For this one, I'm proposing one of my favorite villains in gaming and possibly one of the best villains in the 8-Bit genre. She already has the category so I'm just doing this to give her the Red Lock. Before I proceed any further, I would like to mention that this was a collaboration post involving me and Accounty the Sequel, who was generous enough to provide the required information on the games I was unfamiliar with.
What's the Work?[]
Shovel Knight is an 8-bit Indie Retro Game created by Yacht Club Studios. It follows the adventure of a shovel wielding knight called, well, Shovel Knight. As the franchise grew, more games were made to expand to the world and characters, including that of the main villain and the subject of today's proposal. Currently, Shovel Knight is one of the most popular indie games of all time.
Who Is She?[]
The Enchantress is the main antagonist of the Shovel Knight series. She is always trying to take over the Valley and leads the Order of No Quarter, a group of many powerful knights. Throughout the story, she serves as the main threat that Shovel Knight needs to face.
What Has She Done?[]
Shovel Knight Dig[]
She appears at the game's tail end. In the true ending, specifically, doesn't appear in the others. After defeating Drill Knight and collecting every gem, a hidden path reveals itself. Drill Knight tries to get the "treasure", only to accidentally unlock a mysterious glowing amulet. The Enchantress emerges from it, without physical form yet due to Shield Knight still being out and about, Apparently, finding the amulet caused the Tower of Fate to re-emerge, in turn causing the return of the Enchantress. She "thanks" the miners before demanding they kneel and serve her. and when Drill Knight declines, she traps his entire team of 5 in gems before absorbing some sort of power from them and using her gem against Drill Knight, transforming into a huge monster out to kill Shovel and Shield Knight. After a boss fight, the two take Drill Knight down, The Enchantress is sucked back into her amulet, before using the last of her power to try to collapse the cave on Shovel Knight, Shield Knight, and Drill Knight, and that's not calling into question anything else that might be in there. When Atreus, the duo's owl, tries to approach the amulet, it zaps him, nearly killing him too. The pair grab the owl as Drill Knight finds his own means of escape with his, well, drills. Making a narrow escape, the two ride a separate drill out of the caves, they set up camp and Shield Knight bandages Atreus's wing, remarking he'll need to rest up before going on another adventure (explaining why we don't see him in any of the other games), and the two plan to embark on a quest to the Tower of Fate to retrieve this amulet. This does not end well, as Shield Knight is taken by the Enchantress and Shovel Knight is left believing she died that day.
Shovel Knight: King of Cards[]
The Enchantress makes a game called Joustus, which becomes a rather popular game and creates a sham tournament with whoever winning it being considered the "King of Cards". In reality, she did this to take the world's eyes away and ensure the recruitment of her Order of No Quarter. She then has three appointed champions with one of them, "King Birder" being an enchanted Birder she had under her command as a puppet judge. As King Knight progresses through his journey, the Enchantress keeps an eye on King Knight as the cloaked figure. When King Knight defeats King Birder, she reveals herself and her plans to the other judges and King Knight himself before going to her Tower of Fate. When King Knight meets her again there, she admits that she underestimated him before turning the former judges into to create The Grand Triumvirate, a golden giant monster. After King Knight wins, she convinces him to betray all of his friends by promising to make him a "real king". After King Knight betrays his former allies, the Enchantress proudly declares him the "crown jewel" of the order. Later, she is sen destroying the Glidewing in the ending as well as trying to turn some Troupple acolytes into her minions.
Shovel Knight: Specter of Torment[]
The Enchantress has Specter Knight recruit the members for her Order. When he fails to recruit Black Knight, she orders him to find the other knights elsewhere. After three knights are recruited, Reize breaks in to fight the sorceress and not knowing who she is, asks the Enchantress to defeat his enemy. At this, the Enchantress turns Reize into Dark Reize and after a battle with Specter Knight, replaces the Dark Acolyte with him. After all stages are complete, Black Knight indirectly reveals that the Enchantress is Shield Knight which causes Specter Knight to go after her for his revenge. When Specter Knight defeats the Enchantress, she turns Dark Reize into a monster before planning to have him as her final knight before Specter Knight refuses and offers himself up to her. The Enchantress sends him to the Lich Yard as his post, deeming it a fitting position. In the Ending, she is shown to have attacked the Armor Outpost and latter sitting on her throne where every knight, except Specter Knight, bows to her.
