Invincible Villain: Difference between revisions

[[Xanatos Gambit|Any "losses" that occur either help the villain more than outright victory]] are ambigious if he lost or won, or [[The Cavalry]] showing the hero can't win on their own. Plus, it's expected in the short term; [[You Can't Thwart Stage One]]! Doesn't matter [[Training from Hell|how hard]] [[The Determinator]] trains, the villain is always [[Hard Work Hardly Works|two steps ahead]]. That head start, of course, is a given when [[Villains Act, Heroes React]]. Even if there is a complete defeat, they'll still be subject to [[Joker Immunity]] or [[Cardboard Prison]]. This of course tends to rob a given episode or movie franchise of dramatic punch when the viewer's reaction to a hero's actual ''win'' is "[[Like You Would Really Do It]]!"

 

* '''"Oh my GOD, would somebody beat this guy already?"''' They want to see the villain get beaten, but not because they want proper closure to the story or any character arcs. Ideally, what a writer wants is for his villain to be a threat and make the audience wonder and anticipate how he's going to be beaten. In this case, the audience are simply bored to see the villains winning without effort, and would rather see the plot be derailed by their death than to have them continue existing.

* '''"[[Only the Author Can Save Them Now]]."''' This is a problem for all of the reason it says on that trope page. You've made your villain such a credible threat that now, there doesn't seem to be any plausible way to beat him. Anything that wins against him now will be accused of being all part of the plan, or people will question why did THIS attack work when all the other ones didn't? All of his limits and weaknesses have been so thoroughly discredited that the only discernible reason why he'd lose is because [[The Plot Demanded This Index|the author wants him to]] [[Deus Ex Machina|right now]].

 

{{examples}}

* Emperor Gene in ''[[Zoids]] Genesis'' is clearly ''trying'' to be a [[Magnificent Bastard]]. However, his constant [[A God Am I]] speeches while his [[Tyrannosaurus Rex|BioTyranno]] effortlessly [[Won't Work On Me|no-sells]] everything that comes their way get really old really fast, causing him to fall to this trope instead. Excaberating the problem is the way that the heroes [[Idiot Ball|fight like idiots]] whenever he's around, [[Mook Chivalry|attacking him one at a time and leaving themselves wide open in the process]].

** ''[[Super Robot Wars K]]'' drives the point home by having a scene (Probably the longest in the game) where just about every playable character in Genesis tries to defeat Emperor Gene and gets crushed by their efforts, until [[Kid Hero|Ruuji]] finally does the trick in his ''second'' try. Note the scene plays [[Gameplay and Story Segregation|after you just kicked Gene's ass]].

** Beerus fits too. Not even Goku's God-Saiyan form could so much as scratch him, and it's pretty much been established that the only true way to "defeat" him is giving him what he wants. Fortunately, he doesn't want much more than to have a good time, and his growing interest in Earth cuisine is clearly what has kept him from demolishing it. The only being who could likely kill him is Zeno - his boss and the ''one'' being Beerus is afraid of - but as of yet, Zeno has had no reason to.

* In ''[[Berserk]]'' {{spoiler|Post-Eclipse Griffith}} is a [[Physical God]] in a mostly [[Low Fantasy]] setting (and most of the non-[[Low Fantasy]] elements are his direct minions). He can [[Won't Work On Me]] cannonballs, magic lightning and even {{spoiler|a [[Reality Warper]] sword forged over hundreds of years specifically to kill him}}. Did we mention he's a [[Villain with Good Publicity]] to the point where most of the world believes he's the second coming of [[Crystal Dragon Jesus]]?

* Yubel, from ''[[Yu-Gi-Oh! GX (anime)|Yu-Gi-Oh! GX]]''. Not only is she the only antagonist with a perfect record as a duelist, her duel with Judai at the end of Season Three resulted in her getting exactly what she wanted, winning the love of her former charge. While this might count as a [[Heel Face Turn]] on her part, the fact remains she did so on ''her'' terms after convincing Judai to accept her.

