Villain Opening Scene: Difference between revisions

 

{{examples}}

* A lot of ''[[Detective Conan]]'' stories open this way as well.

* The first episode of ''[[Dragonball Z]]'' opens with Raditz landing on Earth and killing a farmer.

* In the North American version of ''[[Kirby Right Back At Ya]]'', the very first episode opens with an immense, evil crimson octopus Demon Beast/monster called Octacon attacking and eating a whole flock of sheep to a Cappy farmer's horror before flying back to King Dedede's castle. This scene actually switched places with the original Japanese opening scene where Kirby is flying through space asleep and eventually comes into orbit over Popstar in the dub.

** Also, the episode "Masher 2.0" begins with Knuckle Joe in a battle against a newly-rebuilt Masher 2.0. And not doing too well against it. At least he does well against its helpers, some of Nightmare's kaiju-esque monsters seen in Meta Knight's flashbacks.

* ''[[Arashi no Yoru ni]]'' begins with Giro and his pack of wolves attacking and killing Mei's mother, who tells her son to run away into a nearby forest for his own safety. Just right before she bids her son goodbye and is killed by the wolves, the mother goat attacks Giro and bites off one of his ears.

* ''[[Pokémon: The First Movie]]'' begins with Mewtwo destroying the very laboratory he was created in, killing all of the scientists inside, and immediately escaping.

 

* ''Many'' films in the [[Disney Animated Canon]] have such a scene.

** ''[[Aladdin (Disney film)|Aladdin]]''. Okay, so it actually opens with the Merchant, but straight after it goes to Jafar. This is also true with ''[[The Hunchback of Notre Dame (Disney film)|The Hunchback of Notre Dame]]''.

* The 1986 ''[[Transformers: The Movie]]'' opens with Unicron eating an inhabited planet.

* ''[[Recess: School's Out]]'' opens with the villians stealing the weather-altering laser.

* Several ''[[Godzilla]]'' films start off with either Godzilla or the monster he's going to fight in the films.

* The Joker's bank robbery in ''[[The Dark Knight]]''.

* All three original ''[[Star Wars]]'' films open with a shot of one or more Imperial Star Destroyers (though the Rebel Blockade Runner is seen first in ''A New Hope''). ''Return of the Jedi'' most closely fulfills this trope with its first scene featuring Darth Vader.

* ''[[Dirty Harry]]'' begins with the first Scorpio murder. More accurately, it starts with a pretty girl taking a swim in a rooftop pool, then zooms out at length until we see the barrel of a sniper rifle...

* ''[[Clash of the Titans]]'' opens with ''a'' villain, King Acresius of Argos, crossing the [[Moral Event Horizon]] by sentencing his daughter and baby grandson Perseus to death by exposure in a sealed boat cast upon the waves. Of course, Acrisius dies only a few minutes later, so he's not the main villain of the film, but he is responsible for Perseus being raised as a commoner on an island rather than as a prince.

* ''[[Star Trek: The Motion Picture]]'' opened with V'Ger and ''[[Star Trek V: The Final Frontier]]'' opened with Sybok. (The status of both as true "villains" is somewhat debatable, though.)

* ''[[Stargate (film)|Stargate]]'' (the film) opens with Ra abducting his future host and slaves. (We don't see Ra himself, but we do see the host and Ra's ship).

 

* ''[[The Coldfire Trilogy]]'' by C.S. Friedman begins with a scene with the villain (although it's from the viewpoint of his wife).

** Also somewhat subverted- {{spoiler|Tarrant}} is undeniably ''evil'', but he turns out not to be the main villain. {{spoiler|That's Calesta, who isn't introduced until the middle of the book}}.

* ''[[Intensity]]'' by Dean Koontz opens with a scene about the villain, from the villain's point of view.

* Ken Follett writes amazing books like ''[[The Key To Rebecca]]'' and ''[[The Eye Of The Needle]]'' where the villain starts out as the main character, with the readers' sympathies with him, and then the focus and sympathies begin to slowly shift to the hero.

* Many of [[Robert E. Howard]]'s ''[[Conan the Barbarian]]'' stories begin with such a scene:

** ''[[The Phoenix on the Sword]]'' opens with Ascalante plotting with Thoth-Amon to kill Conan and take the throne.

* Each book in ''[[The Thrawn Trilogy]]'' starts off with a scene on an Imperial Star Destroyer, in a [[Continuity Nod]] to the original trilogy's openings with shots of a Star Destroyer. Its primary fuction is to establish Thrawn's tactical genius.

 

* The very first scene of ''[[Buffy the Vampire Slayer]]'' featured not Buffy, but Darla. It looked like the guy with her was a creepy predator, but then she ate him. (Driving home the whole "helpless blondes in this show aren't actually helpless" thing).

* Any number of detective shows, e.g. ''[[Columbo]]''.

* ''[[NCIS]]'' generally opens with the crime they'll be investigating, villain generally included but not identified.

 

* The first scene of ''[[Theatre/The Ring Of The Nibelungs|Das Rheingold]]'' begins in comedic fashion with the Rhinemaidens playing around and teasing Alberich, but ends with Alberich renouncing love so he can steal the Rhinegold to forge it into the Ring and become the [[Big Bad]].

 

* ''[[Ninja Gaiden]]'' II for the ''[[Nintendo Entertainment System]]'' starts with Ashtar, mastermind of the events of the first game and primary antagonist through most of the second game relaying orders to a subordinate.

* Many ''[[Ace Attorney]]'' cases start with the crime, some of them (mostly the early ones) [[Reverse Whodunnit|clearly depicting the villain]].

* ''[[Tales of Monkey Island]]'' starts out with LeChuck and his captive Elaine near the Rock of Gelato at the very beginning of Chapter 1, all on [[It Was a Dark and Stormy Night|a dark and stormy night]].

 

* [[MAG-ISA]] -- [http://mag-isa.thecomicseries.com/comics/pl/119128 In the prologue of this comic], we get to see how the demons manipulate people.

* ''[[Sluggy Freelance]]'' does this for the "[http://www.sluggy.com/daily.php?date=060814 Phoenix Rising]" arc. Also, the "[https://web.archive.org/web/20081214133743/http://72.36.141.236/daily.php?date=081201 bROKEN]" arc begins with a section titled "Year in the Life of a Villain."

 

* The first episode of ''[[Freakazoid!]]'' begins with a news report on Cave Guy, a minor supervillain, wreaking havoc and confounding the police. The narrator then directs our attention to the [[Batman|one hero with a chance at stopping him]], adds that he's owned by another network, and settles for a nerdy teenager named Dexter. [[Incoming Ham|Or is he...?]]

* Aku from ''[[Samurai Jack]]''. He even narrates the opening credits every week.

* A couple of ''[[Danny Phantom]]'' episodes opened with [[Big Bad]] Vlad. The most devious one might be "Kindred Spirits" where the opening unfolded his plans to make a perfect clone.

* The first episode of ''[[Thunderbirds]]'' opens with a scene of the Hood monologuing to himself.

 

{{reflist}}

[[Category:Beginning Tropes]]

[[Category:Villains]]

[[Category:Scenes]]