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| “ | Breadhead, ever since you were a bun in the oven you've been nothing but good. But your sister... GET BACK IN HERE YOU LITTLE BRAT! | „ |
| ~ Ken's dysfunctional relationship with his family. |
| “ | Mel, look at you. Delicate, unscarred, all of your original limbs. Untouched by this putrid world! AND I WOULD LIKE TO KEEP IT THAT WAY! | „ |
| ~ Ken scolding Mel for her criminal aspirations. |
| “ | I'll make sure you'll never end up... like one of us. | „ |
| ~ Ken's vow to keep Mel safe. |
Ken the Butcher is the deuteragonist of the 2025 Glitch horror comedy web series The Gaslight District. He is the leader of The Smiling Dead crime family. He's the younger brother of Mud, the father of Breadhead and adoptive father of Mel Hill.
While a ruthless and hot-headed criminal, Ken is still a family man at heart, caring deeply for his two children. As such, he often denies Mel's requests to join him in his criminal escapades, fearing that her human nature could be outed or exploited.
He is voiced by Jason Marnocha, who has voiced Megatron in the War For Cybertron trilogy.
Appearance[]
Ken the Butcher is a large, portly but muscular zombie with grey skin, small slit nostrils and red eyes. He's completely nude except for a pair of underpants and a bloodstained apron. The skin on his right arm is torn off, revealing his muscles underneath. Ken notably has a large cleaver embedded in his bald head, with several skin folds surrounding the knife.
Personality[]
Ken is a very wrathful and violent individual who is known for his explosive temper and ruthless nature. He doesn't tolerate any nonsense from his family and often hollers in rage whenever they annoy him, especially Mud or Mel. He also has no qualms with eliminating anyone who endangers his family or his business, usually disposing of them in cruel or unusual ways. This is best seen when he tells Breadhead to sink Jack to the bottom of the sea with cement and brutally kills Temperence by beating him to death in order to keep Mel's human nature a secret.
Underneath his ill-tempered and viciousness, Ken is a loving family man who deeply cares about his children, being fiercely protective of them. He is especially overprotective of Mel due to her being the human of the prophesy that would bring an end to the eternal life of all Rotlings. While he's rather harsh on her at times, this is only because he's scared of her hurting herself, which is why he fiercely opposes her desire to become a criminal. Furthermore, Ken gives Mel reassuring looks when she gets uncomfortable during his speech, reassuring her that he doesn't mean any of the threats against the supposed "human". He’s also rather pragmatic, scolding Mel for forcing him to cement three of her friends after she exposed her human nature to them. As Ken looks away from Jack as he orders the gang to cement him, it appears that he doesn’t actually enjoy inflicting this torture on others, only doing it as a necessary evil to keep his daughter safe.
Biography[]
Ken and his family are at a high-speed car chase in between the members of the Smiling Dead and Jack. Jack is desperately trying to get away from them. Thanks to Ken's quick thinking, they're able to weave through traffic, knocking other vehicles off of the road. Jack is shot in the back of the head by Mud, even though he admits that he doesn't know why they're hunting Jack at all. Meanwhile, Jack is able to be revived and quickly regains control of his car and starts firing at Mel, who'd climbed out of Ken's car. Mel confronts Jack, who is revealed to know that Mel is a human (since she has black blood instead of purple). Jack crashes his car, leading to both him and Mel bleeding. This exposes Mel's black blood. Mel soon realizes that a nearby angel has spotted her. Meanwhile, Ken, Mud, and Breadhead arrive at the scene of the crash, where Jack finally unloads his bullets on them before all three of them revive. Breadhead manages to squish Jack, to which he responds by telling Ken and Breadhead the truth that Mel is a human. Ken decides that it's too dangerous to let Jack go, so he reluctantly decides that they'll have to cement him.
later the same day in Ken's Butcher Shop. It seems to function as a restaurant or bar for the residents of the Gaslight District. Breadhead plays the piano to add to the ambiance of the establishment. Mel is revealed to work as a waitress, passing plates of food around to various tables set up in the shop. Meanwhile, Ken flatters an incoming patron, to which Mel finds disgusting. Mud congratulates Mel on her work on her first mission and offers that she could work for him instead of Ken for triple the amount that Ken pays her. Mel turns him down, and Breadhead states that Ken pays them in valuable experiences. Ken quickly comes to break up the conversation. Mel then brags to him that she's becoming an official member of the Smiling Dead, something that Ken is wary about. Ken doesn't want her to join since it would be too dangerous for her and says that she'll never be an official member of the Smiling Dead. Mel then brings up her plan to steal the human egg. Ken is against the idea, saying that if they're caught, they could be sentenced to an eternity in the Inferno. However, Breadhead and Mud both agree to the plan, prompting Ken to take Mel into the meat freezer to have a "Father-Daughter Talk".
