Vincent (Over the Hedge)

"Alright, RJ. I'm going back to sleep. When that moon is full, I'm waking up. And all my stuff had better be right back where it was."

- Vincent

Vincent is the main antagonist of DreamWorks' 12th full-length animated feature film, Over the Hedge. He is a black bear who appears as RJ's arch-nemesis and former best friend. In the Over the Hedge video game, which is non-canon to the film, he reforms himself and becomes friends with RJ (once again) and the gang makes peace.

He was voiced by the Academy Award nominated actor, Nick Nolte, who also played David Banner in the 2003 Hulk film, Mulgarath in The Spiderwick Chronicles, Jack Cates in Another 48 Hrs., Frank Stockburn in The Ridiculous 6, and Burt Johnson in Arthur.

Beginnings
It is unknown how RJ and Vincent becomes friends in the first place, but they have known each other during their time in the woods.

Over the Hedge
At the beginning of the film, Vincent is RJ's only friend and often hangs out with him. One night, RJ is on the hunt for food, but is unable to reach snacks in the vending machine. He soon notices Vincent's mysterious cave from afar and quietly sneaks into his cave. Before getting his hands on Vincent's cache of food (which are based upon commercials), RJ reminds himself to not be greedy and take what he needs; however, he lets his acquisitive greed get the best of him by giving into temptation and desperately trying to steal all of the food. RJ nearly succeeds, only to accidentally wake Vincent up when opening his can of Spuddies to get a taste of them.

Noticing RJ, Vincent gets confused and asks him what he is doing in his cave and says that since the moon isn't full, RJ woke him up a week early. Then Vincent notices the wagon filled with his food and threatens to kill RJ for trying to steal his stuff. Nonchalantly, RJ slowly tries to make an escape (explaining to Vincent that the wagon isn't stolen since it is still in the cave), but accidentally drops the wagon onto the street, startling the two of them. It ends up stopping in the middle of the road and RJ and Vincent are relieved and share a laugh together about how they thought it was going to get destroyed.

Unfortunately, a truck drives by on cue and crushes the wagon. Shocked and angered, Vincent pursues RJ in an attempt to kill him and before he can escape, the bear jumps in front of RJ, grabs him by the head, and opens his jaws to swallow him whole. Terrified out of his wits, RJ tells Vincent to wait and that he can get all of his food back, saying that Vincent would have to do it himself if he ate him. Thinking twice, the bear decides to let RJ slide and lists down his possessions that RJ insists he can get, including the red wagon, the blue cooler, and the green can of Spuddies (which Vincent claims that "enough just isn't enough" with a Spuddie). RJ exclaims that a week is too short, but accepts this when Vincent threateningly squeezes his head with his claws. Then he tells RJ that when he wakes up from hibernation in a week when the moon is full, his stuff had better be back where it was or he will hunt down and kill RJ. RJ gratefully accepts and Vincent lets him go and returns to his cave to sleep.

One night, RJ makes his own bed in a tree, using a newspaper as his blanket. As he is snoring away, the wind blows his blanket away and Vincent's paw suddenly swipes him out of his tree. The bear tells RJ that time is now up and then opens his jaws to swallow the panicking and suspicious raccoon. However, RJ wakes up and is relieved to find out it was just a nightmare. Soon, he looks up to the night sky and sees the stars forming Vincent in his imagination, who threateningly tells RJ that the moon is full and he will see him in the morning. Then Vincent takes the moon (which suddenly turns into a Spuddie), eats it with a loud and intimidating crunch, and disappears from RJ's mind.

For the remainder of the film, Vincent is not seen again until near the climax, where RJ brings the wagon of restored food back to the bear, who is impressed and tells RJ that if he keeps up the good work, he will be just like him one day and claiming that selfishness and greed will take him far. However, RJ has a change of heart and rightfully decides to help his best friends out with the food instead of giving it all away to Vincent. Soon, Vincent furiously gives chase and makes one final attempt to kill RJ and his best friends as well. After Dwayne LaFontant is knocked out from his van crashing to a halt when trying not to hit RJ on the wagon of food, Verne warns RJ of Vincent's presence and he lunges at RJ in an attempt to kill him.

Immediately, Spike, Bucky, and Quillo take control behind the wheel, following instructions by the voice on the van's small screen. RJ tries several times to make the gang let him in (all the while being chased by Vincent), but they refuse to do so since they still believe him to be a treacherous traitor. Verne tells the porcupine children to lose Vincent, so they push a button that activates the hammer on the roof, which hits Vincent on the head after he pushes the rabbit off. Vincent violently rips off the hammer and tries to smash RJ with it, missing him and breaking the window. After Verne urges the gang to let RJ in since his tail isn't tingling, Vincent tears the metal roof upwards and yells to RJ that he is dead and swipes his paw at him; then he leans toward RJ into the van, telling him that his friends are next. Quickly, Penny jumps down and sticks her quills onto Vincent's nose, making him roar in pain. Spike, Bucky, and Quillo make an immediate left turn, driving the van into helium balloons of a jester and a knight on a horse (which catches Vincent's attention as he astonishingly says, "Ooh!") for bonus points".

The balloons get caught to Vincent and he is dragged off the truck and up into the air as the animals are so jubilant and enthusiastic over losing Vincent. Defeated, Vincent angrily shouts RJ's name. Afterwards, when RJ and the other animals go back over the hedge and into the Outdoor Woods, they fearfully react after Hammy gets terrified and points up at the sky and warns them of Vincent's return by calling him a "scary clown". After using the porcupine quill to pop the balloons, Vincent roars loudly in anger and goes after the animals to kill them and he desperately digs through the hedge while they hide. Gladys and Dwayne chop through the other side, with Gladys using her weed hacker and Dwayne using his cattle prod to kill the animals as well.