* Alistar from ''[[RE: Creators]]''. Originally a character from a (fictional) music video, she went insane when her creator committed suicide, and went on a homicidal rampage. A [[Reality Warper]] wjose power was almost limitless, she could not only make other fictional characters real, she could alter the plots of their stories and assimilate their powers unto herself. Her rampage of destruction was only stopped by, in effect, giving her what she wanted, using a similar talent to recreate her creator and reunite them, with the promise they could write their own world into existence that would be their paradise.

 

* [[John Carpenter]]'s ''[[Ghosts of Mars]]'' has this problem. The titular ghosts are just that - intangible ghosts, who [[Demonic Possession|possess humans]] to interact with them. The spirits can't be killed by any known means (they even tried a [[Nuke'Em|nuclear detonation]], which did nothing), which means that if their host is destroyed [[Body Surf|they'll just move on to the next body]]. The movie dances around this issue by setting up the all-out battle to occur after the story's events, but it's impossible to maintain any hope for the surviving characters because victory is ultimately impossible.<ref>If the ghosts are also capable of independent interplanetary travel then not just the Mars colony, but ''all of humanity'' is completely screwed.</ref>

* The ''[[Final Destination]]'' movies teeter back and forth as to whether the heroes can actually win, but this theme consistently shows up in every entry. They're explicitly [[The Problem with Fighting Death|fighting Death]], a presumably eternal force of nature. The fourth movie even indicates that Death gave them the visions in the first place, which means that every death happened according to his design, including the fates of the survivors - it just wasn't their time yet.

* The Babyface killer in ''[[Happy Death Day]]''. The film's heroine is trapped in a [[Groundhog Day Loop]], with each loop ending in her brutal murder, and no matter what she does, there seems no way to prevent it. She tries avoiding the tunnel where she was killed the first time, but he finds her. She tries avoiding the party completely, but he still finds her. She tries not leaving her apartment at all and barricades the door, but the killer is already there. She caves his skull in with a baseball bat, flees, gets herself arrested on purpose, hoping jail will be safe, but the killer appears, unharmed, and murders the cop before killing her. {{spoiler| (Of course, the fact that there are really ''two'' killers can explain some of this.) In the end, she only survives by identifying and confronting the killer right when the loop starts, before the killer's plan to strike using the Babyface killer persona can even be considered.}}

 

* ''[[Leverage]]'': Sterling. Never. Loses. The best the con artist team can manage is misdirection.

** That said, even in the first episode, the heroes managed to win as well. And, their master plan in another episode hinged on him winning... And his episodes are fun. [[Tropes Are Not Bad]].

** Even though he {{spoiler|ultimately dies definitively in an airstrike}}, he still has the last laugh when he gets to tell Mulder and Scully {{spoiler|that the alien invasion is scheduled for 2012}}.

* Sylar from ''[[Heroes (TV series)|Heroes]]''. He kills numerous people, usually [[Red Shirt|minor characters]], over multiple seasons; and despite being [[Rasputinian Death|mortally stabbed (twice), getting completely incinerated, having his entire brain overwritten, etc.]] he still keeps coming back, usually with [[Up to Eleven|even more powers]], to terrorize the rest of the cast.

 

 

* For a couple years after being recognized both in-story and out as [[Vince McMahon]]'s son-in-law, HHH could never lose a major match. Thanks to being [[Corrupt Corporate Executive|part of Vince's family]], "Trips" is pretty squarely heel, though occasionally a lesser of two evils.

* The [[New World Order]] faction in WCW was a notable example of an entire ''group'' of invincible villains. This was especially evident in the group's early days, where the nWo would frequently run roughshod over their WCW foes and episodes of ''WCW Nitro'' would end with the nWo triumphant more often than not.

