Put Them All Out of My Misery: Difference between revisions

This character is not necessarily an [[Omnicidal Maniac]], a nihilist who wants to destroy everything for the sake of destruction, nor a [[Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds]] who was mistreated, snaps, and lashes out on the world. This person is simply trying to cure an ailment, and are willing to go to any length to do it. While [['''Put Them All Out of My Misery]]''' villains are usually at least slightly sympathetic in the sense that at least their motive is understandable, [[Sliding Scale of Antagonist Vileness|they come off as jerks]] for putting their own misery ahead of others' safety.

Contrast [[Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds]], which is somewhat of the inverse of this trope. Note: both this trope and that one can fall anywhere on the [[Sliding Scale of Villain Threat|scale of villain threat]]. It's the scope of the story that defines the threat: They may be up against everyone in the town the story takes place in, or the entire world. Not the same as [[Well-Intentioned Extremist]] or [[Utopia Justifies the Means]] -- while—while the villain may wish to destroy humanity for what they regard as noble or important ends, this fellow is ultimately driven by pure misanthropy and his own misery. The key to this trope is that they [[Motive Rant|rationalize]] their actions due to self-pity, or contempt for the setting that they view as harmful.

* The motives of {{spoiler|King Joseph of Gallia}} in ''[[ZeroThe noFamiliar Tsukaimaof Zero]]'' can be explained as such. For a long time, he was overshadowed by his immensely talented brother and was intensely jealous of him. He thought he would feel better if he got his brother out of his way, but it did not work and he ended up becoming devoid of any feelings. And then he thought perhaps destroying the world would fill the void in his heart....

* In ''[[Hero Squared]]'', Captain Victory hurt his girlfriend, so she became a supervillain and destroyed the ''entire universe''. He managed to escape to another universe and found his non-superpowered equivalent; she followed. Caliginous has decided that life is nothing but pain, misery, cruelty and death, and should be ended in preferably the most all-encompassing fashion possible.

** Her arch-nemesis [[The Cape (trope)|Captain Valor]] just sees her as an evil megalomaniac, but his alternative self Milo manages to recognize that beneath it all she's a broken, lonely, [[Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds|psychologically tormented and suffering woman]].

* Grace in ''[[Dogville]]'' can be interpreted like this (type 4). Or as a [[Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds]]. Or a ''whole'' lot of other ways.

* ''[[Batman Begins]]'': [[Knight Templar|Henri Ducard]] comes across as a case of either type 3 or type 4 (or maybe both) with the type 3 component being evident from his [[Knight Templar]] attitude, and the type 4 component being apparent from his earlier talk (if he means it) about how [[Freudian Excuse|his wife was taken from him and he "learned the hard way that there are those in the world without decency, who must be fought without pity."]] The sign of [[Put Them All Out of My Misery]] itself is in his conversation with Bruce Wayne about the prospect of destroying Gotham.

{{quote| '''Wanye''': You're gonna destroy millions of lives.<br />

'''Ducard''': Only a cynical man would call what these people have "lives," Wayne. Crime. Despair. This is not how man was supposed to live. The League of Shadows has been a check against human corruption for thousands of years. We sacked Rome. Loaded trade ships with plague rats. Burned London to the ground. Every time a civilization reaches the pinnacle of its decadence, we return to restore the balance. <br />

'''Wayne''': Gotham isn't beyond saving. Give me more time. There are good people here.<br />

'''Ducard''': You're defending a city so corrupt, we have infiltrated every level of its infrastructure. When I found you in that jail, you were lost. But I believed in you. I took away your fear, and I showed you a path. You were my greatest student. It should be you standing by my side, saving the world. <br />

'''Wayne''': I'll be standing where I belong. Between you and the people of Gotham. <br />

'''Ducard''': No one can save Gotham. When a forest grows too wild, a purging fire is inevitable and natural. Tomorrow the world will watch in horror as its greatest city destroys itself. The movement back to harmony will be unstoppable this time.<br />

'''Wayne''': You attacked Gotham before?<br />

* In ''[[How the Grinch Stole Christmas! (novel)|How the Grinch Stole Christmas]]'', the Grinch wants to remove the holiday from society because he finds the mindless joy, celebration, and materialism annoying (Type 3) and also because the singing hurts his ears (Type 2). In [[How the Grinch Stole Christmas (film)|the live action film version]], it's revealed that it's really a case of Type 4 - the Grinch subconsciously desires revenge for being ostracized as a child because of his odd appearance.

