Why Our Villains Are Different Now (Thanos, The Joker, Killmonger) - Wisecrack Edition 

I was expecting both young and old magneto on here

You mean you understand why Malcolm X wanted to be free from racial oppression 'by any means necessary' but you don't agree with him yet you understand him. I understand.

@@ucanthandledatruth01 Some movies really like to make you think about your own morals ngl when I saw the xmen movies it made me think that not everything could be solved without violence.

@@ucanthandledatruth01 Very nice analogy. Ultimately, the 'most peaceful' approach will prevail but there has to be a Magneto/Malcom X to the Xavier/MLK for the oppressed to have more than one option leading to freedom.

Gr8NonSequitur me too, I was lowkey team Magneto. I wanted him to win 😅

In the same way antagonist does not equal villain. *no sarcasm*

what makes a villain a villain and not just a bad person?

Agreed.

Y'all please have a great and or blessed life always.

@@hetalianotaku7103Y'all please have a great and or blessed life always.

or Homer Simpson. .... and we're still paying the price of those characters existing, that give people the image of "it's not a big deal if you screw up.... everything will right itself up"

Mind control. Now this whole generation is soft and words hurt them.

@@bcn1gh7h4wk Yea no

Idk, that might just be the structure of a cartoon series. If every problem facing the hero's life is resolved you can't really make new episodes. Like you can say the same thing about Tom and Jerry, or Coyote and Roadrunner, and those were from the 40's

Reminds me of why i stopped watching bobs burgers. Come to think of it ... i was kinda in a bad place when i watched that show.... huh.... wonder if thats connected. Lol

yeah think about it. islamist terrorists are freedom fighters of sharia law. to them, the world MUST submit to islam as islam is the only way to salvation

Hardcore History?

@@transsexual_computer_faery Catholicism is the same way thats how they justified the scramble for africa and taking over the America's. I think more for Islam though is fighting to take back their countries from foreign interests. If another country was raping your resources and giving the profits to an elite that supresses your interests youd be pretty pissed to

@@L_M185 the best example, the on people won't disagree with, would be The Troubles with Ireland and England, where the Irish were terrorists to the North Irish and the English but freedom fighters in Ireland, fighting for freedom from an occupying force.

technological akshually ༼void༽ spaghetti seeds not really lol. they’re “freedom fighters” fighting against american/western intervention and presence. they’re not fighting to force the world to submit to islam, rather they use islam to rally people to their cause.

i agree

Gary Oldman too

That, and whatever amount of Ledger!Joker’s credit comes from the “Dead Artists are Better” Trope alongside that critically acclaimed performance. Aaron Eckhart and Gary Oldman are still alive and kicking, but while the former is pretty much recognized solely for Harvey Dent, the latter has a long and storied career of characters to talk and meme about. Of course Heath Ledger died too young and too soon, but it’s been 10 years now - it’s okay not to wonder what could’ve been anymore. He left on a hell of a good note.

Aaron is the one playing two face, right? I guess my questiong it shows how overshadowed he is

Also the scarecrow

Bro for some reason I thought you were talking about the movie not the show and spent like literally 3 minutes just being confused.

@Idris Corvus Twas but a brain fart.

what movie??

2 decades

@@meesterbrown There was never a movie.

@RavnDream we can still understand him tho

The lackluster films make the characters forgettable. You’re right though. Magneto is a great anti-hero

@RavnDream black ones? Or are we only considering the suffering of members of white society?

@RavnDream everywhere where eurocentrism dominates and dictates what type of criminal activity is punished. Mental institutions and prisons are very much like the concentration camps you speak of. The worst part about the concentration camps is not the it's an 'concentration camp' that outrages white people, it's that it happened to white people. Black people were contained in many 'concentration camps'/prisons and mental institutions for many years. There were even policies passed which enabled the malevolent business to use black people for base profits. The dystopia type zones blacks were forced to live in were socially engineered to resemble concentration camps.

@@ucanthandledatruth01 wow... Just wow... But what can I expect from somebody with nickname "you can't handle the truth"

I would argue that they were not merely "trying to do the right thing". Generally speaking, they used the noble intention to mask the fact they were violent sociopaths. Vulture had all the money he could need, but continued to sell weapons to criminals to fund his lavish lifestyle. Zemo bombed the UN, killing hundreds, to break the Avengers apart. Could you empathize with them a bit, sure. But they were still pretty horrible people. Same with Killmonger. His grand plan was to avenge the past injustices to black people by perpetrating those same injustices on everyone else. Way to take the moral high ground.

Neither of those two had "noble intentions".

I dont know about zemo but I could definitely see myself feeling the same way as the vulture. He doesn't really do anything different from stark

Every man/woman can become crude, ruthless and diabolical driven by the corrupted system. Even if they want to change the system, it doesn't make them a hero, a true hero is the one holding the flag of morale and justice even being shattered by the world, establishment and the system. That is exactly why Joker made more sense to most adults, more loved also, while Batman remains true hero.

Vulture is a guy that doesn't know how to roll with the punches and zemo is a revenge story because his family got squished

Apocalyptic stories have had a long history in the United States. If you look back at the 1950's, you get a lot of them based off of fears from nuclear war and the impact that would have on future societies, like "Teenage Caveman" or "Terror from the Year 5000". You also had a similar theme of destruction through accidental side-effects of nuclear energy, like "Beginning of the End", "The Deadly Mantis", or "Amazing Colossal Man". They reflected a general anxiety over M.A.D. strategies with the USSR at the time.

Independence day could only work in that brief time period before 9/11

So politics has always influenced things.People should stop complaining about current affairs being shown in today's media (movies,shows,games etc)because they always have.Its just that it becomes less visible in classics (time)

And then there's stories like The Walking Dead where there is no longer a common societal system at all, amd different pockets of humanity are essentially battling to see which fledgling system has the will and right to survive into a worthy replacement for a lost status quo.

