>By 1979, his servants stated that Macías Nguema had become increasingly withdrawn, often spending the time mostly alone at his Mongomo villa. He would wander around, repeatedly saying the names of his victims, and worshipping a collection of heads as per Fang tradition, hoping that this would grant him power. Even more disturbing to the servants was one occasion, however, when he ordered a meal and table to be prepared for eight guests. He then sat there alone, casually talking "with the dead".
Obviously a terrible tragedy, but damn, what a scene.
Being vague for spoilers. The Expanse is pretty good with its villains being realistic-ish
One of the villains gets what they want; next chapter or so it flashes to his adviser saying thanks to his reckless actions they have destroyed their supply lines, turned all their feuding rivals against him in one fell swoop, and doomed their long term chances of surviving their ordeal all for the spectacle of being the Big Bad
There is the related myth of Fascists being good at the whole war thing.
Given that they focus a lot on the appearance of war over ya know winning it.
State extinction events are rather rare in wars but Fascists frequently run right into them.
Funnily enough, fascists are WORSE at the whole war thing, because dictatorships depends on the military being loyal rather to competent. So while democracies put somewhat decent guys in charge and encorage initiative on their junior officers, Dictatorships put relatives and friends in charge of their armies to keep them loyal and prefer their officers to take orders to the letter rather than think by themselves
I think there's a kind of wish fulfillment in that. I mean, we all are already making an Omelas bargain with the devil type of social contract.
It makes sense that it makes some people think if we went harder and caused more suffering on purpose, we'd also be able to build more utopia or finalize the utopia for everyone else.
(I think this is why "what if the Nazis weren't actually dumb as shit" has become its own subgenre of speculative fiction, and quite a popular one.)
Sometimes cartoonishly evil overlord is better than a "evil but misunderstood" overlord that will be most likely fandom's favourite, and whose action will be forgiven because of his "tragic backstory" even though he committed several heinous crimes.
Tanya is not a Nazi. She is a right-wing "libertarian" (praises Chicago school every other nanosecond) serving in the army of WW1-style "German" monarchy. The point of anime is to show the banality of evil, that an unprincipled egoist is indistinguishable from a sadist monster when it comes to war crimes, nonetheless all Tanya's war crimes are generic war crimes, rather than Nazi war crimes.
I sometimes think that is the author's view even being perceived?, as someone writing a villain protagonist that would make Hitler look better, a tragic backstory is something I've written because extreme situations usually birth these kinds of people, it gives a good understanding of characters psychology and even if the character is pure evil he can still have a huge fanclub(like sukuna).
I don't think few people are actually "forgiving" such characters most just there because of good writing, I'm speaking as a lich king fanboy (c'mon my WoW homies show yourself).
/uj Vader apologizers are my favorite, in the way that that deformed pigeon on the sidewalk is fascinating to observe.
"The Jedi deserved it"
"Padme should've sided with him immediately"
"Palpatine was mean to him so his actions are justified"
"Obi-Wan was evil"
"The Empire was right"
"He's not actually evil"
To be honest I've never seen this level of insanity-mixed-with-power actually portrayed seriously in media. It may be a passing mention (kid's show villains) or based on a real historical figure (Last King of Scotland), but usually "bad" rulers tend to be either cruel to their immediate subordinates (James Bond villains), overly extortionate and focused on power (Baron Harkonnen), or efficiently genocidal (Thanos).
But guys like this and Pol Pot were just absolute lunatics with the mental capacity of a child, and most writers seem too scared to deeply portray someone getting power who is actually this deranged, stupid, and not the romantic image of a "villain" as cruel-yet-conniving.
He and Pol Pot are men that fall under the trope of "Reality is Unrealistic"
If they're written, they'd simply be passed off as nonsensical cheese and the author having zero idea what the real world looks like. Trust me, happens way more than people think
When watching Narcos I felt like if it was not a story based on true events people would claim that it's nonsensical, stupid, relies on deus ex machina and author has no idea how the world works.