* [[The Dragon|Ishamael]] has elements of this- he teamed up with [[Big Bad|the Dark One]] because he came to the conclusion that the endless repetion of ''[[The Wheel of Time]]'' made life pointless misery, and he decided to end it by simply breaking the Wheel (which would also have the effect of destroying the universe).

* ''[[Larry Niven|World of Ptavvs]]'' demonstrates this in its most basic form, with the last survivor of a telepathic alien race stranded on Earth and surrounded by humans, their unshielded minds boring into his. In fury, he blasts a powerful command: "STOP THINKING AT ME!" [[Empty Shell|Quite a number of people do]], and everyone else in the world is left dazed. This isn't a matter of lack of control, by the way--heway—he views all non-telepaths much the way most humans view cattle, and if they must be sacrificed for his comfort, well, it's not like they're ''people'' like him.

* Subverted in the ''[[New Jedi Order]]''. {{spoiler|Onimi}}, the real [[Big Bad]], has a lengthy [[Motive Rant]] in which he describes to a captive Jaina Solo how horrible his life has been and how he's going to ''kill every living thing in the galaxy'' so he can ''become a god'', all to get back at the gods he believes in, because he thinks they ruined his life (oh, and he also thinks Jaina is the avatar of one of these gods). The subversion comes because contrary to what {{spoiler|Onimi}} thinks, rather than making him sympathetic, this rant just makes him come off as very, ''very'' [[Ax Crazy|insane]].

* Prince Gaynor the Damned of the ''[[Corum]]'' series by Michael Moorcock. Long ago, he was [[The PunishmentCurse|cursed with eternal life]], and he joins the side of some [[Eldritch Abomination|Eldritch Abominations]]s who are trying to plunge the world into an eternal winterland where everything will die--hencedie—hence, he will finally achieve the death he yearns for.

* The Evil Queen in ''[[Once Upon a Time (TV series)|Once Upon a Time]]'' convinces other fairy tale villains to go along with her plans to cast [[EndoftheThe End of the World Asas We Know It|the dark curse]] by telling them that it will create a world where they can finally win and get ''their'' [[Happily Ever After|happy endings.]]

* "[http://www.lyricsfreak.com/s/soundgarden/blow+up+the+outside+world_20128135.html Blow Up The Outside World]" by [[Soundgarden]].

* ''[[Exalted]]'' features the Neverborn, an example of Type 5. Once, they were Primordials, the creators of the universe, but as they designed it, they didn't believe the cycle of death would ever need to incorporate something as grand as themselves. So when they ended up getting killed, they found they couldn't pass into Lethe, eventually undergoing the cosmic equivalent of sepsis without ever being able to die from it. So they plotted to feed Creation into Oblivion, mainly so it'd stop the pain.

** {{spoiler|Seymour}} in ''[[Final Fantasy X]]''. His backstory transforms him from an [[Omnicidal Maniac]] to a [[Well-Intentioned Extremist]]. He was subject to [[Fantastic Racism]] due to being born a [[Half-Human Hybrid]], then was [[Forced to Watch]] his mother perform a [[Heroic Sacrifice]] to save those people while his father nodded approvingly when he was twelve. Is it any wonder that he [[Go Mad Fromfrom the Revelation|Went Mad From The Revelation]] that the church that encouraged all of this was in fact [[The Necrocracy]] dedicated to [[Medieval Stasis|keeping things this way forever]]? From that perspective, destroying Spira to put an end to its pain is simply the obvious conclusion of the state religion's position that ''death is peace!'' It's hard to [[Take a Third Option]] if your entire existence is based on denying such a thing is possible.

* Purge from ''[[Space Channel 5]]'' Part 2 could be considered this if you take the time to read the profiles for some of the Rhythm Robots and his own profile.

* The [[Big Bad]] of ''[[Arcanum: ofOf Steamworks and Magick Obscura|Arcanum]]'', {{spoiler|[[Omnicidal Maniac|Kerghan]], first of the necromancers}}, plans to kill every living thing in existance before allowing himself to die, because {{spoiler|he died once already and discovered that the afterlife is a state of eternal peace, whereas life is pain and misery. He brought himself back from the dead in order to carry out his plan, claiming that people only fear death because they do not know the eternal bliss that lies beyond. Also, because living necromancers can summon the spirits of the dead back from the afterlife, so he himself cannot be certain that his eternal peace will not be disturbed by the living.}}

{{quote| '''Bender:''' I'm so embarrassed. I wish everyone but me was dead.}}

{{quote| '''Calvin:''' I wish I was dead... Wait, no I don't. I wish everyone ''else'' was dead.}}

{{quote| '''Bender''': I've come to free you from your complicated lives! ...the "complicated" part, not the "lives" part.}}

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