn't that evil.

{{quote|'''Professor Chaos:''' *[[Evil Laugh]]* Oh, the look on their faces, [[Poke the Poodle|when they got the wrong soup!]]}}

* "The Villain Nobody Took Seriously" on ''[[The Secret Show]],'' who was able to rule the world precisely because nobody took him seriously. He was just a clown living in an abandoned circus tent, talking about all the things he would do once he ruled the world...and then managed to get elected World Leader by changing his name to "Mark X Here", making confused voters cast their votes for him.

* Finn, Ratso and Chow in ''[[Jackie Chan Adventures]]'' should qualify. While they are, most of the time, serving the [[Big Bad]]s of each season, they serve, pretty much, as Jackie's punching bags. Even when Daolon Wong grants them demonic powers. In the only episode I remember them going solo, they even pulled a [[Heel Face Turn]] (it didn't stick, though)!

** Mostly because they were just as bad at being good as they were at being bad.

** [[Word of God]] is that the writers felt sorry for him, so they started writing stories where he'd team-up with He-Man against some outside threat, just so he could win occasionally and not look like a complete tool all the time.

** Subverted in the 2000-era re-imagining. While Skeletor's still a [[Card-Carrying Villain]] [[Surrounded by Idiots]], and Evil-Lyn is clearly his mental superior, Skeletor's clearly a threat this time around, having destroyed half of Eternia before the show starts, and twice defeating the [[Big Bad]] that the heroes themselves could not. While still sometimes played for laughs, and never shown as even a tenth as threatening as Hordak, Skeletor crossed the line into [[Complete Monster]], at least.

* Mister Smarty Smarts of ''[[Spliced]]'', though there have been a few times that he has been a genuine threat to the other inhabitants of the Island.

** Subverted in ''Mad Love'' where Batman actually admits that Harley Quinn was closer to killing him than the Joker ever was. Considering that this is the Joker, that says a lot!

* [[Jerkass Woobie|The Ice King]] in ''[[Adventure Time]]'' certainly has the potential to be a great threat, being a powerful magic user but constantly thwarted by [[A Boy and His X|a boy and his dog]] doesn't do much for his reputation. His defeats are often so pathetic that they're depressing, and in the end, it's almost always Finn beating up an old man.

** The E.V.I.L organization, which stands for [[Fun with Acronyms|"Every Villain Is Lemons"]], The extent of their villainy is shining flashlights into boats at [[Make-Out Point|Makeout Reef]]<ref>Good times, goooood times...</ref> and making fun of the young people.

* The Urpneys of ''[[The Dreamstone]]''. It takes a rather incompetant bunch of mooks to make a [[Sugar Bowl]] world like The Land Of Dreams come off as unneccessarily rough on them. Even the times they [[Not-So-Harmless Villain|do actually prove formidable]], they are [[Contrived Coincidence|constant victims of circumstance]], fate always unraveling their schemes in [[The Fool|the heroes' favor]].

 

{{reflist}}

[[Category:No One Respects the Spanish Inquisition]]

[[Category:Saturday Morning Cartoon]]

[[Category:Villains]]