Nietzsche Wannabe: Difference between revisions

** Nnoitrae, a [[Death Seeker]] who has no problem with killing [[Would Hit a Girl|anyone who gets]] [[Would Hurt a Child|in his way]] and who states that he believes the only point of living is dying (subverted somewhat in that he is very clear and specific about the kind of death he wants to have).

* Revy from ''[[Black Lagoon]]'' is a genuine nihilist in that she denies the existence of meaning, at least academically. For practical purposes, however, she'll preach the virtues of money and guns over God and love, since this is what she has been able to rely on in her life. She initially has great difficulty dealing with Rock's idealism, threatening to kill him if he ever moralises to her again. Revy herself elaborates that "nothing's worse than being treated like some whore by your companions", but in recent chapters, it is suggested by one character that she attacks idealists because their ideology contradicts her assertion that the world is a terrible place. By the end of the (anime) series, Rock himself confesses to be a nihilist, just with a positive attitude where the [[Nietzsche Wannabe]] is characterized by its decidedly negative attitude, here speaking of saving an innocent girl's life:

** In the same conversation, Balalaika reveals herself to be one of these as well, [[The Baroness|to absolutely]] [[Lady of War|no one's]] [[Blood Knight|surprise.]]

* ''[[Mahou Sensei Negima]]'' has {{spoiler|The Lifemaker, the [[Big Bad]] that Nagi faced off against. Nagi's response? "'''SHUT THE HELL UP!'''"}}

** Fate has also shown these tendencies; claiming that everyone are just soulless puppets, etc. {{spoiler|Although he has a basis for this belief, as the Magic World, along with it's native inhabitants, may have been created by Fate's master.}}

* Agent Smith in ''[[The Matrix]]'' sequels. In ''Revolutions'' he goes into a long rant about why Neo bothers to continue fighting him and that "Only a human mind could come up with something as insipid as love!" and "Why, Mr. Anderson!? ''Why!? Why do you persist!?''" Ironically, Neo's response is something a Nietzschean Ubermensch might actually say: "Because I choose to."

* Played for laughs in ''[[The Big Lebowski]]'' with the three evil German nihilists, and their amusing [[Catch Phrase]] "We believe in nothing!" often applied free of any particular context. They're very enthusiastic about their nihilism, and love to bring it up. {{spoiler|Their nihilism, however, doesn't stop them from whining about how "It's not fair!" when it turns out their attempt to extort money out of the heroes by pretending they've kidnapped a woman when she hasn't even been kidnapped has been rumbled.}} Walter retorts {{spoiler|Fair! WHO'S THE FUCKING NIHILIST HERE!}}

* Zé do Caixão, or "Coffin Joe" as he is called in the English subtitles, [[Anti-Hero]] ''(HERO?)'' of a series of Brazilian horror movies.

* In his ''[[Hamlet]]'' speech at the end of ''[[Withnail and I]]'', it's debatable whether Withnail is talking about his sexuality or confirming an absolute nihilism.

* The [[Big Bad]] from ''[[Sunshine]]'' (2007) uses this as an excuse to kill the astronauts going to recharge the dying sun.

* ''[[Match Point]]'' - the [[Villain Protagonist]] uses his nihilistic philosophy as justification for murder.

* Characters based on Leopold and Loeb (such as the protagonists of [[Alfred Hitchcock]]'s ''Rope'') are pretty much always portrayed as Nietzsche Wannabes.

* In the [[Discworld]] book ''Night Watch'', the [[Complete Monster|bad guy]] Carcer is said not to be insane but rather too sane, in that he can do whatever the hell he wants because he knows that laws and things are just arbitrary lines the normal folk draw in the sand to pretend they're safe. Needless to say, [[Lawful Good|Vimes]] [[Berserk Button|does not]] [[Crowning Moment of Awesome|take this well]].

** Although he channels his cynicism much more constructively than most people on this page, [[The Chessmaster|Lord Vetinari]] also occasionally holds such rants. Once at the end of [[Discworld/Guards Guards|Guards Guards]] when he lectures Sam Vimes. And then there's his little annecdote in [[Discworld/Unseen Academicals|Unseen Academicals]], when he tells about the time he saw an otter and her children devour a still living salmon and the eggs it was carrying.

** In a bit of a subversion, Death maintains that things like justice, mercy and duty are lies, but says that the entire point in believing in those lies is that it's what makes them real.

