Punch Clock Villain: Difference between revisions

* In ''[[Little Gloomy]]'', Simon von Simon's hunchback assistant Boris honestly couldn't care less about whatever project Simon is working on; he's a hunchback, so mad scientist lab assistant is the only job he can really get. He also tells Frank that he's just doing his job before hacking him to pieces with an axe. When Simon's castle blows up, not only is Boris long gone (the gig was clearly going sour), his first thought is sifting through the newspaper's want ads for new employment.

* ''[[Atomic Robo]]'' portrays most German soldiers this way, making sure that the readers see them as human beings.

* Eric Finch from ''[[V for Vendetta]]'' could be considered to fit into this category, depending largely on one's political perspective.

* Most of the thugs, minions, and lackeys in ''[[Empowered]]'' are pretty decent guys, especially the protagonist's boyfriend and his buddies. The segment where he explains that killing superheroes is even dumber than killing cops is ''hilarious'', and makes an enormous amount of sense.

* A couple of [[Regional Bonus]] scenes from the first ''[[Austin Powers]]'' film show Dr. Evil's security mooks to be family men with normal social lives, and explore the tragic results of their death. These scenes appeared in North America as [[DVD Bonus Content]]

* Although they don't get ''paid'' per se, this trope sums up the entire point of the [[Terminator|Terminators]]. They hold absolutely no bloodthirst against their intended targets. It really just is a job to them, and it ''can't'' be anything else. Consider the classic scene from the second movie when the "hero" T-800 is about to kill some dumb jocks who were just screwing with John...

'''The Terminator:''' Of course. I'm a Terminator. }}

* In the film ''''[[Bon Cop, Bad Cop]]'', Officer David Bouchard recounts killing an entire houseful of criminals, but sparing the vicious attack dog because it was "just doing its job."

* The three main characters of ''[[In Bruges]]'', the [[Odd Couple]] protagonists and the [[Big Bad]], are all this trope.

* Although there are no ''direct'' examples, the film ''[[Cube]]'' implies the builders of the eponymous [[Death Course]] were of this nature.

* Dee Jay in the ''[[Street Fighter (film)|Street Fighter]]'' movie, who not only does his job only for the money, but clearly hates every single person in the organization, as he also doubles as the [[Deadpan Snarker]]. He ends up trying to escape with Bison's money only to find out that it's Bison dollars, which are worthless.

* The teen protagonist of ''[[The Manhattan Project]]'' is hunted by gun-toting government agents that repeatedly threaten to kill him if he does not turn over his homemade nuclear weapon. One of these agents assures him it was nothing personal later in the film just before they may all die in an unintended detonation. (And in all fairness, they were government agents acting legally to protect the public from an unauthorized ''Plutonium-Bomb''!)

* In ''[[Apocalypse Now]]'', Kurtz gets a monologue on the subject:

** This is actually a distorted retelling of another sort of punch-clockery: soldiers in the Belgian Congo were accused of wasting ammunition, so they were told they'd have to bring back a hand for every native they claimed killed... so to save some ammunition for hunting, they took to cutting off hands from the living. John Milius took an example of barbarism for pecuniary gain and turned it into a parable of how thinking men can turn themselves into monsters for an ideology....

* ''[[Repo! The Genetic Opera]]'' has the Genterns, sexy sadistic nurses who put up with an awful lot for their well-paying jobs (including occasionally being raped or murdered by a Largo child). There's also the Repo Men, sociopathic organ retrieval experts armed with very large scalpels. One of the Repo Men is a protagonist--he's shown as being a sweet, slightly campy, doting family man when not on the job.

* In ''[[The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]]'', the cops towards the end of the book are "a couple of intelligent caring guys that you'd probably quite like if you met us socially!"

* [http://www.bartleby.com/148/3.html An Irish Airman foresees his death] by Yates can be both this trope and [[Punch Clock Hero]], depending on whether you're an Irish airman or an adversary of an Irish airman. It has this as the third and fourth lines:

Those that I guard I do not love. }}

* [[Tales of Kolmar]] has the villain hire mercenaries to go after someone. She is defended by an ex-mercenary who sees through their attempts to get casually close and warns them that they can leave now and it'll be fine, but if they go after her they're all dead, and urges the youngest one to leave the profession. The mercenaries do go after their target and are repelled, losing several of their own. After that, shaken, the youngest one decides that he's had enough and quits, and all the older mercs are actually pleased for him, but they won't quit a contract. {{spoiler|All of them get killed.}}

* Though in most ways the opposite of this trope, Max of ''[[Dark Angel]]'' goes in that direction in her pre-hero career. When confronted with the supposed immorality of her burglary, she replies indignantly: "I steal things in order to sell them for money. It's called commerce."

* ''[[The X-Files]]''. Morris Fletcher in "Dreamland".

* Subverted in ''[[Firefly]]'' when Jubal Early claims to only hurt people because it's part of the job, River replies that it's why he took the job. Eventually he concedes.