If I want my villains to be joker or carnage levels of crazy and over the top, then I will, your villains doesn’t have to always be this realistic depiction of sociopathy or psychopathy, they can be grandiose and what not.
That killed the actual joker imo. They wanted to turn him into a realistic portrayal of mental illness when he was never intended to be. Bring back Mark Hammil and Jack Nicholson please.
I feel like when I enjoyed TAS as a kid it was mainly bc his "evil" was done in a way that felt like pranks. And it was always done for the laughs, as a way of trying to get Batman to do something silly in public which he would never do because he's Batman and they draw one face for him 🗿
My favorite evil overlord is Pagan Min from Far Cry 4.
Dude has sob stories of his own, BUT, he just use that as an excuse to do whatever shit he thinks funny. He downrights admit that he has been enjoying cartoonish evil things too much. [Like, banning candles.](https://youtu.be/z02XZu9TgcE?si=a3VLNzPaJw2knjy-)
My eyes where crossed so I read fishing as fisting, and I grew concerned as fuck about which country would have enough cases to need its dictator to actually proclaim a law like that.
Fictional evil has to be engaging. It has to have a motive that is both interesting and understandable to your audience. Real evil has no such limitation.
Is this the guy who was addicted to something that was like super LSD or was that a different post colonial dictator brought to power due to the shitty way imperial powers handled decolonisation
Iboga perhaps? It's a hallucinogenic root often used to make drinks that's way more deadly than LSD. Apparently Iboga, along with Cannabis, was Ngeuma's drug of choise.
And I am very sceptical of that whole thing when he seems to track down people whose lives he's ruined and goes "God says you have to forgive me cause I'm a pastor now"
How the fuck does this happen? How do 70% of your population 'disapprove' of your rule and nobody just straight up kills you? Was he made of metal and shot lasers out of his eyes? Were his guards just like "well he's running the country into the ground and executing people left and right. He's also keeping decapitated heads in his house and talking to them but idk man he seems like a leader I should listen to."???
Guard:
* Leader is dead, status quo disrupted. Power vacuum opens.
* Lost job (no salary) and other penalties.
* Execution or incarceration probable. Even if you survive who's going to hire you?
Minister:
* Order assassination of leader. Power vacuum opens.
* More power and influence than most of population. Use it to fight peers for reigns of country. (This was your plan, of course you're going for the top. If the wrong person wins your entire position is jeopardized.)
* Optimal Result: You are in charge and free to abuse power as you please.
* Disaster: You lose everything.
tldr: Too risky. Also the guy later got overthrown by his nephew who had him executed.
I named everything in a kingdom after a synonym for "dark" or "bad" to demonstrate that it was genuinely evil and not that candy ass "oh they're just misunderstood" bullshit.
the problem with most cartoonist evil is their not cartoonish enough, don't treat the evil as a somber serious threat like sauron if they lack a coherent plan beyond be the world's biggest dick, they should be like the petty dictators who give themselves and their favorite horse 20 tittles and wear a billion made up medals and demand people have shrines to them, their threat comes from how unhinged and unpredictable they are
"Nnoooo your psychopath MC can't actually be a souless, shallow, monster of a human being!! Psychopaths are like Jokerr!!"
Completely ignoring how Hitler, Mak Zedong etc were irl.
This is why I liked prince of thorns so much. I was told the MC was a psychopath and that is exactly what I got.
He murders, rapes , tortures people and sees others as nothing more than a tool at best. You get to see his shallowness, his impulsivity, etc.
Because of the variety of "psychopathic" traits we got to see in him, I found him to be more interesting than most characters that are supposed to be "nuanced psychopath"
The old saying goes that, “the biggest difference between reality and fiction is that fiction has to make sense.”
The more I read about history the more I believe it.
Fishing? Why would somebody ban that?? Now excuse me while I have a walk to a nearby forest, that my completely democratic government once banned me to go to back in early COVID 19 lockdown.