How about the futuristic dystopian movies..they reflect probably the fear of the society of where our world is headed. In most of them villains are the ones who either created it or not aware that they are in one. And I don't see the point in what the heroes does in those movies whether it's trying to get the world back to normal (whenever that is..) or make a new future, 'cause we are destined to repeat the past no matter what.

I knew that didn't sound right lol

"there is no such thing as an absolute, timeless enemy"

So you're saying Hitler did nothing wrong?

@@kegluneqs1011 I'd say that's true for the label of enemy, not the state

@Vex Eon I think that rn without having to insert myself 100 years ago

@Vex Eon Expect Hitler didn't care about his people, and actively repressed the groups trying to make things better in the country. He was a megalomania who rode a wave of public anger to power.

Kill Monger is less justified than Malcom X Malcom X changed his viewpoints and became more pacifistic near the end of his life.

Malcum X used harsh language to point out unpercieved truths that were conveniently burried under buerocracy and "niceness". Malcom made theoretical arguments about how things could go down if ppl in power continued abuse, hoping that this percieved threat wouldnt become real if enough people in office feared retribution. However he argued that the willingness to die for a cause must first exist in reality to force change.

@@DrSPF23 malcom x pre pilgrimage to mecca is probably more accurate.

Not really. T'Challa isn't a pacifistic reformer. (Not until he changes his mind at the end.) He's an isolationist. He's not trying to solve the world's problems at all. He just wants to keep himself and his own kin from having to deal with any of it, which he does by refusing to interact with the outside world at all. Killmonger does want to go out and solve all of the world's problems, but he's too angry and bitter, so he turns into an extremist, tyrannical asshole (which won't solve anything anyway, just make everything worse). That's the central conflict--"Just do nothing and stay out of it so it doesn't affect me" vs. "Burn everything down because I'm so pissed off about how fucked up the world is". Philosophically, MLK vs Malcolm X is more like "To change the world, we have to be morally superior to our enemies, and try to make everything better for everyone" vs. "No, we should only care about what's best for our own people; fuck everyone else."

@@macdeus2601 That's his father. His whole arc is that he figures out that his father was wrong and he doesn't have to blindly follow in his footsteps.

The most underrated villain in the MCU, honestly. A really bold and subtly brilliant move on the screenwriter's part, especially considering, up until him, the MCU had no clue how to craft a villain who wasn't just a one-note psychopathic mirror image of the hero. Zemo was a fantastic baddy, I wish more superhero projects had villains like him.

I concur with your assessment. What was remarkable to me was that so many RU-vidrs who review movies accidentally or deliberately, in my opinion deliberately, ignored your views- Oh, and fornicator-faces that say - "Well, kieran10202's post was dated months/years after my review, so how could I know about it" - you're too stupid to comment on this discussion. Zemo had no superpowers, no superscience, no plan for world domination, no plan to purge humanity of its undesirables, no plan for racial supremacy, no pinocchio syndrome, no "adopted child doesn't fit in psychopathic sociopathic jealous of sibling" syndrome, no genocide to make things better syndrome... He was a man completely and utterly broken by the senseless deaths of his wife and children by the direct and indirect actions of the Avengers and wanted revenge. And he succeeded.

I love the MCU Zemo because he's just a nobody with a few resources, his cause is in line with the Sokovia Accords, only his personal loss has turned that cause into one of revenge. He's a complex villain because of his relative nothingness to the Avengers, he doesn't know any of them, has no grief with any of them as individuals, and would possibly even get on with a lot of them, his issue is that they have a lot of power, and the fallout of that power is ignored, disrespected, and fatal, and I think that is beautiful design in a villain.

@@robofistsrevenge3288 Sadly the fact that Zemo just gets quickly forgotten is by design. The Russos and the screenwriters did a good job in creating a complex villain but by virtue of the fact that this story is Civil War he had to take a back seat to the fact that technically Iron Man had to be the main opposing force throughout the movie and needed to be the final antagonist. Zemo was always going to be forgotten. But I'm happy they didn't use that as an excuse to be lazy in writing him.

@@cptnraptor Here here! :)

Outsmart & Outwork are you paid by wisecrack?

Great video!

Yeah.

Now screw the story, and do what we say !

Yeah, tear it down for a 1 world gov't !

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@@Spartacusse It's not often that we see Corey Booker in the comments section . . .

RU-vid is owned by Raid: Shadow legends

which eventually we'll get to the point where villains are humans and heroes are human, then what? they're exactly the same how are we supposed to have a good story if it's essentially just "i had a bad day and want you to feel bad" and the hero is just like "wow, that's life, how are you the bad guy?"

That's not what he was trying to say lol he was saying that it's scary to realize that each of us being human have the capacity for evil. And Bruce wished he was just a monster as it would be easier to write that off and not trouble your mind with that thought

My favorite scene of the entire Gotham series.

@@TheTrains13 falling down

@@TheTrains13 imagine using a slippery slope argument to advocate for dumber and less complex stories.

That's an interesting thought. This is why we may sympathize with the former because they're doing something we have always felt like we have to do but haven't because of reasons. I've always resonated with villains who try to solve the problem of overpopulation and humans exploiting nature by trying to give the world a fresh start. Ultron in Avengers: Age of Ultron was one such villain and so was the villain in Inferno.

@@hittingyouoverthehead I don't know if I personally resonated with those kinda genocidal bastards, but they definetely were interesting!

@@oswaldrabbit1409 Why not resonate with them? Think about it. Take Thanos for instance. His cause is very noble one and unlike what he did in Gamora's planet, he simply snapped half the population away without hurting them or causing them any pain of any sort. One would argue he solved the problem without any bloodshed.