* Although ordinarily he is not of this view, when [[The Chosen One|Rand Al'thor]] of ''[[The Wheel of Time]]'' has a long overdue psychotic break and cracks after {{spoiler|almost killing his father out of paranoia and misplaced rage}} he rants about the pointlessness of existence in this fashion, railing against the actions of all being forgotten and then repeated thanks to the series' conceit of [[Reincarnation]], and he comes within a few seconds of destroying or at least irrevocably damaging all of reality in a desire to end it all before he talks himself down via a conversation and eventually a {{spoiler|[[Split Personality Merge]] with the voice in his head}}, and can be found in the quotes page of this trope.

* Bazarov in ''Fathers and Sons'' is one.

* The Inner Party from ''[[Nineteen Eighty-Four]]'' is an entire social caste of Nietzsche Wannabes, and they happen to rule everything. Ingsoc is pretty much the Nietzsche Wannabe of political systems, being built to completely corrupt [[The Power of Love]] (Ingsoc's actual ideology is also known as the "Obliteration of the Self", which from the name can be easily seen as Nihilism incarnate). The Inner Party is completely amoral (nothing was illegal, since there are no longer any laws) but if they notice a single sign of individuality and love, called "thoughtcrime", they capture the thoughtcriminals but instead of killing them, they torture them and make them literally live their worst nightmares, but all of this is not to interrogate them, but to traumatize them and drop them into [[Despair Event Horizon]]. They leave the majority in immutable poverty, the superpowers in perpetual war and the entire world in [[Despair Event Horizon]]. You cannot reason with them or express love on them, ever. Why? Simply because their only motivation is "pure power".

== Live Action TV ==

** On the other hand, he's probably one of the least-wannabe-like on this page; a perfectly valid [[Alternate Character Interpretation]] is that he is ''actually'' an [[Ubermensch]] in the making, on the threshold of becoming one but uncertain if he is quite ready to take the leap. As such, he's hidden his actual, personal [[Blue and Orange Morality]] behind the mask of somewhat more socially-acceptable nihilism.

* Connor from ''[[Angel]]'' reached his peak of [[Nietzsche Wannabe]]-ness in the Season 4 finale, and gave a rant that still sends chills down this editor's spine.

* The sci-fi series ''[[Andromeda]]'' has an entire race of folks called Nietzscheans. They were originally humans who decided to live by Nietzsche's writings. They left Human territory to found their own colonies, genetically enhanced themselves, separated in to clans (called "Prides"), and generally don't like anybody but themselves.

* The famous-within-the-fandom 'Death And Dust' speech from [[Stephen Colbert]]. Even better because the character is (usually) a die-hard Catholic. Shortly after the 2000 Florida recount, having decided that all the debate and argument is irrelevant and who's President doesn't even matter:

'''Stephen''': [cheerful] Oh, and I'm having a Christmas cocktail party... }}

* ''[[Oz]]''. Lemuel Idzik, the mentally-ill murderer of {{spoiler|Kareem Said}}, who he'd met years before in Istanbul. {{spoiler|Said}} gave a passionate speech about how life was meaningless because the universe would one day end. Lemuel took the lesson to heart and tries to commit suicide by killing two people in Oz -- to his dismay he doesn't get the death penalty by reason of his insanity.

* On ''[[Burn Notice]]'', [[Psycho for Hire]] Larry waves off the immorality of killing people for money (or just for fun) with his mantra of "some people live, some people die."

* ''[[Supernatural]]'': Dean Winchester of is a rare heroic example of this, although [[Trauma Conga Line|considering the way his life is going]], it's not entirely unjustified.

** Made even more depressing in that {{spoiler|finding out for a fact that God exists doesn't really make him change his mind.}}

* Marcus in ''[[Babylon 5]]'' is equal parts [[Nietzsche Wannabe]] and [[Knight in Shining Armour]].

* ''[[Othello]]'': The operatic version turned Iago, a villain who normally did it [[For the Evulz]], into one of these with his [[Villain Song]] "Credo in un Dio crudel."

* The operatic version of ''[[Woyzeck]]'' has [[Morally-Ambiguous Doctorate|The Doctor]], who gives us this little gem.

== [[Newspaper Comics]] ==

* [[Norm MacDonald]]. Imagine if [[The Joker]] from [[The Dark Knight]] decided not to blow shit up and instead became a stand-up comic.