Once inside, Mel explains her plan to take an angel egg instead of the Human Egg and fool the townsfolk into thinking that they'll be safe for another 10,000 years. She states that her elaborate plan would distract everyone from the fact that she's, in fact, a human. She also states that she hates that Ken cemented all of her friends, to which he retorts that while the reveal of her black blood to Jack was an accident, she straight up told several of his staff about her human nature, forcing him to silence them all. Mel is able to convince Ken to look over her plan after stating that they'd be paraded around as heroes if the plan is successful and shows Ken all of the research that she's done into planning the heist. Ken agrees under one condition: that Mel would never leave his side and that she would never pull any crazy stunts like the one she pulled on Jack.
When they arrive at paradise lost, Ken and Mel are teamed up together and have made it to the doors of the laboratory. Mel asks if Ken is proud of her for how well the plan is going. However, Ken doesn't answer her and says that he'll meet up with her later. When Mel reminds them about their deal, Ken loses his temper in front of her before stopping himself. They make a new plan to meet at the Stairway to Heaven and make a pinky promise. Mel decides to immediately change her mind and starts to climb up the stairs by herself.
Inside the Laboratory, Temperance is working on a surgery. However, he is shocked to be found by Ken. Ken immediately starts a violent fight against Temperence, though Temperance seemingly doesn't want to fight. He insists that he's kept his promise to Ken and that he's never told a single person. He begs for mercy from Ken. Mud sees this through the security cameras and is shocked at the extent of how Ken is harming Temperance. After eating his brain, he burns the laboratory and grabs Mel with the egg and the crew has one last escape from the Angel Mother. He then fights Diligence and knocks him out of the truck to his death as he vows to Mel that he will make sure that she will never become one of them.
Later back in the Gaslight District, the Rotlings all gathered at the center of the town to prepare for the killing of the "Angel" egg now brought by the Smiling Dead. Just when Mel was about to destroy it with the spike, it suddenly hatched into a baby crow, revealing to the Rotlings that it's no egg at all and not a human one to begin with. As Mel questions her dad what to do now, Ken looks down in disappointment, knowing that their plan was a total fail, the entire family went from feared legends to straight up liars in the eyes of everyone else as their only shot at convincing people that Mel isn't human, is now completely shattered in literal seconds.
Relationships[]
Family[]
- The Smiling Dead
- Mud (older brother)
- Breadhead (son)
- Melancholy Hill (adoptive daughter)
Allies[]
- The Smiling Dead
- Xenora
Enemies[]
Trivia[]
- During his speech in part four of the pilot, his shadow resembles that of Oogie Boogie from The Nightmare Before Christmas.
- Ken's description of the Inferno is strangely specific. Either he has heard what it's like or he was one of the people that was sentenced to the Inferno. Additionally, Temperance is shown pulling out one of his ingrown toenails, someone he knows personally. It is likely that Temperance saved Ken from the Inferno, and would later trust him in raising Mel.
- A tablet in the show, when translated, describes the process by which Rotlings are processed into the Inferno, involving a gunshot splitting the head, and that they can be taken out if they're proven innocent. Thus, it seems possible that Ken was framed and sent to the Inferno by Temperance, leading to his head getting split in two, but got released after he was proven innocent, hence his vendetta against him.
- The runes that appear in the impact frames when Ken throws his cleaver at Temperance describe betrayal, connections being severed, millennia of duty being destroyed and justice being served. Thus, it seems that Ken might've either been betrayed by Temperance, or severed his connection to him in that moment.
- As seen from a certificate near his counter, the Whale Belly Butchershop is the most popular dining area in the Gaslight District, implying that Ken has rather good cooking skills.
- Despite being the deuteragonist of the series, Ken's head is featured on the logo for the series, making him the unofficial mascot.
External Links[]
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 Villains
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Rotlings Virtue Corp. Others | ||