@@hittingyouoverthehead Noble goal? Killing half the population at random isn't exactly kind, nor is it particularly humane considering eventually the population would get large again, and he'd have to repeat it again. Every time that happened, the instability and chaos it would cause is unimaginable, quite cruel honestly so no I don't particularly resonate with that.

The number of times a conflict is made up of the later on both sides is astronomical

I think zombies are popular because it's hard to get into trouble with the PC crowd in killing them. They no longer have souls according to most 'gaming' source material. They are just reanimated corpses. So they are fair game. (I think the ideal of zombies in movies and games are just adaptions for entertainment. A good 'Book to Read' on the topic is titled: The Serpent and the Rainbow. Yeah a book. lol) To me zombies and pandemics aren't villains. Why? They can't adapt to the actions of the hero. A good villain is mostly a hero who discards morals to achieve his own ends. He provides the focus of what is wrong and motivates the hero to right action ... mostly. Every one's ideal of a good villain is different yet they all share one trait .... almost everyone loves to hate them. Says a lot about our nature doesn't it? lol

The PC crowd? Did you know the word "Mafia" is never used in The Godfather? Why? Because the studio didn't want to offend the Italian American Anti Defamation League. Studios have always been trying to avoid controversy with big investment films. The "PC crowd" isn't anything new or significant.

For @@TeaQualizer. I mentioned the PC crowd more or less as a measuring stick. That is to say: if they can't find problem with killing hordes of zombies then it's a Safe Bet that almost no one will. I also agree that they aren't new. To say they aren't significant in today's world of social media? Hm. I bet ole Joseph Goebbels is turning over in his grave over the fact that he was born 70 years too soon. Scary to think what he could do with the tech we have today if he was alive. Yet, if history has shown us anything it's that names may change but the nature of opportunist don't. There is always some one some where waiting in the wings.

I think zombies can be seen as a form of forced collectivism and equity. Everyone is equal when they are dead, or part of the unthinking herd, seeking out and devouring anyone not like them. The terminator, matrix, and plagues are about a fear of what we create, if our creation will turn against us, and when it's to late to stop it. While also getting us to think about the morals and ethics of how, why, and what is created. Again I see this as a possibly rally against collectivism or how we get there. For IT and Kruger I think it was mostly about facing your fears in order to survive and grow, with Pennywise's forms being picked from the kids subconscious. And Kruger picking surroundings and scenarios from the teens lives(if I remember correctly. It has been a long time since I've been to elm st.) And for almost all movies listed there is the primal fear of being hunted, or escape from persecution, and freedom from the unthinking masses.

@@brokefangmagepunk3685 I think you make a great point in that a good story makes you stop to think about the ethics of what was created. I believe Mary Shelley's book Frankenestein (written during the Victorian Era) does this really well. Taking responsibility for not only what we create but the far reaching consequences of that creation. Honey, what are we having for dinner? O, we're having FrankenFish. :-)

Or the White-Gray-Black System, where you have the Good Guy (Hero) vs. an extremist good guy (Antihero/Villain, Think the Punisher) vs the bad guy.

@@lgmmrm The punisher isn't really gray, and if you're gonna call him that then you'd have to put most of his villains in that category too. Even in his best case scenario the punisher is always a Villain Protagonist. That isn't to say that his antagonists are good guys, but it absolutely is to say that he isn't.

@@1Seanmb At worst he's an anti-villain. He isn't a full-on villain whatsoever.

"Unjust System" appears to have no good guys or bad guys in it...thats..thats kind of depressing.

Joker didn't have to do anything

This is not true for all the villains. Some of them are simply driven by hate and jealousy which is somewhat understandable. Voldemort for instance suffered a bad childhood because of the way the wizarding society looked down on having relationships with muggles. Logically, he should have done something along the lines of forcing Wizards to accept muggles but he went the other way. He hated his father who was a muggle and hence set out to create a world where wizards ruled over muggles.

Magneto is NOT an anti-villain. The dude wants to murder all non-mutant humans; that's... very much a villain. A character's not an anti-villain just because their motive isn't money, or "for the lulz."

@@PoochieCollins he’s a villain to non mutants. But hero to the mutants who have been oppressed by non mutants. Hero and villain is all about perspective.

@@98ore : that goes true for most villains.

@person person ich liebe eine kartoffel saft am dienstag

@person person tookas bro

That comes from old literary traditions, and is something I like about it. In Chinese historical fiction, for example, its messy and violent history wasn't often oversimplified into good guys vs bad guys, it was just groups of people with the same goals, but in a "this town isn't big enough for the two of us" kind of way. They both want the same things, but can't both have it at the same time, so there is inevitable and sad conflict. Nihilism plays an interesting role in it though, like in Romance of the Three Kingdoms, where all the characters are morally complex, but all end up failing their goals in the end of a decades-long conflict. The whole time, they keep talking about the glory, prosperity, and unity they want to bring, and they all die before finishing their battles, and so the book's message ends up being that even great men can't fight the currents of history, and that history is a cycle that will continue irrespective of human desires. It's interesting because the characters are the opposite of nihilists, but that is used as a sort of character flaw by the author.

Most people are known only by their actions which shows their true character. Thus if you never had the movie tell you their good intentions you would only see their actions and have no choice but to call them evil.

you mean like Cao Cao from War Of the Three Kingdoms (2010) all episodes can be found on youtube btw, he's the coolest guy on the show and they show him as the antagonist-antihero dude

he was foreshadowing instagram filters lol

He know in part that, he dosent like wakanda culture because in general a) it was wakanda who kill is father to preserve their way of living and b) he belive you can only be respect by force.

Well T'challa already pointed out to him that he changed so much he act like people he hate.