* Played almost literally in ''[[F Troop]]''. The Hekawi Indians have no time to terrorize the settlers when they're busy making souvenirs for tourists and distilling whisky for the town saloon.

* "Mike" from ''[[Breaking Bad]]'' is a professional hitman, as well as a multitude of other jobs that generically make life easier for criminals. Although he confesses to enjoying his job, he is also shown to be somewhat of a clear-headed softie, and a caring family man.

* The Romulan Commander from the ''[[Star Trek TOS]]'' episode "Balance of Terror":

* This was how the Klingons waged their civil war in ''[[Star Trek: The Next Generation|Star Trek the Next Generation]]'', with soldiers from rival sides drinking together in bars at the end of a long day's slaughter. In an interview, [[Ronald D Moore]] even cited the classic [[Looney Tunes]] Ralph the Wolf/Sam the Sheepdog cartoons as his inspiration.

* Most of the Germans from ''[['Allo 'Allo!|Allo Allo]]'', if you think about it.

* Gen. William Howe in ''[[The Dreamer]]''. He really doesn't want to fight against the very people he fought with in the French And Indian War, but he has no choice but to follow orders.

* Davan in ''[[Something Positive]]'' originally worked in a Medicaid billing department, which required him to send crushingly expensive ambulance bills to people below the poverty line. [[Truth in Television|The artist was taking out his rage at having previously worked at a similar job.]]

[[Jerkass|"Pretty well. I mean, fuck it, why should I care? It's not like they're my kids."]] }}

* According to his [[Villain Song]], Skipper Plumbthroat, of ''[[Homestuck]]'''s [[Show Within a Show]] ''Squiddles!'', apparently hunts the eponymous Squiddles in order to pay off his debts.

** Ironically, the Anti-Paladin himself is just a professional. He's a bit of a [[Noble Demon]], though still evil. (He sacrifices kittens so he can enter holy ground. However, see his focus in "Angel in Father John's Basement".)

* Tex from ''[[Red vs. Blue]]'':

'''Tucker:''' Yeah, I don't wanna talk about this anymore. }}

** Just Tex? The setting is one of [[Grey and Gray Morality]] - depending on which side's perspective you take, nearly anyone on the show could be considered this trope.

* Several [[Looney Tunes]] shorts where Ralph Wolf is trying to steal sheep away from Sam Sheepdog. There is an ''actual'' punchclock in this one, and both the wolf and dog punch in and out at sunrise and sunset. They also get an hour long lunch break, during which they eat lunch together and occasionally have a smoke (probably the reason why television doesn't show these anymore).

** Like many cartoon series, it took some tweaking to arrive at the formula. In the first one, only the sheepdogs punch the time clock, a new shift continues pummeling the wolf. In the second, both the wolves and sheepdogs punch in and out, but at separate clocks - no interaction off work. By the third, the two would greet each other at the clock, and by the series end, they even shared a house!

* Jack Spicer begins to cross into this territory during the second season premiere of ''[[Xiaolin Showdown]]'', after a temporary alliance with the heroes comes to an end. When Omi pleads with him to not return to evil, Jack sighs and says that, though he's still going to fight them for control of the Shen Gong Wu, he promises they'll [[Go-Karting with Bowser|go out for ice cream sometimes]] when they're all off the clock, which cheers Omi up.

* Shriek in ''[[Batman Beyond]]'' started out like this: he tried to kill Bruce, but only because, otherwise, his [[Corrupt Corporate Executive]] boss would fire him from his perfectly respectable career as a sound engineer. However, he was then caught wearing his [[Clothes Make the Superman|super suit]] at his workplace, meaning that he would unable to go back without being arrested, prompting him to embrace the moniker Shriek. Then, {{spoiler|a battle with Batman caused him to go deaf}}, so he embraced full-on, city-threatening supervillainy to get his revenge.

* In ''[[South Park]]'', [[Satan]] is portrayed in this fashion. He is also rather meek, insecure and [[Affably Evil]], certainly less evil than Cartman, and even chats pleasantly and enthusiastically with his victims (who appear to only be truly bad people) after torturing them.

* Lampshaded in ''[[Archer]]'' with this exchange:

'''Charles:''' Because, commie, I have something called a "mortgage." }}

** The villain of "Movie Star" also counts. She even briefly considers not carrying out her duty as a sleeper agent until she remembers that the Soviets said she'd get to direct...

*** There have also been suggestions that the reason so many people continued with it was because they'd guessed that the shocks weren't real. As a result, a follow-up study was done [[wikipedia:Milgram experiment#Other variations|using a live puppy actually receiving shocks]] as the victim. 20 out of 26 participants were still compliant, even though several participants openly wept.

** Milgram, "The Perils of Obedience":

** Which brings to mind the famous Upton Sinclair quote: "It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his job depends on not understanding it."

** Reportedly, there was a recent experiment where this took the form of a game show...with even more disturbing results.