Eventually, RJ fits Verne's shell on and gets Vincent's attention, teasing him by repeating what he told him that "enough just isn't enough" and eating a Spuddie. Outraged, Vincent shouts RJ's name and roars angrily as he lunges himself at RJ in an attempt to finish him off. Hammy drinks some energy drink that makes everything freeze for a while after Hammy makes time stop. He sets the Depelter Turbo and the freezing starts to fade away. Slowly returning to normal motion, RJ is fished out of Vincent's mouth with a fishing rod by Verne and RJ teasingly waves goodbye to the bear, as he is flung into the red lights in Gladys's backyard, knocking Gladys and Dwayne down as well.

Eventually, the Depelter Turbo goes off and upon noticing it, Vincent looks extremely curious. After a warning from Dwayne telling them to prepare to get stung, the powerful machine burns all three of them, but they are still alive. By now, Vincent has lost completely all of his fur.

Afterwards, Vincent is now-drugged and taken away by Animal Control with a mask on him and is sent back to the Rocky Mountains.

Over the Hedge: The Video Game
After Vincent is caught by the Depelter Turbo, he does not get taken away by Animal Control, but is still left without his fur.

Later, RJ plans to go to his cave to steal his satellite dish and brings the whole gang with him. He is pretty sure Vincent isn't there and assures the gang so; however, as he goes to steal the satellite dish, Vincent (whose fur has now apparently grown back) appears from behind his food stack with a brainwash-helmet and tries to eat the "annoying raccoon". After a competitive and fierce battle, RJ and the gang are able to knock off Vincent's helmet. Vincent regains consciousness and wonders what RJ is doing there. Verne convinces Vincent to help them on their missions, so he can take revenge on Dwayne (who was recently fired by Gladys after failing to kill the animals) and redeem himself. Vincent accepts and he joins the gang.

Afterwards, he is seen in the Outdoor Woods watching films with the porcupines.

When the animals return to the woods with Gladys's PDA, Vincent is holding off the brainwashed animals in defense of the others.

At the end of the game, Vincent is successfully enjoying the victory party with everyone else, having finally come at peace with them.

Bee Movie
Vincent (or at least a bear who looked very similar to him) made two possible cameo appearances in Bee Movie, where he appeared in the news segment destroying a hive and is in the courtroom as one of Barry Benson's witnesses.

Personality
Vincent is a mean, obnoxious, short-tempered, traitorous, greedy, abusive, and nasty bear who likes to sleep and believes that selfishness will take him far, and he even proudly tells RJ he is going to be like him someday; however, this proves to be wrong as RJ instead uses the wagon of food to help his friends, thus rightfully betraying Vincent and making himself a better person. One of his most objectionable and iniquitous plans is when he occasionally steals food from campers. Thus, Vincent's brutal and acquisitive side gets the best of him as when he tried to kill RJ and his best friends, he was defeated when Verne saved RJ by pulling him out of Vincent's mouth with a fishing pole attached to his shell, making the bear fall straight into Gladys's backyard and get stung severely by the Depelter Turbo alongside Gladys and Dwayne.

In the video game, Vincent manages to redeem himself and ends up living with RJ and his best friends as a new member of the family.

Trivia

 * Vincent is constantly believed to be the secondary or tertiary antagonist of the film. However, this is false, as Vincent is the one who drives the plot of the film, constantly stressing RJ out while he is with the gang and having more malicious traits. What really makes him the main antagonist, however, is the fact that he opposes RJ and the others out of personal contempt, while Dwayne and Gladys merely see them as vermin.
 * These mistakes are not without justification, however, as Vincent has less screen-time and dialogue than the other two, combined with the fact that all three of them are defeated simultaneously.
 * In the film, Vincent was taken away by animal control and remained the animals' enemy. However, in the video game adaptation of the film, Vincent stayed in the Outdoor Woods and redeemed himself, thus becoming the animals' new friend and a new family member.
 * His praise towards RJ near to the film's climax where he compliments him on his deceitfulness to get what he desires (methods he frequently employed himself) was added into the film by the directors to justify Vincent's status as a villain since, for all of his viciousness, he wasn't an especially villainous figure, only trying to survive as he had worked personally to acquire his necessitates and was perfectly reasonable to negotiate a settlement with RJ after he both greedily and unnecessarily tried to take and accidentally caused the destruction of what was rightfully the bear's.
 * To avoid having portrayed Vincent as too sympathetic to audiences, it was added that he manipulated, betrayed, and even murdered his best friends to fulfill his needs and takes a remorseless pride in his cruelty. He also attempted to kill the others as well as RJ for no actual good reason at all.
 * Vincent acts as a foil to RJ. Both are introduced as selfish, avaricious, and independent loners who take human food to survive, but RJ later redeems himself after coming in contact with Verne, Hammy, and the other animals, considering them the family he had long sought. Vincent (on the other hand) is a greedy and manipulative control freak who never redeemed himself and only wanted to get his food back, even if it meant killing RJ and the others. Vincent serves as an example of what RJ would become if the latter let his pride and greed consume him.
 * After Over the Hedge was released, Sony Pictures Animation released Open Season (which also was also released in 2006), in which Boog, the film's main character, is modeled after Vincent.