@@GigawingsVideo That is true

Lol I think you figured out what makes him a villian and not a hero. He talks about the struggles of people, like you said there culture, the taking of black culture and land by the white and them making it their own. He uses that as a justification of his own to take from those he perceives as helping that culture by taking from it to take back culture and land. He is a radicalist who believes that change can only happen through destruction. the protagonists believe that cultural change happens through each generation learning from the mistakes of the past, that we all have to work together to make the world a better place. my problem with the movie is that the mcu doesn't seem to have changed because of this. all the main characters already knew about this and nothing has changed as of infinity war because of it. then after infinity war I don't think the effects of their reveal will actually help the people it was supposed to help.

Killmonger is an interesting character. He grew up in America; bitter and twisted at what happened to his father. He then becames super woke and collectivist about black people in general, because.... America?

After watching I can say.. All of the movies... ;). For other people with this question, this video does spoil a lot of big films spanning from the 50s until now. (Edit: Think a long the lines of Ben-Hur, Jaws, One Flew Over The Cuckoos Nest, Jaws, Star Wars, Scarface, Rocky, Die Hard, The Dark Knight, The Departed and more recent films like Black Panther)

This is something I always hated about Watchmojo and other top tens. Warning for spoilers at the beginning doesn't help if I don't know what I have and haven't seen just let me know as they come up in the video to give me time to avoid them or inform me beforehand

ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-74BzSTQCl_c.html

Many of them.

Basically every good movie with a villain.

So it was fictionalized.

@@LunaBari It was rebranded as SPECTRE, an independent criminal syndicate, for the films IIRC

Also, the name is a blend of two Russian words meaning "Death to Spies". Leave it to the Russians to be that intense and specific with naming a gov organization.

Good advice

I disagree I think you can do both

All of which will completely misunderstand his rise and followers, as well as further wedge apart the world at large.

Oh Yeah!

That's not a nihilist. A true nihilist sees no intrinsic point or value in anything so why exert so much effort into destroying something you think doesn't matter

@Mr Dudemangeezermate thank fuck for that!

Κυριάκος Tss are YOU paid by wisecrack?

Wisecrack: Look like If Comic Sans and Papyrus had a baby... RU-vid: This video has been demonetized for promoting incest.

I could imagine it inspiring villans of negligence, politicians of nations and such who are fine but aren't always good enough to keep everyone safe. Nothing interesting enough to make into films though.

Yes! I wonder the same thing.

And Hollywood's political veiws are most of the time not reflected of what we think or like. With the exception of basic things we all agree on.

Oh, damn, thank you random comment. I can not believe I didn’t think about that

Also: 1) studios and directors differ in the extent to which they focus on catering to a US public or an international/global public. 2) Many of the villains shown here are based on novels or comic books and have a backstory they need to serve. Often in books the villains serve to portray specific social, cultural and/or political views, but get dumbed down in the movies to cater to more popular entertainment needs or in same cases even the other way around (e.g. Tyler Durden in Fightclub)

@@milton7763 there no words to express how much I agree with you... So I guess all I can say is that... I do, in fact, agree with you.

Omar Guillen you disgust me

@@marlom7882 Don't be dickish

I would pay to read that

@@LordSmilesalot i think he's referencing the "you people disgust me" gif i.imgur.com/2k8p4mi.gifv

There must have been a lot of boning going on then

Schadowization Productions Well you know, it’s not like it’s actually a good or meaningful twist.

To be fair, it was really obvious

It was mentioned there would be "tons of spoilers" at the beginning of the video. You were warned.

Dee T He said/showed it before the warning

A painfully obvious twist to a pathetic underdeveloped villain. Big deal

It just makes it all the more murky when the so called good person just bring harm onto their own by being too soft.

Ethan Gray Funny thing is.. evil people can call themselves good. And Good people sometimes mistake themselves for being evil.

True, and you know what they are right. Evil and good is completely subject to opinion so if you think something is evil or good then it is... to you. Others may disagree, but that's what violence is for.

Ethan Gray Good is good. But sometimes boring and stable. Evil is exciting, chaotic and sometimes fun. Too much good is a life one can't fathom. Being perfect too much? Oh God. But completely engulfed by the darkness? Nope, that isn't wise, you'll eventually lose everything even if you have everything. I guess people have to live a balance diet of good and evil.

Ethan Gray So basically monks.

Pffft, Griffith is a saturday morning cartoon villain veiled in heroic imagery, to be quite frank. Which is, btw, also by his own design. That's the genious.

I know

@@alchemicpunk1509 Let's listen to the LoL salty player... he sure can tell us all about good writting 😂 Boy, if Griffith is a " _saturday morning cartoon villain veiled in heroic imagery_ " , then Heath Ledger's Joker is just a try-hard edgy character with no dept made for impressionable children

Of course, interpersonal conflict is indeed the strongest (if the conflict is between people). The ideology gives a reason for the conflict oftentimes, because the hero and villain often have the same goals.

That actually happens to be my opinion of the Nolan Joker, the role is carried by Ledger's performance alone. xD

Insanity is a legal defense not a DSM-V classification

Darth Utah 66 - No. They went from having greedy, selfish motives to having relatable, selfless motives.

@@scottk1525 You'd have to be insane to beleive that Scott K, thats how evil works. it makes you think that its right

​@@lookbehindyou7906 That's basically what I said. Villains these days have "relatable, selfless" motives because one can at least see why they think what they're doing is right. Thanos is a good example. As opposed to villains of earlier times that were just in it for the money, or world domination, or whatever.

@@scottk1525 and yet i have a hard time in finding Thanos believable, because his motives are too stupid and shortsighted for someone who leads an intergalactic force. The Problem he´s seeing is not really existing and even if, his solution would just shift it towards future generations and cause tones of other problems on the side. His thinking seems to primitive for his character.

So the next blockbuster villain will be from... Dragonball Z and Steven Universe?

