Thread:LostGod2000/@comment-27818776-20140901142846/@comment-1672596-20140904111014

Aesop's Feast wrote: Ok, my bad. I should have worded it better: The criteria for the CM category is (with the obvious exception of the Heinous critereon) based on mass opinion. The thing is, besides heinous actions, the rest of the criteria are based on character interpretation. Film is a subjective medium and hence cannot be objectively judged (at least not fully) like in Mathematics or Science – there is no proven mathematical formula or scientific theory that can be applied to the interpretation of villains.

Of course, that means that the villain's actions are the only objective aspect of the interpretation, but that's exactly it. Frollo's actions does nothing to show that he feels remorse. Fear of punishment from an omnipotent entity is just a fear of punishment. There must be an aspect of regret and concern for the people that you have wronged for it to count as remorse.

All these seem subjective, right? So let's look at his actions:

1. When asked by the Archdeacon to care for Quasimodo as a means of repentance, Frollo is obviously disgusted and annoyed. If he were remorseful, he would not have displayed the aforementioned feelings.

2. Frollo emotionally abuses Quasimodo from the very start, even blaming him for the death of his mother. That's no remorse. Even if I go by your definition of "remorse", Frollo still willingly abuses Quasimodo in spite of the fact that there is an all-knowing God watching over his actions.

In conclusion? Frollo's delusionally paranoid. Not remorseful.

Exactly. CMs can still be three-dimensional. Them not changing simply means that they are static characters and not dynamic characters – it has got nothing to do with being three-dimensional. And yes, while a psychopathic/sociopathic villain is predisposed to be a CM, it does not mean that (s)he is automatically a CM. That's where the Heinous standard comes in. Most psychopaths/sociopaths are just manipulative jerkasses; few become mass murdering maniacs.

Having history and the heinousness of those aforementioned villains backing you up does not mean anything when considering Frollo. The CM criteria never mentioned anything about having a universal baseline for a CM, just that the villain in question must be utterly and remorselessly heinous in the context of the story.

Yeah, and in the context of Star Wars, Darth Vader also was utterly and remorselessly heinous in the context of the story, even being considered pure evil even 100 years after his death if Legacy is anything to go by, despite his redemption, yet he wasn't a Complete Monster, either.

And when the person you're deeply paranoid about an entity who, BTW, is basically like Big Brother from 1984, watching every action you make, being unable to be fooled at all, and more than willing and capable to destroy you when he has the opportunity and chance, which is pretty much every time, like God does, yes, that definitely qualifies as remorse, or at least the closest thing one can get to actual remorse anyways. He'd only not have remorse if he actually intended to trick God, and someone as religiously pious as him would know full well such is a fruitless action. The only way fear of punishment would not apply as regret is if you actually know you have a chance at actually deceiving the guy above you, sort of like Jafar did have some degree of fear of being punished by Sultan Hasad in Aladdin (and for good reason, since he attempted to usurp the throne and did everything he could to hide any indications that he was going to betray him and take control until Prince Ali/Aladdin broke his control, literally.), or how Kefka tried to deceive Emperor Gestahl for most of the game until the opportunity arose to backstab them (or until they were caught, in the case of Jafar). In other words, if Frollo was truly unremorseful, he'd actually think he had a chance at fooling God (like how Kefka Palazzo fooled Emperor Gestahl and everyone around him right before murdering the former and blowing up the world; or how Bill Clinton fooled everyone with that false apology regarding Monica Lewinsky [and in the case of Clinton, even when credible evidence came about, he actually denied it all the way until the blue dress was exposed]), and he'd know full well that God cannot be fooled, period, hence, remorse.

Again, they should have made him more like Phillipe Augustine from Eternal Darkness, you know, a guy who pretends to serve Christianity, yet in reality, in secret, was a Satan Worshipper (well, technically Phillipe Augustine never worshipped Satan as much as an eldritch abomination Ancient, but ultimately the same principle), as that would make his lack of remorse more blatant and especially obvious (as, again, when dealing with an all-powerful, all-knowing entity who would more than enjoy punishing people when He has the chance to do so when they die, paranoia is indeed the closest thing to remorse. God himself is remorseless precisely because he has absolutely nothing to fear and can do whatever he pleases.). That would have also pushed an even more Christian message for the film version anyways, showcasing Satanism as a very bad thing. Yeah, it may be too adult to do that, but then again, the film itself was too adult anyways, and considering it was derived from a High School literary text, that is too adult (my mom felt the film should not have been made). And let me point out that God absolutely lacks remorse precisely because he lacks fear, and in fact enjoys harming people, despite what the Bible claims. If he didn't, he wouldn't blow up Sodom and Gomorrah, and he wouldn't tell Saul to commit genocide at all.