 

* The Dark Eight from [[Dungeons and Dragons]], the cabal of pit fiends that command the armies of the Nine Hells; they'd like mortals to ''believe'' they fit this Trope, as they and other powerful devils claim they have ruled for thousands of years, immune to the betrayals and machinations of underlings so common in a race of [[Social Darwinist]]s. In truth, [[Subverted Trope| it is a ruse]] done to ensure the cabal's authority, and only ''one'' of the original Dark Eight still remain. Dark Eight members are killed rather often, an underling taking the slain members name and position when it does. Whether this is a tightly kept secret or an [[Open Secret|badly kept one]] is [[Depending on the Writer]].

 

== [[Toys]] ==

 

* Caius Ballad from ''[[Final Fantasy XIII-2]]'' possesses the Heart of Chaos, which makes him immortal and also connects him to the goddess Etro. {{spoiler|If he dies, so does she. This [[Downer Ending|actually happens at the end of the game. But, of course, Caius is revived]].}} Due to him being the overseer of the world's timeline, he has gained vast knowledge of every possible scenario and uses it to his advantage.

** To make it even worse, in the Arcade version of Extend, when fellow [[Big Bad]] Relius Clover ''beat him'', Hazama looked all happy and embraced death with laugh, as if he predicted that and was very sure of eventual return.

** Because losing to Relius was the entire point. Terumi needed to ''die'' in order to {{spoiler|eliminate Takamagahara as a spirit}}.

*** Which results in a funny kind of [[Gameplay and Story Segregation]] when doing the amount of damage required by the game for the boss fight happens in a couple sniper rifle shots. Shepard even accuses Kai Leng of running away all the time.

 

 

* [[The Slender Man Mythos|The Slender Man]] is an interesting case.

** A: He's a particularly successful meme rather than a character from a single story. Showing any one spin-off character 'defeat' him could be considered unfair, and wouldn't have much weight anyway as it wouldn't impact the dozens of other stories.

** B: He's generally a mental threat rather than a physical one, and either teleports away or goes to full-on [[Mind Rape]] if approached. There's still no consensus on what he actually ''does'' to his victims once he gets his hands on them (which just makes it creepier).

** C: Most of his victims aren't the kind of people who would even consider attacking a [[Humanoid Abomination]], but a few have tried - and failed. As [[Can You See the Words|Steph]] told the [[Everyman HYBRID|HYBRID boys]], "I don't think he has a weakness."

 

* David Xanatos of ''[[Gargoyles]]'' lets you know it's all in [[The Plan]] - ''[[Trope Namer|his plan]]''.

** ... for about the first season and a half, anyway. Xanatos's growing [[Pet the Dog]] tendencies and habit of teaming up with the heroes [[Villain Decay|took their toll]] (though this also meant that having him win wasn't entirely a bad thing), until by the later episodes, Xanatos showing up in a plot usually meant some other villain outmaneuvering him, and he needed help. The real bearer of this trope is his creation Thailog - it generally takes into the second episode with him to realize that the drow-looking palette swap of Goliath with all the original's strength and skill, plus all of Xanatos's intelligence, who always effortlessly manipulates everyone is not a bad fan fic, but a [[Canon Sue|Canon]] [[Villain Sue]].

* [[Bounty Hunter|Muktar]] from ''[[Aladdin (Disney film)|Aladdin]]''. The good guys were never able to truly outfight or outsmart him. In his first appearance, they "won" because his employer told him to back down (giving him no reason to fight them), while the second time, he changed his mind on his own.

* Snuffles, aka Snowball, from ''[[Rick and Morty]]''. A dog who gains superior intelligence - and a desire for revenge against humanity for turning dogs into a [[Slave Race]] - his plans of world conquest are halted only because he ''chooses'' to halt them, realizing that enslaving humanity would make him the same type of monster he believes them to be. [[Hobbes Was Right|It clearly doesn't say much for humans as a whole...]]

{{reflist}}

[[Category:Characters As Device]]