@@LowestofheDead I haven't kept up with DBZ past GT but idk Frieza can be talked down xD

I think we already caught a glimpse of this in Spider-Man Homecoming. Not necessarily a villain-turned good, but a villain who’s motives you could understand, and who in the end could understand his own defeat to the point of not giving away the person who defeated him

Mass effect 1 did it already with Saren.

Good reference to Mass Effect. The most intense encounter I can remember in a video game was talking Saren into standing down.

Heck, even in one movie a USSR general backs off because he sees how fucked up it all is, and gets iced by the main villain, a former MI6 agent.

saying that bond didn't fight primarily the USSR (also communist china) in this period is patently false.

@@snarckys3063 Oh don't get me wrong, he certainly did but it was more in the case of "we are enemies because of politics" rather than a strict "the other" eneminity. He fought them because they were an enemy nation in a political context, not because they were "the evil communists". Also, I don't think you can talk without bias on any political conversation with your avatar being a photo of Pinochet, just sayin

@@manuelsaavedra8081 Yes I know it's pinochet, it's not a political message, it's just a funny profile picture of some dictator with sunglasses, "serious" face, and crossed arms. A ridiculous "serious" pose. That's all there is to it, a silly profile pic. As for your argument, you just formulate it yourself : of course it's evil commies, precisely because "we are enemies because of politics", i am from the uk, the western bloc, so you communist, you're the ennemy, you're the other, of course it's "the other" thing, no matters how you choose to formulate it, in the Bond stories, books or movies, the communists want to conquer the world, and Bond as the protagonist and hero stop them. That's it.

More interesting though is that SPECTRE are closer to the "Illuminati" - a kind of too-extreme for most Soviets force of covert Globalist conquest, that use Communism (and frequently Capitalism as well) to achieve their goals but it's highly doubtful that they themselves care about the plight of the proletariat or something. At that time there was 0 political controversy in having something like that as the enemy, as it was pretty non-contentious to view people with genocidal plans, hell-bent on destroying your nation in order to rule the world as an obvious evil. Only today is anything I just said able to be interpreted as "controversial".

It depends upon whether you are talking about British-style or American-style antiheroes. In Britain (where we get the word antihero), the antihero was conceived as a person with no heroic qualities. Not somebody who did bad things, just somebody who wasn't brave, or strong, or who had no goal or purpose, and was unable to get what they wanted. In other words: a regular person, because regular people are rarely heroic in the traditional mythical sense. Willy Loman from Death of a Salesman (an American play) is a great example of a British antihero. In a cultural context, this type of antihero represents the anxiety that comes with a feeling of helplessness, the feeling that we are small and powerless and that we have to live out these meaningless lives of college, job, family just like everybody else. In this view, there's not really any good or bad, no morality play to take comfort in because things aren't often good and evil, just average. The American antihero, which I assume you're talking about, is the antivillain seen from the other side of the street. It's somebody who wants to do good, but in a way which is either unacceptable or questionable, ethically. The difference between the antivillain and the American antihero is rather blurred. The defining difference is perspective. If it's the protagonist, they are an antihero, if they're the antagonist, they're the antivillain. Another defining characteristic is the character arc, particularly whether it's positive or negative. If the character ends up learning something and becoming better, they're more likely the antihero, and if they have a downfall and become worse, they are an antivillain or villain. Take Marvel's Wolverine compared to Star Wars' Anakin Skywalker. Some characters completely blur this, though, like the Punisher. The Punisher tells himself that he does what he does to save innocent people from the suffering of his family and picks up the slack left by ineffectual or even moronic bureaucracies, and protects the innocent relentlessly when they're in danger, just like Batman does. But the Punisher also destroys the families of the gangsters he kills, creating orphans and widows, and directly sabotages the same social justice which acts as a bulwark against society becoming like the Old West. He is part of what he hates, but is unwilling to admit it. At the same time, Punisher stories have strongly implied that he loves violence and murder, and can only express his true self on a battlefield, and so used his family's deaths both as a way to shrug off the burden that family placed on his identity and as an excuse to manufacture an endless war against targets capable of fighting back and who can easily be labeled as worthless because of their crimes. So is he a good guy or a bad guy? I'd personally call him an abhorrent villain (even though I love the character), but many others see him as a hero.

These "new brave" villains are anti heroes but the plot demands they be villains just for the sake of conflict. essentially making some of these movies pointless

@@MountedDragoon damn, that was an amazing analysis

@@MountedDragoon Really well said. Thanks for writing this.

@@MountedDragoon wow, i actually didnt know about that semantic difference. great comment. also says a lot about our different cultural ideas...

jp3813 well...

@@Maniachook4099 How could you possibly justify Micah?

I agree with everything you said except with the part where you said Infinty War is an example of a movie not tying the hero and the villain ideally which is definitely wrong the movie clearly ties Thanos and Tony as the futurist who try to solve problems before they can happen. The movie also ties in Thanos with Steve Rogers (it makes sense the movie ties in these two in particular since both Steve and Tony are considred the faces of the MCU), with the "no trade lives philosophy" Thanos wins at the end not only because he's powerful (although that's a reason) he also wins because he knew that sometimes a sacrfice must play to achieve the greater good, Cap on the other hand dosen't measure lives he saves them. This factor will definitely play a role in A4 judging by the synopsis as Steve Will learn that sometimes a sacrfice must be done. Like Joker or Killmonger, Thanos makes the heroes question if what there doing is for the greater good which is why he's considred a great villain.

