Kingpin in His Gym: Difference between revisions

Some [[Big Bad|Almighty Overlords]] like to do more than [[Slouch of Villainy|lounge]] [[Orcus On His Throne|around on]] [[Cool Chair|nice chairs]] in their [[Evil Tower of Ominousness|fortresses]]. They'll go for a bit of [[Time to Unlock More True Potential|self-improvement]] instead. Some may get a [[Training Montage]] or two, while others may pursue a [[Dangerous Forbidden Technique]] or [[Forgotten Superweapon]] in parallel with [[The Hero]]. Regardless of how they choose to better themselves, showing a villain building his prowess can be a menacing taste of what's to come when the heroes finally reaches his doorstep. Like [[Orcus On His Throne|our good old friend]], however, they don't pose any direct physical threat to the good guys at the moment.

Contrast with [[Orcus On His Throne]] and [[Slouch of Villainy]].

* ''[[Hayate Cross Blade (Manga)|Hayate Cross Blade]]'' also shows [[Arch Enemy|Ensuu]] doing crunches hanging off the top half of a bunk bed and jogging in the school gym on two separate occasions before facing off with the protagonists' team.

* In ''[[Death Note (Manga)|Death Note]]'' Teru Mikami, Light's [[The Dragon|right-hand man]], visits the gym religiously. Given that his method of killing just involves writing down names, this is purely for his own benefit, and has nothing to do with fighting.

* While not exactly a villain, the Raikage in ''[[Naruto (Anime)|Naruto]]'' is introduced lifting huge dumbbells in his gym. Oddly enough, he's the only leader of any group that's been seen training at all so far, despite the setting being a [[World of Badass]] supernatural ninjas.

* Tao Ren is shown working out in the lead-up to his first official tournament fight with the protagonist, who doesn't exactly share his obsessive work ethic. Of course, since Ren is a walking ball of issues and ''[[Shaman King (Manga)|Shaman King]]'' the rare shonen series where [[Unstoppable Rage]] ''does not help'', Yoh's mellower approach works in his favour.

* General Silver from ''[[Dragon Ball (Manga)|Dragon Ball]]'' is shown working out at least once in order to beat Goku. It doesn't work.

* [[Rocky (Film)|Rocky Balboa's]] major opponents got their own [[Training Montage|Training Montages]], which often told viewers something about their character: Clubber Lang's dungeon-like basement emphasized his monstrosity while Ivan Drago's almost clinical routines (and his steroid use) showed his lack of "heart."

* A few [[James Bond (Film)|Bond villains]] are fond of this:

** Largo practices his aim with clay shooting in between stages of SPECTRE's plan to detonate stolen nuclear weapons in ''[[Thunderball (Film)|Thunderball]]''.

** Scaramanga, ''[[The Man With the Golden Gun (Film)|The Man With the Golden Gun]]'', has a warped relationship with his diminuative manservant Nick-Nack; in the event of his death, Nick-Nack inherits everything...in return for Nick-Nack actually ''trying'' to kill him by hiring the best assassins in the world for Scaramanga to pit his skills against.

** Max Zorin sparred with his [[The Dragon|Dragon]] May Day in ''[[A View to A Kill (Film)|A View to A Kill]]''.

** Colonel Moon in ''[[Die Another Day (Film)|Die Another Day]]'', whom we meet taking his Tae Kwon Do- frustrations out on a punching bag containing his anger therapist- that'll teach him to lecture Moon. [[Big Bad]] Gustav Graves also has some fun at a fencing club. {{spoiler|We later find that they're the same person}}.

* In ''[[Gladiator (Film)|Gladiator]]'', Commodus practices his swordsmanship against multiple opponents, showing that wealth and power have ''not'' made him soft.

* The 2011 film adaption of ''[[The Three Musketeers 2011 (Film)|The Three Musketeers 2011]]'' shows [[Big Bad|Richlieu]] sparring in his off-hours. With three opponents, no less.

* [[Star Wars|Count Dooku]], a.k.a. Darth Tyranus, was shown sparring with General Grievous in the ''[[Star Wars Clone Wars]]'' animated series. Most other master vs. apprentice fights in the ''[[Star Wars]]'' universe tend to be cases of attempted [[Klingon Promotion]] although they ''could'' be considered training for the apprentices.

*** He uses the chair because excercise bores him. He prefers eating at his expensive restaurant, date-raping and dumping mind controlled babes, and musing how much better he was than everone else. He's closer to an [[Orcus On His Throne]], were it not for the fact that spends a lot of time engaged in various evil schemes.

* In ''[[Snakes On a Plane]]'', crime boss Eddie Kim is shown practicing karate while ordering the titular plan. Could have been a [[Chekhov's Gun]] for an eventual Kung Fu faceoff with [[Samuel L Jackson]], but [[They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot|nope.]]

* In ''[[Kick Ass (Film)|Kick Ass]]'', Frank D'Amico is shown training in the gym to show he's a step above his mooks, later on even using his skills against a hapless superhero cosplayer. His son is shown [[What the Fu Are You Doing?|clumsily messing around with some weapons]].

* From ''[[Avatar (Film)|Avatar]]'' we have [[General Ripper|Col. Quaritch]] lifting weights, who comments on the fact he needs to keep his muscles in top condition in Pandora's low gravity.

* Prince Humperdinck in ''[[The Princess Bride (Literature)|The Princess Bride]]'', with his Zoo of Death.

* ''[[Stargate Atlantis (TV)|Stargate Atlantis]]'': When we are first introduced to him, Commander Kolya of the Genii is having a sparring session with some of his military subordinates.

* Spoofed in ''[[The Simpsons (Animation)|The Simpsons]]'', where Mr. Burns makes Smithers work out on his behalf.

* In ''[[Gargoyles (Animation)|Gargoyles]]'', David Xanatos enjoys sparring in a dojo. As always [[Magnificent Bastard|subverting]] such things, he shows how [[Badass]] he is by ''losing'' to his [[Battle Butler]] and then commenting on how surprised he was that Owen has improved.

* Done three times in the second ''[[Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 2003 (Animation)|Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 2003]]'' series. The first occurs with the Shredder, who gets a training scene in the episode "Darkness at the Edge of Town". The second occurs with Karai, whose very first scene is of her training. The third time occurs in a supplementary short of dubious canonicity, also featuring Karai, which shows her apparently killing the four turtles...until its revealed that they're actually advanced training robots.

* Tombstone does this in ''[[The Spectacular Spider Man]]'' - fitting, since that adaptation promoted him to the Kingpin's usual role (they couldn't use the trope namer himself due to rights issues).