Shovel Knight Showdown[]
This one's set right before the end of Specter of Torment. When the Mirror of Fate traps the cast inside of itself right, splitting the Enchantress and Shield Knight, and forcing them to battle against clones. Killing several of them (not heinous since technically self-defense), she eventually runs into Black Knight, who believed Shield Knight was still within her, and tried to convince her to stop. She let him work with her for a while, before attacking him in the final room and then smashing the Mirror in her route. Of course, that's not the only route... Shield Knight and Reize's are the only other two of note. In Shield Knight's, she reveals that she was trapped within the Enchantress so long she lost awareness of what was going on, suppressing her thoughts and causing them to cease to be. Now that she was separated, she is able to think again, and runs into Shovel Knight, where he learns she's still alive. The two are forced to fight by the Mirror, but the two are clearly hurt by it. In Shield Knight's route ending, she defeats the Mirror but returns inside the Enchantress, but with her awareness restored. The game describes her fate as "being forced to watch" as the Enchantress does her acts of villainy, so that presumably means she has to watch as the Enchantress forces her body to attack Shield Knight, her closest friend and love interest. Reize's route doesn't offer much in terms of explaining what the Enchantress did, but the ending is crucial. It shows him turn back into Dark Reize with the exact same effects used showing Shield Knight being turned into the Enchantress. This explicitly confirms he's conscious during everything that happens to him, too. So, yeah, not much new, but a lot of explanation on earlier acts that make her worse.
Shovel Knight: Plague of Shadows[]
After Plague Knight reaches the Enchantress to take the final essence needed for the potion, the Enchantress declares that she doesn't need it but fights anyways to make Plague Knight know his place. She later decides to give her essence to him willingly, seeing the fight as a waste of time and a powerful alchemist. The Enchantress's essence causes the Ultimate Potion to overreact and create the Corrupted Essence.
Shovel Knight: Shovel of Hope[]
In the game, the Enchantress has already taken over the valley with her order and is still trying to recruit Black Knight, who refuses to her anger. However, Shovel Knight starts his heroic journey to find his Shield Knight in the Tower of Fate. In the final Black Knight fight, the Enchantress once again tries to recruit Black Knight when seeing him defend the tower. Upon being rejected, the Enchantress gives some power to Black Knight before leaving to her headquarters. At the final level, she and Shovel Knight engage in a fight as Shovel Knight tries to free Shield Knight from the Enchantress. Once Shield Knight is freed, the Enchantress goes into her primal form, the Remnant of Fate before she is defeated by the duo. As the tower is collapsing, the Remnant attacks and knocks out Shovel Knight one last time before she is killed by the falling debris.
Shovel Knight Pocket Dungeon[]
Taking place midway through Shovel of Hope and Plague of Shadows, the Enchantress decides to both take out her enemies and betray her own group by manipulating Prism Knight into teleporting them into the titular dungeon via gift boxes. The Pocket Dungeon is a dangerous and nigh-impossible to escape place filled with numerous deadly monsters, designed for the purpose of keeping anyone from getting in the way of her plans, and what better way to do that then sealing everyone away? She appears at the game's end, as she usually seems to do, she mocks Puzzle Knight over his daughter being the one who sealed everyone inside, and Prism Knight gets ticked off at being used by her, before the Enchantress chains the father-daughter duo up and prepares to try to kill whoever you're playing as when you reach the end. When she's defeated, she angrily transmutates Puzzle Knight into a blob-like creature known as "The Master Mind", before forcing him to go after the player instead as she leaves, having "tired of the games". Once he's defeated, he returns to his normal state, and his daughter quickly helps him up before the two and the player run as the Dungeon collapses, saving all 19 people she trapped within the deadly dungeon.