@@comicculture5410 I would say that the sacrifice theme is much bigger than Cap, it applies to the Avengers as a whole. If anyone is willing to sacrifice on the Avengers side then Thanos loses. Loki is unwilling to sacrifice Thor and gives Thanos a stone Gamora is unwilling to sacrifice herself before meeting Thanos or sacrifice Nebula and that gives Thanos a stone Everyone is unwilling to sacrifice Vision including Scarlet Witch and that is the thing that causes them to lose the mind stone I see some parallels between Tony and Thanos like you pointed out but I still don't think it is enough since it isn't like Tony sees any of himself in Thanos and I'm not sure that the audience needs to see that either

@@Coolkid5800 I'm well aware that the sacrifice theme applies for all the Avengers and Guardians of the Galaxy but with Captain America is where the theme contrasts the most with Thanos. The other heroes don't want to sacrfice because whomever and whatever they'll sacrifice is something they love they don't want to sacrfice out selfishness and not considering the greater good. Captain America on Thatcher hand doesn't wan't to sacrfice not out of a selfish desire for something but because he sees that one life should stand in the way of trillions he dosen't measure lives he saves them, to him Vision's life is just as important as the trillions of lives out there. For Thanos it's the opposite in the Vormir scene as much as he loves Gamora he sees that whoever person no matter who doesn't stand in the way of (in his head) the greater good.

@@comicculture5410 I can see Cap as the polar opposite in that respect so fair enough but overall I'm not really a fan of his actions at all since he was willing to sacrifice Wakandan lives

Nathan Adeleye You made a great comment. I think villains like the Joker and Freiza are unique in that they have nothing to gain or lose as villains. They’re bad to be bad and are self aware of that. Very few are on that level as an antagonist. There’s usually something to gain or some seemingly righteous drive that pushes their agenda.

Its a shame he couldn't be brought up in this, but then again metal gear series is known for its "eye opening" moments and characters.

Much like Congress

Seems like there was just one flip.

It doesn't, it just finds more acceptable ways to be anti-communist.

@@sambradley7393 dude the boys up in hollywood are straight up marxist opportunists, nothing anti commie going on over there. They all for equity n shit

@@spaak3465 yeah those Hollywood billionaires are definitely communists yeah sure

What I never got was how a country so unanimously dead against communism could be scared of being subject to communist ideas as if they wouldn't immediately recognise them and get them shut down.

@@LouisOnAir You got it backwards

Did that Olympic boycott happen really or in the movie

Qwerty Manova 1980? Really. At least that is what history book says. There were other boycotts before and after that one. It's kind of depressing, considering the origin of Olympic games.

@Louis Hypothetical Obviously you haven't seen the protesters shouting "Trump/Russia" all while waving Soviet flags. lol Government use to try and shut down Islam and Communist, we've fought them from Tripoli to Korea yet they fought for free speech for the Nazi and KKK so obviously that let's commies speak too.

I wanted it to be less thought provoking. I hate that movies are nothing but political brainwashing pieces.

guerilla warefare tactics while fighting in a jungle

PropSpairGaming aka Commies. Except they control Hollywood now

Yep. Pretty much. And I fucking hate it! Read the manga "Berserk" and you'll get an idea of a truly great villain! Hell, even Fist of the North Star or Yu Yu Hakusho have extremely well written villains! Dragon Ball GT to it's credit had a good villain as well. Baby comes to mind. Sure, these are anime villains, but they work. Marvel's Beyonder and DC's Brainiac God (Convergeance) are better villains than these new Woke villains we're getting. The fact that people relate to villains like MCU Thanos and Killmonger just shows how cucked many people have gotten. It's pathetic really.

He's warning us not to watch the video until we have seen every movie ever made.

I was wondering ... no mention of watchmen

Ozymandias was certainly interesting, but what holds him back as a villain is that his competition or opponents where very mentally and emotionally compromised. He used Dr. Manhattan, but emotionally, Dr. Manhattan was weak, and physical power=/=mental power. Thanos went against people with stronger minds and bodies and won, although not everyone was very strong, altogether, they were close to snatching victory from him while Ozy never was at risk of losing because besides DM (who never truly was opposed to Ozy anyways), no one else was able enough to compete with him. He was a bit of a villain version of a "mary sue" who never really was challenged and had god-like intellect. Ozymandias has the advantage of being portrayed by a human and existing in a grittier and more grounded world (unless you count Dr. Manhattan). I like that Thanos was powerful but very flawed, since it adds more dimensions to his character. I'd only expect a comic book villain to have a perfect plan with almost no hiccups. I'd say they're very close, but none of that ">>>>>>>>>>>" nonsense. That's just overrating Ozy.

Vibranium Shield i just find ozy much more well written than thanos and if you go by the book and not the movie he didn’t use dr manhattan anyway

@@benhinton4613 I thought the switch was an improvement over the book. It streamlined the story and actually made more sense. Ozymandias is a better villain than Thanos. One example was his ability to have Dr. Manhattan, Owlman and Silk Spectre corrupted. Was there a better way than Ozymandias' crazy plan? One that would have brought together humanity with something instead of fear. We will never know because the other "heroes" were corrupted and compliant.

Michael Brammer yeah his character is much more interesting, thanos is just big bad guy that has this “trying to save everyone” plot thrown in at the end to cause viewers to sympathize

He did warn about spoilers

He should have list the films exemples

Her name is literally a spoiler the second you hear it. It's not that big

As if that pathetic, one note excuse of a villain is worth keeping a secret....

It’s been out for a while

I did. Whenever I saw queer coded confident villains, I did think "yeah, that's super tempting".

Heck, some modern "heroes" are even worse. Look at Jack Bauer in "24" - it's a freaking celebration of torture and extra-judicial action and his heroism isn't ever questioned by the show.

Oh that military hero worship and bow down to your government BS. Gets me every time seeing a cop show where cops break the law every single time as if they are the good guy. Makes me sick. Worst of it is on TV or radio even in comments, the thank you for your service. That crap is supposed to replace making the government keep its promises to its soldiers?

Actually his actions are questioned constantly by the show...season 7 even fixates on this for most of the season.

