Cartoons where the bad guys have no reasonable motives versus ones where they do

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viciously_delicious

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Sometimes it seems like some cartoon villains have very weak or nonsensical motives for being bad. I think one of the worst examples of this is Captain Planet. Sure, some of the bad guys had a profit motive but there were others who just seemed to enjoy wrecking the environment for giggles. Their plans seemed like they would be super expensive and of no benefit even to the villains.

Others have some vague plan, like capturing a mystical doo-dad or finding out a secret. And then there are rarer ones where the villains actually have motives that make sense. I guess Magneto wanted to make things better for his kind in X-Men, for example.

So, what are some good examples of nearly nonsensical villain behavior and motivations? What are some examples of well thought out motivations? Either single episode appearances or overall villain series arcs would make good additions to the discussion.

Also, which do you prefer? Bad just to be bad or bad for a reason that makes sense?
 
What did Gargamel want with the Smurfs again? Turn them into gold or eat them or something? I could never quite figure out what his problem was.
 
It was different in different episodes. Considering there are only roughly 101 Smurfs either way, it doesn't seem like a productive thing to waste your entire life on.
 
Ali from Gundam 00's a recent example of a villain who's evil basically for the sake of evil.
In one example out of many, he brainwashes a bunch of kids (one of them being a main character) to kill their own parents.

There's also what Nena did to Louise's family.
 
For me to ultimately care about a villain, their movies have to be sensible. I really hate it when a villain is bad just the show needs a villain, or when they try to give them a reason but it's never really elaborates on it much aside from a quick blurb to attempt to make the villain more than a cardboard cutout.

A great example I would use is Phobos and Nerissa from W.I.T.C.H.: the Animated Series. They both have similar actions, but their motives are completely different. Phobos amasses power and conquers planets for no reason other than the divine right of kings. He wants to control everything and cares nothing for who or what gets in his way. Nerissa on the other hand, was once a Guardian of the universe. She began contemplating that the only way to truly protect them was to rule them. Under her, there would be no war or suffering or injustice in the world. She also has standards which relates to this motive; she does not kill or harm innocents for no reason, only people who get in her way and people who are necessary sacrifices in order to reach her goals. She also desperately wants her friends and family to see her vision, as it's important for her that her friends and family to accept and agree with her method so they can all enjoy life in a utopia together. She has, on plenty occasions, refused to kill her friends and family when they opposed her; something you could attribute to her eventual downfall: for a "villain", she's too nice.

Their interaction with one another over the course of the series offers a nice look onto their differences and similarities. Phobos scolded Nerissa for acquiring all the power she had but not utilizing it to do anything, and Nerissa criticizes Phobos because while he used his power often, he had no vision outside of conquest to satisfy his own hunger and her goals were beneficial to everyone in the universe. As stale as Phobos' motives were, it offered a great contrast to Nerissa's goals. It also helps he was such a manipulative and interesting tyrant to watch.
 
I can't really decide which sort of villain I like better. While I do lean more towards the villains who have some kind of motive or reason for doing bad things, I'd be a liar if I didn't admit that there are villains I like who are evil simply for the heck of it (*coughFantomascough*).
 
Really a villain can be evil with seemingly no reason, if that character is used in a comedic manner or seems like an actual psychopath.

Compare 80s Shredder to 03 Shredder, you can argue that they were both evil for no reason, but only one of these characters seemed truly evil, will other seemed like a goofball pretendng to evil. No hints in guessing which was which.
 
A lot of new shows have taken the route of The Joker, who just does evil because he likes to see crap happen, and not because he necessarily craves power or anything. There is always that one villain who is just bat-crap insane, and does things because he or she is just evil incarnate. Like Mirage from the Aladdin series.


Villains who have somewhat of a noble streak are trying to enslave or rule because it's their "birthright", even if said birthright never once mentioned enslaving or taking over a race.
 
Gargamel at one point had a song he regularly sang in which he stated he wanted to both eat and turn them into gold. What I could never figure out is that TWO Smurfs were created because of him (Smurfette & Sassette), so why not just create his own smurfs to eat/make gold from?
 
For the most part, they never meant it litterally. Sure, cities would be demolished, but the actual planet would be in one piece.

Sometimes, the villain is just insane. One example is Dark Megaman from Megaman NT Warrior. He impersonates Megaman, almost kills his friends, and then tries to frame him. He does all this just to annoy Megaman!


Sometimes, the "villain" has a good reason. An example is Duo from Megaman NT Warrior. He thinks that Earth is full of evil, and by destroying Earth, he will have eradicated all evil. I know, dumb, but still a reason.
 
In most cases the "destroy the world" card is only played by a villain as a desprite act after their attepts to take over the world fails. It's basicly pride mixed with a "if I can't rule the world, no one can" mind set.

Other times the destory the world villain could have a twisted noble reason for doing so. Such as the D-Reaper from Digimon Tamers. The D-Reaper is esentually an anti-virus program that saw humanity as a Virus and to it destroying the world was the only way to save it.
 
In some cases, the villain would have another world to retreat to. As an example, Krang and Shredder's attempts to destroy the world could be taken seriously because they'd have Dimension X to retreat to afterwords.

Another example would be Invader Zim, who would have (at least in his mind) the Irken Empire to return to.
 
The Almighty Tallest, leaders of the Irken empire on Invader ZIM, had no motives other than to feel important. Those were still very vague motives, though. Most of the planets they've conquered are slave planets with specific jobs, since they're just trying to give their work some sort of use. This list includes Foodcourtia, Callnowia, and......did they ever announce the name of the parking structure planet?
 
Ooh. If he can make a girl Smurf all he needs to do is make or capture a boy Smurf and breed them like chickens! I guess that would make a rather effed up cartoon, though.
 
If I'm not mistaken wasn't Sassette created by the younger Smurfs because they wanted a playmate like Smurfette? Or is my memory fuzzy?
 
Yep---Sassette was created by the male Smurflings out of wanting to give Smurfette another female Smurf to pal around with.

Re: villain motivations:

I generally prefer villains to have some sort of motivation (even if it's a generic one such as "take over the world"/"I hate the "), versus "I'm doing this for no reason because I'm craaaazy/eeeevil". Maybe one reason I never liked current/recent versions of the Joker (if I want to see people do nihilistic grim stuff for no reason, I've already got the easily-more-frightening-than-clown-boy-could-ever-be evening news, thanks...).

The Hacker on "Cyberchase", despite being a PBS cartoon for kids, has an actual goal---conquering all of Cyberspace to rule/spread chaos as he sees fit, with some of the attempts involving trying to kill off its sitting ruler (Motherboard) to do so. Which would seem to put him past "Arthur"'s Binky Barnes in the threat-level territory... ;-)


-B.
 
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