Heinous Standard[]
Considering that she sets the standards of the story, she easily passes the in story standards so we should discuss if the passes general standards. Ultimately, by the rather obvious virtue of me making this proposal, I believe that she does, if barely. If we were going solely off of the original games, she would just be a standard "take over the world" bad guy but future games expand on her crimes and cruelty. In Showdown, it is revealed that what she did to Shield Knight and Reize counts as a FWTD since they are shown in a nightmare that seems inescapable. While it isn't particularly graphic, I believe it is enough for her to pass the baseline given how the story presents it. Furthermore, she left many people to rot in a dungeon to die in Pocket Dimension which was filled with many deadly enemies. In the end, while the Enchantress isn't killing billions every Tuesday, she is definitely bad enough for this category.
Mitigating Factors[]
Not really much of a concern as she's portrayed as a traditional irredeemable villain of the story. Even so, there're some factors I might need to address starting with ...
Honor[]
There are instances where the Enchantress might respect someone or show restraint but frankly, none of them are redeeming. Examples include calling King Knight her “crown jewel”, showing a villainous respect to Black Knight, allowing Specter Knight to save Reize and not punishing him when he doesn't bow to her in the ending. However, all of them can be boiled down to pragmatism. It's safe to say that the Enchantress was appealing to King Knight's ego when praising him so that he can join her cause. Furthermore, Specter of Torment shows that she is more than willing to send Specter Knight to harm King Knight and put him in his place(though to be fair, King Knight did deserve it and it was warranted for his laziness), putting any respect she has for King Knight into question. While she does enable Specter Knight to save Reize and not bow to her, it’s likely that this was done to ensure that Specter Knight didn't rebel against her. Considering that Specter Knight was able to defeat her, it is probable that she did this to ensure that Specter Knight doesn't try to kill her again. Finally, her villainous respect to Black Knight mainly boils down to him being a powerful candidate who isn't against her. While the Enchantress never tries to kill Black Knight and even teams up with him in Showdown, this is likely done to prevent a waste of a powerful member which is also why she gave her essence to Plague Knight in Plague of Shadows. As such, it's safe to say that she would've killed Black Knight easily had he actively gone against her which is further shown by how she attacks him when he refuses to join her at the end of Shovel of Hope. Overall, any "honor" she might show is just likable pragmatism at best.
Moral Agency[]
When looking at her origins, the Enchantress is shown to have been an evil spirit stuck in the amulet for a long time. However, nothing really indicates that the Enchantress is Made of Evil and the pragmatic decisions she makes as mentioned above indicate that she is capable of good but avoids it so that she can achieve her goals. Honestly, this isn't really a problem for her, especially with our new rules on Moral Agency.
Comedy[]
Shovel Knight is a rather comedic and light hearted series with many funny characters, moments and recurring gags. The main protagonist is a knight wielding a shovel after all. The Enchantress herself does have a sarcastic and mocking personality which can come off as funny to the audience as she even laughs, "Ho Ho Ho" at times. However, that is a rather downplayed case of her being Laughably Evil and the characters take her as a serious threat in universe meaning that she is only funny to the audience. You might argue that she has a comedic defeat at the hands of a Knight wielding a shovel but the same rationale that applies with the Lucky Orb and the Witch very much applies here as while it sounds comedic on paper, the whole situation is played seriously and suspense-fully. Now, the Enchantress is clearly inspired by Maleficent but nothing really suggests that she is meant to be a parody since her appearance in the story is meant to be taken seriously as she darkens the normally light heartened mood of the games. Furthermore, any comedic aspect that could've applied to the Enchantress completely drops when she is turned to her primal form, the Remnant of Fate. Comedy isn't a real issue for her.
Verdict?[]
A rather easy yes to the Enchantress. She's already Pure Evil and once again, this was done to put the Red Lock on her page.