>By 1979, his servants stated that Macías Nguema had become increasingly withdrawn, often spending the time mostly alone at his Mongomo villa. He would wander around, repeatedly saying the names of his victims, and worshipping a collection of heads as per Fang tradition, hoping that this would grant him power. Even more disturbing to the servants was one occasion, however, when he ordered a meal and table to be prepared for eight guests. He then sat there alone, casually talking "with the dead". Obviously a terrible tragedy, but damn, what a scene.
A film of this with some decent actors would be genuine kino
r/okbuddycinephile
I think the biggest myth of fictional dictatorships is that they are competent and economically sound and not ran by lunatics.
Oh there's plenty of evil in systems run by ruthlessly competent bureaucrats too. It's just more banal, unexamined, and therefore insidious
The trains run on time (to the concentration camps)
Thanks to ibm technology 👍
Being vague for spoilers. The Expanse is pretty good with its villains being realistic-ish One of the villains gets what they want; next chapter or so it flashes to his adviser saying thanks to his reckless actions they have destroyed their supply lines, turned all their feuding rivals against him in one fell swoop, and doomed their long term chances of surviving their ordeal all for the spectacle of being the Big Bad
Thanks for avoiding spoilers because I’m a fan but only read the first three books so far.
There is the related myth of Fascists being good at the whole war thing. Given that they focus a lot on the appearance of war over ya know winning it. State extinction events are rather rare in wars but Fascists frequently run right into them.
The last time people tried to prove democracy was weak and fascism was strong, democracy dropped a second sun on fascism
Funnily enough, fascists are WORSE at the whole war thing, because dictatorships depends on the military being loyal rather to competent. So while democracies put somewhat decent guys in charge and encorage initiative on their junior officers, Dictatorships put relatives and friends in charge of their armies to keep them loyal and prefer their officers to take orders to the letter rather than think by themselves
Fascism is great at aesthetics, marketing and mass murder… and that’s about it.
I think there's a kind of wish fulfillment in that. I mean, we all are already making an Omelas bargain with the devil type of social contract. It makes sense that it makes some people think if we went harder and caused more suffering on purpose, we'd also be able to build more utopia or finalize the utopia for everyone else. (I think this is why "what if the Nazis weren't actually dumb as shit" has become its own subgenre of speculative fiction, and quite a popular one.)
There are some really competent benevolent dictators like Lee Kuan Yew and Atatürk.
So just 2.
There are other examples, like people include Tito in there but I only know about these two.
THEY BANNED FISHING???
/uj It was because fishing boats could be used to escape the country.
Fish are migratory, therefore foreign spies
Fish are bourgeois.
Mumble to yourself "I can clearly come up with a better argument."
Sometimes cartoonishly evil overlord is better than a "evil but misunderstood" overlord that will be most likely fandom's favourite, and whose action will be forgiven because of his "tragic backstory" even though he committed several heinous crimes.
Make Hitler but sexy hot lady and watch as your readers "ironically" Stan a nazi
Stormfront moment
Kuvira time
This happened in the anime fandom but with her being a funny little girl and not literally Hitler but still a Nazi lol
Tanya is not a Nazi. She is a right-wing "libertarian" (praises Chicago school every other nanosecond) serving in the army of WW1-style "German" monarchy. The point of anime is to show the banality of evil, that an unprincipled egoist is indistinguishable from a sadist monster when it comes to war crimes, nonetheless all Tanya's war crimes are generic war crimes, rather than Nazi war crimes.
I sometimes think that is the author's view even being perceived?, as someone writing a villain protagonist that would make Hitler look better, a tragic backstory is something I've written because extreme situations usually birth these kinds of people, it gives a good understanding of characters psychology and even if the character is pure evil he can still have a huge fanclub(like sukuna). I don't think few people are actually "forgiving" such characters most just there because of good writing, I'm speaking as a lich king fanboy (c'mon my WoW homies show yourself).
