Imagine if Flash Gordon's Ming the Merciless was explained as being an orphan who never got to play on the see saw with other little kids and his life and death on the balance arena was a call back to his tragic childhood of neglect. --- Okay, that would actually be pretty funny. But still, you get my point.

 

Well, it kinda worked for Magneto. And ONLY for Magneto.

 

Yeah, that's exactly what I'm talking about.

I don't even think it worked for Magneto, at least not for me. I sympathize with the boy he used to be, but the man he is now? He's a terrorist with a master race ideology, just like the people who hurt him as a boy. To hell with him.

 

Yeah, I too like bad guys who are just bad guys. There are people in the world who are simply evil.

Ha ha! Yep, evil alright. I've heard, though, that apparently our physical bodies, including our brains, change based on our behavior. So the impulses could be evil because of Megatron instead of the other way around.

 

I agree, there is no need to give villains tragic backstories.
It's much more interesting and would show more skill and effort from a writer to give the audience a somewhat logical reasoning behind their actions that makes you go: "You know, he/she is totally despicable. But I can understand their intentions. They are not just randomly doing shit for the hell of it."

 

I feel like the Aligned/IDW Megatron backstory works because 1) we see that the present, villainous Megatron is still a powerful and dangerous force to be reckoned with, and 2) in the case of IDW Megatron, he has to earn his redemption. He doesn't suddenly become good, it takes two years before he truly renounces violence and is willing to fight to save what he believes are organics. He has to face the resentment, hatred, and mistrust of the Autobots, and those who do forgive him on some level still suffer for simply being associated with him. Nothing about his redemption is sugar-coated.

I can see the appeal of a Megatron who appears out of nowhere and becomes a deadly terrorist and eventually a tyrant, but I feel like he is one case where the backstory augments the character. Plus, even without the redemption, there is an element of tragedy, that he could have been a hero, but chose the dark path instead.

 

I don't know that it defangs them for two reasons. The first is that there are always people like the aforementioned Joker, who by all appearances is simply a psychopath who likes to watch the world burn for the sake of destroying it; learning his story, how ever tragic to see your father gut your mother in front of you, doesn't in any way excuse shooting Babs Gordon. Does it explain where the evil originated? Sure, but so does Adam and Eve and an apple, but that still doesn't excuse embracing evil. A rabid dog may still be a dog, but it's also still rabid. The second is that on some level, every person has the capability for great good and great evil. To me, these are the more terrifying villains because they make the choice to embrace evil. In some ways, even the Joker falls into this category too, along with Palpatine and Vader, because he, and they, know what he does is the wrong thing and simply doesn't care because it literally provides him pleasure. That is a sick type of mind.

Where does Megatron fall in that? I would venture he straddles the line, but he is a very clear example of the dangers of choice (he and Darth Vader being excellent examples). Some times, the development of a character by showing the choices that take a well-intentioned person and leads them to their deal with the devil, that's fine, but don't excuse the choice that was made because there was another choice. There has ALWAYS been a choice, and it's the choices we make that eventually define us.

You can certainly tell their story without making them tragic, and we can still empathize with them, but at some point you have to say there is a line and right and wrong have to stand firm.

 

Joker shot Babbs

By the way love the post

 

Fixed! Thank you!

 

I don't know, it defanged Vader for a good while until Rogue One. As for guys like the Joker, the tragic background is just an irrelevant distraction from his moral choices. As you pointed out, in the end it comes down to the villain's choices. Regardless of backstory, they made the choice to become a monster. Once they've made that choice, who gives a damn about their history - they made the choice. Plenty of people in their situation didn't choose to become monsters. Hell, a few people with the same tragic past ended up using it as a catalyst to become something greater.

I get what you're saying, but too often, in fandom and in the fiction itself, I've noticed a tendency for the act of explaining a villain to become the act of excusing him.

 

G1, i would argue that Sky/jetfire Never really switch sides because he was never really a decepticon

 

evil neurons?

It was just an internal defense system LOL

 

I think the bad guy is whomever tries to crash their planet into the other planet to kill everything and take it over....  

 

Well, remember, in the first year of toys, ALL the Autobots were land-based vehicles and ALL the Decepticons were fliers and handheld devices (faction determined by alt-mode, or vice-versa?!).

So when the Jetfire toy was launched - as an Autobot - the writers of both the comics and the cartoons had to give him a Decepticon origin, then have him switch sides, because at that point in time jet Transformers couldn’t be Autobots.

In the comics Jetfire was built by Shockwave as a lifeless drone, and then later given an Autobot personality by the Matrix. In the cartoons he was a friend of Starscream’s on Cybertron, and switched sides when he was revived on Earth. In both media, he was initially depicted with a Decepticon insignia.

Jetfire openend the floodgates for both factions to be much more diverse in terms of what alt-modes they could assume. It was only a few months after Jetfire’s release (Jetfire, Shockwave and Skids hit the streets earlier than the other ‘1985’ figures - those three toys actually came out in late 1984) that figures such as Powerglide, Cosmos and the Constructions eventually rolled out.