That’s the same kind of nonsense as “video games cause shootings.” Fuck off

Thing is all these villains media talks about are from american movies, meaning they only represent americans view on conflict, because to americans there always have to be a clear good guy and bad guy, even if you have anti-heroes, nihilists, the good guy / bad guy is still there, the attempt to veil villains as complex just goes to show how shallow most americans are when it comes to dealing with morality... wherehas you have other culture's representations of villains as complex in countries such as japan or germany where the people know and admit their countries were monsters in the past giving them better insight into villainy, unlike america who refuses to acknowledge to evils they have done... i mean for example take killmonger from 2018 and char aznable from the 80s, they are essentially the same characater on surfuce level, but char is the superior example of the well-intintioned extremist, basically kill monger was a missed oppertunity, they could have made him not a racist, i mean why killmonger, the so called critical thinker did not consider other peoples suffering? Such as ughyars or tibetans under china, or african minoraties under other africans, or any other oppressed group that is not black... because this just goes to show how far american society has fallen, to think for a moment that revenge is justified in the slightest or deserving of sympathy, sympathy isnt empathy and americans seem to confuse that.

This video actually makes it clear that these "complex" villains are there to let the media manipulate what our society is meant to reflect. The video starts off with very simple villains from the past. Post WWII and Cold War era villains are foreigners to show off a very very bad us vs them mentality. Everybody else is either a bad guy or worse than us. Then Vietnam happened and people realized that we weren't so great ourselves. So media went on damage control. Instead of presenting this honestly media scapegoated politicians and the rich but not us the good American people. If you really look at Dark Knight (besides the obvious propaganda message in the first half of the movie) Joker's ultimate reason for being there is to show the American people that we are on the side of right. This is why you see him attacking ordinary citizens and creating fear while also attacking criminals and preying on their weaknesses. The reason why ordinary citizens are only made to look desperate is to push the point in the end where they are given the power to kill the criminals but don't. We Americans aren't "as ugly" as the Joker no matter how much he backs us into a corner. But the movie also shows that we should be forgiven if we fall off the righteous path and do something wrong because even the best of us could be pushed too far like we see with Harvey Dent. Killmonger is even more on the nose about this. The whole movie is meant to promote sympathy for the black community and give them something that can be used in fiction to put them on a different standing than their former European/American oppressors. In the film we see so many times that Wakanda is somehow better than just being better than everybody else. They have spies everywhere, can speak multiple languages as needed, have technology bordering on pure magic that we don't even see on Asgard and of course there's Vibranium. Then you insert Killmonger who talks about every last thing the black community has ever had to say against the world. And he himself is the physical embodiment of every last bad thing that they can come up with. His father was killed violently at an early age because of his own criminal activity but it was righteous criminal activity so he can be sympathized (see Harvey Dent) he grew up alone in America where his kind is mistreated, he speaks about slavery and specifically that some were smart enough to know that "death was better than bondage." He also promotes the strengths and claims of black people like the idea that all people were black at one point and that there are 2 billion of them in the world. You are meant to criticize Wakanda's isolationism with him and sympathize with his anger and resentment of the world and then you are meant to praise T'Challa's final decision to open up Wakanda and show the world its true superiority and do its part for the black communities around the world. Finally there's Thanos. While many people point out that the directors shot the film in his perspective so we could sympathize with him and therefore not count him as a pure villain this isn't really the message. The true message is that Thanos is a man on a mission and he's willing to do anything to succeed. Unlike the good guys. Even when the chips are down they refuse to kill Vision until it is too late. Dr. Strange might have seen Thanos' defeat at the end so that's why he gave up the Time Stone but what we see is that he's unwilling to see Tony Stark die. We see that Thanos loved Gamora with all of his heart but could still kill her but in the face of the universe dying Quill couldn't hold in his emotions for a few more seconds. In canon none of these guys are how they are in the films. There are plenty of people that have said that Heath Ledger's Joker isn't a real Joker. Watch Batman TAS episodes like the Laughing Fish and Christmas with the Joker. That's who Joker really is. He's exactly how Heath Ledger describes his Joker but not how he acts as the Joker. The real Joker is a "dog chasing cars." He wouldn't know what he would do if he actually caught one. The Joker has no point. He doesn't care if people are good or bad or if one bad day could do anything to any person. That was just the plot to the Killing Joke in other words a one off. In the Laughing Fish he's just trying to get into the fish business and in Christmas with the Joker he's causing mayhem to give Gotham his version of a Christmas Special. All of these statements can be finished off with the words "for some reason." Thanos in the comics is doing everything because he is in love with Death herself. He actually gets the Infinity Stone and offs half of the universe just to impress her. Killmonger was even worse than that. He's just a traitor who fled Wakanda and goes back to Wakanda to take the throne by force. The reason these guys are so different and so much simpler in the comics is because not that many people read comics so they are there for pure entertainment value these days. Movies people go to so this is an opportunity for the media to make us think the way they want and have opinions the way they want us to have them. And if there was any more doubt then just look at a time when comics were read by the amount of people that go see movies today. When Captain America punched Hitler in the jaw and when Iron man ........ ummmm when Iron man was made because his rogue's gallery was basically a Red Scare campaign. (Whiplash, Mandarin, Radioactive man)

I would say that the villains that oppose nihilism and desire the re-imposition of some meaningful set of values other than profit/pleasure is a reaction against "postmodernism" rather than pop culture simply "catching up" with literature and philosophy.

This comment wants to pretend as if it's more profound than it actually is

@@apokatastasian2831 Yeah, fair enough. I deserved that :D

Buckaroo Banzai Smersh was in the novels.

@@davidraley3054 Yes, but the movies specifically changed it so avoid doing what the novels did. The didn't want Russia to be the villains and opted for a villain who didn't hold a political philosophy.