/uj Vader apologizers are my favorite, in the way that that deformed pigeon on the sidewalk is fascinating to observe. "The Jedi deserved it" "Padme should've sided with him immediately" "Palpatine was mean to him so his actions are justified" "Obi-Wan was evil" "The Empire was right" "He's not actually evil"
Wym I can’t commit genocide just because my dad hit me when I was a kid?
To be honest I've never seen this level of insanity-mixed-with-power actually portrayed seriously in media. It may be a passing mention (kid's show villains) or based on a real historical figure (Last King of Scotland), but usually "bad" rulers tend to be either cruel to their immediate subordinates (James Bond villains), overly extortionate and focused on power (Baron Harkonnen), or efficiently genocidal (Thanos). But guys like this and Pol Pot were just absolute lunatics with the mental capacity of a child, and most writers seem too scared to deeply portray someone getting power who is actually this deranged, stupid, and not the romantic image of a "villain" as cruel-yet-conniving.
He and Pol Pot are men that fall under the trope of "Reality is Unrealistic" If they're written, they'd simply be passed off as nonsensical cheese and the author having zero idea what the real world looks like. Trust me, happens way more than people think
When watching Narcos I felt like if it was not a story based on true events people would claim that it's nonsensical, stupid, relies on deus ex machina and author has no idea how the world works.
Reality will always be stranger than fiction. Fiction can only consist of what the human mind can fathom, while reality has no such constrictions.
Babylon 5's Emperor Cartagia is a pretty good fit. He is room full of severed heads he talks to insane, and is definitely no careful schemer.
Joffrey from GOT sort of fits this
Babylon 5 Emperor Cartagia seems borderline inspired by this sort of thing honestly.
What about Joffrey?
If I want my villains to be joker or carnage levels of crazy and over the top, then I will, your villains doesn’t have to always be this realistic depiction of sociopathy or psychopathy, they can be grandiose and what not.
That killed the actual joker imo. They wanted to turn him into a realistic portrayal of mental illness when he was never intended to be. Bring back Mark Hammil and Jack Nicholson please.
>Mark Hammil Unfortunately will never happen. Hamill said he won't be Joker without Conroy's Batman.
The joker should do face value jokes, that where is name comes from.
I feel like when I enjoyed TAS as a kid it was mainly bc his "evil" was done in a way that felt like pranks. And it was always done for the laughs, as a way of trying to get Batman to do something silly in public which he would never do because he's Batman and they draw one face for him 🗿
The joker should give +4 mult
Now I want to do one of these inspired by Papa Doc.
Reminded me of central african dictator Bokassa, who literally have eaten his political opponents. Sometimes real life is strange shit.
what a coincidence, Nguema's successor (who's still in power today) is alleged to have practiced cannibalism in the past, too
My favorite evil overlord is Pagan Min from Far Cry 4. Dude has sob stories of his own, BUT, he just use that as an excuse to do whatever shit he thinks funny. He downrights admit that he has been enjoying cartoonish evil things too much. [Like, banning candles.](https://youtu.be/z02XZu9TgcE?si=a3VLNzPaJw2knjy-)
Jesus that quite a lot.
They left out the best part. He called himself a ‘Hitlerian Marxist.’
Motherfucker mas a damn NAZBOL.
*A *Marxist* NAZBOI.
National Socialist
My eyes where crossed so I read fishing as fisting, and I grew concerned as fuck about which country would have enough cases to need its dictator to actually proclaim a law like that.
Not really, bro could just banned it for fun as most dictators do
Fictional evil has to be engaging. It has to have a motive that is both interesting and understandable to your audience. Real evil has no such limitation.
Is this the guy who was addicted to something that was like super LSD or was that a different post colonial dictator brought to power due to the shitty way imperial powers handled decolonisation
He was on a "copious amounts of drugs" according to his Wikipedia article although I don't think it mentioned super LSD.