 

Evil brain impulse - Transformers Wiki

Check it out, they actually do refer to them as evil brain impulses in the episode itself. The Autobots even ride one of them to get to where Megatron is thinking his evil thoughts to  




I do sometimes wish other series would emulate this kind of insanity. Could you imagine how it would be in DOTM when Optimus finally realises Sentinel has betrayed him when he glances into his brain and sees these dragon-worms swimming around?  

 

The obvious answer for the Joker is that the Waynes died in front of Bruce and how he chose to become something other than a murderous monster, though he became a monster nonetheless.

As for Vader, I don't necessarily agree that it defanged him. He did some pretty monstrous things in the time between Revenge of the Sith and A New Hope. Granted, a lot of it was in the books, video games, and comics that Disney filed under Legends, but they are still there.

 

I'm not sure I agree with this, at least not in all instances.

There's something to be said for the unfathomable malice of a protagonist whose reasoning and backstory are unexplained/unrevealed, who comes out of nowhere to wreck shit up and isn't there to be reasoned with or sympathized with. That's a threat, a naked, visceral threat, and the uncertainty of what's behind it can heighten the tension that goes along with it.

You can, however, heighten that tension in the same way using background information or tragic backstories. Devastating personal experiences can aggravate the animus of the antagonist towards the protagonist, and help explain (if if by humanizing the villain or potentially making them appear a more sympathetic or relatable character) how they simply would not, could not resist whatever ends they're pursuing against the main characters, how determined they are, and what they're capable of (both physically and morally). Khan in the Wrath of Khan might be a good example of this. You could also appeal to the tragic backstory as a way to explaining the mindset or abilities of the villain, in sort of a "this is what they went through, and it wasn't their fault, but that really messes you up so that's what the main characters have to deal with now". It can make the eventual triumph of the main characters bittersweet, but can more deeply invest the audience in the conflict between them.

Really, however, it depends on the intent of the creator, and even then there's probably better and worse ways to do things. If they want to deal in an 'uncertain/grey areas' story where the audience themselves is conflicted in who to root for or is meant to feel sort of bad no matter who wins, then yes, making the villain have a tragic past is one way to approach that. Likewise, it can be used in a more 'black/white' conflict to explain more precisely what the main characters have to overcome. How you'd use these backstories, and very likely the backstories themselves, will differ significantly based on the desired impact on the audience, and are really only one possible tool in the toolbox for a good writer.

I saw Vader as an example earlier, and you could probably use him as a pretty good example of both approaches I mentioned above, and I think that use of both 'styles' is a reason why people find the effect so muddied. Or maybe it's because of the sort of disjointed sequence in which we see the parts of Vader's arc revealed? Think how differently audiences would see him if the prequels had come out first, and we see this sad little orphan kid stripped away from his only family, overcoming various conflicts and realizing his amazing potential, only to be undone by his own inner struggle and devoting that staggering power to the pursuit of his own anger, hatred and despair. And then the next film we see him in is Rogue One, where we see what the result is of those decades of twisting and focusing that power. And then in the next film, A New Hope, we know that terrifying force, driven by tormented power and decades of harsh experiences, is what our new heroes are up against.

 

With regard to your first paragraph, the Joker from The Dark Knight is a perfect example - he's more of a force of nature than a human being.

Your points about story-telling technique are all sound, and I've got no problem with giving a villain a backstory - like you said, a backstory can explain a villain's methods, skills, and motives. I think that it's the only way to do so, even if it's barely touched on in-story. I just don't see how making it a tragic one for sympathy points adds to the villain's menace. I can see a tragic backstory highlighting the difference between the hero and the villain - they both suffered the same thing, yet chose different paths - but the story going "oh, pity the villain for his tragic backstory" while said villain is murdering all and sundry tends to provoke a "do I look like I care?" reaction out of me. It depends on the audience, I suppose - some audiences eat that sympathy-for-the-devil stuff up with a spoon. Magneto has had fans for decades, and Loki's got fangirls out the wazoo.

 

I don’t put much stock in that issue

I felt the more poignant part is that all the decepticons were either spy like equipment or weapons/war machines while all the autobots were civilian transports

HAD TO?
Sorry but I say horse poop..lol

Do you remember the toy commercial, it opens with saying that tired of having no support in the skies the autobots built Jetfire

They could’ve gone with that

I’m very familiar with all that, and again I repeat he was never really a decepticon.

In the comics , From what I recall ,Shockwave built him but wasn’t able to give him a personality because by that time Buster had the creation matrix program, so he was a lifeless drone just following orders

By the time he was given life programming optimus had the matrix back
In the cartoon He was civilian/non-aligned explorer/scientist that crash landed on earth somewhere between nine and 4 million years ago, when he was found by the decepticons, including his best friend he sided with his rescuers not joking nothing about what they represented

And as soon as he did turned his back on them, He just was never really a member of their ranks

The Dinobots also came out in late 84

 

I was just joking my friend