Buckaroo Banzai even if they didn’t call them Russian the point still stands, they represent the soviet threat.

@@dylanb2990 uh, no, they didn't. The movies went out of their way to NOT show Russia as a threat. The movies seemed to be criticizing both the East and West by having Spectre always playing the two off each other, which was easy to do.

Because they're obviously twisting reality for their poorly made video

Christian Tompkins I appreciate your take on it, but think it falls a bit short. Terrorism is definitely a major theme running through these movies, but it’s used as a means to explore deeper topics: exploring principles of our society, the nature of evil and particular different kinds of evil that can’t be lumped together and sacrifice and what it really means to be a hero. All the while of course wanting to deliver blockbuster action. On principles the movies explore how firm they really are (in all three movies there is a lot of emphasis on making society tear itself apart), hypocrisy of principles (“We don’t give in to thugs!” sounds noble and strong, but it comes from a man living in a closed off elite at a party where they’ll decide who they want to make the next mayor), and the cost of weak morals (“just keep our heads down” in a city about to be annihilated) and strong morals (people dying everyday until you give yourself up). On evil, the movies continuously shows different kinds of evil and how they do and don’t compare. There’s a lot of fighting the mafia with a pure money-through-extortion aim. There is a constant portrayal of an upperclass that lives and acts within the letter of the law, but writes that law to their own advantage. And the terrorists aren’t all the same either. There’s the deeply ideology driven raj al gul on the one extreme and the nihilistic Joker on the other - not motivated by the same thing at all. That’s where just calling the Joker a terrorist falls short: he uses terrorist means, but a terrorist has an ideal - the Joker doesn’t Finally, sacrifice is explored in many ways. From the ‘good guys’s’ eveyday sacrifices in fighting crime, to sacrificing Dent to save Rachel (only to find the Joker switched things up again), intent by Wayne to sacrifice Batman to meet Joker’s demand to his sacrifice of Batman at the end of Dark Knight Rises based on his own terms. And then there is sacrifice on evil’s side. Notice how Bane intended to be in the city and die with it to fulfill hos goal where raz al gul was wearing masks to shield themselves from the effect of the gas. The Joker is quite willing to take punches to the face, take the risk of Dent shooting him through the head or Batman running him over on his bike. All in all, you could say the movies invite you not to take everything at face value and reduce everything to black and white. Such as saying that the trilogy was just about batman fighting terrorists

Preach!

neglecting star wars was one of the largest flaws in this

Meditate man, read, take action and transform The World mate

"Propaganda is adapted / flavored to its moment in time."

Shhh Everyone knows that the "old days" were dumb and simple times where people couldn't grasp complex subjects. Today, we have comic book cartoon characters portray middle school-complex issues on a superficial scale; we are truly more advanced and intellectual now. /s

Ram, it's because the video creator has an agenda and he is clearly a progressive

@@billytheconqueror5803 didn't you see the /s?

doesnt fit the narrative that widecrack are developing of evolving villains, thus complex villains of the past must be ignored.

@@billytheconqueror5803 yes you clearly missed his sarcasm.

Somebody turned off there brain and didn't listen and instead got offended

Say something relevant or important or super funny

I was kidding, people.

You gotta do this, apparently.

@@princessbubblegum27 I love you

@@Natzure why u gotta be so ruuuuuuuuuuude

I wonder what will happen when they no longer have a Trump to blame?

@@jayeisenhardt1337 then people make actually try to fix stuff and have solutions instead of being lazy and blaming trump

the trend changes not just because of what "portrays as a good villain in this society" had changed, but also because the "society" is now increased (films are international not just national anymore) and also that the information we can get in what the society thinks are much more detailed now

Mr.13 But Thanos's deeper philosophical underpinnings weren't lost in the narrative.

are you actually saying that having the motivation to kill half of all life in order to romance Death is actually deep and philosophical?

@@wakamoon1910his love of death in the comics in the 70s, 80s and 90s was more about Thanos obsession with certainty and meaning in a meaningless universe. Starlin constantly had him and Adam Warlock undergo existential crisis' in which both search for meaning in what he explored as "cosmic existentialism". Thanos is plagued by dealing with an uncertain universe by seeking knowledge and power as a means to come to terms with his own struggle to grasp with his own existential crisis.

@@sergioruiz733 Well fair enough then.

shinybald36 right like I’d would hate to be mentally ill in the early days

I think a Lovecraft monster is not exactly evil in the normal sense (unless you're talking about Nyarly). They're uncaring forces of nature beyond our understanding good and evil. There is a sense of "otherness" to them, and there is an "us vs them" thing going on, but this sense alienating incomprehensible horror can just as easily be applied to distant, uncaring and bewildering institutions as well as the very modern feelings of nihilism

@@lordcawdorofmordor2549 blue and orange morality is also typical of uncaring monsters like Cthulhu.

I think the VILLAINS of The Crow (while being various degrees of awesome) are all fairly straightforwardly evil. Now the HERO on the other hand...

Yeah the only time the Hero's are the establishment is in the prequels with the republic. And even then the waters are muddled because outside the movies even though the C.I.S is ultimately portrayed as evil the Republic isn't much better.

@@anthonyrodriguez8788 the republic are establish are pretty much decadent and dumb, the C.I.S didnt really matter much in the large scale of things.

@@diegoernestovarelaparra3820 that dosent really change my point.

@@anthonyrodriguez8788 kinda, the point is even the republic is not worth saving, the problem are the sequels who jump into the same mentality which if anything fuel more the cynicsm .

Only problem, he was a villain of the small screen not cinema. Still a great villain regardless, but in a different form of media. Maybe Khan Noonian Singh is what you're looking for.

This whole comment section is a shitshow but I had to chime in when I saw this. Gul Dukat is one of my favorite villains ever. He's not even terribly complex, just charismatic and a little unpredictable.

please dont