* [[Patton Oswalt]] parodies this by crossing it with the [[The Fundamentalist]]:

** Only because he [[Jumping Off the Slippery Slope|totally cracked]] when he realized he would [[Who Wants to Live Forever?|live on]] after Nigredo and Rubedo die. ''I'm practicing so that when they die, I won't cry'', anyone?

* Kefka from ''[[Final Fantasy VI]]'' [[With Great Power Comes Great Insanity|evolved]] from a [[Monster Clown]] with nihilistic tendencies into a fully fledged [[Nietzsche Wannabe]] upon {{spoiler|[[One-Winged Angel|becoming the most powerful physical being on the planet]] halfway through the game}}.

* Seymour from ''[[Final Fantasy X]]'', unloved and alone since his mother's death, wants to harness Sin and annihilate all life on Spira to put an end to pointless suffering. Two years later Shuyin from ''Final Fantasy X-2'', eternally enraged and bitter at the world that let his one true love die, wants to harness Vegnagun and annihilate all life on Spira to end the existence of a world that he now sees as a pointless mockery. Clearly a lot of baddies on Spira didn't get enough hugs.

** Although in the world of Spira, the difference between the living & the dead isn't readily apparent (more than one character in the games is actually an Unsent...), & the dead hold onto their memories & ability to interact with the world. So killing everyone to end all suffering makes a certain amount of sense, in that context, as it would be far from oblivion (at least until being dead make you crazy you turn into a Fiend).

** Also from Blazblue, Hazama wants to destroy the current world because it's filled with "LIES LIES LIES LIES LIES LIES!"

* Mephiles the Dark from Sonic the Hedgehog 2006 qualifies, especially in the Showdown with Mephiles cutscene, where he, in a manner similar to Agent Smith in The Matrix Revolutions, questions why Shadow even attempts to oppose him and defend humanity when he will inevitably be persecuted.

* ''[[Mega Man Zero]]'': Dr. Weil, shortly after explaining his particularly horrific [[And I Must Scream|origin for his]] [[Who Wants to Live Forever?|immortality]] to Zero, undergoes an immense rant about how justice and freedom are worthless ideals, and then as his opening quote even dismisses ideals themselves as being meaningless or a lie.

* Kerghan from [[Arcanum]] chooses death over life and wants to overcome all existing life, ending the pain and struggle all life contains. Under certain circumstances it is even possible to convince him, that only his personal experiences made him a [[Nietzsche Wannabe]]. Arcanum shows in this aspect how your positioning in the [[Sliding Scale of Idealism Versus Cynicism]] is just individual choice.

* In ''[[The Inexplicable Adventures of Bob]],'' [http://bobadventures.comicgenesis.com/d/20080722.html Galatea started out this way.] She's one of the apparently rare cases where [[Whoopi Epiphany Speech|the hero successfully convinced her she was wrong,]] and [[Talking the Monster to Death|she lightened up a little.]]

* ''The Bunny System'' [http://wordpress.thebunnysystem.com/2004/06/18/nietzsche/ approach]:

* In ''[[Suppression]]'' Samantha Wight delivers a speech to this effect when she first appears, but on that same note believes their efforts to be so pointless that she lets them pass afterward. {{spoiler|Which they would have done if Bael's [[Berserk Button]] hadn't been pressed a few too many times.}}

* ''[[Homestuck]]'': {{spoiler|Jadesprite}}, after her [[Unwanted Resurection]], starts taking this view. Jade ends up [[Get a Hold of Yourself, Man!|calling her out on this.]]

* The Stunticon [[Meaningful Name|Dead End]] got to be like this at times during the course of [[Transformers Generation 1|the original]] ''[[Transformers]]'' cartoon. It becomes a bit of a joke when you read his character biography, and learn that [[Hypocritical Humour|he is quite vain about his appearance and constantly stays polished and detailed.]]

* Spider-Carnage in the [[Grand Finale]] of ''[[Spider-Man: The Animated Series]]''. An alternate-universe Peter Parker, he already at the brink of madness due to his version of [[The Clone Saga]] - being possessed by the Carnage symbiote sent him to [[Omnicidal Maniac]]-level out of the belief that life was meaningless. {{spoiler|It took a meeting with an alternate-universe Uncle Ben to make him snap out of it and fight off the symbiote's control.}}