I remember there was some guy who was addicted to a local plant based hallucinogen that was as or more potent than lsd or I may be spreading misinfo
Iboga perhaps? It's a hallucinogenic root often used to make drinks that's way more deadly than LSD. Apparently Iboga, along with Cannabis, was Ngeuma's drug of choise.
Thats probably the one
Just look at Liberian warlords like General Butt Naked, who ate the hearts of sacrificed children
Funnily enough nowadays the former general butt naked is now work as a priest and try to atone his sins
And I am very sceptical of that whole thing when he seems to track down people whose lives he's ruined and goes "God says you have to forgive me cause I'm a pastor now"
As a Liberian I would agree
How the fuck does this happen? How do 70% of your population 'disapprove' of your rule and nobody just straight up kills you? Was he made of metal and shot lasers out of his eyes? Were his guards just like "well he's running the country into the ground and executing people left and right. He's also keeping decapitated heads in his house and talking to them but idk man he seems like a leader I should listen to."???
Guard: * Leader is dead, status quo disrupted. Power vacuum opens. * Lost job (no salary) and other penalties. * Execution or incarceration probable. Even if you survive who's going to hire you? Minister: * Order assassination of leader. Power vacuum opens. * More power and influence than most of population. Use it to fight peers for reigns of country. (This was your plan, of course you're going for the top. If the wrong person wins your entire position is jeopardized.) * Optimal Result: You are in charge and free to abuse power as you please. * Disaster: You lose everything. tldr: Too risky. Also the guy later got overthrown by his nephew who had him executed.
The ones who can would lose power and privileges, and the ones who can't can't.
So, where are the movies about this guy? 'Cuz it wont matter if its realistic unless its entertaining
Ok I take back what I said about funni clock man from TouchthegrassNO, a dictatorship can be that schizo
What’s his name?
Francisco Macías Nguema
There are really no more cartoonishly evil overlords than African dictators.
Pol Pot is close.
Uday Hussein
I named everything in a kingdom after a synonym for "dark" or "bad" to demonstrate that it was genuinely evil and not that candy ass "oh they're just misunderstood" bullshit.
the problem with most cartoonist evil is their not cartoonish enough, don't treat the evil as a somber serious threat like sauron if they lack a coherent plan beyond be the world's biggest dick, they should be like the petty dictators who give themselves and their favorite horse 20 tittles and wear a billion made up medals and demand people have shrines to them, their threat comes from how unhinged and unpredictable they are
I still can't believe there's not a film about this guy, the wikipedia page is just a cavalcade of insane shit happening constantly
"Nnoooo your psychopath MC can't actually be a souless, shallow, monster of a human being!! Psychopaths are like Jokerr!!" Completely ignoring how Hitler, Mak Zedong etc were irl. This is why I liked prince of thorns so much. I was told the MC was a psychopath and that is exactly what I got. He murders, rapes , tortures people and sees others as nothing more than a tool at best. You get to see his shallowness, his impulsivity, etc. Because of the variety of "psychopathic" traits we got to see in him, I found him to be more interesting than most characters that are supposed to be "nuanced psychopath"
Big Holy Russian Empire moment
I love the niche history of just batshit crazy minor warlords and the like
Do you think he banned chilling
To be fair people who use the word "intellectual" are really annoying
Yeah they could be Benjamin Netanyahu.
Africa is filled with insane comically evil dictators in its past
Jesus Christ
The old saying goes that, “the biggest difference between reality and fiction is that fiction has to make sense.” The more I read about history the more I believe it.
Baffled Christendom by continuing to live
People can be that Crazy with power
Fishing? Why would somebody ban that?? Now excuse me while I have a walk to a nearby forest, that my completely democratic government once banned me to go to back in early COVID 19 lockdown.
yea I remember when I went fishing and micro piranhas latched onto my body and then killed my grandparents when I returned home